CHAPTER 458: THE FALL OF THE NOBLES

Shadows Before the Court

In the days that followed, the Barsons and Reuben’s closest allies were dragged before the court for questioning. Rumors spread like wildfire through the capital, whispers of betrayal and treason tainting their once-proud name.

But Duval, ever cunning, had already slipped away. His vast network of spies warned him of the coming storm, and before dawn on the morning after Zura’s attack, he vanished across the border into Westalis with his wife and children. By the time the city guard came searching, he was nothing but a ghost.

The Reckoning of the Barsons

The court was packed, heavy with silence. Heimdal stood at its center, a lone figure holding the weight of the kingdom’s justice. His voice, steady and deliberate, revealed truth after truth like hammer blows against stone. With measured calm, he laid out the evidence he had gathered piece by piece, each revelation tightening the noose around the Barsons’ necks.

Victor Barson, the family patriarch, listened in grim silence, but when Heimdal laid bare the assassination of Queen Astrid, his weathered features blanched. A lifetime of power and influence could not shield him now. He had never imagined Heimdal could reach so far back, dredging up sins buried in the shadows from years long ago

Then came the revelation that broke the chamber’s composure: evidence naming Hector Barson, his son, as the mastermind of the king’s poisoning. The plot, carried out through the queen herself, had left Heimdal bedridden for two long years.

At the sight of the parchments and testimonies brought against him, Hector collapsed into his seat. His breath came shallow, his shoulders sagged, his lips trembled, and in that moment he seemed less a proud lord than a man staring into the abyss, knowing the end of the Barson name was sealed.

The Judgment

The court’s judgment fell like thunder:

The herald’s voice thundered in the hall, echoing off the vaulted stone walls:

"Victor Barson, guilty of assassinating Queen Astrid, many years ago. Hector Barson, his son, and father to the former Queen Helga, guilty of attempting to murder the king by poison, leaving His Majesty gravely ill for two years. Both shall be executed by guillotine."

Gasps rippled through the court as the verdict continued:

"The collaborators shall be cast into Fengsel. As for the innocents among them—the aged, the men, the women, and the children—they are to be driven from the capital, exiled to the far borders of Westalis."

The gavel fell. The Barsons’ dominion ended not with battle, but with silence and shame.

Helga’s Breakdown

When the verdict reached Queen Helga, grief tore her apart. She screamed until her throat bled, smashing mirrors and tearing down tapestries, hurling objects everywhere.

When her former lady-in-waiting entered, she was horrified by the scene.

Helga’s chamber, once a place of regal splendor, had become a ruin. The silken drapes hung in tatters, mirrors were shattered into shards across the floor, and the scent of spilled perfumes clung like a ghost. She sat hunched at the center, her gown torn, her hair unkempt.

"My father... my grandfather... they promised..." Her voice rose suddenly, a wild cry. "They promised me a throne of gold! They could not die, Pamela. They promised!"

Pamela looked at her with pity. The once proud queen was reduced to a pitiful woman consumed by insanity.

She clawed at the floor, her nails bloodied, then pressed her face against the cold stone as though listening to voices only she could hear. The servants and guards whispered that she had been consumed by madness, but to those who watched closely, her eyes betrayed more: the raw wound of betrayal and loss, festering until her mind split under its weight.

When the medics rushed in to help her back to the bed, she clawed and thrashed like a beast in a cage. Only sedation stilled her frenzy, and her cries faded into silence

But during the night, her screams echoed through the palace halls. "Do not take them! Do not leave me alone!"

The guards stood rigid, refusing to meet one another’s eyes.

By morning, the storm had passed—but not the devastation. She awoke hollow, her eyes vacant, her mind shattered. The queen who had once commanded with fire and fury was gone, leaving behind only the husk of madness.

Helga, once queen, had been undone not by sword nor poison, but by humiliation, then the grief too vast for any crown to bear.

The palace grew quieter with each passing day, yet Helga’s cries still echoed through the halls. At times, she raged in frenzy, cursing at Astrid and Turik, and clawing at unseen enemies. At others, she fell into silence, sitting cross-legged on the cold floor, murmuring lullabies to the empty air.

The servants avoided her wing, for strange things were said to happen there. Candles guttered without wind. Doors creaked though locked. In the dead of night, some swore they heard her laughter drifting through the corridors—a brittle, broken sound that chilled the blood.

The king ordered that she be left in seclusion, guarded but undisturbed. Yet from time to time, Heimdal found himself pausing outside her chambers, his hand lingering against the door. He never entered. He could not. To see her was to confront the ruin his justice had sown. So he walked on, leaving her cries behind him. He was free of guilt. The Barsons deserved their fate.

Helga’s decline lingered like a shadow over all. Heimdal never spoke of her, but in council, when the voices of advisors rose too proudly, his gaze would darken. They would fall quiet, remembering the fate of the Barsons, and the madness of the queen who bore their name.

The people, too, remembered. In marketplaces and taverns, her story was told not as history, but as warning. None dared speak openly of her, but in whispers, her name became a curse, a symbol of ambition turned to madness. Mothers warned their children: Do not reach too high, lest you fall as Queen Helga did. A queen who had everything, yet lost herself to greed and then grief. A family that reached too far, only to be consumed by their own ambition.

Helga lived on, locked within her chambers, neither dead nor truly alive. And so she became more than a woman—she became a specter of the cost of greed and ambition.