Tourists swarmed past as they stood by the palace gates, frantically looking around. Delphinia felt her heart race as she called, "Ashton? Ashton!"!" Her voice wavered, her panic growing with each second of silence.
Evander kept his cool, but his eyes scanned the crowd with a sharp focus.. "He couldn't have gone far. We'll find him."
"How can you be so calm right now?" Delphinia snapped, spinning to face him. Her hands were trembling, and her voice cracked with barely restrained fear. "Your son is missing!"
Delphinia's breath hitched as her eyes darted from face to face in the crowd, searching desperately for Ashton. A child's laugh nearby made her heart jump, but it wasn't him. She didn't know she could feel this kind of fear—this overwhelming, suffocating terror for someone who wasn't even her child.
