The woman’s eyebrows scrunch together, and Lor’s face stretches into a grin. The woman waves us off, and if we had more time, I’m pretty sure Lor would convince her to pay us instead.

We stumble into the street and look around to find our bearings. The innkeeper revealed we aren’t far from Aphelion, but it will take us a few days to get there on foot.

We’ll need some provisions for our trip back. I don’t think I should fly us. I’m worried . . . I say to her through our bond.

My eyes cast upwards towards the heavens. As long as we don’t call for her, she shouldn’t be able to summon or see us, but hovering in the sky feels a little too close to her dominion. I don’t really know if that’s how it works, but caution is probably wise. However, I was relieved to find I could use my magic again and that she doesn’t have that kind of sway over me on the surface.

I have a feeling she’ll try to get me back up there somehow, I add with a shudder.

Lor comes up and places a hand on my chest. You understand that no one is taking you from me either. I’ll destroy her if she so much as touches another hair on your head.

I clasp my hand over hers and then wrap my arm around her waist.

You make my knees weak when you talk like that.

She snorts a laugh. I mean it.

I know you do, Lightning Bug. I mean it too.

She has no idea just how much I mean it. I thought I lost her when I was stuck up in that prison in the sky. I thought she hated me. I thought it was the end, and I never want to know that feeling again. I love her with every piece of my heart and will do anything to protect her.

“Lor!” comes a voice that has us both spinning around, instantly on edge. A familiar figure runs towards us, and the sight is so incongruent that it takes a moment for my brain to catch up.

“Willow!” Lor screams, and then she starts running too. They clash in the middle of the street, wrapping their arms around one another.

“Where have you been?” Willow cries as she hugs her sister.

“What are you doing here?” Lor asks at the same time.

Out of the crowd emerge three more figures—Mael, Amya, and Tristan—that make my heart squeeze. “Thank Zerra,” Amya says, throwing her arms around me. “I thought he was finally going to finish you.”

“I’m not that easy to kill, little sister,” I say, and she gives me a watery smile.

“I know that.”

Mael claps me on the back, and then we embrace. “I’m so fucking glad you aren’t dead,” he says.