Just as with the Desert of Dreams, I had no idea how long I walked through the darkness. At times, the ground beneath my feet sloped downward. Now and then, I strode face-first into a wall. No light offered assistance, no voices came from within. A few times, I tripped, as an unexpected rock or hole would appear. I continued on, trusting my feet. I knew at any moment I could walk off a cliff, into a well, toward the gaping jaws of some monstrous creature-

  I walked into another wall.

  I stopped and took a step back, and then lifted a hand in front of me, feeling for the wall. My eyes widened as my fingertips landed on wood. Warm wood. I felt down along the wood, found a knob, and turned.

  The door opened and light flooded into the tunnel. My eyes took a moment to adjust, and then I found myself facing the Kingdom Under the Ice.

  A ledge opened to a grand staircase, beyond which sprawled an underground city in a huge cavern. Warmth washed into the cold tunnel from within the city. Everywhere traveled beings exactly as Cervis had described- not quite like faye or humans, but mostly stockier, taller than humans, in warm, earthen colors. Many had dark, curly hair, though some had stark auburn hair or bright silver. Eyes of all colors, violet, blue, indigo, amber, gray, onyx, seemed to stare at me as the movement came to cease. Sentinels in the streets appeared to debate what to do, a few already parting the crowd to stop my invasion.

  Reality seemed to settle upon the people, as they suddenly rushed into the buildings of smooth orange-, sienna-, and brown-hued rock, geometric structures often built in pyramidial cubes. In the distance, on the far side of the cavern, the front of a palace not unlike Cervis’s floating palace peeked into view from the entry to another dome-topped cavern.

  The sentinels reached the bottom of the stairs and I smiled.

  “Well, hello, there!”

  The sentinels glanced at each other. Seven of them had come to greet me, spears pointed in my direction. I pointed at one. “You know? You have lovely eyes, ma’am. Just absolutely lovely.”

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  The sentinel glanced at her fellow. “What do we do with her?”

  The fellow she looked at, a stately man with extra gold embroidery on his silver-blue sentinel helmet. His copper eyes narrowed from the slit that showed them. “You- state your name and business. How did you pass the Gatekeeper?”

  “I am Aster Fallowfall,” I said. “I am here to save your prince.”

  One of the sentinels lapsed his grip on his spear in shock, and the others’ eyes widened. Gasps rang from them and the crowd in the streets. The captain spoke again: “You- you know of Cervis? His whereabouts?”

  “Yes- but I cannot reach him alone. I need the help of his people to save him.”

  The female sentinel who’d first spoken looked at the captain. “The queen won’t like this-”

  “The queen is gone until Ostara,” the captain said. “Her commands regarding what to do in her absence didn’t account for this-”

  “You know she wouldn’t want it,” another sentinel said.

  “But for Cervis, we must try!”

  The captain turned to me and lowered his spear. “If you are truly here to save our prince- to bring him back- we would gladly help you with everything we could.”

  I suppressed a sigh. “But?”

  He glanced down. “But we are currently afflicted with our own problems. Dragonlings circle the skies, and we’ve lost a number of sentinels trying to thwart their advances- it’s only a matter of time before the broodmother arrives-”

  A worthy job for a heroine. I stepped forward. “Is that all that stands in the way of you helping me?”

  “Yes.”

  “Then I’ll help you.”

  The captain raised his eyebrows. “Have you experience fighting dragons?”

  “No,” I said, smiling. “But now’s as good a time as any to acquire some.”

  And then I remembered- Nyx still sat outside the cave, asleep and unaware.

  “In fact, right now might be a great time to do so.”