“Yes, but you did not leave an entire kingdom at the mercy of a carnivorous family and your best friend to take the fall for your disappearance.”

Jinx stopped asking questions after that. Either because she had the answers she wanted, or because the passageway began to turn in sharp circles as they wound down into the lowest levels of the palace. The air had grown cold and slightly sour by the time they reached the end of the passageway.

And it did in fact end. One minute, they were walking through the darkness with only the glow of the ember to help them, and the next they had come upon a brick wall that allowed them no way forward.

“Now what?” Jinx asked.

Aurora swallowed once, and then again, because she did not know. She knew the passageway existed, but she had never actually followed it all the way to its destination. Was it always like this? Or had the Lockes discovered it and cut it off to prevent infiltrations like the one she was attempting?

Aurora laid her palms flat against the brick and pushed, but nothing happened.

“Roar?” Jinx whispered.

Ignoring her friend, Aurora pushed again, harder this time, sliding her hands to different spots, searching for some weak or special area, but again, the wall did not budge. Her thoughts began to race inside her head, flipping and turning over on themselves, twisting until the inside of her mind felt loud and churning, like the rapids of a flooded river.

“I don’t know,” she finally admitted. “I don’t know what to do next.” The words came out scraped and raw. She had to get Novaya out. She could not even fathom how long she had been locked away down here, could not bear to think of what she had endured, all for Aurora’s frivolous freedom.

Jinx, as always, was undeterred by the snag in their plan. She laced her fingers together and cracked her knuckles. “Let’s see what we have.” She too began to examine the wall, running her fingers across the bricks and along the grooves between them.

“It’s enchanted,” she murmured. “Like the front gate. It requires magic to open.”

Aurora’s eyes widened. That made sense. The purpose of this particular passageway was for use in the event of a hostile takeover. Should the ruling Stormling be locked away in the dungeon, they would have a built-in way of escape that would only work for them.

Quickly, she closed her eyes, calling up the skyfire storm in her chest, and slammed as much energy into the wall as she could. It shook, dust raining down around them, but it did not open.

Jinx pulled back, hissing, shaking out her hands. “Warn a witch next time before you go throwing around skyfire.”