Reborn To Change My Fate-Chapter 316 - Three Hundred And Fifteen

Less than half an hour later, the sound of galloping horses thundered outside the temple gates.

Derek burst through the main doors of the temple. He did not walk; he marched with long, furious strides. His dark cloak flared out behind him. The Grand Duke’s face was pale, and deep worry was etched into every line of his features. Ian and a dozen heavily armed Thompson guards followed closely behind him, their hands on their swords.

The priests quickly parted to make way for the angry Duke.

" Your Grace." They greeted him.

Derek stopped in the middle of the main hall, looking around at the frightened temple workers.

"Where is my grandmother?" Derek asked. His voice was loud, demanding an immediate answer.

A nervous senior priest stepped forward, bowing low. "Your Grace," the priest said quickly, his hands shaking. "The Dowager Duchess is in the waiting room. The best physician is already in the temple and is attending to her right now. She is breathing. She will wake up soon."

Derek felt a small bit of relief, but his eyes quickly scanned the crowd again. He did not see the face he loved most.

"Where is my wife?" Derek asked. His voice turned sharp and dangerous. "Where is the Grand Duchess?"

The priests looked at each other. They shifted their weight uncomfortably. They looked incredibly nervous. No one wanted to be the one to tell the Grand Duke the bad news. 𝑓𝑟𝑒𝘦𝓌𝑒𝑏𝑛𝑜𝘷𝑒𝘭.𝒸𝘰𝑚

"Answer me!" Derek roared, his patience completely gone.

The senior priest swallowed hard. He looked down at his feet before answering.

"Your Grace," the priest whispered, his voice trembling. "She is missing."

Derek froze. The world seemed to stop spinning. "What?" he replied, his voice dropping to a deadly, quiet whisper. " what do you mean she’s missing?"

"She was with the Dowager," the priest explained frantically. "She ordered us to fetch the doctor and for everyone to leave. But when the doctor arrived and the crowd cleared... the Grand Duchess was simply gone. We have searched the nearby rooms, but we cannot find her. We already have people searching the vicinity. We should receive news soon."

Derek’s heart pounded against his ribs like a hammer. Fear, pure and cold, shot through his veins. Liam. He immediately thought of Prince Liam. Did Liam send assassins to the temple?

Just then, a young temple worker ran into the hall from the corridor.

"She is awake!" the worker shouted, pointing back toward the waiting room. "The Dowager Duchess is awake!"

Derek had to make a fast, tactical decision. His family was under attack. He needed to secure them.

He turned to the captain of his guards.

"Take a squad," Derek instructed firmly. "Go to the waiting room. Take my grandmother and escort her straight home to the estate. Put a double guard on the manor gates. Do not let anyone in or out."

The captain bowed. "Yes, Your Grace."

Derek turned to Ian and the remaining guards. His eyes were burning with a fierce, violent light.

"The rest of you," Derek commanded, his voice echoing loudly in the holy hall. "Find the Grand Duchess. Tear this temple apart. Check every room, every closet, every garden. Block the city gates. No carriage leaves the capital without being searched. Go!"

In less than a minute, the heavily armed Thompson guards filled the temple. They drew their swords. They kicked open locked wooden doors. They flipped over wooden benches. They searched the dark cellars and the high bell towers. They shouted Marissa’s name, their voices ringing through the quiet courtyards.

Derek walked through the corridors himself, his eyes scanning the floors for any sign of a struggle, any dropped jewelry, any clue.

Ten minutes later, a guard came running toward Derek from the back gardens of the temple. He was holding a piece of dirty brown cloth in his hand.

"Your Grace!" the guard called out, stopping in front of Derek and bowing. "We found this near the servant exit at the back wall."

Derek looked at the cloth. "What is it?"

"I suspect someone impersonated the servants to kidnap the Grand Duchess," the guard explained, handing the cloth over. "It is a temple worker’s uniform. It was thrown behind a bush. And... it is stained with blood."

Derek snatched the cloth from the guard’s hand.

He held it up to the light of a nearby lantern. He examined the cloth very carefully. It was a cheap, rough tunic. But the back of the tunic was covered in dark, dried patches of blood.

Derek frowned. The blood was not a single large stain from a stab wound. It was a series of long, thin red lines crossing over each other.

Derek thought to himself, his mind analyzing the evidence quickly. This blood pattern is strange. It is only on the back. It looks like long cuts. This looks like an injured back.

He stared at the bloody lines. Suddenly, the memory of last night flashed into his mind. He remembered standing in the courtyard. He remembered ordering his guards to throw Carlos out. He remembered hearing the rumors early this morning that Carlos and Ashlyn had been brutally whipped by Prince Liam before they were thrown out.

Could it be... Derek thought, his eyes widening in realization. Carlos?

Carlos had a badly injured back. Carlos had been thrown out with nothing. Carlos was angry, desperate, and hateful enough to do something this stupid.

Derek’s fear quickly turned into a boiling, explosive rage.

He crumpled the bloody servant’s cloth tightly in his fist. He turned to Ian and the guards standing nearby.

"Find Carlos," Derek commanded. His voice was low, shaking with a murderous anger. "Find him immediately. Search the alleys, the cheap inns, the gutters. And when you find him... drag him to the Thompson estate."

Derek looked at the dark night sky through the open temple doors.

"If he has harmed a single hair on her head," Derek promised the night, "I will kill him with my own hands."