Chapter 28: Gone

(LOCKE)

The sun is setting as we head back to camp.

The monsters have been rampaging, but I’ve finally managed to control some of the chaos. Covered in blood, I enter the large tent. I need a bath. The smell of the mutated monster blood is a pungent one. It irritates my nose.

However, I suddenly see the last person I expected to, standing in the middle of my tent.

“Rothan?!” It takes me a second to comprehend his presence here, and when I do, fear strikes me. “What happened to Corrine?”

“What?” He gives me a baffled look. “You’re the one who sent the order—” He shakes his head as if trying to sort out his thoughts. “I brought her here. I know it’s a violation of your order, but my mother insisted. I tried to contact you, but Bella has blocked all means of communication. This was the only thing I could do.”

“What the hell are you talking about? What order?” I stare at him. “Why did you bring Corrine here? Where is she?”

“I thought you would want to do it privately,” Rothan says. He doesn’t look happy. “I left her at the guard hut near the forest so I could speak with you alone first.”

“What the fuck are you talking about? Do what privately?”

“Execute her.”

Without thinking, I have him by the throat and am slamming him into the table in the center of the big tent.

“Say that again!” I snarl.

The loud sounds have the others rushing in. Edgar and Derrick look equally surprised to see Rothan.

“What’s going on?” Edgar asks.

“This fool says he brought my mate here so that I can execute her!”

Derrick stares at Rothan. “Are you drunk? What the hell is wrong with you?”

Edgar, however, is studying Rothan, who is struggling to breathe. “Don’t kill him, Locke. Let’s hear what he has to say.”

I reluctantly release the man, and he clutches his throat, panting. “I saw the execution letter! Your seal was on it!”

“Bella has my seal!” I snap as my blood runs cold. I repeat more slowly, “Bella has my seal. Are you telling me she forged a letter to have Corrine executed?! That fucking bitch! And you just went along with it?”

“What did you expect me to do?” Rothan says furiously. “Anything with your seal on it is a direct order. I disobeyed it by coming here in the hope that you would change your mind. With the real princess back—”

“What?!” I can’t think straight, and Edgar decides to intervene.

“Everybody calm down. Rothan, what’s been happening at the castle?”

Rothan stares at us. “You mean, you don’t know?”

“We will if you tell us!” Derrick says tightly. “Start talking.”

“Princess Ravenna arrived, the real one, a few days ago. She showed up with a couple of her maids. She told Bella who she was, and Bella immediately rounded up the elders and told them that Corrine was an imposter and that we hadn’t known about it. That Corrine had the king fooled.

Bella had her thrown into a cell in the dungeon. Your mate was tortured, Locke. My mother protested and was locked in her room. I was out of the castle on business. When I returned, I found out what was going on when one of the maids told me. But it was too late. I couldn’t go down to the dungeon because Bella threatened to lock me up, too.”

Edgar frowns. “Even then, even if Bella says all that, she has no right to execute Corrine!”

“She says she does. She says she’s the delegate, and as such, she has the right to make decisions on the king’s behalf when it comes to the elders. If they make a pronouncement, it is up to her discretion how to carry it out. She and the princess pushed the elders for execution. “No”—Rothan’s voice grows hard—”mutilation and execution. They wanted her to be killed by wolves, torn apart in an arena. She then brought the letter with your seal on it.”

A fury unlike any other fills me, and I turn around to glare at Derrick. My friend is pale, with guilt in his eyes. “This is the woman you wanted me to trust. I never should have listened to you!”

Derrick falls to the ground on his knees. “I’m sorry. I had no idea she would go so far as—”

“The reason she ordered an execution on my behalf, without even informing me, was to get Corrine out of the way. She knew I would never agree to it.”

Derrick is silent, and I look back at Rothan. “Did Corrine believe that she was going to be executed?”

“Yes,” he admits, his voice heavy. “She’s waiting for you at the hut to kill her. She believes that you will at least be merciful.”

I punch him in the face, and he goes falling backward.

Edgar restrains me. “Stop. Just calm down. She’s here, Locke. We can sort this whole thing out.”

“What can we do now, though?” Derrick looks shaken. “If the elders know that Corrine is not the princess—”

“She is my fated mate. I’m not killing her!” I roar. “Damn the elders!

Where is she? I want to see her!”

Rothan leads the way in his wolf form. As I follow him, I wonder if I ever gave Corrine any assurances that I would never hurt her. Didn’t I? I looked after her. Surely that meant something to her. The idea that Corrine truly believes I ordered her execution makes me sick to my stomach. Surely, she wouldn’t think—

My wolf is beside itself.

When we reach the hut, I feel relieved. I’ll tell her. I’ll tell her she’s not replaceable.

I burst into the hut, but there are only two guards sitting there, wringing their hands. When they see me, they jump to their feet, shocked.

“Where is she?” I demand.

“Your Majesty?” They both look panicked. “Do you mean the messenger woman?”

I grab the one closest to me and slam him up against the wall. “Where is my mate?!” I roar.

If there was any blood left in his face, it drains away fast.

“Your ma–mate, Your Majesty? That woman—she was the qu–queen?” he stammers. From the fear in his eyes, I’m getting a bad feeling.

“Tell me where she is if you value your life!”

“She ran into the forest,” the other guard whimpers. “She said she wanted to relieve herself, and we told her she could do it at the edge of the forest, before the markers. She didn’t come back, so we went looking for her. We saw her heading deeper into the forest. We tried to stop her, but she ran.”

I stare at him, my blood turning to ice. “And you didn’t follow her?”

He trembles. “We didn’t dare. We are not allowed to leave our post. We thought she was just a foolish woman—”

I plunge my hand into his chest and rip out the man’s heart.

“Locke!” Edgar shouts, and I release the first guard, giving the other one an enraged look.

“You didn’t go after her.”

“Forgive me, Your Majesty!” The man slumps to the ground, petrified. “If we had known she was the queen, Rothan told us she was nobody important—”

I storm out of the hut, heading toward the forest.

Edgar, Derrick, and Rothan all run after me, and Edgar steps into my path. He holds up one hand as he yells, “You can’t, Locke! You can’t go in there! You won’t survive.”

The remaining guard stumbles out behind them, raw fear in his eyes. “It’s pointless, Your Majesty. We heard a scream. We heard her scream.”

I stare at him, numb. “What?”

“Not ten minutes after she left. ” His voice is low. “There was a scream, and then we heard a roar. I’m so sorry. If we had only known—”

I turn to face Rothan. “This is your fault.”

His gaze lowers, a distraught look on his face. I’m about to rip his neck out when I stop.

“No. No, it’s your fault, Derrick.” Derrick looks at me, guilt and grief in his eyes. “My mate is dead because of you. Because of you and your obsession with that woman. I should never have trusted you. I should never have trusted your judgment. Because of you, Corrine died believing I wanted her to suffer.”

I look at the three men in front of me, the men I once trusted above anyone else. “One of you left her here when he was told to guard her with his life. One of you convinced me to give power to the woman who despised her. I trusted you. And this is what I get. Betrayal.”

My wolf is howling within me, and grief is clogging my throat.

My mate is gone. Even if I venture into the forest, I know she could not have survived. She wasn’t a fighter.

My eyes flick toward the looming trees, and I stare at them, feeling empty inside, like a part of me has been ripped out.

Did you go in there seeking your death, Corrine? When the monsters ripped you apart, did you die thinking I was going to execute you, that I gave the orders to torture you?

“I feel safer when you’re around.”

“This castle is your home. You’ll be safe here, whether I’m around or not.”

“I trust your choice.”

I failed her. I lied to her. She wasn’t safe in the castle. I shouldn’t have left her alone. I shouldn’t have let her out of my sight.

The agony eating at me on the inside is of a vicious kind. My Corrine.

Her body. I have to bury her body.

If I enter the forest, I’ll die, but I don’t care. I begin walking toward it.

“No!” Edgar throws himself in front of me again. “Please, Locke! The kingdom needs you! Without you, the Veil will be compromised. Think of the people who are depending on you! Think of your parents! They would not have wanted you to do this!”

I pause.

My parents. My Corrine. All gone. They left me behind. If I do this and don’t survive, the kingdom will fall.

It’s one of the hardest things I’ve ever done, but I turn my back on the forest, on Corrine’s body.

“We’re returning to the castle.”

“Locke?” Edgar sounds wary now. “What are you going to do?”

“Bella wanted my mate to be executed,” I say, my heart turning to stone. “She’s the one who will face the execution, the very kind she planned for Corrine.”

I hear Derrick make a strangled sound, and I turn to face him, my voice cold. “Choose your loyalty here and now, Derrick Fenrin. If it’s to that woman, then you no longer serve me.”

Derrick looks me in the eye, and then he bows his head. “I am loyal to you alone.”

“Very well.” I watch him closely, none of my previous familiarity in my eyes. “Let’s test your loyalty, shall we?”

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