At some point, Mary decided to take a break. She told Malphus she wanted to take a break, but he hadn't listened. She stopped expecting him to slow down or turn around. He did indeed turn, but when he did, it was behind a tree, and Mary hadn't seen him come from behind the tree.
She searched around the tree but found no Malphus, then she turned around and thought 'perhaps it's best for me to make my way back to the castle' only for her to come to realization that she didn't know where she was, or how to get back to the castle.
She looked around in distress, and broke out in tears. The forest wasn't safe, with black witches and wolfs and such it was far to dangerous for anyone to spend the night in.
Malphus heard a scream for help as he walked towards the castle, he was still fairly close to Mary, making all the screaming she did hurt his ears. 'Annoying brat' Malphus mumbled to himself as he avoided the dry leaves on the ground, so that he wouldn't make a sound to be able to be followed back to the castle.
Malphus knew Mary would get tired right where he wanted her to be, thousands of miles away from the castle. Of course he was tired to, but this was Mary's subtle punishment. It would take her a while to walk back to the castle, especially with how slow she walks. All Malphus could do is laugh as he heard the screams settled down, and sobs arise.
He got back to the castle in a timely manner, and continued his day, apologizing to everyone for leaving so abruptly. He made everyone panic, as he left without informing anyone. They worried for the three hours Malphus was away.
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As panic leveled upstairs in the castle about the King being away suddenly, Lilly had finally composed a plan to make Valerie seem to be a black witch.
Of course with Lilly's recent encounter with black witches, she had some stuff left over after their visits. There were beakers with things only black witches could make and receive. Lilly managed to sneak a couple of them past the guards when the escorted her to Malphus' castle. She placed a line of sticky syrup leading to Valerie's room, and placed the beakers in plain sight so whoever went to follow or clean up the mess would be led to Valerie's room with the witchcraft placed inside.
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As a maid was walking down the hallway to the King's study to retrieve him for his horse ride, she noticed something on the floors. She knew that everyone would blame her for it if she didn't get it cleaned, so she quickly went to the kitchen to grab a cloth to wipe it up for now and she'd properly clean it after the King was were he was supposed to be. 'This line of sticky syrup goes on for miles!' The maid thought to herself as she reached Valerie's door. She opened it to find little beakers, with witch handwriting on it, on Valerie's vanity and bed.
She ran out of Valerie's room and grabbed the King, saying that it was something worth his time.
Malphus walked into Valerie's room and stared at the beakers, he was more than sure that Valerie wasn't a witch because other maids have cleaned her room without reporting a thing. It was obvious she had been set up, but this was a new maid so she would have no reason to set Valerie up.
Malphus walked up to the beakers to take a look at them "Thank you, you are dismissed." The maid went to the kitchen to get a mop so that she could immediately start cleaning the syrup.
Malphus remembered seeing these at Lilly's castle before she was taken as a maid 'Already forgetting where she came from, how stupid' Malphus left Valerie's room to go gather all the maids.
All the maids whispered about why they were gathered in the ballroom. Some thought a murder took place, some thought the King had finally gone crazy, and some were just happy to be released form their duties for the time being.
All was quite when the King stepped into the ballroom, he had a dead serious look on his face. Tension rises in the room as the King scanned the crowd, he pause looking into Valerie's eye, which made Lilly uncontrollably smirk at the little action.
"There has been evidence of a black witch residing in the castle." Whippers raised in the crowd, Lilly continued to smirk.
"And I have already deciphered the culprit, please come with me," Lilly couldn't keep herself from smiling ear to ear " ex-Queen, current peasant, Lilly White." Lilly immediately dropped her smile and replaced it with a frown.