The next morning Chris swore to himself that he would never repeat the experience of being in the same bed as Ian for as long as he lived: not only had the Witch tried to kick him out several times, but he also could have - and maybe even would have - very easily turned him into a block of ice in his sleep. Chris made his way downstairs as he grunted and rubbed a sore place on his back where Ian’s knee had been stuck half the night, and found Daniel in the dining room engaged in a small book.

Without raising his gaze, Daniel asked, “How was the night?”

“Let’s just say that I yearned to share the bed with the bugs in Rio.” Chris chose a cup and filled it with tea from one of the kettles. “Where’s Julia?”

“Gone.” Daniel poured himself more coffee, and told Chris in short what had transpired the previous evening. Chris gave him a sympathetic tap on the shoulder.

Daniel shrugged. “I guess it was unavoidable.”

“If I didn’t know better, I’d say you didn’t give a hoot.”

Daniel flipped a page and said, “Honestly, I thought she might be back by now.”

“Thought so or hoped so?”

“She’s not good at surviving in extreme circumstances. On the other hand, we’re pretty close to the border; she could be in the Unfrozen already.”

“Without documentation, do you think they’ll let her pass? Morning!”

Chris’ greeting was addressed to Winter and Ian, who were just coming down the stairs.

Daniel gave them both a wave and said, “Julia isn't stupid, I think she has her ID on her. But either way, I don’t really care if they do, to tell you the truth. Worst that’s going to happen is they call her father to come and pick her up and she has to wait a couple of hours. She can keep herself warm, at least.”

Winter gave them a short nod before sitting down next to Chris and taking a mug from the center of the table. She was wearing a knee-length dark hooded cape atop of her clothes in place of the poncho from the previous day. The material looked somewhat light, a fact that didn’t really make a big impression on Chris: Witches were much less sensitive to low temperatures than Hacches or humans.

Ian pulled up a chair for himself from one of the other tables and didn’t even look at Chris when he poured himself coffee. He seemed to be wearing something that deeply resembled a military uniform (no rank indicated) from around the nineteenth century of the N.C.C., in light blue and white, with a dark waist-long cloak strapped to it. Chris was already used to these kinds of clothes on Ian, so he didn’t pay much attention to this; besides, he’d seen much more ancient attires in Northland.

A few short moments passed in silence before Ian asked, “The pink-haired girl. Where is she?”

“No idea,” Daniel replied.

“Look at me when you speak to me, you ill-behaved human.”

Chris snapped back, “Look who’s starting a lecture on bad manners!”

Daniel looked straight at Ian. “I don’t know where she is. I don’t know when she’s coming back. I don’t want to know. I don’t want to see her. Leave me alone, or I’ll show you how ill-behaved I can be.” With this, he pushed his chair back with a screeching noise and left, taking the book with him.

“One of these days,” Chris huffed, “I’m going to take your hair and stick it in your mouth in a tangle.”

He was just about to stand up and follow Daniel when Winter tugged at the edge of his shirt and asked:

“Did she go back to the Unfrozen? Julia Brown, that is.”

“Uh… according to Daniel, she was planning on it…”

Winter took a sip of her tea and asked, “We should not be waiting for her return, then? We don’t have time to waste, but if you think that she may come back…”

Chris felt himself blink in confusion. It was unnatural for Winter to ask for anyone’s opinion on anything.

“Uh, no, I don’t think so,” he answered. He wasn’t sure if he really preferred being consulted like this.

“It isn’t like we need her,” mumbled Ian.

“We will leave tomorrow morning in that case,” said Winter.

“Wait.” Chris sat back down, a thought passing through his mind. “What exactly are we going to do? I mean, it’s not like I don’t enjoy being here and everything, but what are the plans?”

Winter looked at him, surprised. “You are going to fight for the Crown. Was that not clear?”

“No, I know, but… well, as a start, you know, you could have missed me at the airport or something. You should have called!”

Winter waved him off impatiently. “But I caught you. Besides, I did not want to risk being found out. It would have been odd if you'd suddenly started talking about this on the phone at school, would it not?”

Ian added, “If only those two nuisances hadn’t hooked themselves onto us…”

“The word you need is ‘latch’. And go on, let me hear your brilliant suggestion to them getting out of that situation at the airport!”

“Truth. They would have broken under interrogation.”

“They don’t know anything! What I meant was that they would have just gotten into unnecessary trouble.”

Winter finished her tea and eyed Chris. “Christopher, what about Souza? Does he plan on moving with us further?”

Chris mused over her question for a moment. “Uh, I don’t actually know what he’s… what he wants to do now. I'm just about to talk to him about that. Do you, uh, have a plan on how we’re going to… do this whole thing?”

“I do. But speak to Souza first.”