Chapter 36. A clue to code?

Everyone exited the throne and went on their ways. Some were rushing to complete the tasks the Emperor assigned them. One of them were the ambassador. Along with Felix, he was the one who rushed out of the room.

"Evan, you did well, man. I'm proud that at least you learned something in Valencia." Peter clapped on his shoulder in encouraging manner, with a little stunned face. Evan rolled his eyes and lightly stepped back from the touch "Well, one needs to have common sense to analyze. Why am I even telling you that? Its not like you would understand?" Evan replied with a hint of sarcasm and irritation in his voice.

"Ouch, that hurt, man" Peter dramatically gasped with an offended look and a hand over his heart. "I don't know what you learned in Valencia but, I'm sure you definitely mastered your acting skills" Evan sighed out and Peter smiled wide. "I was always good at it, my friend. You wouldn't have noticed because you were always busy seeing your princess creepily." Peter voiced out with a mischiveous smile and and put on a creepy expression. He immediately shivered "If someone looks at me like that, I'm sure, I would slap them across their face." Peter continued while still smiling wide. Evan wanted to slap that smile out of his face. But, he had a reputation and image to maintain. So, he decided he would simply give a death glare to the person, who he calls his best friend.

Peter chuckled at the glare, unbothered as always, "We have an investigation to do" He said and his expression changed to serious in matter of seconds. Evan wouldn't admit but, sometimes Peter's change of expression and mood within seconds, creeped him out. Its a shame that no one noticed his antics, everyone thought Peter was sweet and is fully committed to his duty. Well, he was fully committed but, he was no where near sweet. That guy had serious issues with mind games.

Evan straightened up and started for the door, peter slowly trailing behind him. As they were walking, peter noticed a troubled expression on Evan's face. He wanted to ask but, they were currently in Palace and he has to keep his distance. Even though, they were best friends, inside the palace they had important roles. Peter made a mental note to ask Evan as soon as they get out.

The best friends duo made their way towards the entrance of the palace and were defending down the steps. Two horses were waiting for them at the end of the stairs. When they reached the bottom of the steps, they made their way towards each horses. They were their own. Evan went up to the side of his horse and smiled while kissing the horse's neck. "You look beautiful" He muttered out silently while petting its mane. He horse neighed a bit and his smile grew wider. "Let's get going, Stella."

Evan's horse was a gorgeous black horse. She goes by the name Stella. Its black mane was silky and was long which flowed gracefully with the wind. When its under sunlight or moonlight, the mane would almost be shining and made it shine the most. He was given this horse when he was going to learn in City Valencia. His father took him to the stable to pick his own horse and he still remembered how excited he was to get his own horse. As soon as, he looked at Stella, he at once knew this one was his. It was like a love at first sight scene. He didnt even spare any other horses a glance and demanded that he wanted only this one. She was stunning and shined out so, he thought of the name Stella for her. A stellar name for a stunning horse.

He mounted her and softly petted her mane again, to which the horse gave him a neigh in return. Peter also mounted his own horse, named Gabe. It was dark brown horse with a mane of color light shade of brown. It suited peter a lot. They quickly made their way to their destination, the Marque's house.

After sometimes, they finally reached their destination and went up to the house. It was practically abandoned. The guards were still their for any suspicious activity in the surroundings. Today, the maids and all the workers in the house were called in for the investigation. The tied their horses to the nearby tree and went to the entrance of the house. The guards at the front bowed to the prince and again stood their guard.

They made their way up to the porch and Evan realized that the house looked much worse than before. The stale stench of blood still lingered and the blood stain was not washed from the floor and was still present. The main guard, who was appointed to gather all the people working and some relatives of Samuel Cullen, came running up to the duo. He quickly bowed his head with them reciprocating the gesture. "Your highness, everyone close to official Samuel Cullen has arrived, along with the workers of the house." He informed them.

Evan nodded and Peter spoke up "The maids who cooked their meals are there?" The guard nodded without hesitation. Peter and Evan looked at each other and nodded at the same time. Time for some crazy interrogation with people.

....

Back to the time when Emperor dismissed the royal court:

Felix broke out in a sprint and made his way to his room in full speed. He almost tripped at the threshold of his door but, quickly scrambled to the table he had in his room. It was his work table, thats what he likes to call it.

He quickly opened his drawer and pulled out a paper. It was the code that they found. He wrote it down on a paper so, that he could decode it. The letter was currently with Emperor for safety purposes. But, it was mostly because his uncle, Alexander also liked to solve the puzzles or riddles. So, he might also be figuring out the code.

He carefully observed the characters and sorted out the similar things. When he heard of what the ambassador was saying this idea popped up in his head. As the goods were exchanged in the hands of different traders, why not the letter is written by two people. Well, more like why not it can be written with two languages or codes combined.

He set to work starting out with the letters and the numbers and the symbols. Somehow, he knew the letters and numbers and the symbols were connected. There was a possibility that the letters were replaced by the numbers and symbols. Someone, cleverly designed this. All he has to do now is figure out. He knew this was an assumption but, something was better than nothing. They only had this letter so, might as well concentrate Hus attention on this. Also, he decided after getting an overall idea and at least a little confirmation, he will tell his uncle about it. Then, they both can work on it. Alexander was also very curious and genius puzzle solver. Felix was damn sure, his uncle was also currently working on the code. After all, he learned all these from his uncle.

He smirked to himself, no matter how clever they maybe, Felix always had to way to sort the puzzles and codes.