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“—them? Um.”
“I have to get back to do some damage control,” Grel said urgently. “Get out of here while you can.”
“Penelope,” Lucia greeted without batting an eye. “I need a knife or a claw.”
I produced my hand with my claws unsheathed, and she dragged me to the fountain. “Come on; I’m not bleeding out for you fuckers.”
Penelope stepped aside as Lucia sliced her palm open on my claw. The others stepped up when she hissed, and an alarm sounded when she lifted her palm over the water.
“Fuck,” she swore. “They know you’re gone.”
“They know you’ve broken us out of the dungeons,” Mikey corrected.
We watched as a drop of Lucia’s blood splashed into the water, turning the section red, followed by another and another.
“Step back,” she instructed, glaring pointedly at Mikey when he frowned.
Blood continued to drip from her cut until the top tier spilled blood-stained water into the central tier, and then the entire fountain was red. The water began to bubble until it was spilling over its edges, thenpopped.
Voices sounded in the maze behind us, and Lucia swayed into the side of the fountain from blood loss.
The fountain’s surface smoothed until it looked similar to the other transport portals we once passed.
“Get in,” Mikey ordered, circling over to Lucia and helping her up.
Reese was the first to go, hoisted onto the edge of the fountain by Neo, who climbed up next to her. He turned to the maze and the castle looming behind us. “See you on the other side,” he said, grinning as he dragged himself and Reese in.
Johnny and Marilyn were next; they didn’t look back at all as they stepped inside.
When I spotted the first two Guardians’ heads over the hedge, I hauled Aria over. “Come on, Mikey,” I urged, reaching out to him. “Let’s go.”
He glanced at Lucia quickly, then back at me. “I…”
My stomach sank.
“Over here!” A shout rang out, and our heads whipped to the other entrance to the maze.
“Mikey!” I snapped. “Come on!”
“I can’t,” he said, his expression tortured. “I’m sorry, I can’t, Sariel.”
My heart bottomed out when he stepped towards us, his eyes trained on Aria. “Take care of him, yeah?”
And then he shoved us both.
My momentary shock gave him the time he needed to push us through the portal, and the last thing I saw before I fell through was his face, his eyes closed, and his lips pressed in a hard line.
15
IN THE ICE
ARIA
Ididn’t take a full breath until my feet hit solid ground.
When I inhaled what felt like my first real breath since arriving at the castle, I realized how different the air out here was. It was crisp—icy and refreshing—whereas the castle’s air had been sickly sweet, almost drugging in comparison.
We were on a cliffside, and from where I stood, the view consisted of only sprawling hillsides. An ice-capped mountain loomed above us, a valley between where we were and it.
