“Trial?” I ask. “I thought I was all good?”
“Your face…” Sylvia snort-laughs. “Not for you. Rhazan!”
I look at Jamie as betrayal swirls in my gut.
She crosses her arms and cocks out a hip. “It’s his final parole hearing, moved up at my request on account of good behavior.”
“Oh,” I murmur.
“Aren’t you excited?” Sylvia asks.
“Yeah, yes. Very,” I say, my smile returning. “It’s just been a whirlwind of emotions today, you know? And I kinda, um, am responsible for the death of two people.”
“We retrieved them from the skreet domain mostly intact,” Jamie says. “One lost a few fingers.”
The rock of guilt in my stomach lightens and I let out a heavy breath.
Not a murderer. Not this time, at least.
“I need to take Zhao Lei to his own holding cell to await trial, so I’ll meet you there,” Jamie says, summoning the jade coffin closer with a flick of her wrist.
She reaches out to shake my hand. “You’re no longer in my custody.”
I grasp her palm and green glitter ekes out of my arm back into her body. A million questions bubble up in my mind, but the impending trial for Rhaz takes precedence.
“Thank you for…”
For not getting Rhaz in trouble when you suspected I’d been in his realm.
For not squealing on me when you knew I was about to pull some crazy magical stunt with Lei.
For watching over Lacey and the town.
For saving the men I almost killed…
“For everything,” I finally say, releasing her hand.
Her eyes narrow. “Plausible deniability is the furthest extent of my capacity to lie, so it would be best to keep your clandestine activity around me to a minimum in the future.”
I clear my throat to suppress a laugh. “Noted.”
“Take care of her, Syl,” Jamie says with a nod for the woman beside me.
Sylvia salutes playfully. “You can count on me.”
We follow Jamie out to the street, or what could be considered a street. There aren’t any vehicles other than the infrequent passing of the pods, and not a lot of foot traffic either. Mostly people appearing or disappearing on beams of light.
Jamie does just that, taking off with Lei to who knows where within this cave-like compound.
“So how does the no mass thing work here?” I ask.
Sylvia shrugs. “Beats the hell out of me. I don’t have a BS.”
“What does bullshit have to do with it?”
She barks a laugh. “A bachelor of science. I’m a business major.”
“Oh.”
