“Lysi.”
My chest constricted. That voice. I hadn’t heard it in so, so long.
I turned, and there she was, blurry through the whirl of activity. She stared at me with an expression of mingled shock and elation.
“Mom!”
The word came as a sob. I shot towards her and threw myself into her arms before she could say anything more. I buried my face in her hair—the exact shade as mine.
I wanted to say so many things, but no words would come.
“Hi, babygirl.”
The sound of her voice reduced me to tears.
A second pair of arms wrapped around me, large and strong. I turned around to hug my father.
For several years that felt like a lifetime, I’d been a soldier, a warrior, a fugitive. Beneath all of that, I’d forgotten what it was like to be a kid. I wasn’t old enough for any of this. At eighteen, I’d fought more battles than anyone should have ever had to face. In my parents’ embrace, my body seemed to shrink into a kid’s again.
“What are you doing here?” said my mother.
I pulled away fractionally. “Same thing as Dione and all of you.”
“Dione?” said my father.
“The leader of the South Pacific group.”
“The lead—you know her?”
I nodded.
My mother smoothed back my hair, studying my face with a pinched brow. “You’re wanted for treason. We nearly died of shock when we heard.”
“They didn’t question you about me?”
“They tried. We’ve been living in hiding in the kelp forest behind Clymene’s place. You remember her?”
I opened and closed my mouth. My parents had been in hiding, after all. Of course they had. It was their only option. They would have been tortured or killed the moment I’d failed to assassinate the king.
“When I sensed you, I thought you were imprisoned here,” I said thickly. “Because of me.”
“You never need to worry about us, babygirl,” said my father. “We’ve been safe and hidden. When we heard the news, we were more worried about you.”
I’d known my decisions would have wide impact, yet, somehow, all of this—my parents in hiding, their friend Clymene risking her freedom and possibly her family’s—made everything more real. Everyone I loved was in danger. Everyone they associated with was at risk. I had to keep them all safe. The way to do that was to make sure Adaro and his kingdom broke beyond repair.
“We only came out of hiding yesterday,” said my mother. “We had to go to Utopia to see the rumour for ourselves. Can you believe all of this?”
The sounds of the fight pounded in my ears. There was too much to tell my parents, and no time. I hadn’t seen them since training. The entire world had changed since then. They didn’t even know about Meela, or the serpent, or why I was wanted for treason.
“We heard from your brother,” said my father. “He’s on his way home.”
I squeaked. “Really?”
My eyes burned with emotion. For years, I had stopped myself hoping that someday my family might be reunited. The prospect seemed too impossible.
“They were met by Medusa’s army,” said my mother. “They surrendered.”
My brother was alive. I was so absorbed in the idea of seeing him again that her words nearly passed by me.
