I raise my eyebrows. “Now?”
Jett nods, looking more serious than usual as he glances out the window at the horizon.“I think that earthquake was likely felt all over Ellender. Need to get back before Daemon and Alix think they have to launch the army.”
“True,” Fox agrees. “You should go.”
“Don’t forget to find Connell first,” I comment blandly.
Jett startles and looks over his shoulder toward the window where Connell had been sitting. The chair is empty. “Fuck me,” he swears, looking serious. “I knew he was being too quiet. Damnit, how did this become my problem? Honestly, I’m asking! He should be Kastian and Odessa’s problem, or at the very least Daemon’s. Why am I in charge?”
I pat him sympathetically on the arm. “He did just free you all from the tower.”
“Once,” Jett hisses. “That was one useful thing. The rest of the time he lives to make my life harder.”
Fox crosses his arms over his chest and gives Jett an impassive look. “Let him go.”
“What?” Jett asks, distractedly.
“Let him go,” Fox repeats. “He’s not a normal prisoner.”
“That’s true,” I chime in. “Weren’t we only keeping him for observation to see if he was really mortal again? Well, I think we know the answer to that after he almost froze to death. So let him go and tell Daemon and Alix, or whomever, that he escaped. It’s not as if it’s a lie.”
Jett looks like he’s seriously considering it for a minute, then he lets out a harsh breath. “I can’t. I’d better go track him down again or he really will freeze to death, and then I’ll head home.” Jett walks halfway across the room, then turns back toward Fox and I. “When should I tell everyone you’ll be back?”
Fox and I glance at each other, and I shrug. “I need to go back to the camp and get Eugene.”
Fox nods. “I should go back too. At least for a few days.”
“Oh yeah, you’re the alpha,” Jett grins. “I’ll make sure all the soldiers know how we’re supposed to greet you now.”
He tips his head back and howls as he strides out into the hall. The sound echoes all the way down the corridor, and Fox stares after him in seething silence.
There’s nothing in the castle that interests either me or Fox, so we don’t linger long. I grab my satchel, and we make our way back down the winding white marble hallway.
I’m not sure whether I want to go searching for my mother or not. I haven’t had much luck with blood relatives so far, and I haven't decided what to do when Fox and I reach the gleaming entrance hall.
The choice is taken out of my hands however, because at the same moment as Fox and I step into the hall, the double doors open revealing the front steps of the palace and a tiny woman in a ragged gray dress with black hair so long that it trails down the steps behind her. She’s panting as if she just sprinted a mile.
She stops in the doorway, her eyes wide as they land on me. She doesn’t seem to know what to do any more than I do.
Fox, looking uncomfortable, clears his throat. “You disappeared.”
Amora lets out a breath, looking grateful that he broke the silence. “I went to check on the queen.”
“The queen?” I ask, unable to contain my curiosity.
Amora nods, still breathing heavily. “Yes. I felt the curse break and I had to go check if she really thawed out after all these years.”
“Did she?” I ask, incredulous.
Amora shakes her head. “No. Well, maybe, I don’t know. She wasn’t there.”
“Does that mean that Thermia has no ruler now?” I ask, glancing over at Fox and frowning. “Unless…are you planning on taking over?”
Amora startles. “Me? No, absolutely not. I’m finished with castles for this lifetime.”
“So you’ll be leaving then? Where will you go?”
“I don’t know,” she says, looking a little lost. “At the moment, I’d just like to be anywhere but here.”
