Page 128 of Infernal Bonds

As I left the garden, the shocking revelations Amra had shared about Cornaith, the council, Elyrdin’s grim reality, and the true nature of the game they were all compelled to play swirled in my mind until my head throbbed.

All I wanted to do was meet Ash at the front of the palace and go home, but Amra asked me to summon Rinlora for her.

I needed to talk to the guys. The immense weight of being magically prevented from telling anyone who didn’t know the truth must have felt overwhelming. I wanted to ease their burden, and maybe a little guilt, by telling them I knew the truth.

Reaching the sitting room where I’d had my first lesson with Amra, I found Rinlora organizing a stack of documents on the coffee table.

She looked up as I entered. “You’re heading home?”

“Yeah. Amra wanted me to ask you to come to the gardens out back.”

“Do you have an escort?”

I’d told her and Amra that Ezra had implemented the rule that I wasn’t to go anywhere unaccompanied. And while I didn’t like everyone believing he acted like my leader too, I figured a little compromise wouldn’t hurt anything.

“Ash is waiting out front to walk me home.”

She tucked the documents under her arm and approached me. “How are you feeling?”

“Better.” I shrugged. “I mean, other than every moving shadow freaking me out.”

Her delicate features tightened into a frown. “You know nothing can get through Elyrdin’s walls, right?”

Again, the portals Shane utilized to allow lesser infernals to pour into the parking garage flashed in my mind.

“Yeah, sure.” I forced a smile. “I’m just overthinking it, I guess.”

“Things will return to normal soon, I’m sure. But you can come to the palace any time and speak with me.” She glanced at the door. “Without the council around.”

I liked how Rinlora seemed interested in me now that she knew I wasn’t out to hurt the guys. I hated that we’d started off with mistrust, but I didn’t blame her.

When she came to Earth with her brother and sister, they found the guys in my house after failing to track them with magic. It made sense that they suspected me. I would have blamed the person who summoned them, too.

But it felt good not to have to prove myself for once.

After we parted ways, I headed down a quiet hallway, avoiding a group of guards in tactical gear who side-eyed me as I went to call Zeke.

Ezra had given me a new phone to keep in touch with them because my phone from Earth wouldn’t work here. But like a lot of Earth’s technology, their cell phones functioned the same way, so it didn’t take much to figure out how to use mine.

Zeke had asked me to check in, even though he knew Ash was going to pick me up after I met with Amra. Not that I blamed him; the feeling that something bad was going to happen kept my anxiety through the roof.

I leaned against a wall lined with windows and hit Zeke’s contact, staring past Alonia’s towering buildings toward the massive barrier in the distance separating Elyrdin from the cursed forest of Feranzis.

I wondered if I’d ever be safe to leave the palace grounds again—even to go into Alonia. How long would it be before I could explore my new home? Elyrdin was almost the size of America, so I couldn’t see all of it right away, but I wanted to see more than the palace walls and our house.

After the sixth ring, I almost hung up, but then Zeke’s breathless voice came over the line. “Hello?”

“Hey. I just finished up with Amra.”

“That’s… good.”

“I’m about to meet up with Ash.”

“Okay… see y—” His breath hitched before he managed a breathless, “Soon.”

I pulled the phone away from my ear and looked at the screen. Did we have a bad connection? “Is everything okay? You’re not coming through clearly, and you sound weird.”

“Yep,” he said, voice pitched high. But then he moaned.