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Adrian’s hand brushed mine beneath the table, derailing my train of thought. “Are you alright? Is your leg okay?”

“I’m alright,” I whispered, sliding my fingers through his as conversation continued around us. Adrian winked at me before returning his attention to the room, his hand never letting go of mine.

Across the table, my father smiled at me from where he sat next to Logan. Both in decent shape after the attack.

I smiled back, excited to introduce Hunter to him and my mother. Knowing they would embrace him as if he were their own.

Thankfully, Adrian had been able to remove Leo’s cloaking magic easily enough from the minds of Sigrid and Cal, an advantage of sharing the same power, and both were in attendance, sitting next to each other among the rest of us at the large table.

Charles, the blond-bearded soldier I had briefly seen the first night I was taken to the Dome, sat on the other side of Adrian and had been acting as Adrian’s right-hand man these past few decades; to such an extent that he’d been entrusted to search for me when I’d been hidden on Six, when Adrian hadn’t been able to do so himself.

Charles also happened to be Cal’s older brother, their blond hair sharing the same straw-colored tone.

The rest of the men and women in the small room were elected royal advisers who helped manage the castle and the lands beyond. They had all seemed genuinely surprised to learn of Leo’s uprising, leading us to believe Leo had been acting alone. But we couldn’t rule out the possibility that he might have others on the inside, working for him.

“We need to move the former king to another location,” said an older woman, with a serious face, dressed in long black robes, her brown hair braided down her back. “Who’s to say he hasn’t already planned another coup, and his beasts aren’t on their way right now to free him?”

My father spoke, “I agree with Helen. Leo would’ve had a plan in place, should he get caught.”

Adrian nodded. “We will move him tonight. I know of a place, and will bring a trusted few to keep the whereabouts a secret. The bars to his cell, where he sits now, should keep him from communicating to anyone on the outside for the time being. Or anything,” he added. “No magic in, no magic out.”

“Hunter, did you ever see anyone, other than Leo, when you spent time on Ten?” Charles asked my brother.

Hunter shook his head. “It was only ever Leo, and he hardly ever spoke. Other than to the creatures, or himself . . . from time to time.” He shivered.

I placed my hand on his shoulder. “Are you okay?” I whispered, concerned for his mental state. Weeks on that decrepit Earth would make anyone go insane.

He smiled reassuringly at me. “I’m okay. I’m just glad to be out of there.”

“What of the creatures Leo’s already raised?” Charles asked Adrian. “Your last report indicated thousands of them inhabiting Ten.”

So that was what Adrian had been doing the night I’d seen him opening the portal on Two. He’d been doing recon.

Adrian shook his head. “As long as Leo stays confined, I don’t think they’re able to use the portals freely without his help.”

“Except on a full moon,” Sigrid offered. “Anyone can pass through on a full moon. They would have all night to do as they wished before reentering the portals at dawn. We are just over a week away from the next full moon.”

“Then we continue to keep extra soldiers at the portal entrances like we’ve been doing, and be ready for an attack until we can plan a counterattack of our own,” said Adrian.

“You mean for us to go to Ten?” Sigrid asked Adrian.

“Yes,” he said. “The Decodons need to be wiped out. Then, we need to destroy all the portals on Ten to prevent anything like this from happening again.”

Cal interjected, “That would take months of recon on Ten for something like that to even be possible. We have no idea how many portal entrances there are. We wouldn’t even know where to begin. Not to mention, the landscape could be different from other Earths. Who’s to say the portal entrances are even at sources of water?”

“Then we better get to work,” Adrian responded.

“How would we destroy the portals once they’re found?” Hunter asked curiously, trying to make sense of it all.

Adrian side-eyed me and smirked. “Fire power can destroy a portal. Permanently.”

I thought back to the wrecked portal entrance at Miranda Waterfall.

The residue of purple flame.

That had been Adrian’s doing.

I would ask him later what the reason for that had been.