Kiakoa
The bond convulses in my chest when she vanishes.
One moment, I feel her presence burning bright in the eastern wing of my castle. Her fear, her anger.
The next—nothing. Empty silence where her heartbeat should echo through our connection.
I wheel my mount around immediately, abandoning the false trail. A scout, one of the outriders, gallops to meet me.
“My lord! A message from the forward scouts—the Valajoki settlements are empty. Evacuated. There are signs of a plague warning posted weeks ago.”
The words confirm what the broken bond already tells me. “A false warning,” I say, the rage building so hot it becomes cold. “A fabrication to lure us away.” I'm already pushing toward home, the horse responding to the urgency in my voice. “This was a diversion. Vasek has taken her.”
“Orders?” Morris asks, riding up beside me.
“Return to castle. Mobilize every remaining guard.” The animal grunts under the pace I demand, but I don't slow. “Full war footing. Anyone who aided in her capture dies.”
Morris nods grimly and signals the column to wheel around. Professional soldiers, they adapt quickly to changed circumstances. But they can't match the speed I need.
I abandon the formation within minutes, driving my mount far beyond normal endurance. The horse's breathing turns ragged, foam flecking its mouth, but I don't relent. If the animal dies under me, I'll run the rest of the way.
The rage builds with each stride. Not the controlled anger I've learned to direct over centuries, but something older. Primal. This is the same raw power that first claimed this territory.
She was taken from my home. From under my protection. While I chased shadows and false intelligence.
I will paint the world red for this insult.
The horse collapses two miles from the castle, heart finally giving out under the supernatural pace I demanded. I continue on foot, covering ground faster than the dying animal ever could.
The familiar spires come into view, and immediately I see the wrongness. The eastern wing flickers in my vision, architecture unstable from lingering reality distortion.
The main gates stand open, my remaining guards rushing to meet me. “My lord!” the gate captain calls. “We felt the magical disturbance, but—”
“Where.” One word, but it carries harmonics that make the stone walls vibrate.
“Eastern wing, sir. Vasek's signature all over the chambers. Portal magic, but unlike anything we've seen.”
I stride past them into the castle, taking the stairs three at a time. The shadow servants materialize around me as I climb, more solid than I've ever seen them. They feed on my escalating rage, growing coherent enough to actually grasp at my clothes in their eagerness to help.
The eastern chamber still holds traces of Vasek's reality manipulation—scorch marks on stone where dimensions folded incorrectly, the lingering taste of metal and alien spaces. But more importantly, I can smell her here. Fear-sweat and determination, copper where she bit her own lip.
And underneath it all, Vasek's presence. Wine and arrogance and the cold sterility of ancient power carefully controlled.
Scratch lies crumpled against the far wall, his form barely maintaining coherence. Multiple cracks run through his smoky body, evidence of violence.
“Master.” His voice is barely a whisper. “I tried to protect her. Tried to fight him.”
“Where is she?”
“The Ironspire. Vasek's personal stronghold.” He struggles to sit up, form flickering dangerously. “I gave her a tracking charm. You can follow the trail.”
My vision goes red around the edges. “How long?”
“An hour to prepare the old portal. Maybe two for—” He sees my expression. “One hour, master. I'll make it work in one hour.”
I stride toward the armory, selecting weapons designed for close killing. Blades that have tasted blood and hunger for more. The shadow servants cluster around me as I arm myself, their forms flickering between translucent and fully solid.
“You risked dissolution to protect her,” I tell Scratch.
“She matters to you. Therefore she matters.” His form stabilizes slightly. “I would do it again.”
“You won't have to. After tonight, no one will dare touch what's mine.”
Scratch leads me to chambers I haven't visited in decades. Ancient stone carved before my time, inlaid with symbols that predate current magical understanding. At the center, a circular platform surrounded by standing stones—the old portal network, dormant for generations.
“The tracking charm will guide us,” Scratch says, beginning the complex ritual to awaken the stones. His damaged form flickers with each gesture, but he doesn't stop. “Directly to her location.”
The ritual takes every minute of the hour I gave him. By the time the gateway opens, Scratch has collapsed twice from the effort. But the portal stabilizes, revealing a stone corridor lit by torches.
“Vasek's stronghold,” he gasps. “Lower levels. She's... high above. Top of the structure.”
I step through without hesitation, the shadow servants flowing behind me.
The stronghold around me is all carved stone and iron—functional architecture designed for strength rather than beauty. Vasek's taste runs to intimidation through power, not aesthetic refinement.
The first guard I encounter dies before he can cry out. My claws open his throat, silencing him permanently. The second manages to draw his sword before I tear his head from his shoulders.
I don't fight them so much as simply end them. Each death feeds the berserker state, stripping away more layers of civilization until only the apex predator remains.
More guards respond to the sounds of violence, rushing down stairs in formation. Professional soldiers with quality equipment and years of training. Under normal circumstances, they might slow me down.
These are not normal circumstances.
I flow through them like liquid death. Where I pass, bodies fall in pieces. The stone walls run red with blood, and my footprints leave crimson trails on the floors.
The shadow servants join the slaughter, solid enough now to grip weapons and throttle enemies. Together, we paint Vasek's stronghold in the color of his failure.
The throne room waits at the structure's peak, reached by stairs carved from single blocks of stone. I climb slowly, leaving bloody handprints on the walls. Each step echoes through the fortress, announcing my approach to whoever waits above.
Each step promises death climbing toward them.
The throne room doors are heavy oak reinforced with iron—practical barriers rather than artistic statements. I don't knock or call for entry or issue challenges. I simply tear them from their hinges when they don't open fast enough.
Inside, Vasek waits beside a throne carved from obsidian. He's dressed in formal robes, trying to maintain dignity despite the sounds of slaughter that preceded my arrival. His face shows strain, but no real fear yet.
That changes when he sees me.
Braith sits in a chair across from him, unharmed but constrained by the same reality-distortion field he used in my castle. When she sees me—covered in blood, eyes burning gold, claws still extended from the killing—relief flares through the bond so strongly it staggers us both.
“Kiakoa.” Her voice, steady and warm despite everything. “You came.”
I drink in the sight of her. Unharmed. Whole. Still mine despite whatever arguments he's made.
“Always,” I manage, though speech feels strange after the wordless violence below.
“Your arrival is... earlier than expected,” Vasek says, as if we're meeting for negotiations rather than his execution. “The portal network hasn't been used in decades. Impressive that you managed—”
My hand closes around his throat, cutting off his words.
“You took her from me.” Each word comes out controlled, almost conversational. The berserker rage has burned so hot it's become cold, focused into something surgical.
“I saved her from—”
I tighten my grip until his words become strangled gasps.
“You touched what belongs to me.”
I lift him from the floor, his legs dangling. His reality-warping magic flickers as panic overwhelms his concentration. The distortion field around Braith dissolves.
“You made her afraid.”
Through the bond, I feel her emotional state—anger more than fear, satisfaction at seeing her captor helpless. But the principle remains. He caused her distress.
I hurl him across the room hard enough to crack the stone wall behind his throne. He hits with a wet sound and slides to the floor, gasping for air through his damaged windpipe.
“Kiakoa.” Braith's voice draws my attention. “I'm all right. He didn't hurt me.”
I turn to look at her fully. Safe, unharmed, watching me not with fear but with satisfaction. As if this bloody trail through his stronghold is exactly what she expected from me.
“I know,” I tell her. “But he still took you. Still made you his prisoner. Still thinks he can persuade you to leave me.”
“He was wrong about that last part.”
“He was wrong about everything.”
Vasek struggles to his feet, blood running from his mouth where the impact split his lips. “You can't simply murder a peer lord without consequences. The others will unite against you—”
“The others,” I say, stalking toward him slowly, “can join you.”
Vasek raises his hands, trying to summon reality-warping magic. The air ripples around him, space beginning to bend as he attempts to escape through dimensional manipulation.
I grab his wrists before the spell can fully form. The bones snap like dry wood under gentle pressure.
His scream echoes off the stone walls, high and musical and deeply satisfying. The magic dies with his concentration, leaving him defenseless and broken.
“This is for taking her from our home.”
I tear his left arm off at the shoulder. Blood sprays across the black throne, painting it crimson. The limb separates with a wet ripping sound that harmonizes beautifully with his shriek.
“This is for making her feel trapped, even for a moment.”
The right arm follows. More blood, more screaming, more satisfaction as centuries of arrogance crumble into animal terror.
“This is for thinking you could convince her to abandon me.”
I place my hands on either side of his head, claws pricking the soft flesh around his ears. He tries to speak—pleas, offers, desperate bargains—but I'm no longer interested in his words.
“And this is for believing she could ever choose anyone but me.”
I twist sharply. His neck snaps with a sound like breaking branches.
Silence returns to the throne room, broken only by the drip of blood on stone and the soft whispers of shadow servants feeding on the lingering violence.
I stand over Vasek's dismembered corpse, satisfaction humming through every nerve. The berserker rage hasn't faded, but it's found its target and consumed it completely.
Behind me, I hear Braith stand.
Footsteps approach across blood-slicked stone. I turn to face her, aware of what she sees—her mate covered in enemy blood, eyes still burning gold, hands still stained with the violence I committed to reclaim her.
She stops close enough to smell the copper and death clinging to my skin. Her gaze travels over the carnage, taking in Vasek's dismembered body, the blood painting the stone walls, the savage satisfaction still radiating from my frame.
“You killed them all,” she observes.
“Yes.”
“Everyone who helped take me.”
“Every single one.”
“You tore him apart because he touched what belongs to you.”
“Because he took you from me. Because he made you afraid. Because he thought he could convince you to leave.” I cup her face in my bloodstained hands, feeling her pulse race under my palms. “My beautiful, deadly mate.”
She stares into my eyes for a long moment, reading the truth there. The berserker hasn't fully faded. I'm still dangerous, still capable of more violence if anyone else threatens what's mine.
Instead of pulling away, she leans into my touch.
“How do you feel?” she asks.
“Complete. Satisfied.” My thumbs trace her cheekbones, leaving faint red streaks on her skin. “Like I've finally stopped pretending to be something I'm not.”
“What were you pretending to be?”
“Civilized. Diplomatic. Someone who solves problems with words instead of claws.” I lean down until our foreheads touch. “Someone who wasn't made for exactly this.”
Her breathing changes, becomes shorter and more rapid. Through the bond, I catch the scent of arousal mixing with copper and death.
“Take me home,” she whispers.
“Not yet.” I glance toward Vasek's corpse, at the blood pooling around his severed limbs. “Here first. In the place he thinks will be his.”
Her pupils dilate. “Here?”
“Here. Now. So his failure is complete.”
I lift her onto the black stone throne, positioning her where Vasek once sat in arrogant comfort. Where he planned to keep her while he demonstrated his supposed superiority.
Instead, she'll claim me here. Mark me as hers just as thoroughly as I've marked her as mine.