“What do you mean he’s not?—“
“The queen called Varix immediately after she found him dead,” Orric explained, his own breathing slightly labored fromthe sprint to catch up. “Varix took him away already to prepare his body for the viewing and funeral ceremonies.”
Varix has my father’s body.
The thought sent ice flooding through Korran’s veins, followed immediately by molten rage. Varix—the healer Tess suspected of deception, possibly even sabotage—now had complete control over King Voran’s remains. Any evidence of what had truly killed his father could be destroyed, manipulated, or hidden forever.
“This can’t be happening.” The words tore from his throat as his carefully constructed world crumbled around him.
I failed him. I trusted Varix when I should have pressed harder for answers. I let politics and duty blind me.
“Where’s my mother?” The question emerged as a snarl, his protective instincts spiking to dangerous levels. If Varix had indeed harmed his father, the healer posed a threat to Queen Lysia?—
“She’s with Varix right now,” Orric replied carefully, clearly reading the violence building in Korran’s expression.
My mother is alone with him. With the man who might have murdered my father.
Terror unlike anything he’d ever experienced crashed over him. His mother—his brilliant, strong mother who’d endured decades of prejudice and political maneuvering—was vulnerable and grieving in the presence of someone who might mean her harm.
“Where are they?” The demand came out barely human, his bear pressing so close to the surface that his voice carried an inhuman rumble.
“At the medical facilities, obviously,” Orric said. “But Korran, you need to?—“
But Korran was already moving, racing toward the foyer. His world had narrowed to a single, desperate focus: reach his mother before anything else could go wrong.
He burst into the grand foyer to find Tess waiting exactly where she’d promised, dressed in practical clothes and ready for their planned day in the lab. Her green eyes widened as she took in his wild appearance—no coat, hair disheveled, barely leashed violence radiating from his frame.
“What’s going on?” Her voice carried that sharp intelligence he’d come to crave, immediately recognizing that something catastrophic had occurred.
“My father is dead.” The words felt like glass in his throat. “He died this morning.”
The color drained from her face, her scientific mind immediately processing the implications. “No, that can’t be. We were so close to saving him?—“
“Well, it’s too late.” The brutal dismissal tore from him before he could stop it, his emotional shields slamming into place as grief and rage threatened to overwhelm him completely. “You might as well just go home now.”
Pain flashed across her features—hurt at his callous dismissal, frustration at the lost opportunity to help. But Korran couldn’t let himself be weakened by the mate bond when his mother needed him.
He pushed past her toward the door. The stolen vials in his mini-fridge seemed pointless now—what did testing immunity boosters matter when the patient was already dead?
The winter air hit him like a dagger as he burst through the estate’s front entrance, but he barely noticed the cold biting through his shirt. Within seconds, his SUV started with a roar, and he was speeding toward town before the engine had fully warmed.
If Varix has hurt her, if he’s used her grief to manipulate or harm her, I’ll tear him apart with my bare hands.
Minutes later, the medical facilities appeared ahead, their glass and steel structure gleaming in the morning light like a testament to all his failures. He’d trusted this place, these people, to save his father. Instead, King Voran was dead, and his body was in the hands of someone who might be responsible.
Korran abandoned his SUV in the parking lot and charged through the building’s entrance, his bear’s enhanced senses immediately detecting the familiar scents of his mother, Varix, and—unexpectedly—Malvek.
He found them in the lobby, and relief flooded through him as he confirmed his mother was physically unharmed. But emotionally—Queen Lysia looked broken in a way he’d never seen before. Her usual regal composure had cracked completely, tears streaming down her face as she stared into nothing with the hollow expression of someone whose world had just ended.
Her fated mate is gone. The other half of her soul.
The sight of his mother’s devastation sent fresh rage coursing through his veins, but also a terrible understanding. This was what happened when you loved someone completely, when you opened yourself to that level of vulnerability. This was why he’d spent years resisting the mate bond, why he’d tried to choose duty over desire.
This is what loving costs. This is what I was trying to avoid.
But his bear snarled in disagreement, remembering the feel of Tess in his arms, the rightness of holding his mate through the night.
“Mother.” He crossed to her side in three quick strides, his hands gentle despite the violence still coursing through his system. “I’m going to take you home. I’ll handle all the funeral arrangements.”
