“Led you?” I asked indignantly. “Youfollowedme. I didn’t sprinkle salt into your palm and hold it to a portal.” My tone held all the heat my body craved.
I got to my feet, my legs heavy with mud. I needed to burn the gunk off and get the hell out of here. I raised my palms and conjured up my fire, then held my hands over my thighs, waiting for them to ignite and burn off the pounds of grime clinging to my suit’s carbon scales.
Neither flame nor smoke appeared. I concentrated harder. After what felt like a full minute, my gloves were still flame-free. I looked at Remo, who’d also gotten to his feet. “Do you have fire?”
He flipped his palms over. “Of course I have fire.” He turned much less vehement when he too failed to produce flames. “What the hell?”
My heart picked up speed, going almost as fast as the magnetic subways that crisscrossed every large city on Earth.
I focused on my feet, trying to drive fire into them, but unless ourkalinifelt more icy-needle than flame in here, then my veins were all out of heat. My pulse quickened, and the chill permeating my skin sank deeper. “Can you fly?”
His forehead was so furrowed it created trenches in the thick mud glazing his brow. He didn’t answer me for so long that my dread turned to full-fledged panic.
I stared at his feet, willing them to lift. When they didn’t, I wrenched my neck back to look at the portal. “If we can’t fly up there, then how the hell are we supposed to reach it?”
“If this really is a prison, then my guess is we’re not.”
I ripped my gaze off the slender disk hovering in the white sky and focused on my Infinity, swiping the tip of my gloved index over it.Please please please be functional.No beam appeared. “My Infinity’s not working. What about yours?”
Remo rubbed his bangle against the back of his thigh, the only clean spot on his body, then held it up and swiped his finger over the glossy black surface. His grim expression told me his was offline too. Which was crazy because Infinities were powered by our pulse, and mine was beating. Galloping even.
“Whatever’s blocking our fire is also blocking our technology,” I whispered.
“Well, wearein a fucking prison. What exactly were you expecting? Bare-chested men fanning you and feeding you gladeberries?” Remo’s sharp, mocking tone made my shoulders snap back.
“Can you put your dickish attitude on hold for a second? It isn’t helping!” I expected a stroke of lightning or at the very least a roll of thunder, but the air was still. Did my Daneelie power not work here either? “Did you tell anyone where you were going?”
He glowered. “Considering I wasn’t aware of my destination,no.”
I disregarded his sarcasm and stared up at the portal again, willing someone else to pop out of it, preferably Gregor. Hope suddenly streaked through my chest. “The packet of salt. I dropped it. They’ll find it!”
“No. They won’t.” Remo gestured to the mud . . . and my packet of salt.
Crap.Although perhaps it wasn’t such a bad thing that he’d taken it with him. Maybe we’d need it to get out. “Wait. Josh knows where I went. When I’m reported missing, he’ll tell someone.”
Remo grunted, running his hand through his clumpy hair. “Locklear’s banned from Neverra. There’s no way he’s going to fess up to sending you in here. He’d be locked out of the isle for lifeorturned to ash.”
“Unless he uses it as a negotiation chip. He’s pretty smart.” Like a weasel was smart.
“Yeah, a real genius.”
“You really hate the guy, huh?”
“I really do.”
“More than you hate me?” I wasn’t sure why I asked him this, but since the words were out, it was too late to take them back.
For several heartbeats, his lips didn’t flex, and it gave me hope that I wasn’t stuck in Gregor’s jail with someone who might try to strangle me in my sleep. “Amara Wood, there is no one on Earth or in Neverra more rankling than you.”
“Wow.” I took a step back, one of my eyes twitching with annoyance. “You could’ve just saidno. You didn’t have to drag out your declaration and use big words.”
His name overtook his brother’s on my mental list of loathsome fae. I whirled around, then clomped away through the sticky field toward the giant cacti and the arid ground beneath them. I wasn’t sure where I’d end up, besides away from Remo Farrow, which was my current goal. Goal number two was finding shelter—preferably one with a roaring fire—to get my thoughts in order so I could devise a plan to escape.
Alone.
Remo could find his own way out. Better yet, he could stay stuck in here forever. It wasn’t as though I’d tell anyone where he went.
10
