radicalducati Chapter 21
Chapter 21
The bond goes ice-fucking-cold at three in the morning.
Not the gentle fade I’ve been dealing with for weeks. Not the slow dimming of a candle burning out. This is like someone dumped liquid nitrogen directly into my chest cavity and called it a day.
I bolt upright, gasping like I’ve been drowning.
Something’s wrong. Not fading-connection wrong. Not distance-making-things-difficult wrong. Wrong in the way that tastes like metal and makes your primitive brain scream about predators and running.
Lucy’s in trouble. Real trouble.
I spend the next three days waiting for someone—anyone—to mention her name. To give me some bullshit update about negotiations or prisoner exchanges or literally anything that acknowledges she exists.
Radio silence.
Toren won’t meet my eyes during council meetings. The advisors discuss everything except the obvious elephant shitting all over their perfectly planned political landscape. The court pretends she never existed, like collective amnesia is a viable strategy for avoiding uncomfortable conversations.
Day four, I crack.
“Fuck this,” I mutter, storming toward the throne room like a man with nothing left to lose.
Which, to be fair, pretty accurately describes my current situation.
The guards try to stop me. “His Majesty is in private session—”
“His Majesty can kiss my ass.”
I shoulder past them like they’re made of tissue paper and bad intentions.
Toren’s hunched over some document that probably determines the fate of thousands of people he’ll never meet. Very important king shit that definitely can’t be interrupted by his son having a complete emotional breakdown.
“We need to talk,” I announce.
He doesn’t look up. “I’m busy.”
“I don’t give a shit.”
“Clearly. You never do when it comes to appropriate protocol.”
“Where is she?”
Finally, he raises his head. The expression on his face could freeze hell. “Who?”
“Don’t play stupid. It doesn’t suit you.”
“I have no idea what you’re talking about.”
“Lucy. Where. Is. She.”
“That name means nothing to me.”
The casual way he says it—like she’s a footnote he’s already forgotten—makes something violent unfurl in my chest.
“The bond went cold four days ago. Not fading. Cold. Like someone was hurting her.”
“Your delusions about mystical connections aren’t my concern.”
“My delusions? You handed her over to a psychopath and pretended it was diplomacy.”
“I prevented a war.”
“You traded a person like livestock.”
“I traded a political problem for political stability.”
There it is. The truth laid bare like a corpse on a marble slab.
“She’s not a problem. She’s—”
“She’s what? Your great love? Your soulmate?” He laughs, and the sound cuts like broken glass. “She’s a girl who got caught in the crossfire of politics too big for her to understand.”
“She understood plenty. She understood that you’re all cowards who’d rather sacrifice someone innocent than deal with actual problems.”
“Actual problems?” Toren stands, and suddenly the throne room feels smaller. More dangerous. “You want to discuss actual problems? Let’s talk about your wedding in three days. Let’s talk about the alliance that girl’s disappearance made possible. Let’s talk about the future instead of wallowing in the past.”
“The future where I marry someone I don’t love to fix a mess you created?”
“The future where you stop acting like a lovesick teenager and start acting like a king.”
“I’m not king yet.”
“No. But you will be. And when you are, you’ll understand that sometimes love is a luxury we can’t afford.”
The bond pulses once—sharp, desperate, like a dying animal trying to claw its way to safety.
“She’s alive,” I say.
“Is she?”
“I can feel her.”
“You feel what you want to feel.”
“I feel what’s real.”
“Reality is your wedding in three days. Reality is Lady Vaela waiting for you to stop chasing ghosts. Reality is a kingdom that needs leadership, not romantic poetry.”
I take a step forward. Then another. Until I’m close enough to see the flecks of gold in his eyes that remind me we’re actually related.
“If you’ve hurt her—”
“I haven’t touched her. I don’t need to. Distance and time will do the work for me.”
“And if they don’t?”
“They will. Love without proximity dies eventually. Even yours.”
The casual certainty in his voice makes me want to tear this room apart stone by stone.
“You’re wrong.”
“Am I? When’s the last time you felt anything more than echoes through that bond you’re so convinced matters?”
Four days ago. When everything went cold and wrong and tasted like fear.
“Tell me where she is.”
“I don’t know where she is. And I don’t care.”
“Liar.”
“King. There’s a difference.”
“Not from where I’m standing.”
“Then you’re standing in the wrong place.”
I turn to leave, but his voice stops me at the door.
“Three days, Cassian. Then this conversation becomes irrelevant.”
“This conversation will never be irrelevant.”
“Your feelings will be. Time has a way of making even the strongest emotions feel like stories you tell yourself about who you used to be.”
I slam the door hard enough to rattle the hinges.