Roderich finally found Elizaveta's crown under his bed, three days after she had gone missing. He couldn't believe how it had evaded him before. Because he had checked there a thousand times. But the crown wasn't Elizaveta herself so maybe it made sense—that those laser blue terrors completely skipped over it. His wife didn't inhabit it. It didn't take a place on her angelic golden brown head.
Now there was an enormous man and his two serious faced sisters, sitting in the parlor, speaking to one another in a far off tongue.
King Roderich cleared his throat. And he took in the image of Elizaveta's tiny silver crown clasped in between the meaty fingers of Ivan Braginski, who was at least six and a half feet tall.
He cleared his throat too.
"So—" That mess of silver and diamond was set against the table before all four of them. As if Ivan had just moved one of those chess pieces into an attack against poor, desperate King Roderich. It sat there like a piece of foil, shoved all the way to back of his mouth.
"The Queen's missing. Do you have any idea of where she have gone?"
Roderich had to think hard for a second. Because now there were three sets of intense blue eyes, pinning him to the wall like a bloodied crucifix. The thought of his wife's location was like a phantom that screamed constantly into his ears. It drew scratches into his flesh and let him wake up in the middle of the night in a cold sweat. Because the woman wasn't there. And this entire thing was a brutal fiasco.
"Here—Why do not we start off with simple question?" Ivan lifted up those bear claws, dressed in leather. "How was The Queen before she disappeared? Happy? Sad?" He held out an arm, as if this was a magic trick, those large eyes opened wider than usual. The light from the window caught his light blond lashes.
"There's no need for you to speak to me that way. I'm aware you're not very orthodox, but now you've condescended to a King."
"Or-tho-dox. What this word mean?" That was Natasha. The smallest of the three.
"It's like…It's like…Katya. Can you explain?"
The middle sibling said something.
Ivan tried again. But now he said something in their language. Natasha nodded and all three pairs of blue were directed back to The King again.
"Well, I don't mean to condescend, but what can you be expected, Your Highness? Being the best is unorthodox. That's the right word, isn't it?" A pause and another cue from Ivan. "Bah. Anyway. You didn't hire Braginski and Company to just sit around and look at your lovely…brick walls. Any information you give about The Queen is good." Then there was a smile filled with no happiness whatsoever. It was blank and empty like a fresh sheet of paper.
"My wife has been miserable. She didn't leave a note or tell me where she was headed, if she did leave by herself. I'm not sure if she was abducted, or whose she's with. But I think Gilbert has something to do with it."
The King's pink lips sank together, compressed into a hard line.
"Gilbert, huh? So Gilbert is what? Your brother? A servant? A bottle of alcohol?"
"A servant."
"Wonderful! Why don't you tell me more about the servant Gilbert? Natasha, write it down. It's important."
You could tell Ivan enjoyed saying Gilbert. Just for the last syllable, he rolled the 'R' especially hard, as if flattening it with the rolling pin he kept in his throat for words like that.
Ivan's interest peaked in his eyebrows.
And King Roderich began to impart his knowledge about the servant Gilbert.
Natasha had her pen and paper.
"He was my wife's favorite and he lives, or rather lived, at the edge of the kingdom."
"What he looks like?" The smallest looked prepared to do a sketch.
"White hair with red eyes. Medium height. Poor…" But there was the possibility of that goddamned woman buying him new silks. It swelled up in Roderich's face and gave his entirety a pouty shade of red and a few drops of sweat.
"So let us say we find the servant Gilbert with The Queen. And if he really is with her, we will. What you want us to do?"
"What do you mean? Bring them both back here."
The man regarded The King with an ardent disbelief. A surprise that was birthed from The King's misuse of a great opportunity. Ivan licked his lips. He set his finger nails on the table, through the sturdy glove.
"Nothing? Well, if you change your mind, we have a few more days, for inspection. Is there anyone else who is…" It took a moment for the word to come. "Note worthy?"
"Not at the top of my head, no. But it could be anyone. Everyone knows how special she is to me."
"Believe me, there is no need to state it." Then, some foreign words directed to the other women, who packed up and left the room. "We're going to look at Gilbert. From what you say, he seem like the best criminal. We alert you as we go on. Salutations, Your Majesty."
And with that, the large man was gone, leaving Roderich with his brick walls and his golden telescope and his mind that was forming into an ugly steel cage.
There was nothing worth looking at but Elizaveta's empty garden. With the corpses of her butterflies and all those ugly black birds.
Braginski and Company found Gilbert's house.
They surveyed the area, with their piercing sapphire eyes and their notepads and pens kept close in hand, tearing the area apart particle by particle. Eventually, all three of them came to stand in the center of Gilbert's make-shift crate and found a small collection of golden brown hairs.
The very tip of Ivan's fingers selected at least three of those strands. The light from the window hit them, forcing them to shimmer even before such an unimpressed stare.
The sun picked up The Queen's highlights of blond.
"What color did the King say Gilbert's hair was?"
The hair was passed around so all three siblings could dissect it.
"This doesn't look white."
"That hair doesn't belong to Gilbert."
"Well—" Ivan placed the strand inside the palm of his hand, forcing it to perform that laser light show once again. It was like one of those brilliant minerals the miners pulled from the ground sometimes.
Ivan allowed his thought to dissipate before beginning a new one.
"I think we should go into town and ask about this Gilbert fellow. Then we'll report back to the King."
And that was exactly what Braginski and Company did. Each holding a piece of the Queen's scalp in their pockets. Like a pack of dogs hunting a pair of stupid rabbits.