For the next couple of days, Meliše did everything she could to get close to the king, but to no avail.
The guard, Hael, never left the king's sight. She clenched the fabric of her robes between her fingers, her long nails pressing into her palms. Each coy smile, each lingering touch—wasted. The king hardly spared her a glance. Her lips curled into a silent snarl before she smoothed them into a thin line.
"Am I not as beautiful as I once thought?" She wondered to herself, but when she brought a hand-held mirror to her face, she couldn't help frowning. She angled the mirror, tilting her head, searching for flaws she knew did not exist. Her reflection stared back, flawless as ever—dark curls cascading over delicate shoulders, lips curved in a practiced pout. And yet, the king remained unmoved. She let out a quiet hiss, snapping the mirror shut.
"I need to find a moment when he's alone, but that blasted guard is always by his side. What should I do?" She asked the baby in her arms, who cooed at her in response.
"If I don't complete this task, Dicaeus will take away my powers, and we can't have any of that."
She bit her lower lip as she contemplated on what to do before an idea came to mind.
Grabbing hold of the child's little hand, she shook it lightly with a small smile tugging at her lips.
"Looks like I'm going to have to borrow some of your power, little one." The baby cooed in response.
She then lifted a hand, hovering it over the child before using her index finger to create a pattern on the child's head. A pale glow seeped from her fingertips, curling like mist around the infant's form. The child let out a soft coo before its limbs melted into shadows, its body stretching and twisting into sleek, polished wood. The sound of whispering steel filled the air as the transformation solidified. When the glow faded, the child was gone. In its place, a staff hovered, darker than the night sky.
The staff floated in the air and the minute Meliše extended her hand; the staff flew towards its rightful owner. Folding her fingers over the scepter, her eyes sparkled with excitement as she held onto the weapon.
"Oh, how I've missed you, Triviae."
Meliše was a powerful sorceress who worked alongside Dicaeus as punishment for playing with human lives. "How ironic," she murmured, tracing the length of Triviae. "Once, the gods stripped me of power for meddling in mortal affairs. Now they send me to do the same, only at another's bidding."
The goddess of love once enchanted her, making the sorceress fall in love with a hero—devoting her entire life to him. By doing his bidding, she ended up taking the lives of countless people just to give him an easier life. But when she found out that the hero had betrayed her and fallen in love with another, she killed their children and his wife out of revenge.
This act got her in trouble with the gods, and as punishment, she was to serve Dicaeus for a century. She could never leave his side and had to do his bidding until her time was up. Since the god of chaos and destruction was delighted to know he'd have such a formidable force by his side, he made good use of her powers and chose her for the job of extracting the golden aegis and the divine spatha.
Dicaeus knew that equipping Ceremus and Hael with those mighty weapons would increase their chances of survival. The god had no plans to spear their lives and wanted any obstacles that could hinder his plans out of the way. So Meliše came down to earth disguised as a regular mortal woman and transformed her staff into a baby. She didn't want to seem like a threat to the powerful king and hoped she could entice him while using her charms.
She didn't want to have to use her hands to harm him if she could help it. In return for retrieving the weapon, she'd have fifty years off her sentence, and she'd gain more power. Of course, Meliše didn't have any plans of letting Ceremus and his guard go.
With her staff now in hand, she cast a spell that would temporarily put Hael to sleep so that she could enact her plans without his interference.
Now it was a matter of whether it would work. Meliše realized there was something strange about Hael. Though he looked like a mortal on the outside, the sorceress could detect a divine energy swirling within him. Unlike Ceremus, who carried half of divine energy thanks to his mother being a goddess, Hael was a unique case. It felt like his blood was entirely divine. Like he could be a god himself.
"But that can't be the case…right? She shook her head, adjusted her clothes, and left the room assigned to her.
She glanced around the ship, still in awe of its craftsmanship. Even after twenty days of travel, with a horde of men infesting its walls, there wasn't a single speck of dust or dirt on its floors. Everything was clean, organized, and immaculate. It was quite the surprise.
Meliše made her way above deck, where everyone gathered and scanned the area for the king, but couldn't catch sight of him.
"Have you seen His Majesty by chance?" She asked one crewman nearby.
The crewman nearly tripped over himself when he caught sight of her, and he turned into a blubbering idiot when she addressed him. Meliše had to wait a good five minutes to hear a coherent answer from him.
"H-He was heading below deck with Sir Hael a few minutes ago."
Again with that man! "Oh, I see, so I just missed him." She smiled politely.
The young man nodded profusely as a light blush painted his cheeks. The smile on her face disappeared after she turned her back on him in search of her target.
Meanwhile, Hael was still being iced out by Ceremus and he wasn't sure what to do. This wasn't the first time the king had given his guard the cold shoulder before—with the events that occurred with Anthanasia and all. He prepared a midnight hunt to appease the king and ask for forgiveness but things were much different now. He didn't think he did anything to anger Ceremus nor had he acted too rashly so he wasn't sure what he had done wrong, but he wanted to fix things with Ceremus quickly.
They hadn't had a proper conversation for two days, and though he allowed Hael to be by his side, he felt more distant next to him than he was far away from Ceremus which upset him.
He followed the king down to their sleeping chambers wordlessly, but froze when he heard the frustrated sigh coming from Ceremus' lips.
"I would like to have some time alone." He said, a little forcefully yet his eyes held a flicker of regret, realizing he had spoken a little too harshly. Hael felt his heart sink to the bottom of his stomach as he looked at the king, who didn't bother turning around when he addressed him.
The guard wanted to protest, but he could only swallow his words when he saw the man enter his room and close the door behind him. He stood there for a moment, stunned by his apparent rejection. A rejection he couldn't accept. Just as he was about to knock on the door and demand for the two to discuss what had happened, he felt his hands being repelled by the door.
"What?" The white-haired giant frowned as he glanced at his hands in confusion.
He tried again, reaching for the doorknob this time, and felt the same feeling—stronger this time. Hael suddenly lost all interest in entering the room and slowly backed away from the door.
A pressure, like invisible hands, pressed against his chest. The air thickened, heavy with an unspoken command—leave. His limbs felt leaden, his thoughts clouded, as if his own will was slipping through his fingers. It was a strange experience, as if he were being compelled by a potent force.
His frown deepened before he shook his head. "I must be imagining things." Hael thought but the moment he turned away, the weight lifted, leaving behind a strange hollowness in his chest.
At that same moment, Meliše was making her way down and caught sight of the young man. He had a dazed expression on his face. The sorceress smiled, believing that her spell must have worked.
She avoided any contact with him so as to not disrupt the enchantment he was under. Since she wasn't at her full strength, the spell would work for about forty minutes, so she needed to work quickly before he returned.
Though I might not even need the full forty minutes by the time I'm done with that king. She thought to herself.