An Eternal Cure: 1

By Safa Keira

"She hated the Scholar as much as she hated the dark sky on a fine day of celebration."

 

Safa Keira brings her debut—The story of once-lost chance but having one last time to fix it all together. However a question lies, will the Queen take the one last chance or will it get too late?

 

The Queen of Ptholer is in misery. Her country is under the mercy of an unknown witch and their curse. And there is only one possible solution to put an end to the rampant fever that has been disrupting the balance of her country—the eternal cure. 

 

Unbeknownst about the identity of the person to the Queen, a Scholar is invited to the palace to procure a remedy as soon as possible. Now she will have to fight more battles than just the turmoil ruling her kingdom, work with the woman with whom she once had a forbidden history with and now despises while battling against herself and the hurt from the past she deliberately left behind. 

 

As her quest for the eternal cure continues, unexpected revelations tear apart the lies she had believed for over three decades.

 

 

• Language: English
• Publisher: Safa Keira
• Release date: Jul 25, 2022
• ISBN: 9798201475390

Safa Keira

Safa Keira has been writing books ever since she was thirtteen. Books always had a positive and heart warming impact on her. She prefer fictions over movies.

Book preview

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Part One

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A flame that was once fiercer than the blaze

The Journal

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The Queen, for a hollow ten years, had been feeling the same. From dusk to dawn, her own thoughts troubled her like the buzz of a beetle resounding in your ears while you’re at serious work. She thought journaling her thoughts while stuck in a pensive mood would help her concentrate on other consequential matters, matters that concern her far less and more about the state of her kingdom. This night, she began her entry with a phrase :

°°°

Pain ends in tranquility. Mine does not. No matter how tranquil I may remain for the rest of my life, I would only end up complaining about the idea of staying silent and calm and the time I had so deliberately lost.

My pain did not end with anything. It is there, hurting more and more like an unhealed wound. And it won’t heal anytime soon, I am sure of that.

I have nobody. To love, to share, to support, to care. I am alone in this world yet I am a constant companion to power. I twist it my way, I rewind it if I feel like it, I reshape it just the way it suits me. But I became a cat, thinking the world is dark when I close my eyes. My own belief betrayed me. I have lost myself to something I so desperately craved once. And I have no shoulder to lean against, no hands to wipe off my tears or any chest I could bury myself into. I am alone. Lost. This tranquil creates my pain. But I am yet to become numb by it.

I am recognized by title and fame. I am nobody important.

°°°

Her entry ended there—once again—in unfathomable trenches of loneliness. But she was trying to make every moment a blessing. Life is to be lived.

The Queen shut her journal and secured it beneath her armpit. She walked over to her bookshelf, an array of thick bound-leather book jackets engraved with letters on their spines stuffed on each section. She  pulled out a thick, children’s story book and opened it. It was a book that could only pique the interest of kids on the outside with all the vibrant labels and funny pictures. The Queen had made sure appearances remained deceptive—somewhat similar to what she had been practicing on herself for years. On the contrary, it was yet to become easier.

The smell of old books swarmed into her senses, the yellowed pages were thumbed at the edges. Inside the book was a neatly-cut hollow space in the shape of a rectangle, with the measurements that were custom-made for only a single book, the Queen’s journal. She gently fixed the journal into the empty space like fixing the final piece of a jigsaw puzzle to form the final picture and swiped the book back among the others on the shelf.

A Curse Unknown

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Many times, if it were not for those little keys that went missing since the day the minister could remember, it’d have unsurprisingly been put to use. But they had been forgotten anyway and there wasn’t much of a cure to be explored in the lockers for which the keys had been lost. However the one true cure was that : the eternal cure. Because that was what the bards in the town sang, and all of the folks in the village :

°°°

Little misery we had in the beginning;

Minor itches, a cough or a two and twice a sneeze a day,

And when there was no way to its ceasing;

It became clear a curse has been cast difficult to keep at bay.

We need a cure, our health had lost its allure,

We need a remedy, a medicine, the eternal cure.

°°°

The simple but efficacious poem had reached the deafest ears and the stupidest minds that their country has been cursed by a powerful witch and she will not step back until, until ... Well, no one knew. But that was out of the question then. What the people wanted to know was how the curse had befallen without even their faintest knowledge to it.

The Queen was beyond furious. She took a stroll in her favorite palace gardens but little did it to lessen her anger. Whose fault was it anyways? The Queen does not know, neither does her courtiers. But they could be lying. And obviously, this curse must be a consequence of someone’s carelessness. No one knew who irked the witch. And it had frustrated the Queen more. No one knows!

If only someone had known.

If only just they knew. Even just an inkling of it.

The Queen was brilliant, as all queens were. She could’ve mapped out the most possible answer to it but only if someone knew.

She paced back and forth, for that kept her thinking proper. Her courtiers were fabulously stupid. They could not devise any good ideas except to leave the kingdom as soon or to pay no attention to the fever that had affected the kingdom. No, not stupid. They were frightened, frightened out of their wits.

The Queen felt powerless, she had no supernatural power like those witches do except for her diplomatic skills and intelligence.

She had tried to sort out the souring mystery of the fever ever since the news of people showing symptoms of a rare disease (which is discussed among the people to potentially spread from one person to another) had broken out from an oblique part of the country. And it was spreading like wildfire.

It didn’t occur to the chief minister that a good batch of investigators should be sent forehand to bring up any further action all the while promoting someone to do a brief study of the situation. The Queen was both disappointed and irritated with the absurdity of her chief minister.

She pinched the bridge of her nose.

Your majesty, the royal scholar has arrived, one of the four soldiers who marched to the garden announced.

Good, she said, Give them all the best assistance and hospitality they shall ever receive.

It shall be made, the soldier assured with a light bow.

And also, the Queen paused, biting her bottom lip. She always reminded herself to think twice and well before she spoke, so she took more seconds of brief internal judgment of her strategy. She gulped down whatever she had in mind, replacing it with something else.

She said : Ask them to study about the fever as soon as they’ve made themself comfortable. This is the Queen’s order.

Yes, your majesty.

She hated the scholar, as much as she hated a dark sky on a fine day of celebration. But this circumstance called for a ruler, not a person who held personal grudges. The Queen smelled a tough future ahead with the scholar in the palace.

She hoped there would be an end for it all.

The story in oblique verses

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Part One

The little girl grew into a little woman, with greater duties and goals,

Her heart was as fierce as a lion and her mind as clear as the sky.

People crowded to see her, traveled across borders, damaging their soles,

They waited every second to see flashes of her skill until she said goodbye.

The story in oblique verses

---

Part Two

She grew from a beginner into an expert, with tough endeavors and dedication,

Her emotions were as mercurial as temperatures and her knowledge as deep as the ocean.

The subjects, adults to children, cheered their round of approval upon her coronation,

Since that day, as the ruler served the country, they had returned the favor in equal devotion.

The Queen and the Scholar

---

The Scholar was unhappy ever since she had laid her first step into the palace. Old memories surged into her mind, floating all over her consciousness. She knew she shouldn’t come here. But then she found herself agreeing to the royal paperworks and signing the agreement in white flashes of memories. More remorseful feelings surfaced, adding to her list of dreadful insecurities. The Scholar was good at keeping knowledge intact but not with bottling up all her emotions.

She was irresistibly furious, sad, and broken all at the same time while bordering a breakdown. She wished time would prove otherwise. The Scholar believed that shielding herself and her emotions with something impenetrable might keep her steady. And she had tried building something of the same quality for a few years. It was yet to work out. So she relaxed on the bed.

The soft quilt reminded her of the days she slept on the cold gravel stones in the slums only to find her back aching in the morning. She  could  still smell the mixed stench of decaying wood furniture, seeping of ugly gray water through the sewers, and the litter messing up in the streets. That was a short story, but extremely hurtful to process. Stories of people like her were always irrelevant and short, stories people add as subplots to either make the story more intriguing or dramatic or even a fairytale. They never focused on how much lives like Rosé’s had been affected by the condition they are constrained to live with, of the tiny, incandescent moments of happiness and hope and the inexorable grief a destitute life could only deliver. She was not a hero, like the Queen was. Neither was she a well known woman in the society. But knowledge saved her somehow from living the once-inevitable life although not entirely from her misery she bumped into on her way by accident.

She blinked at the elegant architecture of the ceiling. Her thoughts were neither about the design or the beauty of it. She was thinking about someone else.

The Queen.

She could not stop thinking about the Queen, about meeting her, about discussing possible cure and more expectations out of the fever with her. Her.

The Queen had ordered her to indulge herself in a brief study of the fever, which she had already done brilliantly before she took off to the palace from home by the royal carriage. Rosé was dutiful in her work. She never was lazy—she could not afford to be. Has the Queen thought so indolent of her?

The Queen. The mere thought of seeing her sent shivers down the Scholar’s spine. The Queen everyone loved and the Scholar people looked down upon. Heck, people didn’t even know her until now. Even the palace staff and ministers and advisers, for starters. Surely, they would not have forgotten her face even though it had been a long time and the Scholar had grown much over the years. She had become an adult. Her breasts had grown but had started to droop now that she’s nearing her early thirties. Her skin has sagged and her lashes are not that thick and beautiful anymore. Her once chubby cheeks her lover used to place soft feathery kisses on weren’t chubby anymore through the tough course of years she had to endure.

A pathetic story. She wished it would end soon for she was pathetic enough for herself. Wishing for a happy ending would mean she had been dreaming all along, let alone thinking of a slightly better way for her story to end.

The story in oblique verses

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Part Three

A fervent yet desperate prayer flew across the kingdom,

Of the fever and the lives forfeited under its cruelty.

The Queen observed her reign edging near doomdom,

She ordered necessary measures to maintain her country’s vitality.

The story in oblique verses

---

Part Four

The once great advisors so well spoke  of, became blunt and brainless,

People, frightened and mad, ran across the streets with verses of futility.

Families watched and cried over their loved ones die helpless,

The Queen ordered someone to be brought to the palace and put into utility.

Before the Queen

---

Never had she been this nervous. Not ever. The Queen twiddled a nice braid of golden threads of her favorite silk over and over. She would have to face the Scholar eventually. Yet, it had been a long time since the last time she saw her, and it wasn’t a good moment to reminisce about. To add further complication, deep within her heart, there was an inexplicable longing keeping itself away from the spotlight because she didn’t want everything to be dragged into her head all at once. She quelled them deeper into the coldest parts of her heart.

Your majesty, one of the palace guards’ voices, interrupting her thoughts. The scholar is here.

The Queen’s heart whimpered, of pain and anxiety. She shut out all the vaults into her heart. She was a queen, rulers didn’t reveal their inner self in diplomacy. It was all diplomacy. Either in the name of it or for the benefit of it and sometimes both.

Your majesty, said the Scholar. There was a tremble in her voice as she faltered in her curtsey. The Queen gestured to sit opposite her.

There. That’s easy. It’s not too difficult. She thought to herself.

It seems we had found a brilliant Herbologist in all of Ptholer. I hope you find your stay here comfortable while you work on finding the cure. You will do it, I presume? The Queen asked in her authoritarian tone, something that had become her signature tone for years. She could see the Scholar was startled upon hearing the sharp edge of her tone.

Of course, it would be my honor and most significant duty, your majesty, she replied, not bringing her eyes to the face of the Queen. She was staring into the pristine floor and trying her best not to stammer.

And what— The Queen paused, realizing her voice quavered just the slightest. She frowned at the woman on the other side; weak with a certain aura around her, protecting her from all the darkness. —is your name?

There was a momentary interlude before the Scholar began : It is Rozanika, your majesty. Rozanika Benff. Mostly called Rosé, however. The Scholar’s lips quivered when she spoke of her name. Emotions stirred in her eyes. But it only lasted for a short time.

Very well, Rosé. Let me know about your plans, if any, that you would indulge yourself to share with me.

Rosé took another momentary pause. She blinked once, twice ...

The air was eerie and packed with viscous coils of tension and lies. Although aware of it, both of them were busy pretending otherwise. There shall be a cure, an effective one. What we need is time.

I’m afraid that is what we are running out of.

Yes. But we do have this option at hand.

The Queen raised a brow, her keen eyes solely focused on Rosé’s. And what may that be?

It is a rare and special medicine produced from three important ingredients, and they’re few and far between to find, she said. One : Shadrins flowers. Two : Pollen from the rows of flowers in the Spring stream. And Three : Honey collected by the bees of WildWax.

Shadrins, Pollen from Spring stream and WildWax, you say? The Queen pondered over the possibility of collecting all the mentioned ingredients. Her calculation predicted that finding all the three was close to impossible, but not that close to completely shut the case.

It seems difficult.

It is, your majesty. I have been hearing there could be an alternative if the actual culprit for enraging this witch is found.  What I had just suggested could be just another option, one I’m less certain about nevertheless.

I see. I’ve sent people from the palace in search of the same goal but so far, The Queen shook her head, lips turned down hopeless.