Chapter 21 When Love is Taken
WHEN LOVE IS TAKEN
OBLIVION
“What do you mean she’s gone missing?”
The words left me sharper than intended.
My gaze already fixed on Torin as he stood opposite me from where I was leaning back against my desk.
But I didn’t wait for him to elaborate, already reaching for my phone as a cold, familiar irritation settled beneath my skin.
One that had nothing to do with panic and everything to do with the fact that this should not have been possible.
Iridessa never went missing.
I tapped her contact, lifting the phone to my ear as the line rang once, twice and then cut off. My jaw tightened as I lowered the device, my expression remaining otherwise unchanged. Although the silence that followed stretched just long enough to carry weight.
“When did she lose contact?”
“Last night, she was due to check in. She didn’t,” Torin replied without delay. A beat passed, my gaze dropping briefly to the screen in my hand, frowning like it was the enemy.
“Then I agree, something is wrong,” I said, my jaw tight, as I gritted my teeth.
Because Iridessa always maintained contact, like everyone else on my council, when on a mission.
I was already turning that thought over in my mind when the sharp rise of voices from below cut cleanly through the moment.
It wasn’t the usual hum of the club, nor the controlled chaos I allowed within my walls.
But something rougher was escalating in a way that felt wrong.
My focus shifted instantly toward the door.
My body already reacting before the thought had fully formed, when a hurried knock followed almost immediately after.
The door opened before I could respond, a waitress named Monique slipping inside with a breathless urgency that didn’t belong in my domain. Her composure fractured in a way that told me everything I needed to know before she even spoke.
“My lord,” she said quickly, her voice tight with panic as she struggled to steady it,
“A fight broke out, and it’s not stopping.
Their demons are out of control.” The words landed wrong.
Not because fights were uncommon, but because nothing within my club ever reached that point without reason.
But more than anything, something about it felt wrong.
Perhaps it was the timing, and because my thoughts were centered around my second in command.
Or maybe I was more on edge because my demon was restless and desperate to get back to my Siren.
Torin and I shared a look before leaving the office after I gave my waitress the nod to leave.
Then the moment we stepped back into the club, I could hear the furious sounds of the fight below.
We then wasted no time vaulting over the balcony, getting us both down there with greater speed.
My wings erupted in a heartbeat, slowing my descent before evaporating as soon as my feet landed.
Two demons were already locked together near the center of the room, one slamming the other back into a table hard enough to splinter wood. While others circled too close and too eager, as though the aggression was spreading rather than contained.
There was something wrong.
I didn’t break my stride as I moved through them, the space parting instinctively at my approach despite the chaos. Though my attention had already shifted past the fight itself, because something else had caught my focus first.
A scent.
Faint, almost lost beneath the usual blend of smoke, liquor, and heat, but sharp enough that once noticed, it cut cleanly through everything else.
Something floral and bitter.
I slowed just enough to reach for the nearest glass, abandoned on a table, lifting it without hesitation, taking in the scent myself before passing it to Torin.
“What do you smell?”
He didn’t question it, bringing it closer, his brow tightening almost immediately as recognition set in.
“…Belladonna.”
Of course it fucking was!
My gaze flicked briefly across the room again, taking in the heightened aggression, the lack of control, and the way even those not yet involved seemed… restless.
Agitated and far too close to the edge.
“Not enough to kill them,” Torin added, quieter now, more certain.
“But enough to…”
“Drive them fucking crazy!” I finished with a growl, already turning away from the fight as though it had ceased to interest me entirely. Because this didn’t feel random.
No, it felt… Deliberate.
My gaze swept over the chaos as the violence spiraled further out of control, bodies colliding, voices rising, something feral threading through it that did not belong within my walls.
So, I took the quickest course of action to sort out this shit and called upon my demon side to do just that. The word didn’t come from my throat alone. It tore free from something deeper, something darker, my voice layered with the unmistakable edge of my demon as I roared,
“ENOUGH!” The command struck through the space with a force that had nothing to do with volume and everything to do with power. At the same time, my hands spread slightly at my sides, fingers flexing as if something far darker answered the call.
The shadows responded instantly.
But they didn’t creep, nor did they crawl from me.
No, instead…
They exploded.
A violent surge of darkness burst outward from me, sweeping across the floor in a wave that swallowed the light as it moved. A rolling fog cutting through bodies, through movement, through chaos itself, as though none of it had ever existed.
The effect was immediate, as every single one of them dropped to the floor.
Not gradually, but all at once, their bodies forced downward as my darkness seized control.
Their knees brutally met the stone as their hands braced the floor.
Then their heads all snapped back with a force that would have broken the necks of mortals.
There were at least twenty of them that had been affected by the poisonous plant, and each of them was now forced to hold their mouths open. With a flick of my wrist, my shadows drove in.
It wasn’t gentle, nor was it subtle as my darkness poured into them, forcing its way past teeth and breath alike. Quickly filling lungs that no longer obeyed their owners, choking, consuming, dragging something out from deep within as their bodies convulsed beneath it.
Then… It surfaced.
A thick, unnatural hue of violet began to seep from them, drawn out in strands that twisted and curled through the air like smoke being ripped from a fire. The remnants of whatever had been forced into their systems now being torn free, stripped away without mercy.
Belladonna.
Or something close enough to it.
The shadows coiled around it, tightening before crushing it entirely, the substance dissipating into nothing as it evaporated into the air, leaving only the aftermath behind.
Silence then followed.
The shadows withdrew just as quickly as they had come, retracting back toward me in a smooth, fluid motion before sinking once more beneath my skin. As though they had never left.
And what remained…
Was order.
The bodies stayed where they had fallen, breath ragged, eyes unfocused, their systems purged so violently that none of them was in any state to rise again anytime soon.
The chaos that had consumed the room moments before was now reduced to nothing more than the aftermath of something far more controlled.
I lowered my hands slowly, the last remnants of shadow slipping back beneath my skin as though they had never existed at all.
“Find the source,” I said, my voice calm now, measured, though it carried no less weight for it.
“And get rid of it.”
Torin didn’t hesitate.
He turned immediately, already issuing orders to those nearest him, his voice cutting through the space with sharp precision as he began directing them to sweep the floor.
“Clear it of the carnage left, but more than anything, check the barrels for any trace of the poison.”
He turned back to me and asked,
“Why does it look like you have a bad feeling about this?” I frowned at the question, as the gnawing feeling wouldn’t leave me.
It was the timing. The fact that it had been just disruptive enough to demand my attention, but not enough to truly threaten anything.
But more than anything else, it felt like…
A diversion.
“I do,” I said at last, my voice even, though something colder had already begun to settle beneath it. Torin’s gaze sharpened at that.
“I just hope I’m not right.”
That was all I gave him. All I needed to.
Because the moment the thought had fully formed, it was already too late to ignore it.
I turned without another word, already moving, the shift in me immediate as everything else fell away.
My focus narrowed to a single point with a precision that left no room for distraction.
“You’ve warded the room,” Torin said quickly as he fell into step beside me, his tone tighter now, edged with something that told me he was starting to see it too.
“Nothing gets in or out without your knowing.”
“I know.”
The words came easily, automatic even, but they did nothing to quiet the instinct that had already taken hold, something deeper than logic. Something that didn’t rely on wards or protections.
Because wards could be bypassed. Rules could be bent. And whatever this was… It felt like it had been planned.
“What are you thinking, Wye?” he asked, quieter this time.
“That I don’t like the timing,” I replied, my voice controlled, though there was nothing calm about the way my thoughts were aligning now.
“Iridessa disappears, my territory is compromised from within, and it all happens just after I claimed my Siren.”
Torin exhaled sharply.
“So, you think they’re connected.” It wasn’t a question.
“I think nothing happens in my domain without reason,” I said evenly, my gaze fixed ahead as the conclusion settled into place with cold certainty.