The silence on the ancient stone road was shattered by the crackle of raw, unrefined magic.
Three Wards, their faces grim masks of fury and urgency, stood behind Andrea, their protective barriers shimmering dark green.
Across from them, King Theroren stood motionless, flanked by his two elite guards, the very air around him radiating an ancient, chilling dominance.
"She is exiled, King of the Crimson Court!" the lead Ward, a burly man named Borrin, shouted, his voice cracking with fear and rage.
"A criminal of the Coven! Grand Witch Duskevil demands her retrieval. Yield the prisoner now, or face war!"
Theroren's crimson eyes narrowed, focusing not on the witch hunters' desperate threats, but on Andrea herself.
He noted the sweat plastering her silver hair to her temples, the dullness in her eyes, and the terrifying lack of any magical presence. She was truly, utterly powerless.
"War is a consequence for peers, Ward," Theroren's voice was a low, dangerous rumble.
"You are merely hounds chasing a broken scent."
He took a slow step forward.
"This witch trespassed on my territory, violating the sanctity of the Blood Forest a direct insult to the truce signed centuries ago. She is now my property, held as leverage until the Stiltworts can explain the nature of her forbidden search."
"We will not yield!" Borrin cried, his fear overriding his training.
With a shriek, one of the Wards launched a clumsy, compressed ball of kinetic energy a crude wind-whip—straight at the King's head.
Theroren didn't dodge.
He moved.
The speed was breathtaking.
It wasn't the focused, precise movement of a warrior; it was the impossible, liquid blur of a predator.
He was past his two guards and standing in front of the charging wind-whip before the spell could fully manifest.
He simply backhanded the air, dissipating the spell into harmless ripples.
Before the attacking Ward could even gasp, Theroren was on him.
He didn't use fangs or claws; he used technique.
A single, brutal strike to the Ward's temple with the heel of his palm, and the man dropped, unconscious, his protective barrier dissolving instantly.
The two remaining Wards were paralyzed. They had expected a battle of strength; they got a display of overwhelming, effortless superiority.
"Foolish children," Theroren murmured, stepping over the prone Ward.
"You cannot fight what you cannot comprehend."
Borrin, realizing the battle was lost, abandoned the fight and screamed,
"Run! Get back to the Coven! Warn the Grand Witch!"
The two Wards turned to flee back into the Blood Forest. Theroren's movement was swift and final. His arm shot out, not toward the Wards, but toward the ground where Andrea stood.
He secured her, one massive, steel-hard arm wrapping around her waist, pulling her flush against the cold, leather-clad armor of his chest.
Andrea gasped, not from injury, but from the shock of the raw, icy heat that radiated off him—the strange, cold energy that was the signature of the vampire royalty.
"You will deliver this message to Duskevil," Theroren announced, his voice carrying clearly into the trees where the Wards were scrambling.
"Your criminal is mine. She is a hostage until the Stiltworts answer for the poisoning of my ancestors and the nature of her research. Tell her that her debt is now measured in blood and in information."
He pulled Andrea tight against him, turning his back on the forest. He looked down at her, his crimson eyes holding hers captive.
"Protest is useless, little witch," he said, his breath warm against her ear despite the cold air.
"Your Grand Witch sentenced you to exile, but I just sentenced you to survival. You are coming with me."
Andrea felt the desperate adrenaline draining away, replaced by a cold, leaden despair.
She had fled her prison only to be claimed by the enemy King.
She was utterly powerless, pinned against the single most dangerous being in the known territories.
Theroren ignored her silence.
He spoke a curt command to his two remaining guards, and then, with a burst of unnatural speed, they vanished from the ancient road, heading toward the darkest, most forbidding part of the distant mountain range toward The Obsidian Citadel.
Andrea could only watch the trees blur past her, the forest fading, the Grand Witch's fury replaced by the cold, calculated control of the Crimson Court.
She was a witch without magic, a prisoner of a King who hated her kind.