85 Close, Yet Far
Caspian headed towards his castle after giving out the orders to capture the one responsible for the incident in Silver Keep.
While on his way, Caspian was thinking of meeting his wife before entering the courtroom. Now that the seeds of doubt had been planted in his mind after visiting Silver Keep, he had more reasons to go and see his wife.
‘I hope no one tried to sneak into the castle to meet her,’ Caspian thought to himself and flew even faster.
When he reached the castle, it seemed things didn’t go as he had planned. The moment he reached the gate, he was greeted by a few ministers who were waiting for the King with some urgent matter.
“Your Majesty, I just received a word about the Turners,” an old-looking man said after giving a polite bow to the King.
“What about the Turners?” Caspian asked in agitation.
That man bowed again in fear that Caspian would punish him for coming to him as the bearer of bad news. However, since he had already garnered Caspian’s attention, there was no way out of it other than giving full information.
And he responded to the King in the most courteous manner he could, “Your Majesty, I heard that they have started to go around, meeting the heads of the other major houses.”
“And?” Caspian’s mind wasn’t fully into the conversation. So he was unable to decode the hidden message at the moment.
.....
The old man took a deep breath before saying everything clearly, “I think that Lord Bartholomew isn’t satisfied with just killing that servant. After all, it was his beloved daughter who had lost her life. My guess is that he is going around, trying to bring the major houses to his side.”
Caspian closed his eyes and clenched his teeth upon hearing what that old man had to say. He was already angry because of a possible werewolf attack. And now this.
He grumpily walked towards the throne hall, asking, “And what do you think Bartholomew is going to do? Are you thinking the same thing as me?”
The old minister and the others followed the King.
And though the old vampire wasn’t a mind-reader, he answered confidently, “Yes, Your Majesty. I also think that Lord Bartholomew might try to do something that might directly affect you and your rule.”
Caspian was now enraged beyond measure. He protruded his claws and angrily snarled, “What does he take me for? A pushover who will get scared by a few houses banding together?”
He gritted his teeth and then further mumbled in his hoarse voice, “Maybe I should have killed all of the Turners for trying to pull off a murder of a Royal family member.”
Caspian chuckled as if he was out of his mind. And he kept on mumbling with determination, “Yes... Maybe I should really do that before Bartholomew can rally the sheep and protest against me or do something to anger me further.”
The ministers exchanged a worried glance with each other when they saw how enraged Caspian was.
None of them would have wanted to stay anywhere near him when he was that angry. However, it was their duty as ministers of the Kingdom to try and give appropriate suggestions to their King.
So one of them politely said to Caspian, “Your Majesty, why don’t we go to the throne hall and discuss what we can do about this matter with everyone? There are also other agendas for the court today.”
The minister reminded the King since he wasn’t heading to the throne hall but towards his own chamber, or so they thought.
Caspian abruptly stopped on his path and turned on his heels. He didn’t even realize that his feet were automatically taking him toward his wife’s chamber.
He wanted to visit her. Yes. But he didn’t wish for Anastasia to see him now. He could tell from the expression on the ministers’ faces that he was looking like a monster at the moment.
Caspian wanted to take some time for a while and calm himself down before visiting his wife. However, he knew that the ministers wouldn’t stop hovering around him until he went to the hall and discussed today’s agendas.
Caspian sighed in frustration and said to the ministers, “Alright. Let’s look at everything.”
He forced his feet to move in the direction of the throne hall. And while he walked at a normal pace, he informed the ministers, “I have some things to take care of today. So, let’s wrap up today’s agendas quickly.”
—
Caspian was constantly eyeing the large wall clock that was hung on the wall that was opposite his throne.
It was almost two in the afternoon.
‘She should be here at any second now,’ Caspian took a deep breath of relief and thought to himself.
Caspian hadn’t forgotten about his promise to take Anastasia to visit the capital of Sorvando today. His anticipation of his wife walking through the door of the throne hall was increasing with every tick of the second hand of the clock.
In fact, that was the only thing that was keeping him sane in the hectic meeting with all the ministers and the councilmen.
The clock kept on ticking. Every second felt like an hour to him. And every minute felt like a day.
The clock was already indicating that it was half past two now. But there was no sign of his wife.
‘Where is she? I clearly asked her to come and rescue me from this hellish meeting. Did she forget?’
Caspian was now starting to get restless. He was constantly tapping his feet while looking at the clock.
The vampires inside the hall were discussing several things among themselves. They were trying to come up with a solution to the Turner case.
Caspian couldn’t care less. All he wanted to do was dismiss the meeting for today and get the hell out of there. But at the same time, he didn’t want to disrespect the vampires who were only trying to think for him.
‘Anastasia... please... I would be grateful if you would hurry up a bit,’ he thought to himself as he sighed restlessly.
The clock soon stroked three. And Anastasia was still nowhere to be seen.
‘Did she just stand me up after agreeing to visit the capital with me today?’ Caspian scoffed and rolled his eyes. ‘Was I the only one who was eagerly looking forward to today?’
Caspian mockingly smirked at himself and thought, ‘And I stayed up all night yesterday, planning for things to do with her. And here she is... a no-show...’
‘She must be thinking that she is doing me a favor by allowing me to do my duty. Why can’t she understand that all that I want to do at the moment is be with her, spend some quality time with her?’
Caspian kept on rambling in his head for quite a while.
And by now, a lot of negative thoughts were flooding into Caspian’s mind.
‘I hope she isn’t having tea with that or any other werewolf. I won’t be surprised if it was actually the case.’
He had deep frown lines in between his brows as he imagined his wife laughing and drinking tea with her friend. He was greatly disturbed just by imagining that fake scenario. If he witnessed that for real, he didn’t know if he would be able to stop himself from attacking that man at first sight.
He tried to console himself, thinking that his guards would have already informed him if his wife had any visitors. But that didn’t do anything to calm his mind.
Caspian narrowed his eyes and thought, ‘What do I do? Shall I go and find my wife?’
After contemplating for a while, Caspian reached a decision, ‘Yes, I think I should end the meeting for the day. I am not listening to anything anyway. And Zenon is also not here to summarize everything for me later on. So, there’s no point in staying here.’
As Caspian was thinking of dismissing the meeting, Vincent suddenly barged inside the throne hall.
Vincent didn’t even think it was necessary to greet all the officials in the hall. He simply rushed over to the platform where Caspian was.
And without bowing to the King, he pointed towards the exit of the hall and hastily said to his friend, “Caspian... the Queen...”
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