Chapter 88: Using the Proto Crafting Package
"Tell me every single thing. Don’t you dare skip a single detail." Alaric screamed.
"This ’Master Riku’," the footman continued, his voice barely audible, "he suspected something. He asked to search the room and found the stone in the decorative bowl... and broke it. A red mist came out of it, My Lord. They all saw it."
Alaric staggered back as if struck, collapsing into a nearby chair. "Broken? The mist seen? That... that changes everything! That upstart commoner! How could he know?"
"Now, now, Alaric, my dear." A calm, silken voice emerged from the depths of a high-backed armchair near the fireplace, where it had been hidden in the deep shadows. "Such theatrics. It’s unbecoming."
Alaric looked up, startled. Seated within the chair was Lady Elara Vayne. Her sharp, aristocratic features were unreadable in the dim light, but the hand resting on the armrest – a prosthetic marvel of dark metal and wood – was unnervingly still. A sleek black cat in her lap opened one emerald eye, then resumed its soft purring as her metallic fingers continued their rhythmic stroking.
"Mother," Alaric said, his voice still tight but now laced with a grudging respect. "This... Riku... he has undone weeks of careful planning! Gregor is lucid again! He even threatened me! And now they know about the stone!"
Lady Vayne smiled faintly, a smile that did not reach her cold, calculating eyes. "Threatened you, did he? Gregor always had a bit of fire left, and it seems that he still has some even when he is at death’s door. It seems this ’Master Riku’ has merely fanned the embers."
She continued to stroke the cat, the metallic clicks of her prosthetic fingers a soft counterpoint to the purring. "Do not fret so, Alaric. This is but a minor setback. The stone in Gregor’s room was but one small piece of a much larger design. His temporary recovery, their discovery of one tainted pebble, means little in the grand scheme."
"But he’s alert now, Mother! They’ll investigate! They’ll question the staff!" Alaric protested, jumping to his feet again. "That footman there," he gestured angrily, "he could be implicated!"