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".. Come in," she responded absently, unaware the door was already opening.

"I\'m here to check your condition," a stout woman with spectacles and a large bag announced, stepping into the room.

"... right," Kel answered, her mind still wandering elsewhere.

"Hmmm," the woman\'s voice rumbled in her throat as she pressed against Kel\'s wrist with two fingers.

Stopping to jot down a few notes, the woman then moved on to check Kel\'s head, parting the golden hair gently as she worked.

"Have you been taking the medication I prescribed?" she asked when she\'d finished.

"No." Kel responded immediately, glancing at the vials of unopened liquid next to the bed.

How could she possibly trust a single thing she was given in this castle?

"Tsk. Your body would be healing faster if you\'d just listen to me," the woman sighed, shaking her head. "Either way, I suppose I can clear you for a short visit."

"Great," Kel said unenthusiastically.

On her way out, the woman paused to give instructions to the guards on duty. They spoke in low voices for a few minutes before nodding to each other.

"Kel," one of the guards turned to her. "Doc says you can go today."

"Great," Kel repeated, slowly rising from the bed where she sat.

She stood silently while one of the guards moved to unlock her chain. Despite her condition as a patient, the cuff around her ankle remained.

A dull ache throbbed in her head as she followed the guards down the hall.

It wasn\'t surprising given the beating Leif had given her days earlier.

After passing out, she\'d woken up lying in her own blood with Leif trembling next to her side.

"A-are you ok?" he\'d mumbled nervously.

"Mmph-" Kel opened her mouth to answer, only to swallow a groan of pain as the shrill ringing in her ears and sharp pain in her head flooded back all at once.

​ "Ah.. y-your hurt.. I-" Leif shivered, his voice cracking with emotion.

Soon, tears were streaming down his face and his breathing turned to a series of sharp inhales.

What was he doing? Why was his freaking ou-

Ugh. It hurt too much to think.

All Kel wanted to do was go back to sleep. The cold stones beneath her head felt like the world\'s softest pillow. Her body felt heavy and warm.

But she knew that in the case of head injuries, sleeping could be dangerous. Still, her eyelids were dragged down with the heavy weight of exhaustion.

"What\'s wrong with you?" Kel coughed hoarsely, forcing herself to focus on staying awake.

If the boy felt this bad about it, why didn\'t he go fetch a doctor or some bandages? No, why did he even hit her in the first place?

"I thought I wouldn\'t.. I promised myself I would never.."

Between sobs, Leif choked out incoherent bits of sentences.

Kel blinked slowly, fighting with all her might to force her eyes back open once they experienced blissful closure.

This was bad. At the very least, she needed to stop her bleeding, but she couldn\'t seem to think clearly about how to go about it, much less move her body.

Just when she\'d thought she couldn\'t cling to consciousness a moment longer, a brave guard peeked through the door.

The events following that all happened in a hazy blur, but Kel remembered waking the next morning with a bandaged head and Leif sitting calmly next to her bed.

"Why are you here?" Kel had scoffed boldly.

Whether it was her injury or being forced to observe the boy\'s childish meltdown, her fear of Mevani\'s erratic young king was diminishing by the second.

"We haven\'t finished talking," Leif had responded calmly. "Plus, I wanted to make sure you were ok, Kel."

"That\'s funny, considering you were the one who put me in this state," Kel retorted, turning away.

She wondered briefly if there was even a speck left of the former sentiment she\'d once held for the boy.

"I was just angry, Kel," Leif spit through clenched teeth. "Can\'t I hit someone when I\'m angry? It\'s in my blood, after all!"

In his blood? What did he even mean by that? The blood of a soldier?

"What an excuse.." Kel murmured, refusing to look back at him.

"After what happened to my mother, I promised myself I\'d never be like him," Leif lowered his voice, "but look at me now."

That was the first time Kel had heard Leif mention his mother. She\'d learned that Barclay was his mother\'s brother and that his mother was dead, but she didn\'t know anything else about it.

She\'d only ever really thought of Leif as Sir Arden\'s son and envied him for his impressive military heritage.

"Ha! I bet you never expected that!" Leif\'s voice had filled with rage again. "That the kingdom\'s best knight beat his own wife to death!!"

"Kel. We\'re here."

The guard\'s voice interrupted Kel\'s pondering.

That unsettling visit from Leif had been five days ago, and she hadn\'t seen him since.

Additionally that day, she\'d learned the whereabouts of another hostage in the palace, and now the doctor had finally cleared her to go visit.

With a nervous swallow, she gazed at the ornately decorated wooden door.

Her room was in part of the main castle. It was certainly better than the dungeons below or even the soldiers\' barracks, but it was nothing fancy.

On the other hand, the room she\'d just been led to was in the Queen\'s wing. It had been empty for some time after Adriell\'s mother died, as the old kind never remarried.

For a vacant annex, however, it had been kept impeccably, as if frozen in time, waiting for a future occupant.

"Can\'t I go in by myself?" Kel asked as the guards spoke with the men guarding the door about who would escort her inside.

"Uh.."

The guards all glanced at each other nervously, nobody willing to answer the question. Of course, they all knew Kel, and that only made following their orders more difficult.

"J-just a few minutes," one man sheepishly spoke up, looking around for approval.

All the other men kept their eyes on the floor, clearly in an attempt to absolve themselves from blame.

"Alright, then," Kel hastily accepted permission before he changed his mind.

"Then please open the door."