Page 196 of The Devil's Fire

“Let me just have a look at your arm first.” Ellie said once she was done changing Althaia’s bandages. I got slashed pretty deep on my arm and had to get stitched up. “Are you feeling better?”

“It’s fine.” I replied. I had a high pain tolerance, and it didn’t bother me much.

“I mean, are you still experiencing any symptoms of food poisoning?” She asked, making me look at her with a frown.

“I didn’t get food poisoning.”

Ellie raised her brows a little in surprise.

“Oh, so you didn’t have the same food then?”

“We did, but only Althaia got it. The doctor said she caught it easily because of… a weakened immune system.” I spat out bitterly. I couldn’t get myself to say that it was because she was pregnant.

“Hmm.” Ellie grabbed her tablet and tapped around.

“What is it?” I asked.

“Are you sure you had the same food?” She asked once again.

“We had the same food for breakfast, and we didn’t get sick either.” Arianna commented, making Ellie sigh with a frown as she continued to look at her tablet.

“… No, that can’t be it.” She muttered to herself.

“Ellie.” I said impatiently, making her look up at me.

“When she got food poisoning, did you go to the hospital immediately?”

“Yes.”

“Then that can’t be it. Unless…” She kept on muttering under her breath.

“You think Althaia was specifically poisoned?” I asked, getting straight to the point. My own words had me clenching my jaw in anger.

“Maybe. If you all had the same food, everyone would have been affected. The blood test they took of her showed nothing, either. While pregnancy weakens the immune system, it’s not to a point where only she would get sick.”

I had to move my neck from side to side to ease the tension in my body before I exploded.

“What do you think it is?” Giovanni asked, his tone dripping with fury.

Ellie grew quiet, her thoughts consumed by studying Althaia’s medical journal.

“She had cake.” I said, suddenly remembering she ate something I didn’t. “She only had a small bite of it.”

“What kind?”

“It was chocolate cake, her favorite.” I tried to remember if there was anything unusual about it, but there wasn’t.

“Did it have powdered sugar on top?” Ellie asked. I nodded, and the realization instantly crossed her face.

“Arsenic.” She said confidently. “That’s my suspicion. It was likely mixed with the actual powdered sugar. Since she only took a small bite, she experienced cramps and vomiting - typical signs of food poisoning. If they intended to kill her, they would have used a larger dose.” Ellie explained.

“I think someone tried to induce a miscarriage, but what doesn’t make sense is that Arsenic would have shown up when they did a blood test, which is making me believe her test was swapped out with another.”

I turned around and faced the window, my hands gripping the windowsill, my veins pulsating throughout my body. The overwhelming fury inside me begged for release. My head was burning as if I had a fever, wanting to explode. Instead, I closed my eyes and tried to calm down.

“I can’t help but think that it was an attack on you, Damiano.” Arianna said. “They’ve been keeping track of us all, and they found out she was pregnant. I think they’re trying to prevent you from having an heir by putting the poison on something she would definitely eat.”

I was itching to punch the wall, my hands twitching with the desperate urge to unleash this anger within me.

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