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Something I wanted for AB as well. To always be with us.

“And let me guess,”—I smirked at Annabeth, knowing her too well—“you wouldn’t let him go without you.”

Her familiar grin lit up her face with mischief. I blinked away my tears, pulling her into me again, ignoring the bag strapped around her digging into my wound, kissing her head. “Fuck, I’ve missed you.”

“We’ve missed you too,” she muttered.

“No! Stop! I have no more brains to suck! You promised you’d suck something else!” A voice jolted through me, causing me to stumble back, my gaze going to her bag between us.

“Oh. No…” I uttered, recognizing the tiny voice. “Noooo.”

A furry brown head popped out, a honey package stuck to it. “What?” He peered around, rubbing sleep from his eyes. “This doesn’t look like an all-you-can-eat buffet. But I’m starving. Am I dead? I have to be. I don’t see any food. This is hell. I am in hell, aren’t I?”

“Oh crap! Sprig! How did you get in there?” Annabeth slapped her hand over her mouth in shock, blinking at him as if he wasn’t supposed to be here.

“Oh fuck. No.” I shook my head. “No fucking way.”

The monkey-sprite twisted to me, his eyes opening. “Oh, sprite biscuits. I was right. This is hell. I’m back with the butt-pirate and no honey. What did I do to deserve this?!” He waggled his arms up at the sky. “Why me?”

“What the hell is that? How is it talking?” Kat came up next to me, staring in astonishment at the talking creature. Monkey-shifters couldn’t talk in their animal form, so even in the fae world, this thing was a freak.

I blew out, my hands rubbing my face.

“An annoyingpet.”

“Pet? Pet!” The five-inch monkey squeaked, crawling further out of the bag, a pair of girl’s black underwear around his neck like a cape, the honey packet still on his head. “How dare you, smelly ass-bandit! I’m the greatSpriggan-Galchobhar!”

“Great at licking your own balls.” I smirked at my old friend, pretending I didn’t want to bundle him up in my arms and kiss his furry head.

“At least I have some.”

“And here I hoped they’d donate you to a zoo by now.”

“You two,” Annabeth groaned with amusement. “Straight back into it, huh? Some things don’t change.” She plucked the wrapper from his fur. “Guess I can figure out why you got in my bag. How many did you eat?”

“One,Bebinn!”Fair woman, his nickname for her. He held up a finger. “Okay, maybe two or three…” He looked guilty; sprites could not lie. “Nine, I swear… okay, ten at most.”

Sprig was an experiment from Dr. Rapava’s labs. A sprite put into a monkey body. A prototype of bigger plans Dr. Rapava had conceived before we killed him and destroyed his labs. Sprig attached himself to Zoey, becoming another member of our little fucked up group.

“I’m gonna have to call Zoey before she freaks out.”

“She knows you’re here?” Her name dug into my heart, missing her more than I thought.

“Yeah.” AB nodded. “She wanted to come too, but with Wyatt and the orphanage, there was no way for her to get away.”

“How’s Wyatt?”

“He just turned six.” She gave me a look, a slight judgment. “So much like Zoey and Ryker. We think he’s a Wanderer. He’s showing magical signs of it.”

“Oh, shit.” I blinked, hating how much of the boy’s life I missed. I should have been there—Uncle Croygen. Now he wouldn’t even know me. “Ryker must be shitting his pants.”

“Not as much as Kennedy and Lorcan are.” Cooper laughed. The Druid Queen and the Dark Dweller had twins, their kids taking on both druid and dark dweller magic. A first for the fae world, which seemed like trouble waiting to happen.

“You also better call Rez. She’s mad at you too,” Annabeth chided.

Sign me up for the worst parent of the year. I missed the parenting window by a long shot, but I tried to stay in contact with her to establish some kind of relationship with her.

Commotion at the beginning of the pier caused my head to look around as a group of Ju’s soldiers moved down, asking for papers and checking out the products on the trading ships.