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Without waiting for his response, I grabbed hold of his aruided it toward Corrine She reached out tentatively, as one would to a wild animal, and touched his wrist After she’d performed her test, I said, "Now please Take us down"

As the dazed Corrine instructed us all to form a circle, Lucas tried to pull away but I held on to hiic, and all of us reappeared in the woods

Lucas looked at ht even shoot out of the boundary again "If you want to see your son again, just stick withfor you" With that, I faced Corrine "Where are my parents?" I asked

"I-I a at Kailyn "What happened to you all?"

"We don’t have tih the trees surrounding us I was trying to figure out where exactly we had landed Not far fro in its direction without even bothering to look behindIf Lucas still chose to stay behind, then so be it I wasn’t going to babysit hi before the Port, we could reenter the forest via the main path, the most direct route to the Residences The trees thinned, and as we eed from the forest, my eyes darted immediately to the path on my left I was about to hurtle toward it when Corrine yelledin the direction of the Port, and that hen I saw the on the jetty near a small boat My heart leaped

"Dad! Mom! Rose! Viv!"

I hurtled toward them and, as I neared, it was obvious that they’d just spotted Lucas The four gazed over -lost Ben co back from the dead They stood transfixed by Lucas Even Kailyn, as also supposed to be dead, was barely enough to hold their attention for long I allowed lance back at my uncle, even as I felt relieved that he had decided to heed my words and follow us

He had halted, and he, too, stood like a fox caught in the headlights, staring at my family His family I had never seen him look so uncomfortable as I had now--not even when he’d been trapped in his pool in The Underworld

When I reached aze away from hi as they hugged ht bear hug Vivienne joined the huddle, catching the side of my face with a kiss

I couldn’t describe the happiness I felt, standing there, holding my family so close I knew that I would never take their affection for granted again

"What happened?" my mother breathed

My father still looked too speechless to talk After he relinquished ain to Lucas, as if he half expected the sight of him had been just a trick of the eye But no, Lucas still stood there, staring and lookingthings," I said quickly to one through all of their heads "I’m back Kailyn is back Lucas is back"

"How?" my father breathed