Meanwhile, in the dark chamber, Theron’s breath shattered into a scream as his gaze fell upon the broken token.

The fragments lay scattered at his feet, lifeless, dull, stripped of the faint glow that had once tethered him to her. For a fleeting moment, reason tried to steady him. It was only a token. A conduit. A thing that could be remade. He knew that. He could reach her again. He would reach her again.

But the thought did nothing to quiet what rose inside him.

Because what had been severed was not just magic.

It was something far deeper.

Something that did not belong to runes or craft or even power.

It was as if a thread woven through his very soul had been ripped away, leaving behind a hollow ache that pulsed with every heartbeat. The pain did not strike like a wound—it lingered, raw and unfinished, like a scar that had been torn open before it could heal. He could feel it there, deep within him, something vast and distant and yet unbearably close, as though a part of him had been dragged beyond his reach.

His chest tightened.

His breath grew uneven.

And then...

Flashes.

They came without warning, without logic, without mercy.

A world unfolded before his mind’s eye—bright and impossibly vivid. Colors richer than anything he had known. Light that did not burn but embraced. Air filled with fragrance so soft and alive it felt like it could lift the soul itself. It was a place untouched by the weight he carried, untouched by the darkness that had shaped him.

A place that felt... hers.

And then...

It cracked.

A fissure tore through that brightness, jagged and consuming. Darkness seeped in, not creeping but pulling, as though it had found something it had been searching for. It did not simply invade; it took. Something was dragged away, something that belonged there, something that mattered.

Something that mattered to him.

Theron staggered, his vision blurring as the sensation tore through him again, sharper this time, deeper, as if that unseen force was still reaching, still claiming what it had not yet finished taking.

"No..." his voice broke, raw and unsteady.

His hands clenched, nails biting into his palms as if pain might anchor him, might keep whatever remained from slipping further away.

"My little hare!" he cried out, the words ripping free from somewhere he could not control, carrying with them a desperation he had never allowed himself to show.

The chamber swallowed his voice.

But the ache did not fade. It settled deeper, rooting itself in his chest like something that refused to be torn out.

"You will not take her from me!" Theron’s voice broke through the chamber, raw and unrestrained, no longer the measured tone of a prince but the cry of someone who had just lost something irreplaceable.

From the King’s vantage, the change was immediate...and terrifying.

Theron’s gaze lost all focus, as though the world before him had become insignificant, replaced by something vast and unreachable. A tremor ran through the ground beneath their feet. Fine cracks splintered across the polished floor, racing outward like veins under strain. The pillars lining the chamber groaned, stone grinding against stone as if the very structure recoiled from him.

And then... those ribbons.

The King had seen them before... those delicate, flowing strands like organza caught in an unseen wind, shadows that had gathered around Theron earlier, shielding him, feeding him. But now, they were no longer shadows.

They were light.

Blinding, radiant, alive.

They unfurled around Theron in slow, mesmerizing currents, coiling and drifting as though guided by a will far older than magic itself. Each ribbon pulsed with brilliance, casting shifting patterns across the fractured chamber walls. They did not simply surround him—they crowned him, claimed him, answered him.

Theron stood at the center of it all, unmoving, yet impossibly vast.

His eyes, that were once sharp and burning with anger, were now completely white, stripped of all human color, glowing with an intensity that made it impossible to meet his gaze. His dark hair lifted as if caught in a storm no one else could feel, each strand turning pale, luminous, until it shone like spun silver. Light seeped from his skin, not in bursts, but in a steady, overwhelming radiance that blurred the edges of his form.

For the first time...

The King stepped back... Out of instinct.

Fear tightened in his chest, sharp and unfamiliar. This was no longer a son testing limits, no longer a prince straining against restraint. Whatever stood before him now... was something else entirely. Something he had not prepared for.

Edric Vantaris moved forward out of reflex, placing himself between the King and Theron, though even he faltered mid-step. His breath hitched, his hands trembling despite years of discipline. He had wielded shadows, bent them, consumed them, yet what radiated from Theron now was beyond opposition. It was not something to fight. It was something that erased the idea of resistance altogether.

The guards did not move at all.

Not one of them dared.

Their training, their loyalty, their very instincts abandoned them in the face of that overwhelming presence. It pressed down on them, heavy and absolute, like standing beneath a collapsing sky.

And at the center of it...

Theron did not look at any of them.

He stood there, wrapped in light that answered only to him, his breathing uneven, his expression fractured between fury and something far more dangerous.

Grief.

And that grief... was turning into something the world itself might not survive.

The King was the first to move.

Not because he did not feel it, but because he refused to yield to it.

In a single, decisive motion, he stepped forward.

The light lashed around Theron like a living thing, flaring brighter as the King approached, as if warning him away. It scorched the air, bending it, distorting the space between them, but he did not slow. His cloak snapped behind him, his boots striking the fractured floor with unwavering intent.

Then, without hesitation, he reached out.

The light struck him. It should have burned him back. It should have erased him where he stood.

But the King did not resist it. He stepped through it.

Not against the power... but beneath it.

His hand closed around Theron’s head, unrelenting.

Not to stop the storm. But to reach past it.

"To fight you... would be foolish," he said quietly.

His fingers pressed harder.

"So I will not."

His voice dropped.

"I will take the only thing you cannot defend."

His hand closed around Theron’s head, firm, unrelenting, fingers pressing into his temple as though he could anchor him back to reality by force alone.

"Forget her."

The command cut through the chaos, absolute.

Even as he spoke, his voice shifted, slipping beneath the surface of language into something older, something carved from power rather than sound. The chant followed, each word precise, measured, laced with authority that did not ask to be obeyed but demanded it.

His eyes changed.

Dark irises split, light igniting at their center before stretching outward in a vertical blaze, transforming them. Fox-like, yes... but not merely in form. There was cunning there, and hunger, and a ruthless clarity that stripped away all softness.

The magic surged.

It poured from him into Theron, invasive and cold, forcing its way past the blazing light, past the storm of grief and fury that had taken root. It sought one thing and one thing alone; to sever.

To find the thread that bound Theron to her.

To erase it.

The light around Theron convulsed violently at the intrusion, the radiant ribbons snapping and twisting in agitation, as though resisting the King’s will. They struck against his arm, burned against his skin, but he did not withdraw. His grip tightened, his chant deepening, more forceful, more relentless.

"Forget her," he repeated, quieter now, but far more dangerous.

Inside that storm of brilliance, Theron’s body went rigid.

For a fleeting moment, the overwhelming light flickered—just enough to reveal the fracture beneath it. Pain rippled through him, not of the body, but of something far more fragile. The place where memory and feeling intertwined, where her presence lingered like warmth that refused to fade.

The King pressed harder.

He did not care for the gentleness of it. He did not care what it cost.

If that bond remained... if that girl remained... then what stood before him would not be contained.

And so he reached deeper, forcing his will into Theron’s mind, seeking to tear her out at the root... 𝘧𝘳𝘦ℯ𝓌𝘦𝒷𝘯𝑜𝑣𝘦𝓁.𝒸𝘰𝓂

Before whatever his son was becoming could make that impossible.

He forced his will deeper, tearing through the storm of light, searching for her—

for the one thread that refused to break.

And then... he found it.

The King’s fingers tightened.

"Forget her."

The command fell like a blade.

Something inside Theron snapped.

And...

Theron forgot her name... and everything else about her.