Bride To His Darkness
Chapter 278: Missing From The Palace

Chapter 278: Missing From The Palace

Ivan quickly made his way down the spiraling stairs to the ground floor.

It took some time before he located the kitchen, as he wasn’t the type who frequents it, but upon entering, his eyes trailed to the water-filled jug on the counter, whilst he moved closer to scrutinize it. This jug... it was the same jug his little lamb had brought down to fill, but when he looked around, scouting the perimeters to confirm if she was nearby, his wife was, unbelievably, nowhere to be seen.

"Where did she go?" His eyebrows creased in unsettlement, a flicker of worry reflecting in his irises at her sudden disappearance.

The sensation that woke him up... Did it come from her??

"Sam!" He called her name, his tone laced with urgency as he searched the vicinity where he presumed she might have ventured into. His heart drummed when he checked all the recommended places, but found her absence instead. What’s strange, he was starting to lose grip of her presence– it felt like her scent was fading, consequently growing fainter and fainter, no matter how hard he tried to follow it.

It’s... impossible! How can he lose her scent?

"Sam?"

His constant calling of her name already had the butler stepping out of his chamber to meet Ivan. He held an oil lamp in his hand, and the mid-night weather was cold, whilst he had covered himself with a shawl and joined Ivan who had stepped into the courtyard. He found the vampire pacing back and forth, seemingly panicking about who knows what!

"Your Majesty? Is there an issue?" Asked Albert who noticed the evident concern on Ivan’s bewitching face. Ivan had stopped rubbing his eyebrows and was glad to see Albert who had entered the courtyard.

"Have you seen my wife?" He immediately asked Albert who appeared momentarily confused by the question.

"Your... wife, your Majesty?"

"Yes, my wife. She came down to get some water and now I can’t find her."

"Maybe she got lost on her way back to the chamber? It is impossible for her to disappear without a trace, I shall summon a few guards and we will search the vicinity." Albert assured Ivan as they moved to the grand hall.

"Can’t someone have a peaceful night for once, I can hear your voice all the way from the top floor, did someone die?" Alistair had humorously come down the stairs, and it wasn’t too long before everyone showed up as well. Everyone besides those from the Winged Palace had gathered in the main hall, but upon sensing the current mood Ivan was in, they dared not question him and casted questionable glances amongst themselves.

However, no one seemed to be aware about what was going on.

"Herbert." Ivan called his trusted guard who showed up in no time, "search the front yard premises and take some of the guards to search the back for my wife. Question the guards at the gate and figure out if anything suspicious happened. No one is leaving this Palace until I see to it that my wife is brought back safely!"

"Of course, your Majesty." Herbert lowered his head in a bow and quickly went to do as ordered. When he exited the main hall, Albert equally took a few male servants to search the garden for their missing Queen, cause he knew, if she wasn’t found, this Palace would be hanging upside down with all of them in it.

"Your wife?" Tobias cluelessly inquired from the stairs as he descended, "did something happen?"

"I don’t know, and I can’t make unnecessary assumptions, but all I know for now is that I can’t find her, and I can’t feel her presence." He dropped the news with an iciness in his voice, leaving everyone stupefied. "She is not someone who’d lose her way while coming up the stairs, and if she did, she would have answered considering how many times I’ve called her out. The jug she brought down with her is still in the kitchen, but she’s not there. I want everyone to stay within the hall premises till Herbert returns. That is an order!" He made it clear to everyone, his crimson eyes conveying the consequences that would be given to whoever had played this dirty trick on him.

"The Queen is missing?" Shocking gasps could still be heard, and it was so unbelievable, even to Abdiel who quietly said,

"Are you suggesting someone from the Palace must have abducted her? She is the Queen, Ivan. I am sure she’s around the Palace somewhere." He assured Ivan, but the Vampire wasn’t in his right state of mind to receive any sort of positiveness, not until he sees his wife standing before him.

"Abduction from the Palace, is that possible?" Alistair softly inquired from Tobias, who was as clueless as he was, but even if abduction from the Palace was extremely difficult, it wasn’t impossible.

Though they hoped that wasn’t the case.

That night, no one had a chance to move from the main hall, even the servants were lined up at a specific corner, including Lucy and everyone within. The news of their Queen disappearing overnight had come as a shock to everyone, the tension in the air was oppressive, enough to choke them all, and from the aura surrounding their King, it was difficult to even breathe, as it appeared even the littlest action could set him off, like cutting the wrong wire on a time bomb.

It was getting close to dawn when Herbert returned with the guards who were assigned to stay at the gate. There were four of them, but another shock of the day, three of the guards were dead, and they didn’t need to be told in order to conclude the obvious, but the one Herbert supported was still alive. From the painful red welts around his neck, Ivan could guess that he had been ruthlessly strangled by something.

Dropping him before Ivan, the guard tried not to cough out and immediately bowed with his head touching the ground. Ivan’s crimson eyes narrowed into a fierce slit, and he asked,

"Who did this?"

"Your Majesty–" the guard’s parched throat felt painfully dry, leading to another cough that made him spit out blood. He had been hanging in a tree for so long, it was merely grace that Herbert and his fellow guards had come to his rescue before he lost his life.

"Where is my wife?" Ivan’s demand and concern for his innocent wife, made him turn a blind eye to the guard’s critical predicament. "Where is she??!!" He was at the verge of raising his voice when the guard finally answered.

"You might not believe this but, she’s... she’s the one who... who killed the guards and left, Your Majesty. We tried to stop her, but she retaliated." The guards man confessed in a trembling voice, and there was silence.