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I blow out a breath and relax for a moment to regroup. I’ll need energy to run away, I tell myself. I’m not giving up. I’m conserving my strength and I’ll slide off the land-hippo when we stop. Somehow. Then I can wiggle free and run away. Sure, it sounds good in my head. More than anything, it doesn’t sound like giving up, and that’s the only thing I’ve got right now.
Aron’s nowhere to be seen, but of course he’s not. We’re crossing hill after hill of dirt, the hippos plodding over them with fierce determination, and Aron stuck to the road. As I stare out, I realize there’s something big and dark floating in the air in the distance. It’s the Citadel, and it looks like a gleaming castle in the sky.
I gasp at the sight of it. When they said it was a citadel, I thought it’d be a fortress of stone, similar to Aventine’s thick walls. This is a glorious, delicate castle that gleams in the sunlight with a thousand colors and floats above the ground like it’s on a cloud.
“How…” I begin, but a wave of pain hits me and I black out.