Rayne Laurent
“What?” Eno roared. That had his lover on his feet and looming over everyone in the room. “Are you fucking kidding me?”
After the loss of his brother for so many years, Rayne could only imagine how sensitive this subject was going to be for him. When he’d first learned of the queen’s suspicion, Rayne had been horrified and suddenly overprotective of his fully grown sister. Well, a touch more than he already had been.
Rayne reached out, lightly wrapped his fingers around Eno’s wrist, and squeezed. “Sit, please. This is…complicated.”
“I’m sorry to say that it’s vastly more complicated than we had previously suspected,” Vitor admitted.
Eno frowned, but he did return to his seat, his angry gaze locked on Rayne, trusting him to supply him with some answers that made sense. Rayne had little hope of it making sense.
“Before we left for Caspagir in the spring, Queen Amara sent me a packet of information—briefings on secret, critical missions that were under investigation or in negotiation,” Rayne began and then had to stop. The queen had known prior to their departure that it was unlikely she was going to survive her confrontation with New Rosanthe and had been making sure her son was as prepared as he could be to step into her shoes.
“When did you see it?”
“Not until we returned to Stormbreak and Chancellor Croft was in custody. I came across the packet while I was preparing notes for General Morgan.”
“It was at that time that I introduced myself to Lord Laurent,” Vitor broke in. “The queen hadn’t given me any instructions to suspend my current missions. I brought Lord Laurent up to date on what I was investigating. It was then that he also informed me of the existence of Bodhi Xier.”
“I’m confused. What’s going on? What did the queen tell you?” Drayce demanded.
“There were strange reports of very young children disappearing around Erya. Mostly from orphanages in large cities such as Stormbreak. But there were also some instances of babies being reported as dying shortly after birth, but then there were no records of the bodies being handed over to the parents for burial.” Eno grabbed Rayne’s hand and squeezed. “When I read the report and got an update from the Gray Fox, I’ll admit that I didn’t immediately think of your brother. I couldn’t understand why he would disappear and not you. I thought maybe he’d been adopted separately.”
“But he was…” Eno whispered.
“I was,” Davi said firmly.
“I don’t understand. Why wasn’t I taken too? Weren’t we together in the orphanage?” Eno’s voice cracked and Rayne tightly clasped Eno’s hand in both of his. The bodyguard was so accustomed to protecting everyone he cared for. It didn’t matter if he’d been only a small child at the time.
“According to our research,” Davi replied with a bit of a proud smirk, “you were already too old. The children who were being stolen are generally under the age of two years. We think the kidnappers are worried that anyone older could potentially remember where they were from.” His smirk faltered and he cocked his head at his older brother. “Vitor said the paperwork he found on you said you were nearly three when you were adopted. I was stolen just ahead of my first birthday.”
“That’s…that’s fucked up,” Eno murmured.
“Seriously,” Drayce agreed.
Vitor shifted in his chair, moving his hands to the armrests as if bracing himself. “It gets worse. I’ve uncovered proof that this has been going on for decades, and this ring of kidnappers hasn’t limited themselves to Erya.”
“What?” The word exploded from Rayne before he could stop it. He was supposed to be the composed one. He’d at least gone into this conversation knowing that children from Erya had been stolen away. It had never occurred to him that this problem was this big or widespread.
“The details are still very sketchy, but I’ve found proof that children have also been stolen from New Rosanthe and Damardor,” Vitor explained.
“Why not Caspagir?” Drayce asked.
Davi shifted forward on the couch so that he could reach the bottle of whiskey. He refilled his cup as he spoke. “We think it might be a problem of distance. It takes a ship two or three times as long to travel from Caspagir to Ilon than it does to come from Damardor. Same with Zastrad or Uris-Oladul. With New Rosanthe and Erya, Ilon already shares a border.”
Rayne had forgotten about the tea Vitor had fixed for him, leaving it to grow cold. He’d lost all interest in it, thanks to the new topic in front of them.
Drayce snagged the bottle from Davi when he was done, pouring himself a cup as well. “How many kids are we talking each year?”
“Our best guess…” Vitor started and paused as if doing calculations in his head. “At least a couple hundred a year.”
“And this has been going on for decades?” Eno roared.
Vitor spread his hands. “You have to keep in mind, they’ve been very cautious. A few from Stormbreak in a year. A few more from Carigset or Tradefalls or Westbury. Not enough for the right people to notice or begin linking the disappearances to all the others. We have been working for years to uncover the information that we have.”
“Add in the fact that it looks like they rotate between the countries,” Davi interjected, motioning with his nearly empty cup. “They’ll hit Erya for a year or two and then move on to New Rosanthe for three years. Then it’s Damardor for a year or two. Five or six years could pass before Erya is hit again.”
“Enough time that authorities will lose interest and focus on other problems,” Rayne murmured.