“An island!” Crystal waves lapped at white sands, leaving a layer of sea foam behind. On one side, boulders and cliffs jutted. On the other, a lush jungle teemed with trees and foliage. The scent of salt, coconut and orchids saturated the overly warm air, making her feel as if she inhaled a vacation with every breath. The sound of rippling water and chirping birds soothed her frazzled nerves.

Wait. She frowned. What was that? A glint of...metal? Oh, wow. Yes, metal. From a section of a plane.

“Where are we?” she asked, glancing at Bane.

“Another dimension sometimes accessed by humans.” He positioned his goggles, hiding his eyes—and emotions—behind their pitch-black lenses. “Zion has a talent for finding lost dimensions within any world. Long ago, I followed him here.” As he spoke, crimson rivers poured from his gashes.

A bone from his ribs had cut through his skin and hung at an odd angle. She winced with sympathy, her stomach churning.

He looked himself over and said, “Tell me to heal quickly, Nola.”

“Sorry, but no. You can’t have it both ways, Bane. You can’t hate me for being your boss, then demand I use my position to aid you. Don’t worry. Girls love scars. You’re welcome.”

“Tell me to heal,” he insisted.

Argh! “If I do, you have to vow you’ll never again complain about my royalness.”

A muscle pulsed beneath his eye. “Patch me up the old-fashioned way.”

Stubborn fool! “Is there a first aid kit hidden somewhere?”

“There is. It’s in a trunk buried under this tarp. Dig it out while I search for bombs and other traps. Someone found my lair. They might have found the island, too.”

She wanted to respond, but a strange scene rose to the surface of her mind. A little movie she couldn’t turn off.

In it, a couple drove a midsize sedan down an abandoned road, a toddler strapped to a car seat in back. The driver had close-cropped black hair, dark eyes and pale skin. The passenger had dark blond hair, brown eyes and tanned skin. Variations of gold. Adwaewethian gold.

So beautiful...so familiar. My parents, she computed with a gasp. A single photo had survived her chaotic childhood, and it featured a younger version of these two.

This was a memory, then? But Nola couldn’t be more than a year old. So young. Too young to remember this.

As the couple argued in hushed tones, Nola picked up individual phrases. “A monster.” “Must hide.” “The others.” And “How much.”

Monster—had they seen a beast? Hide—baby Nola?

Suddenly, a tall, muscular man with pale hair and a circle tattoo similar to Bane’s appeared in the street. Had he used some kind of invisible portal, or teleported? A sword hilt rose above each shoulder, leather sheaths crisscrossing over his torso. An Adwaewethian and a combatant, but how?