Transmigrated Into The Body Of The Cursed Prince Wife
Chapter 203: Exposing The Witch Among The Royals

Chapter 203: Exposing The Witch Among The Royals

Ave was about to part her lips and speak again when she heard the loud voices of the crowd coming from below. Looking down, she noticed it was because the witches were being dragged to the execution center. There were many of them tied with chains and being dragged like animals, from adults to kids alike.

"Kill the witches! Kill them all!" The crowds were chanting angrily as they threw things at the witches, who looked resigned and calm; however, the children among them were terrified as they looked around the crowd in horror, and the sight reminded Ave of when she had watched the people of Gina get killed, and her fingers involuntarily balled into fists.

From the other side of the building where there was another balcony where the Emperor and Empress sat, the Emperor stood up and raised his hands to silence the crowd, and immediately, everywhere went quiet with everyone looking up at the balcony.

"People of Pendragon, listen to me! Today, we stand here together to protect our land from the evil that has tried to hide among us. These people have chosen a path that goes against everything we believe in—they have chosen darkness, causing harm and spreading fear among the innocent."

The Emperor looked around, his voice steady and strong as he saw how attentive the people were.

"These people betrayed our laws and our faith. They turned to forbidden, unnatural powers, breaking the trust we hold dear. They have hurt our families, threatened our peace."

The crowd murmured in agreement, some nodding, some even throwing stones at the sinful witches who had turned to darkness and brought nothing but bad luck to their lands; because of them, many people had died, and even some royals had gone missing. They brought nothing but misfortune!

"Today, justice will be served. Today, we take back our peace by ending the darkness they brought into our world. This is not just punishment; it is to protect every mother, father, and child in our Empire from the same fate!" the Emperor announced, his voice rising in anger as he glared down at the witches who looked back at him with hatred. He didn’t care about their resentment; they deserved to die for the losses they had caused him since the time he had become the ruler. He hadn’t just lost his mother to their kind, but had been cursed with an illness that was slowly killing him.

Now, because of them, he had to face the Banzai, whose daughter they couldn’t find no matter what they did, not to mention his first son’s condition. Alden was in a state between life and death because of them.

"So look upon them and remember: we will never allow such evil to live among us again. Justice is watching, and no one can escape it!"

The Emperor raised his hand, signaling the execution to begin, and the crowd responded with shouts of support, feeling reassured by his words as they all turned to the platform where the men in charge of the beheading were pulling the witches up one by one. Those who hadn’t reacted to the smoke had been left behind in the palace and would be given away as slaves to the other kingdoms, while the ones here were the ones who had tested positive as witches.

The first person to be dragged up the platform and forced to her knees was a beautiful teenage girl who was shaking all over and looking around in horror, searching for someone to save her. Ave’s hands tightened around her dress as she wished she could do something about this, but she knew she couldn’t, not unless she wished to be among the ones on the line to get killed.

Her eyes met Lucian’s from the distance, who stood at the side; she couldn’t see his face clearly from the distance, but she could tell he was trying to assure her with his eyes to stay calm. He held her gaze without looking away until the first girl was beheaded, and the people cheered happily and clapped.

Ave dared not look towards the head that rolled off the shoulder and was lifted up for the people to see; she dared not look away from Lucian’s eyes as he gave orders for the next person to be dragged up the platform. She heard the princesses around her cheering as well, but still she didn’t look. Not until the last person, who happened to be an elderly woman, was dragged up to the platform.

The elderly woman had no fear in her eyes, only resentment as she looked up towards the royals. She stared directly at Ave, her eyes narrowing as if she could see through her soul, before she turned to the Emperor.

"Isn’t this unfair of you, Alaric?!" she yelled at the top of her lungs for the royals to hear as she was forced to her knees. "You kill us for being different, yet you keep one of us among you!"

Those words not only caught the attention of the Emperor but also the Empress, who had been watching and enjoying the execution as she knew her brother had already taken a few of the witches to hide for their own use. But the witch’s words caught her attention because she had known since the day before the birthday ceremony that a witch lived among them, but none of the smoke had worked to fish that sneaky thing out.

The Emperor raised his hand to stop the man about to behead the woman and asked, "What do you mean I keep one of you?"

The woman’s eyes turned dark as she chuckled, and Ave, who had been watching, felt her blood go cold, and her hands clutching tightly to her dress began to shake. For a moment, she had pitied the witches, but it turned out they wouldn’t care to implicate her. Lucian had once told her witches could tell each other apart by looking at them, and she was certain this woman was talking about her.

"Aren’t you a bit too stupid to be asking me that question when she sits up there with your people?" the woman snorted as she glared at the Emperor, causing the people to gasp at her disrespect.

"How dare you speak to the Emperor like that?" rebuked one of the men on the platform, but she sneered and said, "I can speak to him as I please because he is not my Emperor. This witch who is among you will bring more trouble than Valarie has to you; she has been the cause of all your misfortune, not us. Kill her, you must, or you won’t have peace!"

At this point, Ave’s pity was completely gone and was replaced by a fear that paralyzed her and made her pale as she stared down towards the platform.

"Point her out," came the Emperor’s order.

"I will point her out to you, but only if you promise to spare my life. I will go far away from your land," she bargained as she stared up at the Emperor, who frowned upon her demand.

"Agree to her demand and kill her later," said Elara to her husband under her breath. She was more than willing to give anything to know who this witch was in the palace, because this witch was the reason her uncle had woken up after years of slumber, and with her, she could wake her father up as well and conquer the lands easily, as her father always had a solution for everything.

"We need to know the witch who is living under our roof; she is responsible for Princess Madeline’s disappearance and the ambassador, including Prince Lance. We can’t keep living without knowing who this person is," she urged him as he seemed reluctant to agree to the woman’s bargain.

Alaric thought about it for some time before he nodded his head and spoke up, "Very well. You have my word, point the witch out in exchange for your life."

Ave went as still as a rock as a shiver went through her spine when the woman agreed to point the witch out. She felt her stomach twist in nervousness, and her heart began to throb loudly in her ears to the point she could no longer hear anything around her but the ringing alarm bells in her head. Should she run? Even if she were to run, where would she go at this point, where the woman’s head was slowly turning towards her direction, and everyone was watching closely and waiting to see whom she would point at.

Everything happened so quickly that Ave didn’t see it coming when it did because she’d shut her eyes when the woman’s head finally stopped in their balcony’s direction. All she heard was a loud gasp and the shocked exclamations of the princesses around her, and for a moment she thought she had been found out until she heard,

"Oh my Lord! Why did he do that?!"

Why did who do what? Ave thought as she peeked open one eye to see what was going on, and when she saw it, she gasped as well and opened the other eye in surprised disbelief at the sight below.

On the platform where the woman had been kneeling and running her mouth earlier, she was still kneeling there; however, her head was off her shoulders, and Lucian stood above her with his sword held high after beheading her, with blood splashes on his clothes and face. His expression was dark and murderous, and his interference made everyone begin to question why he did it when the Emperor had stopped her execution.

"Lucian!" yelled the Emperor in displeasure as he slammed his fist against the rails and glared at his second son. "How dare you act without my orders?!"

Lucian dropped his sword and turned to his father with indifferent eyes, "She was running her mouth too much with lies, Your Majesty. She was stalling for time to draw a spell on the floor with her fingers." He gestured towards the ground where the woman’s hands were tied in front of her, but her fingers were able to move to draw a spell. In truth, she hadn’t drawn any spell; it was Lucian who had with his eyes before he beheaded her.

He wasn’t going to stand by and watch her get his wife into trouble right before his eyes. Lucian watched as his father’s displeasure fell away as he noticed the drawn spell on the ground, just like everyone standing around had. Meanwhile, the Empress’s eyes narrowed down on Lucian instead of the drawn spell, and her fingers clenched around the arm of her chair.

"The second prince saved us from her evilness!" chanted the crowd as they all believed she had been drawing a spell, and they all cheered for Lucian as the Emperor announced the end of the execution ceremony.

Ave let out the breath she didn’t realize she was holding back as everyone began to leave. She looked down at her hand and saw how they were still shaking. She had been saved by Lucian, she cried in her head as she watched him turn away and mount his horse leaving the execution grounds. He didn’t look at her, and she totally understood why. As she watched him ride away, her heart swelled with warmth and love for him, and she made a mental note to thank him specially when they returned home.