Chapter 17 THE KING’S ANGER.

Chapter 17 THE KING’S ANGER.


Draven’s POV

The feeling of her in my arms was the only thing keeping me from feeling like I was at the verge of madness, even as my wolf paced around my mind making me restless.

And restlessness makes me reckless.

Seren was light—too light. She felt small. Not like the strong willed woman I once knew.

It broke me. To see her this way. For not finding her sooner. For not protecting her harder.

How do I ever get over this?

I reached out with my soul, searching for the girl who had looked at me with  fire in her eyes and told me she was the storm, but I found only a wall. A black ashened wall.

They hadn't just taken her. They had hollowed her out.

I stepped into the carriage, the interior smelling of expensive leather and the faint, lingering scent of her jasmine perfume—a scent that now felt like a mockery. 

I sat down, settling her on my lap, my arms winding around her with a desperation that I felt in my soul.

She flinched.

It was a small movement of her pulling away  her shoulder from my chest, but it felt like a rash against my skin.

My wolf let out a low, mournful howl in the back of my mind. He wanted to lick her wounds; he wanted to tear the world apart until she looked at us with recognition.

"Seren," I whispered, my voice sounding like a stranger’s.

She didn't look at me. She stared out the frosted window, her eyes vacant and terrifyingly blue. 

There was no recognition. No love. No hate. Just the  detached gaze of a survivor who had decided that the only way to live was to stop feeling.

"The healers will fix this," I said, more to myself than to her. I grabbed a furs-lined blanket and tucked it around her, my fingers brushing the raw, purple rings around her wrists where the iron had bitten deep.

Every mark on her skin was a death warrant I hadn't finished signing yet.

"Don't," she rasped.

I froze. "Don't what, love?"

"Don't pretend you care about the skin when you’re the one who put the target on it."

She finally turned her head, looking at me. It wasn't the look of a mate. It was the look of a prisoner evaluating her jailer. "You keep calling me yours. You keep talking about a bond. But all I remember is the cold. I remember the needle. I remember the way they said my name—the same way you do. Like it’s something you own."

My wolf paced. Angry and demanding but I forced it back, my jaw aching from the effort of containing the monster.

"I don’t own you, Seren. I chose you. The universe chose you for me."

"The universe has a cruel sense of humor, then," she said, her voice devoid of any emotion. She leaned her head back against the seat, closing her eyes. "I’m tired, King. If you’re going to kill me or use me, just get it over with. The waiting is the only part that still hurts."

King. Not Draven. Not even 'you.' Just a title. A cold, title I now wish I didn’t own.

I watched her fall into  sleep. Even with her eyes closed, she was haunted. Her fingers twitched, her breath hitching every few seconds as if she were still expecting the needle, the pain.

I reached out, my thumb hovering over her cheek, aching to touch her, but I pulled back. I was a man who took what he wanted. I was a man who had built an empire on the ruins of my enemies’ lives. I had never known the meaning of the word restraint until I met a girl who made me want to be a better man while simultaneously making me want to burn the world to ash.

I looked at her, and the darkness in my soul curdled.

I didn't just want her back. I wanted to own the very memories they had stolen. I wanted to reach into her mind and graft myself back onto her soul so deeply that she could never forget me again, even if she wanted to.

By the time the carriage crossed the bridge into the High Keep, the sun was a bleeding over the horizon. But the palace didn't look like the sanctuary I had envisioned.

The banners of the Southern Mages were flying from the parapets.  smoke rose from the central courtyard—necromantic fires.

"Sire," the guard called out, his voice trembling. "The gates... they’ve been sealed with Void-wards. We can't get through."

I shifted Seren into the corner of the seat, making sure she was covered, before I stepped out into the biting wind.

The palace was crawling with them. 

The High Mages had moved in the moment I had turned my back to hunt for Seren. They had taken my throne, my city, and now they stood between me and the only bed where my mate could rest.

The lead Mage, a man named Valerius’s successor, stood on the balcony. "The King returns! Step down, and we might let the girl live out her days in the asylum."

I didn't answer. I didn't need to.

I felt the shift beginning—the real one. Not the physical transformation into the wolf, but the psychological descent into the thing I had spent twenty years trying to suppress.

I walked toward the gate, each step cracking the cobblestones beneath my boots. 

“I’m the only villain who will ever love you this much.”

I had said those words to her in the carriage. It was time to prove them.

"You took my kingdom," I said,  "You took my son’s mind. And you tried to erase the only thing in this world that makes me human."

I reached the gate. The Void-wards hissed, I placed my bare hands on the iron bars.

"But you made one mistake," I hissed, looking up at the Mage.  "You left me alive."

I tore the gates off their hinges.

The sound of shrieking metal filled the air as I tossed the gate aside like they were made of parchment not iron. I didn't wait for my guards. I didn't wait for a plan.

I walked into my palace,  my hands ending lives before the Mages could even finish their incantations.  I was a monster. And I enjoyed every second of it because every drop of their blood was a payment for the tears Seren had shed in that ice-cell.

I reached the throne room, the doors swinging open to reveal the High Circle. They were prepared. A dozen of them, their hands joined in a ritual of suppression.

"Down!" they chanted.

The feeling of a thousand tons of gravity slammed into me. I fell to one knee. 

They were using a Soul-Bind—a ritual that used the life force of the kingdom to crush the Alpha.

"You are nothing without your anchor, Draven!" the High Mage shouted. "And your anchor is broken!"

I felt the pressure. It was trying to flatten my lungs, trying to stop my heart. I looked at the door, thinking of Seren sitting in that carriage, empty and cold.

She is not my anchor, I thought, a smile pulling at my lips. She is my reason.

I didn't fight the gravity. I absorbed it. I let the darkness of the Soul-Bind flow into me, mixing it with the fury of my wolf.

I stood up.

The Mages gasped, their chant faltering.

"My turn," I whispered.

I didn't use magic. I released a growl so deep that the Mages’ eardrums shattered instantly. They collapsed, clutching their heads, their ritual turning back on them, consuming their minds.

I didn't kill the High Mage. I walked over to him, my boot pressing into his chest until I heard the ribs begin to break.

"The ritual," I rasped. "The one to restore a shattered mind. Give it to me."

"It... it requires a sacrifice," the Mage wheezed, blood bubbling at his lips. "A piece of the caster’s own soul. You would... you would be permanently diminished, Draven. You would lose your power. Your wolf would never be the same."

I didn't hesitate. I didn't even blink.

"Give it to me, or I will spend the next days showing you exactly how much of my soul is tainted ."

Ten minutes later, I walked back out to the carriage. 

The palace was quiet now—the silence of the dead and the terrified.

I opened the door and found Seren still asleep, her face pale and beautiful in the moonlight.

I climbed in and pulled her back into my arms. I knew what the ritual would cost. I knew that by giving her back her memories, I was giving up the part of me that made me a King. I would be weaker. I would be vulnerable.

But as I looked at her, I realized I didn't give a damn about the throne.

I leaned down, my lips brushing her forehead.

"I'm going to bring you back, Seren," I whispered. "Even if I have to follow you into the dark to do it."

I closed my eyes and began the incantation, feeling the first jagged tear in my soul as the magic began to pull the memories out of my own heart to gift them back to hers.

It was an obsession. I wasn't just saving her. I was ensuring that when she woke up, she would have no choice but to see me.