Weeks after the funeral, it was still cold and snowy. The some of the fury had died down, but many were filled with unease as the culprit had yet to be found. But largely everyday life returned to normal for most of the kingdom.

In the Queen’s tower, two healers are at work making the Queen comfortable. The hours go by as the older of the two falls sound asleep in a chair. The younger of the two sneaks away to his current lover among the maids.

The healer snores loudly for some time before abruptly becoming quiet and sitting up. With practiced ease the healer begins to pull off the skin on his face. The skin mask peels off as the illusion in play suddenly disappears.

Skin masks were rare and expensive unless one had a necromancer in their employ. By using the skin of any animal, a magical mask was created allowing the user to wear the face of any person that had been met, but could only be used a total of five times, before being destroyed.

The figure stretches as the woman’s long scarlet hair is kept in a tidy braid as her sapphire eyes the sleeping Queen. During her imprisonment, Lena had waited impatiently in prison for the King’s visit as a signal that she was free to move. It was no trouble to escape unnoticed and replace herself with a puppet golem made from bones. (Another gift from a certain necromancer.”

Using her interface, Lena wordlessly controlled her puppet and could see the on goings of the prison. Though puppet golems had one fatal flaw, they could not eat. But her golem was only required to sit and talk. And the daily food given was rather ease to tear up and throw down the sewage pipe. All in all, it’s wasn’t difficult to convince everyone that she was still in prison and trapped.

Being trapped in prison had reminded Lena of the need to take care of loose ends. Once out it wasn’t difficult to drug the Queen with a hallucinatory drug. After that the healers, did their job not being unable to find poison or anything wrong with her. Once the drug began to wear off, Lena would give her periodic doses as needed. There wasn’t a great need as the healers regularly drugged the Queen to keep her sedated.

Even when the Queen awoke in full capacity, she did not let out a word otherwise. The Queen had become addicted to her treatment and much more preferred to spend her days in a hazy daze. Over time, her mind would erode until only an empty living vessel remained. A fitting end for such a Queen.

But even then, Lena had been unable to learn much from the Queen. Even drugged, the Queen would not reveal her secrets. Except for the single instance, when the mysterious masked figure asked for information about a certain heroine.

Lena was certain it was Delilah, thanks to the description, but what bothered Lena is that she did not know for which prince it was for. Though all was not a loss as she learned, there was a 2nd party she had to look out for. If the Light served themselves and the gods, then there was an opposite organization that served the shadows, Typhoon.

But the thing with shadowy organizations, they’re like a hydra. One cuts off a head to only have two emerge instead of one. And from the sound of it, they were as powerful and as old as the light. And without a doubt, the light already had infiltrators.

To make matters worse, the figure who destroyed her puppet was anything but simple. Lena hadn’t though there could be anyone capable of reaching her power in this world. But she was wrong, that person was even stronger than her current self.

It was time she left. With that in mind, Lena puts on another face mask and walks unmolested out of the palace.