Page 4 of Broken Fates (Severed Flames #3)

Chapter 4

Xavier

W e’d been tracking Vale for hours.

Wind howled through the trees, shaking loose drifts of snow from their branches. The night stretched on, vast and unyielding, the world suffocating beneath the weight of winter that seemed to stretch on forever. The moon, pale and hollow, hung high in the sky, casting long shadows through the dense woods.

But there was no sign of her—only fading tracks, half-faded ghosts of movement left behind in the snow. A hoofprint here, a scuffed boot mark there. Each sign of her presence fading by the second, the trail disappearing beneath the snowfall, getting harder to follow with each passing mile.

Kian rode ahead of me, his jaw tight, his body a coiled wire ready to snap. Idris rode behind, silent as the grave.

And I…

I couldn’t breathe around the weight in my chest.

She was alone. Too far ahead. And we were still wasting time.

We’d left the kingdom on the edge of a blade.

Freya—a thousand-year-old vampire with the temperament of a battle-ax—had been the only choice to leave behind. She had no patience for politics but more loyalty than most of the nobles combined. If anyone could keep the council from fracturing while we were gone, it would be her.

But the kingdom was on the brink of civil war.

Half the noble houses wanted war—a retaliation against Girovia, a display of power so ruthless that no one would ever think to challenge us again. The other half wanted Idris dead for letting Vale ascend the throne in the first place.

It didn’t matter that the curse had been lifted. It didn’t matter that their magic was finally whole again. They wanted blood, and we were one wrong move away from collapse.

And here we were—three of the most powerful figures in the kingdom—riding into the cold, leaving it all behind.

For her.

I ran a hand down my face, fighting off the bone-deep urge to shift. It would have been faster. So much faster.

But speed meant nothing if we lost her in the trees. The Girovian forests were vast—too dense, too dark, too tangled in shadows. If we took to the skies, we’d lose her. She could be a mile ahead or ten, but from the air, she would be invisible.

And worse—Girovia was watching. Malvor and his ilk might have been on their own, but Girovia and Festia had been at war since the curse started. Mages were stationed at every border, waiting for an excuse to drag Idris down.

If we shifted, we’d be seen, and if we were seen, we’d be hunted.

Girovian battle mages specialized in grounding dragons. We were powerful, but not invincible. If they caught us mid-flight, they’d rip us from the sky like birds shot from the heavens.

So we tracked her the only way we could—on horseback—and we were running out of time.

A sharp gust of wind cut through the trees, stirring loose snow from the branches. The cold bit at my exposed skin, but I barely felt it. I kept scanning the ground, looking for any sign—a trail, a broken branch, something.

And then I saw it.

The faint impression of hoofprints leading toward a frozen stream.

I pulled back on the reins, slowing my stallion to a halt. Kian did the same, both of us scanning the clearing, tension coiling thick in the air.

The world had gone silent.

The trees stood like watching sentinels, their frostbitten branches weighed with snow. The only sound was the distant trickle of water—a frozen stream, fractured and broken. Kian pulled up beside me, eyes narrowing. We both dismounted in one fluid motion.

The moment my boots hit the ground, I knew.

She’d been here.

The air still carried the faintest trace of her scent—burning embers, a blooming rose, and something else uniquely Vale. The scent was fading, but it was here.

Kian crouched, running his gloved fingers over the indentations in the snow.

“Not more than half a day ago.” His voice sounded as if it had been dragged over hot coals, the desperation like a knife in my gut.

“She stopped here,” I muttered. “To rest.”

I tried not to think about how exhausted she must have been. How little time she’d had to breathe since she left. I hadn’t managed to sleep since we’d been apart, and as far as she’d gotten, she’d barely had time to breathe, let alone rest.

Kian stood, eyes scanning the tree line. “Then why the hell did she leave in such a hurry?”

The thin ribbon of water in front of us had begun to freeze over, but near the edge, the ice had been disturbed—like she’d left fast, without time to cover her tracks.

My gut twisted at the thought.

That was bad. That was very fucking bad.

And then Kian stiffened. “Shit.”

I turned and saw it—a body. Half-frozen, stiff with ice, dark robes barely visible beneath the snowfall. The only reason I didn’t lose it right there and then was because he was far too big to be Vale. Kian crouched first, pressing two fingers to the man’s throat.

“Dead?” I asked, my voice low, my magic crawling over my skin, reaching for the ice around me.

Kian shook his head as he reached for the sword at his belt. “Not yet.”

I stepped closer. That was when I saw the blackened veins crawling up his neck. The hollow look in his half-lidded violet eyes. This wasn’t just any soldier. No, he was a mage. Vale had almost killed a Girovian mage.

A glimmer of pride cut through the bitter worry clawing up my throat. Good.

I knelt beside him, gripping the front of his robes, pressing just a bit of healing magic into him to get him to speak. “What happened?”

The mage’s bloody lips cracked into something too close to a smile.

“She’s already…” His voice rasped against the wind, “…too late.”

Kian and I locked eyes.

I gritted my teeth, shaking him, the desire to rip him limb from limb nearly overtaking my brain. “Too late for what?”

His mouth opened, but no sound came out.

“Answer me,” I ordered, shoving more magic into him to keep him talking.

A shudder racked his body as his eyes rolled in his head. “You think you can save her?” He let out a breathy chuckle. “She might have ended me, but she’s dead already. She just doesn’t know it yet.”

Then, he convulsed, the breath rattling in his chest. His fingers twitched once, twice, and then stilled. A fresh gust of wind cut through the trees, and I felt it—a whisper of something unseen. A pulse of magic.

Not Vale’s.

Not even Idris’.

Something else. Something dark.

The sensation slithered against my skin—watching, waiting, pressing at the edges of the clearing, and then it was gone, and the mage was dead.

A long silence stretched between us as I tried and failed to reach for Vale through the bond. All I felt was the faint flicker of her fear coiling like a snake in my belly.

She was terrified.

And she was alone.

Wind howled through the trees, shaking loose the last remnants of snowfall clinging to the branches. The forest had gone eerily still, watching, waiting—as if the very land knew that something was about to break.

Then Idris’ voice cut through the tense miasma curling around us.

“She wouldn’t have done this unless she had to.”

His words were quiet—too quiet. Not broken. Not regretful. Just stated like a fact, as if that made it better.

I dropped my hold on the mage, watching dispassionately as his body flopped limply in the snow. My fingers curled into fists, the cold biting into my skin as rage boiled in my gut.

“Is that all you have to say?”

Idris finally lifted his head. His golden gaze met mine, unreadable, but something about it set my teeth on edge.

“You want me to tell you she was running?” His voice was level, a thread of something sharp woven beneath the steel. “That she’s afraid? That she regrets leaving?”

He exhaled slowly. His jaw tightened.

“That’s nothing you don’t already know, and I don’t think she does. If she regretted it, she’d be headed back to us—not running off again.”

That broke something inside me.

The cold, detached way he said it—like it didn’t gut him to admit it. Like he wasn’t fucking dying inside. Like the mate bond wasn’t stretched so thin it felt like thorned vines wound through my whole fucking body.

He wasn’t even angry. He wasn’t desperate like Kian and I were. He was just— nothing . Like he’d already accepted life without her. Like he’d already given up.

It was the last fucking straw.

I moved before I thought, the distance between us vanishing in an instant. My fist collided with his jaw, snapping his head to the side.

Kian didn’t lift a finger to stop me. Didn’t even flinch.

Because he knew.

Idris staggered back but didn’t fall. His breath left him in a sharp exhale, his magic crackling beneath his skin. His gaze snapped back to mine—and for half a second, something flickered.

Something raw. Something so close to breaking. But then?—

He locked it down. He always locked it down. This was exactly why she’d left.

Before I could think, I grabbed him by the collar, slamming him into the nearest tree. The bark splintered behind him, brittle from the cold, cracking under his weight. Snow dusted from the branches, shaking loose like dying stars.

“If you’re the reason she won’t take us back,” I snarled, my voice razor-sharp, “I will fucking end you.”

Kian didn’t move—didn’t breathe. Neither did Idris. His jaw clenched, his throat working around words that never came.

I pressed in closer, lowering my voice to something lethal. Something final. “I swear to all the gods and goddesses, on all the blood in my veins, on the fucking air in my lungs—if she won’t return to us because of your bullshit, I will rip you limb from limb. Do you hear me?”

His breath hitched.

For a fraction of a second, he almost looked away. Almost let himself feel it.

Then, his mouth parted. “I?—”

“ No ,” I growled, cutting him off. My grip tightened on his collar, my claws digging into the fabric. The only thing keeping me from tearing him apart was the fact that I needed him breathing long enough to find her.

“If I lose her because you can’t get your head out of your ass long enough to realize she sacrificed herself to save us all—that she loved you enough to fucking die for you—you won’t have to worry about Zamarra or Arden.”

The next words left me like a death sentence. “I’ll kill you myself.”

Something inside him fractured. Betrayal, hurt, fury—all crossed his expression as his golden eyes burned. I’d warned him the day she’d waltzed into the kingdom that I would not watch her die. He’d already made me a liar once. He wouldn’t do it a second time.

Idris didn’t argue, didn’t fight back.

Because he knew I was right—we both knew it.

I let him go and stepped back. The silence burned between us. Thick. Tangled. Poisoned.

He just stood there. His hands balled into fists at his sides, shaking just slightly. His jaw was still tight, his breathing slow and controlled—but his magic flared, spinning out from his body in a great golden arch.

For the first time, the cracks were forming beneath his armor, and I had to wonder if he was just as close to breaking as we were.

But then he swallowed it all down, just like he always did. He exhaled sharply, rubbing his jaw, rolling his shoulders like he was shaking it off.

“We’re wasting time.”

For once, I didn’t argue.

I turned toward my horse.

Kian mounted first, still watching Idris like he was waiting for him to shatter.

I swung onto the saddle, my knuckles still burning from the hit, my chest still coiled so tight it hurt to breathe.

And the mage’s last words haunted me.

She’s already too late.

Vale was still ahead—still alone.

I didn’t know what she’d found or if she was safe, but I knew one thing.

If we didn’t get to her in time, there wouldn’t be a kingdom left to save.