Irina woke up to the empty bedside and memories from the last night came flooding in her mind.

'I'm having my meal.'

The girl hid her red face behind her hands and rolled into her stomach whining into the pillows. She remembered feeding on the Queen's blood last night and falling asleep on the top of her the very next moment.

"Why did I have to say that!?"

 She groaned and the banged her head on the pillow in frustration. The warm taste of her skin and blood still lingered on her tongue; her faint scent was still present on the red robe she's wearing and Irina pulled the collar up to her nose and took in her smell, of red grapes and cinnamon, and other times of ink and paper wood, and Irina felt herself drunk on the master's smell. She rolled back on her spine and stared up at the ceiling. Averinka, was her master and she should not be thinking about the scent of her master and her blood. The girl dragged herself out of the Queen's room towards her own chamber washed herself thoroughly and dressed in trousers and black shirt followed by a black caftan which had narrow straps of leather across the breast plate and had an open cut at the front. She secured her caftan with a thick leather belt and tucked her sword inside it.

The girl made her way to the dining chamber, and greeted the royal family with a bow.

"I beg your pardon, Queen Averinka, for not tending to you earlier."

"You Don't have to be formal, Irina. Come and sit with us." The queen said to Irina and the girl pulled out a seat and settled next to Averinka. She stared at the empty place in front of her, feeling uncomfortable that she couldn't eat with them and instead settled for a tea to keep them company for the breakfast.

"So, how does it feel like when you have blood?" Alexander asked looking at the girl with eagerness and Irina spluttered her tea, not expecting the young prince to question her about her eating.

"Sasha!" Vladislav barked dropping his piece of loaf, and scolded the young boy. "You should watch your words, lad. I don't want queen to get in trouble."

"I was just curious."

"It tastes like honey in tea?"

"What?"

"Of queen's you're asking."

"Does it not make you sick?"

"Does having your meal makes you sick?"

"Fair enough." Alexander gave up and Irina busied herself with her tea making a face at how liquid tasted in her mouth and added half jar of honey in it to make it sweeter.

"What kind of men do you crave?" Alexander asked again and Averinka choked on her food, reaching for the glass of water.

"Sasha!" Vladislav barked popping a vein of his head at his son's mannerisms.

"I don't need any man when I have master." Vladislav's wife Praskovya dropped the knife, gasping in horror and Averinka was having hard time controlling her coughs and thumped her chest. Irina was confused for a while before noticing the implication of her words and immediately corrected herself.

"I mean as long as master is alive I could only take blood from her...no other man is needed." Praskovya let out a sigh of relief and went back to eating her meals. They were eating in peace, when they heard commotion outside the hall with clamping sound of guards' boots in the corridor and the double doors to the hall burst open with a guard barging inside the room out of his breath.

"What's going on?" The queen stood up at her chair and the guard went down on his knee, bowing down his head for bringing a terrible news.

"Lord Gavini has escaped from the prison after killing Mikhail and took Fedorova with him."

"How could you let this happen!" The queen shouted which made the soldier sink lower on the floor before her.

"He had vial of poisonous smoke with him and used it against the guards to escape." The queen brushed past the soldier walking through the corridors and hall of the palace and came outside in the courtyard where the palace guards and Vladimir were surrounding Gavini who had a knife pressed against his throat, and Averinka noticed the body of Lord Federova lying at his feet in pool of his blood.

"Lord Gavini!" The queen shouted and made her way through the guards. The Lord grinned upon seeing the Tsarina and snarled at her when she asked him to surrender.

"To surrender before a weak queen like you, is an insult to the blood of Russia. Soon, people will realize that the crown cannot guard their country and will rise to dethrone you."

"The people will not see crown as weak when you'll be beheaded in the public by my own hands, Lord Gavini. The country must see what happens to those who commit treason against the crown." The queen spoke through the silence of the atmosphere and Irina narrowed her eyes at the man who had a sly smirk on his face, a look of a person who had something up on his sleeve.

"And that they shan't see." Before Irina could react and get to the man, Gavini slit his own throat splattering the shower of blood, whose droplets landed on the Queen's face. Irina stood in shock, along with Vladimir who was frozen in his place when the man dropped dead in the pool of his blood. The queen stood silently, watching the accident unfold before her and raised her gloved hand to wipe the blood off her cheek with the back of her hand.

"Behead them and put their heads on display at the gallows. Tell the people that the queen had already executed them herself before the dawn." With that said, she turned her back and went back inside the palace.

She wouldn't allow anyone to question her as next crown after late King Alexander. The woman passed the servants and her guards, sending message for Lord Patronovich to meet with her in her studies. The queen slammed open the door and slumped down on the chair at the desk, waiting for her only trustworthy Advisor from her father's times. Mikhail, Federova and Gavini the advisors closer to the late king were the one involved in conspiring against the royal family. Now that Gavini had killed himself and Mikhail, she could not get to know about their true motives behind their assassination.

Could it be the possibility that there's someone else being involved? Vladislav's son was next in lineage to the throne if the queen didn't bear the first heir to their country but if had been Vladislav, the man had insisted to agree with the court's advice to find herself a consort. Averinka felt a throbbing headache in her head and massaged her temple, when she felt Vladislav's hand on her shoulder and gave her a concerning look.

"Gather the advisors for the court meeting. I'm seeking out a royal suitor for myself."

-

The queen was pacing the room when Irina entered the Queen's bedchamber and noticed the lost look on her master's face who walking restlessly across her chamber.

"Master?" Irina approached the queen with cautious steps but then stopped in the middle of the room before going too closer to the woman.

"Has the advisor Patronovich prepared for the court's meeting?" The queen asked stopping in her movements when she saw the girl and dropped her hands limp at her sides, turning her full attention towards Irina.

"Master, you are in no condition to make a decision for a consort. You must give it a..." But before Irina could finish her thought, the queen crossed the room and stood face to face with the girl with a scowl on her face.

"And are you going to stop me?" The queen spoke with harsh tone and a look of contempt on her face, the expression which Irina had never seen on her master made her shiver.

"Master but it's not..."

"I have asked you, are you going to oppose me?" Averinka asked in an authoritative voice and Irina immediately dropped on her knees before her master as a sign of immediate submission that it was not her intention to offend the Imperial queen.

"No. I'm concerned for the master." Irina spoke earnestly and raised her head to look at her master.

"Concerned?" The queen laughed under her breath."Do you speak of your loyalty? How would I know you're not one of them?" The queen turned her back towards the girl and clenched her fist at her side.

"Master..."

"Since the day you've stepped inside the palace everything has started to fall apart out of its order. How would I know that you're not the one causing it?"

"Master, I would never!" The girl defensively rose on her feet shocked at her master's accusation.

"Never?" Averinka turned to face her. "You say, master I would never then prove it. Prove it to your master that you'd never."

"How? How does master want me to prove myself?"

"Strip." Irina thought she must have misheard and looked at the expressionless face of her master.

"Master..."

"Did you not hear me?" The queen barked loudly at the girl. "I said strip, no article of clothing should be left on you." The girl hung her head in silence and said nothing because if it meant proving her loyalty to the queen, then she would do it for her master. The girl dropped the sword out of the belt on the floor the removed her belt before started stripping out of her clothes, first her trousers followed by her shirt and chest wraps and stood straight before her master, unfurling her naked body in shame.

"Go to the wall and put your hand on it. Do not turn back to look at me." The queen ordered and the girl complied, going to sit tight front of the chamber's wall near the bedside and put her hands on the wall. Averinka pulled out a thin steel rod from the basket in the corner of her room and come to stand behind the girl raising the rod in her hand and brought it down to strike the girl's back with a brutal force. A shout erupted from Irina's mouth, stinging sensation of pain shot through her back as the rod came in contact with her cold skin. Averinka clenched her jaw tight and struck the girl again who arched her back and threw back her head crying in pain.

"Do not make a sound!" Averinka barked and whipped the girl across her back, red bruise and welts began to form on her pale skin and the girl curled her hands in a fist against the wall as she bit harder on her tongue to hold back her cries. Averinka continued beating her, throbbing pain spread throughout her aching back and neck. Blood started seeping out of the wounds, where the whip had tore open the skin of her back. She shuddered violently against each strike, hanging down her head and bit her lips as tears began to fall on her knees from her closed eyes. Another strike, and it stung her entire back and a moan of unbearable pain escaped from her mouth. She heard the stick dropped behind her on the floor, and felt strong arms wrapped around her waist from behind as Averinka dropped on the floor and rested her forehead against her throbbing and bruised back.

"Are you still going to stay loyal to your master?" Averinka's voice came out as a broke whisper and Irina could feel her heaving and trembling with her entire front pressed against her back from behind. Tear fell from Irina's eye on the back of hand of Averinka wrapped around her, and Irina rested her own hands on the top of the Queen's cold hands.

"What else should I do to prove my loyalty towards you?" Irina asked in her throaty voice so silently that Averinka wondered if she had not imagined those words.