Page 82 of The White King's Favorite

“You’re the one not telling us the truth.”

“I’m not lying! We drugged them!”

“Who p-provided you the d-drugs?” asked Cessilia, frowning too. “Who t-told you the King was c-coming?”

“I told you, no one! We made it!”

“You d-don’t have the ingredients here t-to make such a p-potent and c-complicated drug,” she retorted. “Someone had t-to c-come beforehand and t-tell you this p-plan. The K-King had an easy fight against th-those bandits b-because you helped him. I just want t-to know who helped you.”

The old woman seemed to hesitate, her eyes going to Nana behind them. Seeing she still wasn’t talking, Naptunie took a deep breath and came forward.

“Granny, please? We are on His Majesty’s side too, we came from the Capital to understand what happened here. We will help you, I promise. ...I… I will ask my uncle to bring you some food, as soon as we can. Look! See? It’s a pass from my family, the Dorosef Tribe. We can help you, I promise.”

The old woman’s eyes lingered for a while on Naptunie’s papers, her lips pinched in a line. Then, she sighed.

“That woman... She asked us not to tell anyone about the drug, but since you already know... I don’t know more, anyway. She just snuck into the village the night before the King arrived, and gave us a huge bag that smelled like herbal medicine, asking us to put it in their food.”

“A woman?” Tessa frowned.

“Yes. She had strangely pale skin just like yours, and red hair too.”

Cessilia and Tessandra exchanged a look. The latter sighed.

“Oh well, that explains a couple of things... although it makes me mad too.”

“Why all the questions, what are you here for?!” the older woman exclaimed, frowning. “With that dragon, I thought you had come to attack us!”

“Why would we attack here, there’s literally nothing left we’d possibly want to steal...”

“Tessa!”

“My thoughts too!” scoffed the granny, not offended.

“We only c-came b-because we heard what ha-happened here,” sighed Cessilia. “...I a-am a healer. Are you sure you d-don’t want me t-to look at your wounds?”

“Oh, if that’s the case... There are a few more who need it more than me. The soldiers did their best, but those brave boys aren’t cut out to heal anything... If that’s alright with you, I’ll go back to the others now and explain to them. We’ll see if they want to be healed by a foreigner or not...”

“Th-thank you.” Cessilia nodded.

The old lady slowly went back, and Cessilia let out a long sigh, crossing her arms. Tessandra walked up to her, a sullen look also.

“What are you thinking? Are you mad that... the King had help?”

“...I don’t know.”

Cessilia was conflicted. Her eyes kept going back to the pile of bodies. Even though she now knew who they were and what they had done, she still felt something was terribly wrong about all of this. She didn’t like the idea that Jisel had cheated the battle in Ashen’s favor, either, but she knew this had probably spared him, and a lot of the soldiers, some wounds and effort. Perhaps it had even saved lives.

“This is too horrible,” muttered Naptunie, still upset. “To think those people were still under those bandits’ tyranny all this time! It makes me sick just thinking about what that granny had to go through...”

“Don’t think too much,” sighed Tessandra. “You getting sick won’t help them. Can your tribe really provide food here?”

“We can,” nodded Sabael. “I’ll make sure of it.”

“Great. But I doubt the Dorosef can feed all the other villages in the same situation...”

Cessilia felt the same. Even if the Dorosef provided some help, it would be temporary, not a long-term solution. She looked around. They had to help those people so they would get back on their feet by themselves.

First, as she had promised, Cessilia spent time looking at the wounds of the people the old woman brought forward to meet her. They were clearly lacking the proper medicine and supplies, so they had to make do with what they had, as well as explain to them how to tend to the most basic wounds, sterilize things, and create their own supplies. Not only her, but Tessandra, who had also learned some rudimentary medicine, helped too. There weren’t many people left to tend to, but they did their best. Even Naptunie was happy to run errands, distribute some snacks she had gotten earlier that day from her aunt, and learn what she could from Cessilia. It was clear her thirst for knowledge knew no bounds, and she even quickly got over her disgust of blood and exposed flesh to help out. Meanwhile, Sabael was recruited to help repair the damages, unplug the well, and gather what materials could still be useful. It was cute to see him run around, eager to help and eager to get out of a certain lady’s line of sight...

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