The room spins around me as my magic expenditure from earlier and the sheer shock of what’s happening catch up to me. Too much information is being revealed to me, when all I can focus on is Thorne. He’s trapped by his father, who’s revealed his intentions to steal him away from me. Everything in the room fades around me as I stare at my mate, mind frantically reeling for any plan that will save him. Thorne struggles against his bindings, trying desperately to get free. I sink to my knees in horror and despair.

Nemesia appears at my side and lifts me from the ground with steady hands. It’s like the moment at the Battle of Moormyr, when she had helped me stand to face Mazus. Three hundred years later, we’re still locked in a battle we can’t win, once again at Mazus’s mercy. I desperately want to collapse, curl in on myself, and sob. But I don’t. I pull my shoulders back and squeeze Nemesia’s hand once, the only apology I can offer her right now for everything I put her through. I instantly recognize her brand of powerful plant magic, trying to penetrate the invisible wall between us and Thorne, but it doesn’t work.

“I can assure you, General, this is not a fight you’ll win,” Mazus says to Nemesia, who snarls at him with her own grief-laced fury.

“So, it was you who gave them the letter stolen from my room? How did you even enter Thayaria?” Nemesia asks, confirming what she’d told me. I’ll have so much shame to unpack later, but right now I can’t think of anything except Thorne, can’t bring my thoughts to wander anywhere but my trapped mate and how I’m going to save him.

Mazus only shrugs. “I hoped that by convincing Laurel you betrayed her, it would push her into Thorne’s arms. From what I hear, it worked. And as for how, let’s just say only the tiniest drop of blood can unlock many doors that once seemed sealed shut.”

“If you do this, if you take him, it means war,” I snarl with the aether-voice, but Mazus is unaffected. I lock that information away for later, unable to examine it now.

Mazus only laughs at me. “Oh, you stupid female. The war never ended. I just took my time between battles, honing my strategy until it was perfect. I thought I needed you, but turns out, I had the solution all along. I just needed the mating bond to officially snap into place so I could swap your blood for his.”