Chapter 4
Healing Hands and Hidden Eyes
The morning light crept into the Northern Wing like a whisper from another world.It spilled across the marble floors and draped the curtains in pale gold, soft and unassuming, so unlike the night that had nearly drowned me.
I breathed in, steady and slow, tasting the faint chill of lilies from the Moon Garden below. For a heartbeat, I imagined the lake again.
The cold water, the silence, the weight pressing down my chest.Then I exhaled and pushed it away.
The lake had tried to claim me.But it hadn't.
Today, I would not hide in bed or tremble at the Queen's shadow.Today, I would reclaim the only part of my old life that was truly mine: my hands.
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Ana entered softly, balancing a tray of breakfast. "Your Highness," she began carefully, "your porridge will grow cold again."
"I'll eat later," I said.
"You said that yesterday," she murmured.
"Then today, I'll mean it."
Her brows knit. "You look pale still. Should you be walking about?"
"I'm not walking," I replied, drawing on my cloak. "I'm working."
Ana blinked. "Working?"
"I'm going to the Physician Court."
Her face paled. "Princess, that's under the Queen's direct supervision. The physicians there—"
"Serve the crown, not the people. Yes, I know." I adjusted my hood and met her eyes. "That's why I need to see them."
Ana hesitated. She looked as if she wanted to protest further, but then sighed and followed. "If you're going, then I'm coming too."
"Good," I said, smiling faintly. "I'll need someone who actually listens."
The Physician Court was tucked near the Chapel, a place of healing meant to echo divine order.Instead, it smelled of bitterness, the sharp tang of tinctures, the stale rot of old herbs, the smoke of perfumed incense masking decay.
Marble pillars divided rows of worktables, where jars gleamed under filtered light. The physicians, older men in gilded robes, moved like priests, murmuring to one another with prideful solemnity.
When I entered, silence fell like a dropped veil.
One of them, the eldest with a golden insignia, frowned deeply. "Princess Amethyst. Forgive me, but this is no place for one of your station."
"I'm not here to disturb your work," I said evenly. "Only to learn."
Another physician smirked. "Learn? From whom? These are matters of medicine, not embroidery."
A chuckle rippled through them.
Ana's jaw tightened, but I simply smiled. "Then I'll observe. Surely observation won't break divine law?"
They exchanged irritated looks, but were unable to refuse.
"Very well," said the eldest, gesturing curtly. "Do not interfere."
The first patient was a small boy, flushed and weak. His mother, dressed in minor noble finery, wrung her hands. "He hasn't slept in three nights. His fever won't fall."
The attending physician checked the boy's wrist with disinterest. "A common fever. The body will correct itself." He waved dismissively. "It's common, Your Ladyship. Give him the blessed decoction thrice a day."
I stepped closer. "May I?"
He frowned but stepped aside. "If Your Highness wishes to pretend."
I knelt beside the boy. His breathing was rapid, shallow; his lips pale. His pulse fluttered beneath my fingers.
Weak and irregular.
"This isn't a simple fever," I said softly. "His skin is hot, but his hands are cold. That means infection. Likely waterborne."
"Impossible," the physician scoffed.
"Not impossible," I murmured, already mixing herbs from the nearby shelf. "You've missed the signs because you're not looking for them."
The mother's eyes widened as I explained how to hydrate him.
"Boil his water. Replace the decoction with this mixture," I said, adjusting the herbs on the table.
"Add willow bark for the fever and mint for the stomach. And make sure his bedding is clean, so change it daily."
I looked up at the mother gently. "He'll recover in two days. Maybe three."
Hours later, the child's fever began to drop. The mother fell to her knees, weeping in thanks.The physicians whispered. None dared meet my eyes.
The next patient was a palace guard with a festering wound.The smell of infection struck before I even reached him.
"Who treated this?" I demanded.
"One of the aides," a physician said. "A scratch."
I peeled the bandage back. The wound was red, swollen, and angry. "A scratch doesn't smell like rot."
I called for boiled water and cleaned it myself, ignoring the murmurs around me. "Boil your cloth before touching a wound," I said firmly. "And never reuse bandages."
"Such heretical practices," muttered one man. "Boiled water? A princess giving orders—"
"Boiling kills infection," I said without looking up. "Pride does not."
Ana, standing nearby, whispered, "Your mother would be proud, Your Highness."
I smiled faintly. "Then I must be doing something right."
By midday, the Court was in disarray.I had treated six patients, corrected three misdiagnoses, and publicly contradicted four senior physicians.
The whispers followed me now.
Cautious, curious, envious.
Each time, I corrected the careless, exposed the neglect.
"Princess," one physician said through gritted teeth, "you overstep your station."
"And you neglect yours," I answered evenly.
The man went silent.
Ana watched from the corner, half in awe, half in fear. "They'll report you," she whispered.
"I want them to," I said. "The Queen should know I'm not as harmless as she thought."
Some servants smiled when they thought I wasn't looking. Others bowed quickly, fear and hope tangled in their eyes.
The old men watched me in silence, and I could almost hear their thoughts: Who taught her this? What does she want?
I wanted nothing from them. Only to save those they dismissed.
But as I worked, I noticed something else... patterns hiding in plain sight.
Records that didn't match the medicine shelves.Herbs are mislabeled or diluted.And one vial, faintly shimmering violet, and labeled Blessed Tonic.
I froze. That hue was unmistakable.
Lunara root. The same poison was once poured into my veins.
I slid the vial quietly into my sleeve before anyone noticed.
The last patient of the day was a young maid. Pale, trembling, her hands shook as she tried to bow.
"She's weak-blooded," said one physician. "Common among the servants. Too much labor, too little faith."
I knelt before her. "Tell me what you've been taking."
"A tonic, Your Highness," she whispered. "From the Queen's conservatory. It helps me stay awake."
My stomach turned cold. "Show me."
She held up a vial. The liquid shimmered faintly violet.
I forced my face to stay calm. "Stop drinking this. Throw it away. Do you understand?"
She nodded quickly, frightened by the sudden steel in my voice.
When she left, I released the breath I hadn't realized I was holding.
The Queen was still poisoning her own servants and the court physicians were blind, or complicit.
As I washed my hands in the basin, a chill prickled the back of my neck.That feeling of being watched.
I glanced over my shoulder. Near the far end of the hall, beneath the shadow of the columns, stood a figure.
A man dressed in plain black, posture steady and too composed to be a servant. He didn't move. Didn't speak.
Only watched.
When our eyes met, he inclined his head once, polite, distant, then vanished into the side corridor.
Ana turned. "Who was that?"
I hesitated. "I don't know."
And I didn't.But something in the quiet of that gaze lingered, unsettling and sharp.
Perhaps it was just another physician's aide.Or perhaps not.
When evening came, I left the Court exhausted but alive with purpose.
The corridors glowed dimly, candlelight glinting off glass and gold. Outside, the sky had deepened into dusk, and the lilies below my balcony swayed in the soft wind.
Ana walked beside me, voice quiet. "You've done more good in one day than they have in years."
I smiled faintly. "Then I'll just have to do it again tomorrow."
"You'll make enemies."
"I already have."
Later, alone in my chamber, I placed the stolen vial of violet liquid on my desk. It glimmered faintly in the candlelight, deceptively beautiful, like every lie in this palace.
I wrote in my small journal, hands steady:
Day 4 — Physician Court observations:
Lunara root detected in palace supplies.
Administered as "Blessed Tonic."
Victims: servants, possibly more.
Unidentified observer present in Court. Motive unknown.
The candlelight trembled as I signed the page simply: A.
When I looked up, my reflection in the mirror met my gaze — pale, defiant, alive.
"I am Laurine Samaniego," I whispered to the empty room."I am not the girl they tried to drown."
Outside, wind brushed the lilies below, and for a heartbeat, I thought I saw movement among them — a shadow slipping away into the dark.
But when I looked again, there was nothing. Only the quiet pulse of the night and the distant shimmer of the lake.
I closed my journal and whispered the promise again, softly, fiercely —
"I will not die again."