Aelin barely waited for us to get in before she floored it.

  “Try not to get it stuck again.” I picked my discarded clip up off the floor and put it in my CB.

  “I’m hearing an awful lot of backseat driving from someone who can’t stay on an empty road.” Aelin shifted in her seat. “Unless you plan on taking the wheel, why don’t you leave the how up to me.”

  “As long as you don’t get us stuck again.” I teased her blonde curls.

  “Does someone want to tell me what’s going on?” Ether dropped onto the couch behind Aelin.

  I looked over at my ivory wife. Her face was covered with concern, which didn’t help put my mind at ease.

  “A herd of plains bulls decided to run our RV off of their territory.” Justia turned the passenger seat around to face the back of the RV. “Trent and Miel were concerned about the hybrids being able to damage the RV if they were in it and the target of the monster’s ire, so they hopped off and were going to lead the monsters away, then meet back up with us closer to the bridge.”

  The green priestess took a deep breath. “While we were running away, Achilles Ferrous, a Lunatic, cut us off, and when we tried to run back to the others, we saw them fighting more Lunatics.” Justia slowly pawed at her hair. “Someone got desolated.”

  “Which is why we’re way off road and off course.” Ether sighed. “That explains the Minotaur, but what about the other monsters?”

  I raised my hand as I sat down next to her. “That was my idea. Find a hybrid that would fight Achilles and after it killed him, we could finish it off.”

  “But you pulled too many, which is why there are a bunch of birds chasing us?” Ether looked out the window behind us.

  I wasn’t sure what she was trying to look at. It was way too dark to see something out there that wasn’t in the headlights.

  “What are we doing now?” Fray’s hand trembled as she sat down in the booth. She quickly hid it under the table and tucked it under her legs.

  “Mom and Trent are still alive.” Ether turned away from the window. “Hopefully they beat whoever they were fighting, which means we should meet them at Jyscor.”

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  “How do you know that they’re still alive?” I slid my arm across her shoulders and pulled her closer to me.

  “Mom is listed as our instructor.” Ether tapped on the crystal strapped to her wrist. “Do you never check your CB?”

  “Wait, what?” I took my right arm back so I could scroll through the menus. Sure enough, in the PARTY menu, Miel Warray was listed as our instructor. I looked over at my wife. “When did that happen?”

  “Trent was going to be busy with his brother, so he made Mom our instructor so she could take us into the Dungeon at Iver.” Ether tilted her head. “Weren’t you listening when they were talking about what they were going to do once we got to Iver?”

  “I…” I shrugged. “I don’t remember that.”

  “You need to pay more attention.” Ether chastised me.

  “So how do we know that Mister Vowler is safe?” Fray piped up.

  “You said someone got desolated.” Ether shifted so she could lean against me. “Gibborim don’t desolate.”

  “That’s what the Lunatic said.” I let out a sigh of relief. “So we know that both of them should still be okay.”

  “Why both of them?” Fray gripped her leg to stop it from bouncing. “We wouldn’t have seen anything if Mister Vowler had died.”

  “I mean…” I shrugged. “I guess we don’t know for sure that dad is okay, but I mean, of the two of them…” I glanced over at the woman lying on me.

  “It’s okay.” Ether patted my arm. “I’m not offended you think your dad could beat my mom.”

  I chuckled but didn’t have a comeback to that.

  “I see the bridge!” Aelin pumped her fist. “And it looks like those birds decided we weren’t worth chasing with that feast we left behind.”

  I allowed myself to sink into the seat as I looked at the time. 1:57am. It was still very early in the morning and I could feel my body longing for sleep, but at the same time, the evening’s excitement had me awake enough that I doubted I’d be able to fall asleep for a while.

  Ether settled in my lap, her chest slowly rising and falling as her breathing leveled out.

  “Is she already back asleep?” Justia chuckled.

  “She can fall asleep very fast.” I stroked the sleeping woman’s face. I glanced around the RV. We were all dirty, but Justia had taken care of any scrapes or bruises we’d earned. Overall, it would have been hard to believe just by looking at us that we’d just survived against one of the Gods’ personal guards.

  “Fray, you should go back to bed.” I nodded at Justia. “We can get you up if something else happens.”

  “I’m good.” The green woman pulled off her leather helmet, then smoothed her brown hair behind her round ears.

  I settled back on the couch. I doubted I was going to fall asleep, but I was at least going to try to be comfortable. I tried not to worry about Trent or Miel, but I knew they weren’t going to leave my thoughts until I saw that they were okay.

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