Chapter 197

Chapter 197
THIRD PERSON POV

The door to Dimitri’s study opened, and Lief stepped into the room. Behind the desk, Dimitri sat with an unusual calm, but a closer look showed his bloodshot eyes. Ryker, on the other end, stood at the corner of the room, in the shadows. His gaze was fixed on Varkas as he reported on the current status of Lyra’s whereabouts.

So far, there was nothing tangible.

It’s been a week, yet the wizards couldn’t find a trace of her power, and Ryker couldn’t feel her most of the time. He waited for Varkas to be dismissed, and not until he could sense Varkas had left before he stepped out of the shadows.

“Follow him,” He mentioned to Lief. Lief nodded, understanding Ryker meant discretion. “And Lief,” Ryker met his gaze. “Be careful. He’s not what I think he is.”
Lief nodded and walked out.

“Varkas has been my beta for so long. Even before I met Lyra’s mother. Why are you having your beta track him?” Dimitri frowned, standing up. He looked at Ryker, his eyes narrowed. Ryker was a presumptuous man, and he never did anything without reason.

“I have my reasons. You can call it a gut feeling. He’s been circling Lyra ever since we were bound to be mated after the last trials. He has made bold moves on her in my absence. But that’s not all. I felt traces of his aura in Lyra’s chambers the day of her disappearance.”

“That—Varkas doesn’t have that kind of an aura. If he did, I would have known. That aura is ancient, almost as old as I am, if not more.” Dimitri shook his head lightly.

“What if he’s an enemy and has been hiding it perfectly?” Ryker folded his arms and maintained eye contact with Dimitri. He could understand Dimitri’s reluctance to think in his line. If someone told him Lief was a traitor, he would never believe them, either.

“Fine. Think what you want. But my mate and my pup are out there, unsafe. And every day that passes, I lose my mind. If my gut says I should watch Varkas, then that is what I would do.” Just then, Lief’s voice shot through Ryker’s mind-link.

“Alpha, I lost him. He suddenly disappeared. I don’t know how. I had carefully followed him from a distance, but when I got closer, I couldn’t see him again. This place looks like a maze—” Lief continued as he went deeper. Suddenly, the connection scrambled, and Ryker barked.

“Come back now!”

The scrambled link gave Ryker a spark of hope. He didn’t mention that for the past few days, he had been hearing a scrambling noise in his mind. He knew it was Lyra. And she was trying to reach him. If Lief’s sudden mind link connection scrambled like that, then he had found something. Perhaps, where Lyra was.
Ryker walked out of Dimitri’s study, leaving him to his thoughts, while he met Lief down the corridor.

“Take me there,” Ryker spoke and walked with Lief hurriedly. They got to where Lief had been, and they were met with a wall.

“What the hell?” Lief gasped in disbelief. “It was just here. This wall—it wasn’t here, Ryker,” He turned to Ryker and met Ryker observing the walls keenly.

“Are you sure, Lief?” he asked as he tore his gaze away from the wall.
Ryker observed Lief and watched the disbelief in his eyes. He didn’t see a word and spun on his heels towards the direction of his room.

Lief hurried after Ryker. “I swear, it was just there. Could it be a secret door that can only be opened by magic?” He whispered to himself and entered the room after Ryker. He noticed how Ryker’s shoulders tensed.

Since he came to Ironclaw on his Alpha’s request, he had noticed how Ryker barely slept or ate. He had come into the Lycan kingdom barely twenty-four hours after Lyra’s kidnapping. He clenched his hands at his sides tightly.

“Find me anything you can on her. But be careful. Make sure you don’t cross paths with Varkas. I have a bad feeling about him,” Ryker warned and turned his attention to Lyra’s portrait on the wall. He stared at her longingly and brushed his fingers slightly over her face.

“Where are you?” He whispered. His voice shook with emotion as he worried for his mate. Rider, his wolf was restless.

Lief excused himself, unable to bear to see Ryker’s pain, and decided to investigate on his own. He first took a detour to his room and took the scent-masking perfume his mate had given him to protect him if he encountered danger, and sprayed it on his clothes and body, then walked toward the stairs. He had made up his mind. He was going to sneak into Varkas’ room.

He was so certain he had been in a maze-like corridor that almost got him confused had he not been taking note of his turns. And luckily, he had not gone too far before he mindlinked Ryker. Who knew that he was going to have difficulty mind-linking the farther he walked into that place? What shook him more was that if he had not heard Ryker’s forceful command to come back despite the scrambled link’s connection, he would have been trapped behind a wall with no way out.

One thing was clear: there were secrets in these walls, and he was going to find out, starting from Varkas. But he was going to be careful.

Ryker had warned him to be careful. If he was saying that, it only meant that he was too dangerous for Lief. Lief was a smart beta and knew better. He wasn’t going to lose his life by being egoistical. He would try to be careful.

After what seemed like a long time, Lief finally snuck into Varkas’ chambers from the open windows. The room was dark and had an oppressive air about it. His curtains were black, bedsheets, black. To put it simply, he loved black.

Lief walked quietly, navigating his room, and noticed a safe with a code. He stared at it for a while and continued his search. He didn’t know what he was looking for, but he simply looked around. He found a very large book open on his desk beside a laptop. The opened text was on the image of a moon-like stone that had powers enough to weaken a mythical being. The book had a diagram of the light stone shining through from the sky on a mythical being and sme texts he didn’t understand. So he took a snapshot with his phone and put it on the laptop. He looked at the time and started cracking the password. In less than one minute, he was already in Varkas’ system, going through files. Everything seemed normal, and Lief was about to give up when he finally stumbled on a hidden encryption. He worked fast and decrypted the folder. In the folder, there were several encrypted files except for one.

Lief worked quickly, decrypting the files while looking at the time. As the files opened one after the other, he moved the content through a series of code to his phone. Just then, he heard the sound of the door opening.