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She’ll never cry tears of heartache again. Not if I have anything to say about it.

“Sweetheart,” I murmur, trying to keep my voice soothing, when in reality I’m having a hell of a time keeping my anger from bleeding through.

“Take a breath for me, yeah?” I inhale deeply, prompting her to mimic me. It works.

“That’s it,” I praise. “Good girl.”

I keep swiping my thumbs over the tops of her too-sharp cheekbones, grounding her with my touch. Little by little, she calms enough to take a full breath.

I gather Idril in my arms and retreat to the tree, lowering myself to the soft ground. She’s so fucking light it breaks my heart.

I cradle her in my lap, pressing her cheek against my chest.

She curls into me, tucking herself as close as physically possible. My purr grows louder.

“Are you sure you’re real?” She whispers tentatively.

I bury my nose in her hair and breathe her in, feeling the sting of tears behind my eyes.

“Yeah, sweet girl. I’m real. I don’t know where we are, but I know I’m real. And you’re real. That’s enough for now.”

I feel her nod, and for a few moments, we just sit here, not daring to move or disrupt this small pocket of peace around us. The world could burn down, and I’d gladly sit right here, holding my Mate.

What I need now is information. I have to figure out where she is and who she’s with. If I’m going to go straight to her—and I fucking am—I need names and locations. Anything she can tell me that’ll help us get to her quickly.

The sooner we find her, the sooner I can begin helping her heal.

The moment I’m strong enough to claw my soul back into my body, I plan on burning her father alive for how he’s treated her.

I lean back, just far enough to catch her eye. “I need you to tell me where you are, sweetheart,” I whisper, afraid of breaking the peace of this moment. “Not here. Out there,” I clarify.

My arms tighten, the panic I’ve tried to keep buried finally breaking through. “I need you to try and remember everything you can. Who’s with you, what you’ve seen. So when I wake up, I can find you.”

I rub my cheek against hers, scent-mark her, reminding myself that I found her once, and I’ll stop at fucking nothing to find her again.

“I’m going to come for you.” My voice is lethal, a vow dripping in anger I can no longer contain. “My brothers and I will find you, and we will ruin your father. I will bury the memory of that bastard so deep beneath my love for you, you won’t even remember his fucking name.”

My Alpha is right at the surface, demanding vengeance for his Mate. I don’t hide my anger or thirst for revenge. Every cell in my body is vibrating, full of pissed-off Alpha and blood-thirsty vampire energy. Her father obviously came back for her, which means my pack didn’t find her before carting me out of that fucking house.

And now look at her.

When I meet her eyes, what I see in them brings my spiraling thoughts to a halt. They’re swimming with confusion.

“I’m not…” she hesitates, a little wrinkle forming between her blonde brows.

“You’re not what, sweet girl?”

“Caelan,” she murmurs. And gods, I nearly groan. My name on her lips is my favorite song.

She twists until she’s facing me, straddling my hips. Her hands shake as she lays her palms on either side of my face, swiping her thumbs softly against my stubble. I swear my heart stops.

A tiny smile pulls at her lips, but it’s all wrong. There’s no joy. Only longing and sadness.

“I’m at your castle.”

I frown. “My castle?”

She bites her lip, her eyes falling to the soft grass surrounding us. “I heard Daxen and some others call it HQ. Is that right?”