Chapter 46: Chapter Forty-six: How to know a dragon.
"What do you mean they’re gone?! Where are the princes?!" The king’s voiced rolled out like a thunderbolt after the a scout rendered his update.
The scout member shivered at the intensity of the king’s voice. "Your highness. By the time we arrived at the local market, it was already in ruins with no sight of either of the princes."
Earlier, a loud, shattering rumble had pulsed through the ground, stretching all over the kingdom including the palace. It was like an earthquake and a hurricane had attacked the kingdom at the same time. The king had sent an envoy to go and investigate the cause of the disturbance.
"Did you find out what had caused the earthquake?" Alexandria asked after some time of thinking.
The scouts looked at each other nervously, clearly afraid of telling of the king. After seconds of not receiving an answer, the king raised his head at the men in front of him.
"Well?" he questioned again. "You found nothing at all?" His anger bubbled within him, threatening to burst.
"N-not quite, your highness." a scout said, stepping forward.
"Then what did you find?" Alexandria asked, already getting impatient.
The man reached into a small, leather bag and brought out the greatest abomination in the whole of Zerathane. A dragon scale.
The king stared at the man’s hand fear-strucked by horror.
His hand trembles greatly as he pointed at it. "Where did you get that?!" he yelled with a horrified look on his face. His reaction scared the scouts greatly that the man holding the scale dropped it to the ground in fear.
Everyone gasped as the scale laid flat on the ground in the middle of the room.
"Get me Xypherion! Now!"
The envoy stumbled over nothing as they ran towards the exit in confusion. A dragon scale was an abomination. A sacrilege in their kingdom and now, there was evidence of its presence.
Alexandria collapsed on the floor shaking violently. What sort of impossibility is this?. A dragon in the kingdom could only mean one dreadful truth that he desperately didn’t want to believe. If truly there was one, and it was on the lose, then the ancient relic was either weakening or failing. But how? What could be attacking it?
Once the relic start to weaken, it signified the beginning of the end of the current king’s rule. It was an indicator of a king’s deposition. The ancient relic was a divine tool carved by the vampire ancestors who had defeated the great dragon thousands of years ago. To protect the kingdom from ever getting attacked again, they created the relic to fortify the land with the poison that keeps them out.The ancient vampires devised the relic out of the remains of the great dragon and turned it into the very poison that protected the kingdom from being attacked again.
It chose the next ruler from the royal bloodline each time the current one’s time is coming to an end. The method by which it chooses it is dynamic, varying from one generation to another. The very worst part of it all, as legend said, was that once the wrong person was charged with the relic’s immense power, then the whole kingdom is doomed to fall by the dragons’ retaliation.
By the time Xypherion entered the king’s chambers, Alexandria was already on the floor, looking as deteriorated as ever. The physician rushed to his side and immediately ordered him to be carried to the bay. Word immediately spread throughout the palace of the king’s critical condition and it didn’t take long for them to notice the absence of the two princes.
The word soon reached the Queen under minutes. She dropped the head tie she was knitting and rushed down to the king’s quarters where Xy was already standing by his bed.
"My Queen." the physician greeted, bowing his a head at her.
"Is it..." she trailed off, ignoring his greetings.
The physician pointed to the dragon scale on a small table beside him.
"No-no. It can’t be! It’s too soon!" she screamed hysterically, falling to the floor in a heap.
"The relic is weakening fast, your grace. The moment the king dies, we will all be vulnerable to attack. We need to find the next ruler before it’s too late!" Xypherion said with much urgency.
"How are we going to find the next king? There have been no signs or anything at all." That was the tricky thing about the relic. It was in charge of choosing the next king and could also self-destruct if someone didn’t replace the former one immediately.
"There will be certain signs that will be made on the body of whoever the relic chooses. Call in the four princes immediately!" he yelled at no one in particular but the shuffling of feet were heard loudly from outside the door.
The Queen turned to the King with sadness in her eyes.
"Your majesty..." she started, breaking down into tears. The king, already looking like a starved human with less than a litre of blood in him under a few minutes, looked up at her face and smiled wryly.
"Isolde...my queen..." he said, as she took his hand in hers. Her tears rushed out off her eyes, spilling all over his hand.
Alexandria reached out and wiped the tears gently from her cheeks.
"You ha-" Isolde was cut instantly cutoff by the sudden opening of the door. Cassian barged in, followed by Severin. Xypherion frowned deeply upon seeing just two princes.
"Where are the other princes?!" he asked frantically, walking towards them in a hurry.
"They were sent outside the kingdom for a mission and haven’t returned." Severin answered politely. "Why?"
Xypherion paced about the room, wringing his hands. "This is bad. This is really bad."
With wide-eyes, Xypherion walked towards Severin and tore his shirt from his body. The fabric fluttered down his back, exposing clear, pale flesh. Severin looked surprised for a fleeting second before lowering his gaze.
"It’s not him! He’s not chosen!" he yelled out wildly.
The physician then paused his movement Suddenly. He turned around swiftly and looked directly at Cassian.
"You are the crown prince are you not?"
"Yes, yes I am."
"Take off your shirt. Now!" he commanded. Cassian begun to unbutton his shirt but was too slow for the agitated physician.
In one clean move, he ripped the crested shirt from his chest, revealing the bare body. Xypherion and Isolde stared in horror at his body.
It was completely clean. There were no marks whatsoever.
"It can’t be." Xypherion whispered in horror. He grabbed Cassian by the shoulders and turned him around so that his back was facing him.
Nothing. Absolutely nothing.
Not even a mark, a scar or anything. His flesh was devoid of anything, even a mole!.
"What is going on?!" Cassian asked, clawing the old man’s hands from his body.
"Didn’t you say you were the crown prince?!" Xy asked in utter disbelief.
"I already told you I am. What’s the problem?" Cassian countered, already getting annoyed by his behavior.
"Then why don’t you have the mark?"
"What mark?"
A strangled grunt came out of the king lying on the bed, forcing everyone’s attention to him. Isolde, who had just been standing there watching the whole thing play out, didn’t look a bit surprised. She was the prophetess and knew the prophecy but couldn’t say it. Even with her knowledge, she had never expected the time to come this soon. Apart from that one detail, nothing else shook her.
Xypherion rushed over to his side in a panic. "Your majesty." he started in a strained voice.
"Where are the other princes?." he asked, trying to be formal as possible but it was just so hard when there was every possiblity that he could die any second from now!
"The crown-the crown prin-" he stuttered in pain. He hadn’t completed his sentence before a seizing cough overtook him. He coughed and coughed so seriously until blood and water came out of his mouth. Isolde looked in horror at how much the King was debilitating quickly. His silver hair that once shone even in the dark had turned to a deathly shade of grey.
During his time, his silver hair was what had pointed him out as the next king. No one else in the royal family had silver hair including him as at the time the previous king was still alive.
All of a sudden, he fell deathly ill and Xypherion, had been there to point him out as the chosen one.
"We have to keep him alive till we find the other princes." he said, running to the far end of the room. He reached into his bag and took out a glass cup with green coloured liquid in it. He then walked over to the king, opened his mouth slightly and poured the content in one gulp.
Alexandria, though in pain, swallowed the content, knowing fully well the gravity of the matter facing them.
"That should keep him alive for some days." The king closed his mouth slowly before lowering his eye lids, his lips stained with his own blood. He was asleep now.
Meanwhile, Severin and Cassian had long left the room. Cassian slammed the door of his chambers behind him, still shirtless. He had known long ago that he wasn’t going to be the king but he hadn’t expected to be called out like that.
Cassian never knew the relic would bring out a mark on the body of the new king. He had thought probably it would be passed around until it glowed or something!
"No matter." he said gritting his teeth. "I don’t need a mark before I can crown myself king? I will never lose."
With that, he walked towar
ds the the closet, grabbed a shirt and put it on before disappearing.
It was time...