Page 124 of Chased By My Grumpy Alpha
“Astra!” I roar for what feels like the hundredth time, though I know it’s useless. She’s not here. She hasn’t been here for over an hour.
The thick, cloying, unfamiliar magical scent clings to everything. It coats the back of my throat like oil, making me want to retch. Whoever did this was powerful. Professional. They knew exactly what they were doing.
I’ve torn through every inch of this place. The bathroom, the closet, under the bed. I’ve searched the entire inn grounds, following every possible escape route. I’ve questioned everyperson within a five-mile radius, using enough royal authority to make grown men tremble.
Nothing.
My mate is gone, and I have no idea where to even begin looking.
The sound of footsteps pounding up the stairs makes me whirl toward the door. Seth bursts in without knocking, his face grim, with a man I don’t recognize beside him. The stranger is thin, pale, with the kind of sharp features that undeniably mark him as a witch.
“Where is she?” Seth demands, taking in the destruction I’ve wreaked in my search.
“Gone.” The word comes out as a growl. “Someone took her.”
The witch steps forward, his nostrils flaring as he breathes deeply. His eyes flutter closed in concentration, and when they open again, they’re worried.
“Magic was definitely used here,” he says, his voice carrying the educated accent of someone trained at the Royal Tower. “Powerful magic. But...”
“But what?” I snap.
He shakes his head slowly, genuine confusion creasing his features. “This signature doesn’t belong to any witch registered with the Royal Tower.”
My blood goes cold. Every practicing witch in the kingdom is required by royal decree to register their magical signature with the Tower. It has been law for over two centuries, designed to prevent exactly this kind of unauthorized magical activity.
“That’s impossible,” Seth says. “Every witch—”
“Every legal witch,” the man corrects him, his pale face growing even more ashen. “Whoever cast this magic is working privately. Unregistered. And that means...”
“A noble family.” The words taste like poison on my tongue. “Only noble families recruit private witches.”
It’s an illegal practice, technically forbidden by royal law, but everyone knows it happens. The great houses have always bent rules to their advantage, including keeping magical practitioners off the official records for their personal purposes.
Seth’s face hardens. “It hasn’t even been a day since I warned you about Lady Zari.”
“You think it’s her?”
“Her family is the only one that has openly kept witches in their employ for generations,” my friend says grimly. “The other noble families have their own magical practitioners, but your people have been watching them. You had their signatures catalogued, didn’t you?”
I nod and turn to the witch, who says reluctantly, “I’ve studied the magical signatures of every witch known to serve the major houses. This doesn’t match any of them.”
It’s true, then. If it’s not any of the families we’ve been monitoring, if it’s not any registered witch, then there’s only one remaining option.
“The Tashina house it is, then.”
The witch’s face goes white. Seth curses under his breath.
Lady Zari’s family. My supposed betrothed. The woman who has been sending increasingly desperate letters, making increasingly bold demands for my attention and affection.
Rage explodes through me like wildfire, so intense that the windows of the inn room rattle. Both Seth and the witch take an involuntary step backward.
“She took my mate.” My voice doesn’t sound human anymore. My wolf is too close to the surface, my canines extending, claws bursting from my fingertips. “That pathetic, spoiled bitch took my mate!”
“Lucian—”
“She had me trapped downstairs,” I snarl, the memory flooding back clearly now. The inn owner’s glazed expression.The strange compulsion that pulled me down those rickety stairs. The musty basement where shadows seemed to move on their own. “Some kind of binding spell. I could barely think, couldn’t shift. By the time I broke free, they were already gone.”
I was helpless while someone took Astra. The thought makes me want to tear this entire building apart with my bare hands.
