#Chapter 33: Your Mate

Logan I paced the corridor outside my mother’s study, the thick velvet carpet muffling my footsteps. The weight of the past few days pressed down on me like lead. Evelyn’s voice still echoed in my mind, her broken, shaky whispers in the alley before I carried her from the tavern played in a relentless loop. The rogue’s unnatural death haunted me too, as the words "green eyes" were a thread left dangling in a tapestry I couldn’t yet unravel. So when the summons came from my mother, I nearly didn’t go. I was too overwhelmed, too occupied with all of these other endless, swirling thoughts. But avoiding my mother would only prolong the inevitable. She never waited too long for anyone. I knocked once before stepping into the room. The heavy doors shut behind me like a cell. She sat in her high-backed chair, a vision of poise and icy control. Her silver hair was twisted into an elegant knot, her expression unreadable as always. She barely glanced up from the documents in her