Page 78 of The Jester

She doesn’t finish the sentence, but she doesn’t need to. We all know what’s at stake. If Eldrion catches us now, there will be no mercy. No second chances.

“Alana Leafborne!” Eldrion is closer now, and his voice brings the images back. The ones I was trying to forget.

“GO!” I yell for Briony and Roan to keep running. “Don’t stop. I’ll catch up. It’s me he wants, and I’m the only one with magic.”

“You won’t find the way,” Briony yells.

“They all exit somewhere, right?”

Briony hesitates, then nods.

“Then I’ll find you. Now, go!”

Chapter Thirty-Six

ELDRION

My entire body throbs with a mixture of pain and power. It is a surge I haven’t felt for centuries, since my own powers started to grow and transition into their fullest form.

Something new is inside me.

And I know it came from her.

Clambering onto my knees, I grip hold of the armchair and pull myself up to my feet. My body feels heavy with the weight of its new knowledge.

The knowledge that she is everything I ever needed. But she could be everything that will destroy me.

Because she saw what I saw. I know deep in my soul that she saw the flames, and heard the screams, and watched Luminael crumbling. But I still do not know if she is its saviour or its damnation.

All I know is I have to find her.

I am at the door when it is flung open. A guard with a red, sweat-laced complexion braces his hands on the frame and pants loudly.

“What happened?” I bark.

He meets my eyes. “My lord. The jester. He has disappeared, and many of the servants, too. It seems...” He hesitates. “It seems they are trying to escape, my lord.”

A surge of rage courses through my veins, hot and fierce. My wings flare out behind me, filling the room with their shadow. The guard takes a step back.

“The Leafborne prisoners,” I growl, my voice low and dangerous. “What of them?”

The guard swallows hard, his Adam’s apple bobbing in his throat. “They’re gone, my lord. The cells are empty.”

A roar of fury tears from my throat, and I lash out, my fist connecting with the stone wall. Pain lances through my knuckles, but I barely feel it. All I can feel is the white-hot anger consuming me, the overwhelming need to find her, to bring her back.

She has seen what I have seen, felt what I have felt. And now, she is running from me, taking with her my only hope of understanding what it means.

I cannot let that happen.

I will not let that happen.

I stride to the window, my gaze sweeping over the citadel below. I will find her. I will bring her back. And I will make her understand that she belongs to me, that her destiny is intertwined with mine in ways neither of us can comprehend.

“My lord?” the guard stutters.

I turn around, and stride towards him. “Who else is missing?”

The guard’s eyes widen.

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