Chapter 201

Damon

The Councilors were speaking again. They were always speaking. Reports, figures, meaningless noise that slid over me without registering it.

I stood at the window behind my chair – which Asher hadn’t managed to take yet – my fingers resting on the cold sill, watching snow drift down over the courtyard below. The banners of Stormfang hung limp, their colors dulled in the foggy weather.

“…the eastern packs request aid, Your Majesty.”

“…rebellion at the southern border.”

“…Lord Asher recommends…”

That last name cut through the static. I turned, slowly, until the room fell silent. “Lord Asher recommends what?”

The nearest advisor swallowed hard. “He’s been… maintaining the council in your absence, Your Highness. Some of the Alphas have begun petitioning him directly. They fear the realm grows leaderless.”

Leaderless. I almost laughed.

A King who’s lost his Queen is worse than leaderless, he’s hollow. A decaying body wearing a crown because he doesn’t know how to live.

“Tell them,” I said, keeping my voice even, “that the throne still remembers its rightful ass. And that I will not share it. If Asher wants my Crown, he can challenge me for it. Since you all love tradition so much.”

The man nodded too quickly, ink-stained hands trembling. I dismissed them with a flick of my wrist.

Chairs scraped, papers rustled, and then they were gone, leaving me to my anger once again.

It had been two years.

Two years since the night the bond went silent, since I’d felt her power flare and then vanish like a dying star.

The kingdom had begun to decay along with me. Crops failed in border towns, patrols grew lazy, trade slowed to a crawl. I’d tried to care. I’d tried to rule. But all I could think of was my mate.

Zane prowled inside my head, restless. This place smells like death.

He wasn’t wrong.

I crossed to the throne at the far end of the hall. Its carved surface caught the pale light filtering through the high windows, dull and cold. My fingers brushed the armrest where her hand had once rested beside mine when we faced down the Elders.

“I can’t do this without you,” I murmured. The words echoed unheard into the empty hall.

I turned away before the weight of my grief crushed me. The doors groaned as I pushed them open, the sound carrying down the corridor like a final goodbye.

Outside, the wind cut sharp across my face, but the cold helped me focus.

I looked toward the northern horizon, where the mountains rose against the fading light. Somewhere beyond them, the world kept moving; packs living, dying, people just trying to make a home.

Maybe Lila was part of that world now, or maybe she wasn’t in any world at all.

Either way, I couldn’t keep sitting on a corpse of a kingdom pretending to lead.

I called for my horse before the sun broke fully over the walls. As I rode through the gates alone, I didn’t look back. Let Asher play at governance; let the court rot under his ambitions.

The realm could be rebuilt when I found her. Until then, there was nothing here worth saving.

A raging storm hit hard by nightfall.

Snow slashed sideways through the pines, thick enough to bury a horse in hours. I found shelter at a border outpost; a tavern built for traders and mercenaries who value cheap ale over comfort.

The hearth smoked more than it burned, and the floorboards creaked under the weight of damp, tired boots.

I kept my hood up and my back to the wall. No one recognized the King anymore, and that suited me just fine. My leathers were travel-worn, my hands still stained from the road. The barmaid brought me something hot that barely qualified as food but I didn’t care.

The room hummed with low conversation: border gossip, trade routes, and the same stories I’d heard a hundred times before.

It was nothing useful. I had half a mind to leave when a voice from the far corner broke through the low hum of tavern murmurs.

“…swear it on the moon, she glowed,” a man was saying, his tone boasting and slurred. “Hands like light itself. Healed my brother’s fever with one touch and he was good as new by morning.”

My head lifted before I realized it, honing in on the conversation.

The speaker was a merchant, middle-aged, half-drunk, spinning tales to a group of guards around his table. I let their laughter wash over me and listened harder.

“Where?” someone asked, snorting. “The moon doesn’t walk among us mere mortals.”

“Silver Glen,” the merchant said. “A small village near the northern ridge. They call her the Silver Healer. Some say she’s blessed by the Goddess herself. Eyes like molten silver, they say. Glows when she works.”

My pulse stumbled once and then roared to life, and I couldn’t explain the certainty if I tried. Zane’s voice surged in my mind, equally sure. It must be her.

The cup in my hand cracked before I realized I was gripping it too tight. I set it down gently, forcing my breathing to steady. My heart was a drum in my chest, pounding in rhythm with that old, buried bond.

I rose from the table and crossed the room before the merchant noticed me. “You,” I said quietly, adding power into the command. The single word silenced his companions. “This healer. Tell me everything you know.”

He blinked, taken aback by the tone more than the question. “I…I just passed through, my lord. Silver Glen’s a week north, maybe less if the roads are clear. She doesn’t take coin, only trades. Lives with a handful of villagers and has an apothecary. Keeps to herself mostly.”

“Describe her.”

He hesitated, squinting up at me. “Dark hair, though she wears it up mostly. Pretty, but… not young exactly. Not sure if she has a mate, but she’s got eyes like moonlight. There’s something about her, something that makes you feel, I dunno…”

“Unworthy,” I finished for him.

He swallowed hard. “Aye. That’s it.”

Zane’s growl purred low in the back of my skull. Go.

I dropped a pouch of coins on the table. It landed with a heavy clink, the kind that made men think twice about talking further. “You never saw me,” I said.

The merchant nodded so quickly I thought his neck might snap.

Outside, the storm hadn’t let up, but I didn’t feel the cold at all. My horse snorted steam into the wind as I mounted, snow already collecting in her mane. I turned her north and pressed my heels to her sides.

Each gust of wind stung like needles against my skin, but it didn’t matter. I could feel the faintest pull in my chest again, like the bond was stirring, whispering from the dark.

After two years of silence, I finally had direction.

The world blurred around me, the storm howling so loudly it drowned everything else. Still, beneath it, I swore I heard her name.

For the first time in years, I didn’t feel dead inside. I felt alive.

And I felt like my endless hunt was about to end.