Chapter 4: The Broken Trail

Ronan POV

"Your Majesty! Up here!"

A loud, harsh voice cut through the quiet alley, and a bright flashlight beam flashed across my eyes.

I blinked once. Twice.

The dark, blurry shapes that had blocked my eyes for the last few hours melted away. The damp alley came into clear focus under the pale gray light of early morning. I could see the small cracks in the red brick walls. I could see the wet asphalt. I could see the rust peeling off the metal dumpster ten feet away.

My vision was back. The burning silver poison in my blood was completely gone.

I sat up fast. My hand slammed down onto the wet ground to balance myself, but my fingers didn't touch cold pavement. They landed on a soft, folded fabric.

I picked it up. It was a cheap black jacket, still holding the faint warmth of a person's body. I brought it up to my nose and took a deep breath.

And under it all, a sweet, clear scent of wild berries that made my chest tighten.

She's gone, my wolf, Aurel, growled deep inside my mind. Find her. She's ours.

"Where is she?" I yelled, my voice rough and scratchy.

I jumped to my feet, my eyes searching every corner of the narrow alleyway.

"Sire!" Heavy boots slammed against the wet street.

Lucian ran around the corner. His dark vest was covered in mud, and his hand rested flat on the handle of his gun. Six royal guards ran right behind him, their heavy boots making loud splashing sounds in the puddles.

Lucian stopped moving. His eyes went wide as he looked at my bare chest.

"Your Majesty... you're standing," Lucian said, his voice dropping low. "We lost your signal when the radio jammer hit. We fought off four men near the main road, but we thought"

"I don't care what you thought!" I barked, stepping right into his path. "Where is the woman who was sitting right here?"

Lucian blinked, looking around the empty space. "Woman? Sire, our guards locked down this street three minutes ago. No one left this block. We didn't see anyone."

I grabbed the front of Lucian's vest and shoved him back against the wall. The metal buttons on his vest hit the brick with a hard click.

"She was here," I growled, setting my teeth. "She sat right here on this cold ground. She healed me with her bare hands, do not tell me she was not here!"

I grabbed the torn cloth of my shirt and pulled it completely off my skin.

There was no deep cut. There were no dark purple veins spreading across my stomach. There was only a thin, smooth pink line across my ribs.

"She fixed it," I said, rubbing my thumb over the smooth skin.

Lucian stepped closer, his eyebrows pulling together as he looked at the healed line. Then his eyes dropped to the wet pavement beside my feet.

He kicked a piece of dark metal with the toe of his boot. A broken dagger lay in the puddle, its dark silver blade etched with fine side grooves dripping with thick, black liquid. The burnt, metallic smell of silver poison hung heavy in the damp air.

"A silver poison blade," Lucian breathed, his face turning pale. "Your shirt is shredded and soaked in poison residue, Sire. You should be dead."

"She saved me," I said, my fingers tightening around the cheap black jacket.

Lucian's eyes moved down to the black jacket in my hand. "Your Majesty, look at the ground."

I let go of his vest and dropped my eyes.

On the wet pavement lay a dark pool of blood. Right next to it were two faint wet footprints heading toward the street. One print was clear. The other was smeared with a tiny spot of black dress fabric.

"She ran," Lucian said, keeping his hands open at his sides. "She left before we turned the corner. If she had stayed, she would have run right into our guards."

I let go of Lucian completely and took three fast steps toward the opening of the alley. I lifted my head and pulled the cool morning air deep into my nose.

The air smelled like cold rain, car exhaust, and wet trash. The sweet scent of berries was getting weaker, washed away by the light rain falling from the gray sky.

"Spread out!" I shouted, turning back to the six guards. "Search every building, every side street, and every doorway within five blocks! Check the security cameras on the main road!"

"Sire, this district doesn't have working cameras," Lucian said, his voice calm and steady. "The streetlights and cameras were broken years ago. You know that."

"Then talk to the shop owners!" I said, walking fast toward the black armored car parked on the curb. "Find anyone who was outside at dawn."

Lucian walked right beside me, taking long steps to keep up. "What did she look like, Ronan? Give me her height. Give me her hair color or her eye color. Give me something to tell the search team."

I stopped right beside the open car door. My fingers clamped down on the hard metal frame until my knuckles turned white.

I closed my eyes and tried to force my mind to bring up her face.

I remembered the warm feel of her skin under my fingers. I remembered her shaky breath against my neck. I remembered her voice when she said, 'I want you.'

But when I tried to picture her eyes, her nose, or her mouth, there was nothing. Just a dark, blank gray spot.

"The poison," I hissed, slamming my fist down onto the roof of the car. The heavy metal made a loud THUDthat made two guards jump. "The poison made my eyes weak while she was here. I couldn't see her face."

Lucian stared at me, his mouth opening just a little. "You... you don't know what she looks like?"

"She has rare healing power," I said, turning to face him directly. I held up the black jacket. "She stopped a silver death-curse in seconds. A normal person cannot do that."

"Then who is she?" Lucian asked.

"I don't know," I said, stepping into the back seat of the car and pulling the door shut with a heavy click. "But I have her scent. And I will search every house in this city until I find her."

******

Rain tapped hard against the glass windows of Aurelian Tower.

It was eight o'clock in the morning. I sat behind my dark wood desk on the top floor, staring out at the gray buildings of Blackthorne City.

A tall glass of water sat on my desk, untouched. The cheap black jacket lay flat across the smooth wood in front of me.

The office door clicked open. Lucian walked in, holding a thin black glass tablet in his left hand. He looked tired. The dark lines under his eyes showed he had not slept.

"Tell me what you found," I said without turning my chair.

Lucian tapped the glass screen. "We checked the white tag inside the jacket. It's a cheap brand sold in over fifty stores. There are no numbers on it. No store tags."

"What about the blood sample from the alley?" I asked, turning around to face him.

"We tested her blood from the pavement where you were together," Lucian said, stepping closer. "The lab ran her DNA through the city system three times."

I leaned forward, resting my arms on the desk. "And?"

"Nothing," Lucian said, shaking his head. "No name, no family crest, no medical record. She doesn't exist on paper."

I picked up my glass, took a small sip of water, and set it back down. "A woman with that kind of power doesn't just disappear, Lucian. Someone is hiding her."

"Or she is hiding from you," Lucian said, looking straight at me. "Think about what happened, Ronan. She saved your life. She gave you her purity. Then she ran away, she didn't ask for money. She didn't ask for your name."

"Which means she is in danger," I said, my voice dropping low. "If the people who sent those attackers find out she healed me, they will hunt her down to cover their steps."

Lucian set the black tablet down on my desk. "We checked the broken weapon from the alley, too. The knife was custom-made."

I picked up the tablet. The screen showed a clear picture of the broken metal blade from the alley. The metal was dark silver with tiny grooves cut into the sides to hold liquid poison.

"This is a Marcellis Biotech design," I said, recognizing the structural build. "Only their labs manufacture silver blades with these specific side channels."

Lucian frowned, his brow furrowing. "Do you think Darius Marcellis ordered the hit on you? He was at the Celestial Crown Gala last night showing off his family."

"No," I said, shaking my head as I stood up and walked toward the window. "Darius is a businessman. He is greedy for power, but he isn't stupid enough to attack the King directly. A weapon like this could have been stolen from his labs or sold on the black market months ago."

Lucian tapped his arm. "So someone used Marcellis technology to try to eliminate you."

"Precisely," I replied, staring out at the fog. "Whoever hired those rogue border wolves stole high-grade Marcellis weapons to do it. But Darius runs those labs. He keeps tight logs on every custom weapon produced."

I clenched my hands into fists at my sides.

"Call Darius Marcellis," I ordered, turning back around. "Tell him I want a private inspection of his research labs and security logs tonight. Tell him the King is interested in his company's safety standards."

"Are you going to tell him why?" Lucian asked, his hand going to his phone.

"No," I said. I picked up the black jacket from the desk, folded it four times, and locked it inside my top desk drawer. "I will inspect his whole household and his records. If someone stole weapons from his facility, the leak came from inside his house."

Lucian bowed his head. "I will set up the car team right now."

He turned and walked to the heavy door, but stopped when his hand touched the handle. He looked back over his shoulder.

"Ronan?"

"What?"

"What if you never find her?" Lucian asked softly. "What if she was just a stranger who ran away?"

I looked at the locked desk drawer. The sweet scent of wild berries was still clear in my mind as Aurel clawed at my chest, restless and angry, demanding I track her down.

"She belongs to me now," I said, my voice cold and firm. "I will search every street in this city until I find her."

Lucian nodded and pulled the door open. Before he could step into the hall, a young guard ran up to him, holding a yellow paper folder.

"Commander!" the guard said in a loud whisper. "An emergency call just came in!"