Chapter 67 Right - Aleksandr’s POV
The sound of hurried footsteps behind me interrupted these dark thoughts. I turned to find Elder Nora following, her pace remarkably quick for a wolf of her years.
"A word, Your Highness," she said, not quite a request but not quite a demand either. "In private."
I nodded, continuing toward my office with Nora at my side. Neither of us spoke until we were behind closed doors, the security protocols engaged to ensure no eavesdroppers.
"You handled that meeting better than I expected," she said, settling into the chair across from my desk without waiting for an invitation. Such was her privilege as the oldest living member of the royal court.
"I nearly shifted in the council chamber," I pointed out, remaining standing rather than taking my seat. "I wouldn't call that 'handling' anything."
"You restrained yourself despite considerable provocation," she countered. "Given your current state, that demonstrates remarkable control."
I waved away the compliment, if that's what it was. "You didn't follow me to discuss my self-control, Elder. What is it?"
Nora studied me for a long moment, her ancient eyes seeing more than I was comfortable revealing. "I've been reviewing the security footage," she said finally. "The images of Amelia leaving the castle."
Something in her tone made me go very still. "And?"
"Her gait is wrong," Nora said simply.
Four words. Just four words, yet they hit me with the force of a physical blow. "Explain."
"I've spent two weeks observing Amelia," Nora continued, her tone measured. "She favours her right leg slightly—the result of an improperly healed injury, I suspect, from her time at Frozen Mountain. It's subtle, but consistent."
I knew the limp she meant—barely noticeable most of the time, but more pronounced when Amelia was tired or cold. A testament to the cruelty she'd endured before coming to me.
"The woman in the footage shows no such tendency," Nora said. "She moves differently—smoothly, evenly, without the slight hesitation between steps that Amelia displays."
"You're suggesting..." I couldn't finish the thought, couldn't give voice to the hope that threatened to rise in my chest.
"I'm suggesting that we cannot trust what we've been shown," Nora said carefully. "That perhaps things are not as they appear."
'Told you!' Skoll crowed, surging forward with renewed energy. 'Mate didn't leave! Mate taken!'
"If it wasn't Amelia in that footage," I said slowly, each word measured as I fought to keep my voice steady, "then where is she?"
"That's what I'm working to determine," Nora replied. "I have people, discreet, loyal people, verifying the authenticity of the footage. Examining when and how it might have been altered. Looking for any trace of Amelia within or beyond the castle walls."
Hope, that treacherous emotion I'd ruthlessly suppressed these past two days, flickered to life again. "And the destruction in her room? The photographs?"
"Staged, perhaps," Nora said. "A convenient narrative to explain her absence. To make you believe she left willingly, so you wouldn't search for her."
The implications hit me all at once—if Amelia hadn't left of her own accord, if someone had taken her, created false evidence to cover her disappearance... The rage that surged through me was unlike anything I'd ever felt, cold and calculating and utterly merciless.
"Who?" I demanded, my voice a low growl that barely concealed the beast rising within me. "Who would dare?"
"I have suspicions," Nora said carefully, "but no proof. Not yet. And wild accusations against council members especially would only alert those responsible that we're onto them."
She was right, of course. If someone on the council was behind Amelia's disappearance—and who else would have access to security footage, to her rooms, to the photographs of Marcus's punishment?—then revealing our doubts prematurely would only endanger her further.
"So we proceed with the ball," I said, understanding Nora's earlier comments in the council meeting. "We maintain appearances while you investigate."
"Precisely, Your Highness," Nora confirmed, her expression grim. "Let them believe they've won, that you've accepted Amelia's 'departure' and moved on to finding a new potential mate. It buys us time to discover the truth."
"And if the truth is that she's been taken," I said, my voice dropping to a dangerous whisper, "there won't be a corner of this earth where they can hide from me."
Nora studied me, those ancient eyes seeing the promise of violence in mine and not flinching away. "I believe you, my King. But I urge caution and patience. Whoever has done this has planned carefully. We must be more careful still."
I nodded once, a sharp gesture that was all the restraint I could manage. "Find her, Nora. Find her before..."
Before the curse takes me completely. Before I lose what little humanity I have left. Before it's too late.
"I will do everything in my power," she promised, rising from her seat with the fluid grace of a wolf far younger than her years. At the door, she paused, glancing back at me. "Try to rest, Aleksandr. Eat something. You'll need your strength for what's coming."
After she left, I stood motionless, staring at the untouched glass of whiskey still sitting on my desk. For the first time in two days, the crushing weight of despair had lifted slightly, replaced by something far more dangerous: hope.
'Find mate,' Skoll insisted, his voice stronger now, more focused. 'Save mate.'
"We will," I promised him, promised myself. "Whatever it takes, we will find her."
Eight weeks until my hundredth birthday. But if Nora was right, if Amelia hadn't left voluntarily... I didn't have eight weeks to save her. And whoever had taken her, whoever had dared to touch what was mine, they didn't have eight weeks to live.