King Martin locked the Queen’s chamber for the whole morning and put several guards on her door so she wouldn’t have a chance to leave the castle. When she woke up from her faint yesterday, she kept on begging her husband to do something about Eloise’s case and kept on convincing him that their daughter was only framed. But Martin did not listen to her and to avoid the Queen from doing something scandalous during Cassandra’s execution, he locked her up.
Martin had the council supervise the execution and chose not to attend the horrid event. Instead, he isolated himself in the courtroom. He always had high hopes for the royal family. He thought he could raise a picture-perfect family but everything he took years to build crumbled before his eyes.
His eldest daughter became a black mage, his sick son was murdered, and now his second daughter would be executed for a grave crime.
And it wasn’t just that. Stripping his villainous son-in-law of his title didn’t seem reasonable at this point. The only remaining child he had was Lauren, and the lack of a successor would put him in a bad light. Even if he would insist on a court trial for it, the Supreme House would most likely turn a blind eye to Alec’s impudence for the sake of the state’s orderliness.
While the King was thinking about his dilemma, outside the castle more people continued to arrive to witness Cassandra’s execution.
After the court trial yesterday, the news of the second princess’ crime immediately spread all over the town. With the continuous mishap coming around the castle, the superstitious people wondered if the royal family had been struck by a curse, while some people believed that the royals had always been hiding dirty secrets underneath their noble facade.
As Alec held authority over the council, Lauren’s request of having Cassandra flogged to death instead of putting her straight to the scaffold was granted. The scaffold would spare her from torture and that wouldn’t be interesting for Lauren to see.
Back when Eloise died, she didn’t have a chance to torture her because she turned into a black mage and the council was the one who took care of her, so she wanted this time to be different. Cassandra had been such a nuisance in her life that she would love to see how she would be tortured to death.
Outside the castle, on a raised wooden platform, Cassandra was chained in between two stands of thick metal stands. She was surrounded by royal guards and some of the councilmen who were there to supervise the execution.
Cassandra was wearing an off-white dress worn by female prisoners and had some dirt all over her after spending a night in the dirty dungeon. Her long hair which used to be adorned by expensive hairpins and ornaments had become messy. At the moment, she no longer looked like a pureblooded royal but a poor criminal who could do nothing but submit to the cruel fate given to her.
"Kill the criminal!"
"Torture her!"
"Kill her!"
The people’s chanting was the first thing Lauren noticed the moment she and Alec stepped out of the castle.
When the townsfolk saw them walking to the platform where the criminal was, they stopped their chanting for a moment to bow to their future rulers.
Now that the power struggle between the King’s children was no longer significant, the people believed that it was now certain the couple had secured the crown.
"Your Highnesses," Lord Simon Lancelot gave respect to the royal couple who just arrived. He was one of the councilmen tasked to supervise the criminal’s execution.
"We met again, Lord Simon." Lauren smiled politely at the councilman, remembering the night of Alec’s coronation when they had a brief chat in the castle’s front yard.
"So you had met my wife, Lord Lancelot? I wonder when that is when you are usually occupied with council affairs." Alec watched the man with dark eyes, and Lauren took note of how Alec addressed the lord too formally even though both of them were working in the council.
"It was during your coronation, Alec. Lord Simon was there," Lauren answered before Simon could. "I believe we should now proceed with the execution."
"Of course. We prepared seats for you," Simon gestured to the seats at the side of the platform where they could clearly see Cassandra who was at the center.
Instead of going straight to the seats, Lauren stopped in front of her half-sister who was refusing to look at the people throwing so much hate at her.
"Hello there, sister."
The sweet venomous voice rang in Cassandra’s ears which made her raise her head.
The chains holding her clanked when she tried to reach for Lauren, her bloodshot eyes were bulging out in anger.
"You bitch! Even if I die I will come back to haunt you and kill you!"
Lauren chuckled at how Cassandra sounded so ridiculous. She could only count on her fingers how many times the mighty second princess lost her prized elegance. Cassandra always acted calm and indifferent, but today was the first time she saw her lose control and blaze in so much anger.
"Don’t yell like that, Cassie. Didn’t Father praise you for being the epitome of a prim and proper princess? You were always praised by our governess back then, but you are yelling like an illiterate commoner now." Lauren shook her head as if she was disappointed.
"I’m glad you have come to accept that you will die this morning though. But unfortunately..." She crouched a bit to whisper. "I’m not afraid of ghosts. I also doubt the devil in hell would allow you to stay in the living world like a stray cat when your sinful soul deserves to be caged and tortured in the underworld."
Cassandra laughed evilly.
"You think I’m the only one who’s evil between us? You are no different from me, Lauren! You are like your shameless mother-"
Before Cassandra could continue her ill words about her mother, Lauren gave her a strong slap.
"Finally, I got the chance to slap you. I have been meaning to do that all these years. But as much as I want to give you more, I don’t want my hands to get dirty from that filthy face of yours," Lauren said coldly before she turned to the executioner.
"Start flogging her," she commanded with her voice holding authority.