Chapter 122: Looking for Me? - Riven's POV

Getting Raze back through the academy grounds without being seen was easier than it should have been. I expected to be stopped or to run across someone, but we didn’t. The alarm had done us a favor on accident. Every student was still locked inside their classrooms and security was spread along the perimeter, looking for the mysterious blur they had seen.

The east corridor was empty when we came through the service door. I kept Raze’s arm draped over my shoulder and his feet moving on instinct more than him deliberately doing it.

Callista held the doors. She didn't ask if I needed help with his weight. She just moved to wherever she was needed without being directed, and I tucked that away as another thing I was thankful for.

We made it to the car without incident.

Raze was conscious by the time I got him into the back seat, though conscious was doing a lot of work as a word. His eyes were open and tracking, which was more than he had managed in the woods, but he wasn't speaking and the color hadn't come back to his face. He looked like someone who had been wrung out and set down.

I knew that feeling too.

Callista slid into the back beside him without discussion, which left me in the front, and I pulled out of the academy grounds before any of the security wolves thought to question why the Alpha King's son was leaving during an active breach incident.

No one stopped us.

The drive to the mansion didn’t take long at all, probably because I never looked at how fast I was going. My demon had gone quiet in a way I hadn’t felt in a while. I was certain he was just watching and waiting to see what I’d do with this new information.

We are not your enemies. We are your curse. There is a difference.

I turned that over and over and couldn't find the angle where it made sense and also didn't change everything.

In the back seat, Callista said something low to Raze that I didn't catch. He responded in a murmur. She said something else, and he made a sound that was almost a laugh, short and exhausted, but there.

I glanced in the rearview mirror.

She was looking at him with a straight expression that she normally used when she was trying to be present with them. It wasn’t a performance at all, because she was always there for anyone who needed them. Though I had only gotten to experience it a little before sending her away, I had noticed her doing it in the hallways the entire time we were separated.

Raze looked back at her with a soft smile as she tried to make sure he was okay.

I looked back at the road.

The mansion gates opened before I reached them, which meant someone had been watching the camera and I had a feeling our father already knew we were coming.

I pulled through and parked, and before I had the engine off, the front doors of the mansion were opening. I got out and helped Raze out of the back. Callista appeared on his other side, and the three of us made it up the front steps with his arms slung over our shoulders and through the doors before I let myself look up.

Ronan was standing at the end of the entrance hall, just as I knew he would be.

He was still dressed from whatever he had been doing before we arrived. It must have been something formal, because he was in his nicest suit with a dark burgundy tie. He almost looked regal for a moment with his hands clasped behind his back and an expression that gave nothing away. His eyes moved from me to Raze, then to Callista. Something moved through his expression so fast that I couldn’t track it.

"Bring him to his room," he said, his voice even. "There are people waiting who can help him."

"There are people waiting," I repeated slowly. "You knew we were coming."

"I knew he had gotten out. I've been trying to get ahead of it since this morning." His gaze moved to me. "Riven—"

"We'll talk," I said sharply. "But that’ll be after he’s settled in his room and I know that he’s okay.”

There was a moment of silence as Ronan looked at me for longer than was comfortable. Then he nodded once, relenting.

Two staff members appeared from the side hall, and between them and me, we got Raze upstairs. He didn't fight it, because he was too depleted to fight anything. By the time we reached his room and got him onto his bed, his eyes were already closing again, as if he was ready to take a very long nap. I stood over him for a moment, watching his breathing even out into something that meant he was asleep.

The demon was gone from his face entirely and even the veins had retreated a little. He just looked like my brother.

I turned and found Callista standing in the doorway, watching me with an expression that said she understood what this moment cost without me having to explain it.

"He'll be alright for now," she breathed.

"For now," I agreed.

I crossed the room and pulled the door closed softly behind us. We stood together in the upstairs corridor for a moment before either of us moved. The mansion was quiet around us. Afternoon light came through the tall windows at the end of the hall and lay in long, pale strips across the floor.

“Should we try to check—” I started, then stopped.

“Maybe. But you said you’d talk to your father.”

I nodded, but moved, knowing that I’d head to his study. We moved toward the stairs. I kept my steps even, unhurried, the way I moved through the academy when I didn't want anyone paying attention to where I was going. It was no different here.

We reached the landing and turned toward the south wing where Ronan's study sat behind a door that was always closed and locked. There wasn’t a time that it hadn’t been, but I hoped just this once that it would be unlocked.

I was ten feet from it when his voice came from behind us.

"Looking for me?”