Ivetta wasn’t at the funeral.
An uneasy feeling formed in my gut, looking around as I stepped out of the carriage. There was the priest, and a crowd of villagers who must have known her mother, but Ivetta wasn’t there. I ignored the stunned expressions of all gathered and walked up to the priest.
“Prince Chevalier, I’m glad you could join us,” he said, his brown eyes nervous but his smile friendly, as it had been two days ago when I spoke with him and arranged the funeral.
“Where is Ivetta?”
He looked back at the crowd, and I saw a touch of anxiety in his eyes. “I haven’t seen her.”
A big, burly man came tearing into the cemetery, his beefy face red with exertion as he came to a stop in front of the priest.
“It’s Ivetta,” he said, gasping for breath. “She’s gone.”
“Gone?” I snapped, grabbing him by the collar. “What do you mean, gone?”
His eyes widened as he looked up at me, and he shook his head. “It looks like there was a fight - there’s a dead man at the door-”
“Show me.” I half dragged him to the carriage, barking orders at the coachman as I pushed the burly man inside. The horses were in motion before I shut the carriage door.
“Who are you?”
His Adam’s apple bobbed up and down as he swallowed. “John Stotts, your highness. Ivetta’s neighbor.”
“When did you last see her?”
“Yesterday afternoon. The missus and I brought over a meal to offer our condolences.”
The carriage came to a halt, and I leaped out and stared at the body in the pool of blood next to the door, the guard I’d stationed there to protect Ivetta. His face was frozen in a permanent expression of shock, his throat slit from ear to ear, his sword still in its sheath. The door itself was barely hanging on by one hinge. Inside, the dirt was a mass of footprints and skid marks, the table and chairs had been thrown up against a wall and shattered, the meal brought by the Stotts’ was plastered across another wall. The blanket had been ripped from the bed and lay discarded on the floor next to her shoes, and a torn scrap of the red skirt was all that remained of her. Droplets of blood in the dirt, bloody fingerprints smeared on the door. If any of that blood was hers-
“And you didn’t hear anything?” I demanded.
“No, not a thing. And I checked with the missus and the kids. Nobody heard or saw anything.”
Whatever happened here couldn’t have been quiet. But if it occurred quickly enough, if it was over almost before it began, maybe it could have been dismissed as a dream.
I stepped back out into the sunlight. Just outside the doorway, hoofprints facing all different directions had churned the dirt and blood together into a sickly red mud. A single, small, bloody footprint hadn’t been trampled and erased. She’d obviously fought hard, based on the disaster inside, but she’d still been able to walk out before she was taken away by horseback. A horse could cover a lot of ground in a few hours, and the blood in the dirt was already congealing. She could already be halfway to Obsidian.
“How often are horses ridden through here?” I asked, following the hoofprints with my eyes. They led away from the village, west into the forest. West to Obsidian.
“Very rarely. None yesterday or today.”
Except for last night. But that meant the trail was clear.
I turned back to the carriage. “Gather a search party and follow those tracks.” Then, without waiting for his response, I barked my next order to the coachman. “The palace. Now.”
My fists clenched and unclenched, my vision red as we neared the palace. Gilbert. He was the first and most obvious suspect. And he would still be at breakfast with everybody else, so I could question Silvio and Keith as well. It would be incredibly foolish to abduct her now, while they were still here, but such a move could be meant to make them look less suspicious. Julius, Baron Flandre, and the informant were all suspects as well.
If anything happened to her, so help me…
I burst into the round table room and had Gilbert by the collar, dragging him out of his seat before anybody had a chance to react.
“Where is she?” I roared, slamming him into the nearest wall and pinning him there with both hands at his collar.
“Chevalier, what’s going on?” Leon asked sharply.
“Don’t tell me you’ve failed her again?” Gilbert growled, ripping my hands off of him. I stepped back and drew my sword, my first strike blocked by a quick parry from his cane, but I anticipated his movement and turned my wrist, keeping my blade in motion, keeping the momentum up. His cane went flying across the room. My sword came to a stop, the point at his neck in less than a second.
“I’ve had enough of your mouth,” I growled.
“Chevalier!” Jin shouted.
“Ivetta’s gone,” I snapped, shooting him a glare to freeze him in place.
“Maybe she ran away from you because you’re insane,” Gilbert snapped. I pressed the point of the blade into his throat, a trickle of blood running down his neck.
“That’s rich, coming from a psychopath. And would you also have me believe that she overpowered a trained knight and slit his throat before he had time to draw his sword?”
“Hold on. What happened?” Leon asked, his amber eyes flashing.
“The guard is dead, her house has been trashed, and this is all that’s left of her,” I said, removing the scrap of cloth from my pocket with my free hand and holding it up, not taking my eyes or sword off of Gilbert. His blood red eye widened slightly as I released the cloth, letting it flutter to the floor.
“I had nothing to do with that,” Gilbert said coolly, his eye flicking from the cloth back to me.
“We’ll see about that. Luke, the villagers are organizing a search party. Western edge of the village, tracks leading into the forest. See what you can find,” I commanded.
“Got it, King Highness,” he said.
“Licht, take Silvio to another room and question him. Jin, take Keith.”
“On it,” Licht said. “Better behave, Silvio, or I’ll have to teach you some manners.” There was an unusual edge to his voice, rarely heard except in situations like this.
“This is ridiculous!” Silvo protested. “You can’t really think-”
“Just shut up,” Licht snapped, cutting Silvio’s complaint short.
“Come on, Keith,” Jin said.
“Alright, but I’m afraid I can’t be of much help,” Keith said quietly.
“For your sake, I hope you’re right,” Jin glowered.
“Yves, get the door,” Leon said quietly as he came to my side, his arms crossed over his chest.
“Start talking, or I start cutting. What do you want to lose first?” I hissed.
Gilbert returned our combined glare even with the blade at his throat. “I ruled Ivetta out as a source of information the first night I was here,” he said quietly. “My interest in her since then has been of a personal nature only.”
“What do you think?” I asked Leon. “An ear? A hand? Where should I start?”
“Probably should leave the ears alone, since he’s having a hard enough time listening as it is,” Leon commented.
“I’ll confess here and now to everything we discussed yesterday if that will get you to think straight, but you’re wasting time,” Gilbert said impatiently. “What reason would I have for taking her?”
“What reason would you have for digging into her background and treating her like a threat?” I snapped.
“King Highness-” Yves started, struggling to hold the door shut.
“It’s me, Clavis!” came a muffled voice.
“Let him in,” Leon ordered.
Clavis stepped in, glaring at Yves, but he grinned as soon as he took in the situation. “Oh, dear. Something happen, Chev?”
“Ivetta has been abducted. If you have any pertinent information, say it. Otherwise, keep quiet.”
Clavis’ face paled. “When?”
“Last night. You know something?” Leon asked.
“Flandre and his informant went missing last night, too,” Clavis said quietly.
“How did you let that happen?” I snapped angrily.
“Wait. I may know something after all,” Gilbert interjected. “Though I had no idea Ivetta was involved.”
“Keep talking,” I growled.
“Put your sword down,” he replied calmly.
“Stop wasting time and spit it out,” Leon said angrily.
“I’ll tell you after you put the sword down,” Gilbert repeated. “I may know where she is.”
I reluctantly lowered my sword, much to the relief of my aching arm.
“Go on.”
“Flandre said he could get valuable information about you and your plans from a very close source. It didn’t occur to me that the man was stupid enough to think Ivetta could be that source,” Gilbert explained, his blood red eye narrowing as his face twisted into an uncharacteristic scowl. “If my guess is correct, the baron and your informant are on their way to Flandre’s barony with Ivetta right now. There’s an old fort that’s been in disuse for some time on the westernmost edge of his barony. That’s where we’d arranged to meet.”
“Clavis, take some men and check it out,” I ordered. “Although it seems suspicious that you would so willingly give up such valuable and detrimental information,” I continued to Gilbert, narrowing my eyes further as I studied his face.
He sighed heavily. “It may not be the best political decision, but on a personal level, I don’t want to see her getting hurt,” he confessed quietly. “If they want information from her, they’re going to torture her, Chevalier.”
I already knew that, but hearing it aloud was still a sickening blow.
“Chevalier?” Leon asked as I sheathed my sword.
“Question Julius. If he’s involved in any of this, we need to know. And get your troops ready. You’re backing me up. We leave as soon as we get confirmation.”
I wanted to jump on my horse and ride out after her, but cool logic prevented that. Gilbert could be wrong, or lying, and my acting hastily in error would only increase the amount of time it took to find her.
“Yves, you will have eyes on Gilbert at all times.”
“You can count on it,” Yves said, his blue eyes flashing as he glared at Gilbert.
“You will tell Yves everything,” I instructed Gilbert in a low threat. “Everything. What we discussed yesterday, what you think you know about Ivetta. Everything. Do you understand?”
“Perfectly,” he replied through gritted teeth.
Silvio, Keith, and Julius knew nothing. I kept them under surveillance regardless. Luke lost the tracks in the forest when they crossed a river, but the general direction was consistent with a route toward Flandre’s barony. The hours passed, each more tense than the last. Leon and I gathered our knights, and we waited. Evening came, and I went to my room out of habit. There was no way I’d be sleeping. The bed was still unmade from this morning, her dirty uniform still on the bathroom floor.
I shouldn’t have left her alone.
She’d been more fragile and vulnerable than I’d ever seen her, and I left her alone. I could’ve stayed. She’d said she wanted to spend the night there, but she hadn’t said anything about needing to be by herself. That was my assumption based on her numerous attempts to tell me I didn’t need to do this or that for her. But had she really meant any of it, or had she just been worried about inconveniencing me?
If I’d stayed - if I’d been there - she wouldn’t have had to fight for her life, again. Flandre and the informant would be dead; my knight would be alive. And she’d be here, safe with me.
Gilbert was right. I’d failed her. Again.
If Flandre had her-
He was unstable, unpredictable. I didn’t know the man anymore. As one of my knights, someone who should have known me fairly well, he more than anyone should have known better than to send an untrained assassin after me. And he should also have known that I wouldn’t let any information slip to a maid, no matter how close I was to her. But he’d already killed one of my knights without remorse, possibly two. He was attempting to strike a deal with an enemy nation to save his own skin; he beat women he claimed to love. If he had Ivetta - if he intended to torture her - he wouldn’t show restraint.
She was as good as dead if he had her.
Nokto burst into my room around midnight, his crimson eyes frantic.
“King Highness, Flandre has been massing troops near the border.”
I was on my feet in an instant. “At an old fort, on the westernmost edge of his barony?”
Nokto nodded. “How did you - why are you - nevermind.”
“Come,” I ordered, offering no explanation as I swept past him into the hallway. “How many?”
“About two hundred, mostly green and poorly trained, but the fort has been repaired,” he replied as we walked. “What’s going on?”
“Any recent activity? New arrivals, a possible prisoner?”
“There was talk of a prisoner coming soon, someone who works closely with you and has valuable information.” He stopped, his face drained of color. “Wait. Has something happened to Ivetta?”
“Get Leon,” I snapped. “We ride out within the hour.”
“Right away, King Highness.” Nokto dashed away in the opposite direction.
Flandre had her. She’d been gone for twenty-four hours, enough time to reach his barony if the horses were pushed to their brink. And why should he care about the health of his horses? He didn’t care about anybody but himself. That much was clear.
It had already started.
Word spread quickly, and my brothers, Sariel, Belle, Rio, and the foreign princes were in the outer court when Leon and I mounted up.
“Thanks for the support, guys, but we won’t be needing you,” Leon said with a smile that didn’t reach his eyes.
“You don’t really think you’re leaving us out of this, do you?” Jin asked, his sharp burgundy eyes narrowed dangerously.
“You’ll slow us down,” I snapped. “Sariel, start drafting a treaty. Leon and I will finalize it when we return.”
“Yes, your highness,” he said.
I didn’t wait around for any further protest. That would keep them busy, and save me some time when I returned. Gilbert’s crimes were out in the open. Obsidian was in a difficult position, now that Rhodolite, Benitoite, and Jade knew the truth. A position that would force them into signing a peace treaty with extensive concessions given to the countries Obsidian had hoped to invade - if Obsidian wanted Gilbert back in one piece.
Yves hadn’t disclosed what Gilbert had told him regarding Ivetta’s background. I had no time to worry about that. It must not be pertinent to the problem at hand. Yves would tell me, or Gilbert would tell me, later, after I returned with Ivetta. And she would be alive. I would reach her in time. I had to.27Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡQVvqqZG1cB
