<h4>Chapter 310: I Still Haven’t Found Anything</h4>


    He cursed under his breath. He hoped to the high heavens this wouldn’t keep up for too long.


    He missed his wife. Goddess, he missed her. The warmth of her skin against his, the scent of their bed tangled with her hair, the quiet strength in herughter when she let her guard down. Now, they were living like strangers in the same house.


    Luna had been sleeping in the baby’s room for three nights straight, leaving his bed as cold and empty as his chest felt without her. He could still smell the faintvender of her presence when he entered their bedroom, but it only deepened the void.


    He longed to crawl into her space, to bury himself against her, to beg for forgiveness even though he wasn’t sure he deserved it.


    But instead, he was ying a game with Isolde—a woman he should have killed rather than entertained. And every moment he kept the farce alive was anothersh against his bond with the only woman who had ever truly owned him.


    *****


    Eryk arrived at the royal empireter that afternoon. He entered the king’s office, finding Damien sprawled across the sofa, one muscr arm flung over his face as if shielding himself from the weight of the world.


    "Your highness?"


    "Eryk." Damien didn’t bother to rise. His posture alone spoke volumes.


    "Your highness, I still haven’t found anything." Eryk shifted uneasily, his hands sping behind his back. "No one visited her. I kept my distance but no one came in or out of the building before she left. How do I proceed?"


    Damien slowly lowered his arm, revealing eyes rimmed with red. "She is talking to someone. Someone hit her and she put the me on Talon. I think they are using a cloaking spell." He sat forward, resting his elbows on his knees, fingers digging into his temples as though to still the roar in his skull. "I need you to find Sage Veyron."


    "Your highness?" Eryk asked, almost whispering, as if afraid even the walls would judge such a request. "I have no idea where to even begin that search. And how about his banishment from Blood City?"


    Damien rose finally, towering. "We’ll cross that bridge when we get there. Just ask around. Ask Doctor Thessa also, see if she knows."


    Eryk bowed his head. "Of course, your highness." Yet he lingered, his weight shifting, his hands sping and unsping.


    Damien waved a hand, a casual flick meant to dismiss him, though it carried the sharpness of a man who wanted to be left alone with his torment. But Eryk didn’t move. He cleared his throat. He had more to say.


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    "What?"


    "Your highness. You should speak to the queen. I don’t think you should underestimate her. I think she will be madder when she eventually finds out what your n is."


    "I need the emotional bacsh from her to make it believable." Using Luna’s fury, weaponizing her heartbreak—every fiber of him loathed the necessity. Yet he could see no other way.


    Eryk shook his head slightly. "But it’s not her I am worried about. Of course, I care about the queen but I worry about you. You look..." He hesitated, lips parting then pressing closed again. He dared not finish the sentence.


    To tell the king that he looked like a broken man, that the strength in his shoulders no longer hid the hollow behind his eyes, was dangerous. But the truth hung heavy in the air between them anyway.


    Damien’s head snapped toward him, predator-swift, eyes gleaming with cold fire. That re was enough to slice the rest of Eryk’s words from his throat.


    "Is that all?"


    "Yes, your highness." The bow that followed was sharp, deeper than usual—a concession, a plea for forgiveness wrapped in deference.


    "You can go." Damien dismissed him with ice in his voice.


    Silence should have been a balm, but instead it roared in Damien’s ears. He leaned back into the sofa, head tipping against the cushion. His chest rose and fell slowly, heavily. The man wasn’t wrong. He might look a wreck on the outside, but on the inside? He was worse.


    Every time he closed his eyes, he saw Luna’s gaze—those molten pools of love once unshakable now staring at him as if he were a stranger... no, worse, as if he were an enemy. And that look was killing him more efficiently than any de could.


    *****


    The nursery glowed with a gentle warmth. The room smelled faintly ofvender, and the hush of the hour wrapped everything in a cocoon of fragile peace. Magnus had just fallen asleep in Luna’s arms, his tiny breaths puffing against her corbone.


    Her hair fell loose around her shoulders, framing her in the kind of beauty that was unearthly, maternal, devastating.


    Damien paused in the doorway, struck as always by the sight of her. The queen of his world. His chosen fated mate. His salvation—and his damnation. He stepped inside, careful with his movements.


    Luna did not acknowledge his presence. She simply lowered Magnus with infinite tenderness,ying him down into the crib. She tucked the nket around their son and brushed a kiss over his forehead. Her lips lingered on their child as if he were the only man in her life worth giving affection to.


    Damien’s hand twitched at his side as he stepped closer. He leaned over the crib, pretending to look at his son, but truthfully? He just wanted to breathe her in. The floral sweetness of her skin, the intimate pull of her nearness. He wanted to close his hand around her waist, pull her back into his chest and bury his face in her neck.


    Luna finally shifted, her gaze sliding briefly over him before darting away again. That fleeting nce was worse than a p—it was filled with walls. Distance. Pain. She had moved her bed into the nursery, and that rejection screamed louder than words. For days, his bed had been cold.


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