Soren did not run. Princes did not run. Commanders did not run. Sentinels did not run unless the walls were falling.
But when Kael appeared at the end of the corridor with blood on his gauntlets and a look he had never worn before—Soren moved.
Not running.Not walking.Something in between—a lethal, unstoppable stride that made servants flatten themselves against the walls.
Kael didn't bow. He didn't kneel.He just said, quietly:
"She's gone."
For a heartbeat, nothing existed.
Then the world narrowed to a single point of fire beneath Soren's ribs.
"Explain," he said.It came out a whisper.A dangerous, quiet whisper Kael had heard only once before.
"We found signs of a struggle," Kael said. "In the infirmary."
Soren's jaw clenched.
"Where is she now?"
Kael shook his head once—sharp, pained."No exit route. No trail. Whoever took her didn't go through the main halls."
Soren inhaled—slow, icy."Then they used the tunnels."
Kael said nothing, which was answer enough.
Soren turned away from him and slammed a hand into the stone wall.
The wall cracked.
Kael didn't flinch.
"She disobeyed?" Soren asked, though he already knew.He could feel it—Elena's stubbornness, her curiosity, her absolute disregard for danger where it concerned answers.
Kael nodded once."She went to the prisoner, I think. The one from Kharath."
A cold, murderous calm settled over Soren.
"The Empire," he said, voice flat. "They took her."
Kael hesitated. "We cannot confirm—"
"They took her."
Those three words filled the corridor, the citadel, the beating heart in his chest.
The Kharath Empire had taken Elena.
Elena, who appeared from nothing under the rift's light.Elena, who had stared him in the eye on her first night in a world that wanted her dead.Elena, who infuriated him, disarmed him, resisted him, made him feel—
He cut the thought in half.
Feeling would not help her now.
He looked to Kael.
"Gather all eight Sentinels."
Kael nodded. "We'll be ready within the hour—"
"You have ten minutes."
Kael blinked once."Yes, Your Highness."
Soren turned, cloak flaring behind him as he strode toward the armory.
He felt it then—the absence in the citadel.A hollowed-out ache he didn't have a name for.
It sat beneath his ribs like a blade.
Elena was gone.Taken.By enemies older than his throne, crueler than winter.
He hadn't protected her.
His voice—low, sharp, shaking with something he refused to acknowledge—slipped into the empty hallway:
"Wherever they take you, Elena…I will burn the path between us to ash."
He reached the armory doors.
"And when I find you…"His hand tightened on the iron handle, knuckles white beneath leather.
"Gods help the men who touched you."