Rowan pushed the door open, his eyes scanned the living room. He ran towards Willow's room hoping that she was lying on her bed, sleeping and that he was just being delusional about someone harming her.

As Rowan stood outside her door, he could hear nothing moving inside her room. Not even the rhythmic breathing of a person sleeping. Fear gripped Rowan as his hand hovered over the doorknob. Giving everything inside him, he twisted the doorknob open to see what he knew but had been hoping otherwise.

The room was empty and so was the whole house, beside Venice, Willow's mother inside her own room.

Rowan's hand fisted and punched the wall beside the door. He grew frustrated that he had left Willow in the hands of danger himself and left her alone. So what if she was menstruating? He could have just controlled himself more than he always does. He could have stayed behind instead but he didn't and now he was here with Willow gone.

"Rowan."

Rowan stayed still as he listened to Felix, who walked up behind him. Even though he knew what Felix was going to say, he still hoped that all this was just a prank and that Willow was hiding in her closet and would jump out on him anytime now. But he knew it was just his wishful thinking.

"Lark is not in his room." Said Felix. "I looked everywhere. From what I can tell he was here a few hours ago, and he even had this in his room," Felix showed him a pair of headphones. "They look likes Willow's."

Rowan's fist once again met the wall in force. He shouldn't have left Willow with Lark.

But he still wanted to believe that it wasn't Lark who wanted to hurt Willow. What if Willow was actually fine and she only went out for a walk and Lark was hanging around the forest.

Rowan recalled that Lark had said that he was exiled and faeries can't lie. So, how did Lark lie about him being exiled from the faerie land? Or maybe he indeed was exiled but the news wasn't spread yet.

Rowan shook his head, he should stop thinking about all of this and first look for Willow, whether she went out for a walk or if she was kidnapped, he would look for her till he had her in his arms.

"I-" Rowan looked around the hallway. "I have to look for her."

"You're bleeding." Said Felix.

Rowan looked at his hands, though his hand had already healed, his hand was still covered in blood. He took out his handkerchief and wiped his hands on them. It was the same handkerchief he had given to Willow on the first day they met. He clutched the handkerchief tightly in his hands.

Rowan shut his eyes and cleared up his mind. With his smelling senses heightened he looked around for Willow's scent last found.

Rowan walked towards the kitchen and paused. His brows furrowed as he sniffed again. That is when he noticed that her scent stopped coming near the back door in the kitchen, as if it had never been there. But Rowan had always seen her lock the door at night after dinner so it was impossible for her scent to disappear near the door.

Rowan's eyes widened when he saw that the door was unlocked. Anger surged through Rowan as he opened the door and he could tell that Willow's scent completely disappeared as if it was being masked on purpose. He looked around the kitchen and found a cup of tea smelling heavily like Willow. He walked out of the kitchen and that is when he smelled a faint scent of tranquilliser and it was in this place that he could smell her scent mixing with absolutely nothing, as if the person who came to get her had also masked their scent.

Masking one's scent was a witchcraft, Rowan wondered if Lark would use witchcraft just to kidnap Willow and why would he even use a sedative to kidnap Willow, he could just glamour her, even though Willow could break free of the glamour, from what he had heard the last time, he could still glamour Willow for a few minutes, since she wasn't yet thought about magic yet. The reason she could do that was because of his mark on her, but the mark was also fading, making their bond weaker.

Rowan walked out and looked at the rising sun as he thought about all the people who would want to kidnap his mate. Though there might be many, since he was a Prince of Vampires, next in line for the throne, the first person to surface in Rowan's mind was that person who probably hated Rowan the most.

Willow felt sore as she regained her consciousness. She was about to brush her bangs away from her face, when she noticed that her hands were tied to the arm of a chair. Willow felt groggy as she scrunched her brows, thinking how in the world she ended up here, kidnapped of all things!

Last thing she remembered was going to bed. After pondering on it, she remembered that she did indeed wake up after the same recurring dream and then she had–and then she had seen someone outside her house and the backdoor to her house was unlocked! That wasn't it, she had also been kidnapped! But at this point in her life she shouldn't even be shocked at being kidnapped. She had often been picked up out of the blue in the middle of the hallways in school the previous year so she was very much used to it, though she must say that creeping into her house in the middle of the night and using sedatives was new way of kidnapping her, but she wasn't the least surprised.

Willow looked around and guessed that she was probably in an attic. The small circular window showed that the sun was high up, the ray of light passed through the window and refracted on the wooden floor. Willow was placed on the darker side of the attic, away from the window.

Willow sigh as she went through the self defence classes in her mind that she used to follow on YouTube.

Willow thought hard but couldn't remember them clearly because she had never been tied to a chair, since her bullies would only tie her hands up and lock her in a room. She shook her arm trying to loosen the knots, she felt that her legs were tied up together instead of tying them to the chair.

Willow spread her legs then pulled them back in and repeated it till she could feel the bonds loosening. Willow forced one of her legs out of the knotted rope, even though she knew that it will bruise, her first priority was to get out of this place in order to avoid being killed, raped, sold to some mad scientist, sacrificed as the virgin bride of the devil or worse, all of them.

Willow finally freed her foot and then it was easy to free the other. Just when she was about to work on her wrists she heard a commotion nearby. Willow's eyes widened as she stared at her wrists and then her legs, she swore as she kicked the rope behind with as much as force she could muster up, she hoped that the darkness would cover up the rope or glamour it like Rowan would have done.

Willow shut her eyes feigning unconsciousness as she heard the scuttle door open and heard the noise of people climbing.

"Are you sure you heard someone moving around?" Said a manly voice.

"I swear, I really heard someone moving!" Said another person.

"Oh hush, check up on her and you should guard her Justin, just in case." Willow's brows almost twitched when she heard the third person because she knew that voice

"What?" Said the second person, Justin. "Why should I?"

"Because you are the sceptical one here." Said the first person as he reached the attic.

"That's so unfair! I'm not being sceptical, I did hear someone moving around."

"That's impossible, because we masked all our scents, no matter how strong that prince is, it's impossible for him to unmask it and find her, that too this quick." Said that familiar voice and that is when she put face to that voice, it was Nick Nelson, Lana Nelson's brother!

"Hey, hey, hey she's up." Said the first guy, making Willow curse inwardly.

"Is she? She looks asleep to me." Said Justin making the room go quiet.

A while later the first guy said, " And he said that he heard someone moving around the house."

"Hey, quit acting. We all know that you are awake." Said Nick.

Willow pursed her lips as she opened her eyes and glared at them, it was no use acting anyway. "What do you want?"

"We don't mean you any harm," Said the other guy, before adding. "But his highness might."

"You're not supposed to talk about the Prince!" Said Justin.

Willow furrowed her brows when she heard that. Prince? Rowan was a Prince, but he wouldn't need to kidnap her, Willow herself would gladly go with him. The other prince she knew was Lark, but why would Lark want to kidnap her out of all the people? Even if he wanted to kidnap someone he would kidnap some five star Michelin chef instead.

"What's wrong with you? Why would you tell her?"

"You were the one who first told her Ed!" Said Justin.

"Cease your racket, why do the both of you always fight?" Said Nick. "You don't expect her to tattle on—did you not tie her feet?" Nick abruptly turned to the other boys.

Willow's eyes widened.

"He was in charge of tying her feet." Said Ed, probably the other guy.

"I swear I tied her feet together!" Protested Justin. " How did they come free?"

"So, you mean to say that this little thing removed the ropes from her feet while her hands were tied together? Wow!" Ed Retorted.

You're not wrong. Thought Willow.

"But I did—"

"If you did, then where is it?" Said Nick.

Justin remained quiet as he stared at Willow's feet, which were clad in socks. Even though she sported bruises on her ankles but her long pyjamas covered them up.

"As a punishment, Justin should keep watch." Said Ed.

"But I have a date tod—"

"It ain't my fault."

"You made a mistake and you should make up for it." Said Nick as he was about to turns around and go back downstairs, but he paused and turned back around. "Wait, I forgot the most important thing."

"Ah, where is it?" Ed asked.

Nick fumbled around his pockets before he pulled out a—Willow stared dumbfounded at the packet of strawberry flavoured Capri-Sun. Willow backed up in the chair when Nick pierced the straw through the juice packet. Even if it looked like a harmless little packet, you never know what they had added into the juice. It might be some drug say, aphrodisiac, or some sedative or some hallucinogen or a depressant to make her tell them her cringe stories when she was a tween or worse, her card password.

"Drink this." Nick bought it close to her mouth.

Willow shook her head and pulled her inside making sure that it would be impossible to put the straw in her mouth.

"Drink it!"

"You drink that!"

Nick glared at Willow. "Ed, do it."

"I was waiting for you to tell me." Ed grinned.

Willow grew scared. No no no, this was not happening to her. She really hoped that this was a nightmare but the ropes biting into her wrists told her otherwise.

Ed, with a crazy smile on his face, walked forward. Willow glared at him, showing that she wasn't afraid of whatever he was going to do, but she was crying bloody tears internally. Then Ed was close to her he extended his arm and started tickling her.

Willow started crying externally as well, as she couldn't stop herself from laughing out loud. But her tears were true. She felt so miserable as Ed tickled her and the Nick put the straw in her mouth. Willow choked as the liquid ran down her throat, the red liquid spraying out of her mouth on to Nick who was standing in front of her. Ed stopped tickling at that.

Nick sneered. "Whatever, the prince will take care of you." He turned to walk away in anger. "Justin keep watch."

"Have fun." Said Ed as he wiggled his fingers in a wave, before gloatingly walking down the ladder and then shut the scuttle door.

Justin sneered at him as he went to look for rope around the attic. He returned and tied her legs, but unlike the last time, he tied them to the legs of the chair but as he was doing so, her pyjamas rid up, bearing her reddened ankles.

"What is this?" Justin asked suspiciously, his eyes narrowing.

Willow started sweating, could she just attack him? But Justin was the burliest among the trio, he could probably smash her into pulp.

"Well, you see, I'm allergic to peanuts and—and to shellfish!"

"You are?"

She wasn't.

"Yes! And I had grilled shellfish for dinner and a Snickers before I want to bed."

"It doesn't look like a severe allergic reaction." Said Justin. Tying her other feet securely to the post.

"What? Yes, yes indeed. It's not that bad, it just causes few rashes here and there."

"I know how you feel, I'm allergic to peanuts too. Life is so hard because I can't eat peanuts! I want to punch everything when I think about it—"

"Calm down! Maybe one day you'll stop being allergic to peanuts, you never know what the future holds!" Said Willow.

"Yeah I've heard of people who fight these allergic reactions, but I'm severely allergic to peanuts." Said Justin sadly.

"Stay strong!" Said Willow.

"I should." Justin sniffed as if he was about to cry out any moment. " I'm sorry, I get too emotional at times like these."

"Oh go ahead, take you time I'm not looking." Willow leaned back and shut her eyes, her mouth starting to taste bitter and had a strange metallic taste in her mouth, she really wanted to wash her mouth.

Willow thought if anyone noticed that she wasn't at home or if she'd have to wait till this 'Prince' came to sell her to a mad lab.

Willow thought about how if Rowan was in Onyxscar she could have told him telepathically, even though she knew that he was miles away, she still wanted to try calling out to him.

Willow called out for Rowan, doing it with all her might. Then she heard him, she heard Rowan, she knew then that it wasn't just her, imagining his voice.

Willow? Willow is that you?

Rowan?

Willow! Where are you?

I don't know. But there is this guy from school—

"Whose there?" Willow was snapped out of her connection the Rowan when she heard Justin speak and saw that the scuttle door opened up. In a whoosh someone had climbed up the ladder and was standing in front of her.

Willow gasped when she saw the familiar long dark hair and the tall stature, that exquisite face couldn't belong to anyone but Lark.

"Lark?" Willow was shocked.