“It’s a deal,” she said, holding out her hand for me to shake. “Now, I don’t know about you, but it’s time for this princess to get some sleep. Is there anything else you need before I abandon you?”

The list of things I needed would take an hour to recite, but I put on my bravest smile. “Nope, I’m good.”

“All right then. See you in the morning.”

Giving the couch a baleful look, I pried off my shoes and arranged the pillow and blanket as best I could. Then I climbed into my makeshift bed and tried not to think. I fell asleep before I could decide if the couch rated as torturously uncomfortable, or merely miserable.

The next time I woke up, there was no crisis, which made for a nice change. My neck and back were stiff and sore, and my head didn’t feel much clearer than it had when I’d first touched ground in London, but at least no one was kidnapping me and no monsters were attacking me.

Stretching in a vain attempt to work some of the kinks out, I stood up and headed toward the kitchen where various noises indicated Kimber was up.

I rounded the corner in time to see her pour some Cheerios into a bowl, and had to swallow a laugh. Who knew a Fae ice princess would eat something as mundane as Cheerios for breakfast?

I must have made some noise despite my effort to be quiet. Kimber turned and gave me a grumpy, first-thing-in-the-morning look.

“Want some?” she asked, shaking the cereal box.

My stomach growled its approval, and I nodded. I couldn’t help watching her out of the corner of my eye as I poured my cereal and doused it with milk and sugar. She moved with the uncanny grace of the Fae, but she looked far more human this morning than she had last night.

She was still naturally beautiful enough to make me feel like Ugly Betty by comparison, but her hair was tied up in a messy knot at the top of her head, and she was wearing faded flannel pajamas that looked like they were meant for a guy. I surreptitiously checked her feet for bunny slippers, but she wasn’t quite that human.

It was when I glanced at the clock over the stove that I nearly choked on my mouthful of cereal. It was almost noon. I couldn’t believe I’d slept that long.

“Ethan’ll be here around one,” Kimber told me. “Then we’ll take you out to conduct our … test.”

I swallowed hard. Ethan had said it wasn’t anything to be afraid of. But then again, he’d said I’d be safe in the cave last night, so he wasn’t what I’d call a reliable source. I stirred my Cheerios around in my bowl, my appetite gone.

Kimber pulled a sponge from the cabinet under the sink and used it to wash her bowl. I wasn’t surprised to find that she wasn’t the sort to leave dirty dishes lying around. She shot me a glance.

“It’s really no big deal, you know. The test.”

I nodded and tried to smile. But if I wasn’t going to trust Ethan’s word for it, I saw no reason why I should trust his sister’s.

Kimber pursed her lips. “You’re just going to look at something and tell us what you see. Real simple. Okay?”

I can’t say I was convinced, but I dropped the subject anyway. “Can I ask you a question?”

Her lips twitched in an almost-smile. “Apparently so.”

Har-dee-har-har. “Do people in Avalon always carry knives and guns around?” I remembered the shock of seeing Jason draw a gun and wondered for the umpteenth time what I’d gotten myself into.

Kimber thought about that question for a moment before she answered. I wondered what she’d decided to leave out.

“It’s not what I would call common practice,” she said. “But we are the Student Underground, and Avalon politics can get cutthroat. Literally. If we didn’t have Ethan, we might not scare anyone enough for them to bother us. But Jason wasn’t lying when he said Ethan is a prodigy. He can do amazing things now, and it’s scary to think what he’ll be like when he’s older and has more experience.” She made a sour-lemon face—inferiority complex, anyone?—before she continued.

“He’ll be a force to be reckoned with someday, and some people might prefer to reckon with him now while they still can. So he’s single-handedly made our Underground into a threat, and the rest of us are at risk by association. And that’s why we make a habit of always being armed.”

“Aren’t there, like, gun laws or something?”

She laughed. “We radicals like to think of laws as more of ‘guidelines.’ Besides, I’d rather risk someone going all technical on me about carrying a concealed weapon than be unarmed when attacked by Spriggans.”

She was being real chatty this morning, despite her obviously edited answers. I figured as long as she kept answering my questions, I’d keep asking them. “So are there a lot of Spriggan attacks in Avalon?”

I’d stopped eating my cereal, even though there were some milk-sodden O’s left in the bottom of the bowl. Kimber took the bowl from my hand and washed it while she talked.

“Not usually. Only the humanoid Fae are allowed into Avalon, though it’s a lot harder to keep Fae creatures out than it is to keep humans out. The border on the Fae side doesn’t have the kind of immigration system that you humans do.” A frown furrowed her forehead. “But the Spriggans would only take orders from Unseelie Fae. I can’t imagine why any of the Unseelie power players would want to attack our Student Underground. We’re known to favor an Unseelie candidate.”