"Fine! When can you write it?" Ellena crossed her arms on her chest.

Suddenly, she had a plan.

Emmelyn might try to trick her to let her go, but Ellena had a plan of her own. She would get Emmelyn's confession to seal the deal, but she would also need to do something else.

Ellena looked at the woman she hated with all her heart and noticed her bulging tummy. How far was she in now? Almost seven months in? Or more?

"I will only write it after I get out of here and feel safe," said Emmelyn. "Not before."

Ellena's brows twitched. She suddenly had a plan, but she needed to wait a little bit. If all went according to her plan, then she could stop worrying about Emmelyn for good.

Not only that, but she would also use it to her advantage and win Prince Mars' heart. Gosh.. this was so good that her icy heart was brimming with happiness.

She was glad she came to see Emmelyn and talked to her. Now, she got another idea to execute.

"Fine," Ellena replied. "I will find a way to get you out of here and then you will make that letter. If you dare to lie to me, I will make sure you will regret it."

She intentionally turned her gaze to Emmelyn's bulging stomach. Even though she didn't say anything, it was obvious that she was threatening Emmelyn with her unborn child.

If Emmelyn dared to cross her, Ellena wouldn't hesitate to kill her baby. Someone who could kill Queen Elara in cold blood, wouldn't hesitate to kill an innocent child.

This made Emmelyn shudder. She knew Ellena was crazy. She was truly rotten to the core.

"You are not human," Emmelyn gritted her teeth.

SLAP!

"I dare you to throw me another insult," Ellena slapped Emmelyn hard. "Next time, I won't be so merciful."

Then, she turned around and laughed, leaving Emmelyn in her prison.

Emmelyn rubbed her reddened cheek. Ellena's slap didn't hurt her. She was infuriated by Ellena's wickedness and the disgust and hatred in her heart trumped all other feelings she was having.

"Someday, I will make you pay. I will wipe the smirk off your ugly face, you wench!" Emmelyn said to herself. She imprinted this incident in her memory. Someday, she would come back stronger and she could make Ellena pay for her crimes.

But until then, she had to stay alive.

***

Emmelyn planned to write her confession over a secret letter. She hoped Mars would be able to see her real letter when this confession reached him.

After Emmelyn thought hard for a long time, she realized that any letter she would send to the crown prince would be destroyed and they could never reach him.

That's why she decided to make sure that Mars would receive her letter. The only way to do that was to trick Ellena into thinking she would get her confession.

If Ellena kept her letter with her 'confession' in it, she would not destroy it. Somehow, she would make sure that the prince got the letter and read it.

Jokes on you, Ellena, Emmelyn said to herself. She would write a confession, but at the same time, she would write the truth with the invisible lemon ink.

First, she would need to talk to someone and have them send her message to Lily. She still needed the help of an ally in the capital before she could escape.

KNOCK

KNOCK

Emmelyn was moved from her reverie. She was so busy thinking about strategy, that she didn't realize it was already lunchtime.

She looked at the door and saw two maids came with a tray each in their hands. They brought her food and medicine from the royal physician.

"My lady, this is your meal for today," said the older maid respectfully. She arranged the trays on the small table next to Emmelyn's bed.

"Hm.. thank you," said Emmelyn half-heartedly. She looked at the two maids and tried to assess them. Should she ask for their help to call Mr. Vitas or Lily?

Well.. maybe they will be too scared to do what she asked.

Unless...

Yeah, unless Emmelyn pretended to be sick and asked for the physician to come. Fine. Emmelyn knew lying and acting were things that she was quite good at.

So, she would trick these maids to call Mr. Vitas by pretending to be in pain.

She walked slowly to her bed and got ready to eat her lunch when suddenly her movement became wobbly and she winced in pain.

"Aah..." Emmelyn faked her shriek and fell to the bed with a paled face. She managed to grab the headboard and supported herself before she touched the mattress hard.

"My lady, are you okay?" The maids immediately went into a panic. They were terrified if anything bad happened to this woman since they would be blamed.

Both rushed to Emmelyn's side and checked her condition. The princess shook her head and took a deep breath.

"I lost my balance just now," she whispered. "My stomach is so painful..."

"Oh, no..."

The two maids exchanged glances.

'What should we do?' One of them mouthed her question.

'Maybe we should call the royal physician?'

"My lady, please wait here, I will immediately get Mr. Vitas here," said the younger maid. She nodded to her friend and made a sign that she would be the one to go. Her colleague nodded back.

"I will stay here with you, my lady," said the older maid.

"Uf... thank you," said Emmelyn.

She was glad that her trick worked.

"How are you feeling now?" the old maid asked her again.

Emmelyn pretended to look pitiful. She closed her eyes and took a deep breath several times. When she opened her eyes, she said, "I feel slightly better."

"Oh, that's good," the maid was relieved. "Maybe you should eat your food. Pregnant women need to eat a lot of nutritious food, otherwise, they might faint."

Emmelyn saw the regular food that they used to serve her. She wasn't hungry and didn't have any appetite, but she knew she had to eat for Harlow.

She also saw two bowls of potion next to the bread. She didn't remember Mr. Vitas gave her two potions before. Usually, she only received one bowl of potion with her meals.

Why were there two now? What's in the other one? She was wondering.

"That's for the baby," the maid explained when Emmelyn asked. "Since you are now in your third trimester, the baby will need extra supplements to help with the delivery. Mr, Vitas had prepared those from last week and told us to serve them to you starting today."

Hmm.. that made sense, Emmelyn thought. Emmelyn trusted Mr. Vitas. The old man cared so much about her baby that she begged the king to spare Emmelyn's life.

She still remembered the moment when Mr. Vitas and John the butler dropped to their knees and pleaded for Emmelyn's life.

Ahh.. she owed them her life. She hoped she would survive her ordeal and lived to reward their service.

Emmelyn finished her meal and her medicine and sat to rest. She really hoped to see Mr. Vitas soon.

Half an hour later.

"Oh...."

Suddenly, Emmelyn felt an excruciating pain in her stomach.

.

.

>>>>>>

From the author:

I know it is so infuriating to see someone as wicked as Ellena can do so much evil and Emmelyn is stuck without a way to save herself. She keeps trying though, despite her lack of support and being alone in the enemy's den.

It will be easy to solve the conflict in two chapters and have Ellena punished... hahahaha, but how boring the story will be? I know it's hard to see injustice and sometimes we just want to jump into the story and smack the wicked people. I promise the book HAS A HAPPY ENDING and it will be so rewarding.

We haven't even met Maxim and find out the source of the curse that befell Emmelyn. So, please, be patient and follow the journey.

Btw, I just read something today and it got me enraged too. Do you know Alexandre Dumas, a famous French writer who wrote "The Count Of Monte Cristo" and "The Man In The Iron Mask"? (Leonardo DiCaprio was super handsome in the movie adaptation of the latter).

His father, Thomas Alexandre Dumas, was the first mullatto (half black-half white) general in the Napoleon's army. He was tall, handsome, formidable, and feared by many.

He won many wars that even Napoleon felt threatened by him. The petty Napoleon finally exiled Dumas (which later became the inspiration for the book his son wrote, "The Count Of Monte Cristo").

I was so curious about this general and found out that he was the son of a French aristocrat and a black slave woman from a French colony. His father brought him to France and spared no expenses to give him the best education and military training, that he later could rise in the military rank and became a famous general.

So, I was wondering what happened to his mother. My finding immediately sent me into a rage. So, apparently, the aristocrat man bought the slave-woman when he was living in that colony and made her his concubine. She was said to be very beautiful.

Over the years, she bore him several daughters and a son. Once the nobleman decided to return to France, he brought only his son with him and sold the slave-woman and their daughters to another man.

Just let it sink in. He sold not just the woman who acted like his wife for years, but also his daughters birthed by her.

I don't really have a point in sharing this story.. just feeling extremely sad at how horrible many women had it in the past.