"And he gave you the plans?" Iris asked, squeezing Travis's hand. He wrapped an arm around her shoulder.

"Reluctantly. Apparently they wanted to use me against my people- as some sort of weapon. Creepy stuff- mind control and the like." Liana rubbed her temples. "We should stage a meeting under our own terms. Blackthorne for Taylor and Jerik."

"No way. He's too valuable," Charlie put in.

"So we offer to exchange another officer," Travis offered.

"They let them get captured for a reason," Liana shook her head. "They must not be very useful to SEAM."

"So what do we do?" Kian spoke up.

"We could make it seem like we're giving them Blackthorne. But... instead, we could attack once we have Jerik and Taylor."

"Absolutely not!" a voice called from behind them. They all dropped their dinner and turned.

A pale, blond man with piercing ice blue eyes glowered down at them. "It's too risky."

"But, Demitri-" Charlie was cut off abruptly.

"King Demitri," he insisted.

"Jerik's not dead," Liana snapped.

His cold gaze turned on her. "How would you know?"

"He's not helpless. He can survive on his own. If he couldn't, why would he have been named King?" Iris covered for her.

"I am in his place for now, and my word is law. And a band of kids are not staging a rescue attempt, no matter how powerful the witch is."

Liana flinched, but resisted from biting back with a snarky comment. "What are we going to do, then?"

"You are going to wait until I can formulate a stable plan. It'll take a couple days, but I'll make sure it won't fail." Demitri said,

"We don't have a couple days! Who knows what they're doing to them?" Liana argued.

"I know you're eager to rescue your boyfriend, but we can't charge recklessly into battle."

Liana didn't bother to correct him as he walked away. "Okay, well... who wants to charge recklessly into battle?"