After quite a few hours of arguing with himself back and forth Raemus decided he owed Lealana an apology. He headed to her room, knocking on the door. There was no answer. He sighed. "Lea, can we please talk? I… I want to apologize." He called inside. He glanced down at his feet impatiently. "Lea please, can you open the door?" His whole face was one big frown. Raemus listened hard to try and hear what she was doing, but there was nothing but silence inside. "Lea, I'm coming in." he called in loudly. He looked up to see Seth walking towards him. "Where's Lea, have you seen her?" he asked Seth, not happy at all with the man.

Seth shook his head. "No, I haven't seen her since I ran into her in a hallway on the other side of the castle." He responded. "She's not in her room?" he asked, confused that Lea wouldn't be in her room.

"If she is she isn't answering her door." Raemus stated bluntly. He opened the door, finding it unlocked. He took a few steps in, shocked by what he saw. The room was trashed. Draperies from the windows and the bed lay on the ground, torn to shreds. Her wardrobe was open; half the clothes were on the ground. All of her jewels were gone. "Lea!" Raemus called, running into the adjoining sitting room. She was nowhere to be found. Raemus turned to look at Seth who had followed him. "I want the whole place searched! I want her found! Now Seth!" he yelled at the guard. Seth bowed and ran off to do as he was told. Raemus looked around, "Lea where are you?" he asked aloud, sinking down onto the edge of the chair.

--- 9 hours later ---

It was close to midnight, and no one had seen Lealana. No one had any idea where she could be or where she had gone. Raemus sat in his office, completely miserable. She had to have been kidnapped, she wouldn't have run away. Not like that. Not one article of clothing was missing; her bags were stored beneath her bed. Only her jewelry was missing…. All of it was, except her wedding ring, which had been laid on her dresser for him to find no doubt.

"My lord, we've searched everywhere." Seth said to him slowly.

"Search again." Raemus stated, twirling her wedding ring between his fingers.

"My lord there's no sign of her; we've searched a dozen times." Seth said, fully exhausted from searching. His men were as well.

"I said, search again damnit!" Raemus yelled at him, standing up, slamming his fist on his desk. "Search the town, search the nearby villages. Someone had to have seen her go."

"My lord, all the villagers remember seeing was a carriage leaving Province late this afternoon. It was heading north towards Trent."  Seth said to him gently, trying to calm him down some. "The carriage wasn't even one of ours. It had the King's crest on it."

"That bastard!" Raemus growled. He looked up at Seth. "He took her, that son of a bitch stole her from me."

"My lord, you have no proof."

"I don't need proof! She wanted to get away from me, and the King offered her a way out."

"Raemus, the King wasn't even near here, we would have known."

"Seth, the King doesn't need to be here. All his silver-tongued servants need to do is say the right thing and of course any poor girl would follow them.  And Lea wanted to get away from me. She didn't want to be anywhere near me. To her, I'm the plague. She wanted to go home, they probably offered that to her. Why wouldn't he? Her family lives closer to him then I do. I'm the monster here Seth, I drove her off," Raemus trailed off for a moment. "And now I get to pay the price for it."

Seth wasn't sure what to say, he let silence fill the room for a few minutes before speaking, "What should we do then my lord?" he asked cautiously.

"Get my things packed, come first light we are going to go see the snake himself. " Raemus said, slipping the ring onto a gold chain and putting it around his neck. "I'm going to get my wife back."

--- Meanwhile on the road to Trent…. ---

Lealana woke up slowly, her eyes felt heavy. There was a lot of bouncing, and she felt her head hit against something hard more than once. She could barely remember anything. She had gone to her room to lay down after her encounter with Seth, and then a cloth had been put over her face and that was all she could remember. Smelling something sweet enough to make her eyes water. She tried to move, but it felt like she was bound. Where was she?

"Hey she's waking up." A voice said, it sounded far away.

"Give her some more night rain, can't have her waking up and screaming in the middle of the night now can we?" another, deeper voice asked rhetorically.

"But, she's gagged…" the first voice said, confused.

"Just give her the night rain idiot; the King doesn't want her harmed or remembering anything." The second, deeper voice said.

Lealana struggled to speak but she was unable to form words. A shadow appeared over her, and a cloth was placed over her face again, and she fell into nothingness once more.