I was sitting in my living room with my head in my hands.

Phoenix had escaped less than an hour ago. I rubbed my temples and stared down at the floor, debating what I'd do. How had she escaped? Her blackstone cuffs were lying on the ground and everything had been destroyed. If someone had helped her out, they had covered their tracks with impossible skill.

Every second I expected someone to rush into the room and announce she was attacking a kingdom or setting siege to the city. So, I jumped when my mother opened the door. She and dad were staying for a few nights.

"Fwhip?" she asked. "Can we talk?"

"Yeah, what is it mum?" I sighed and looked up.

"That girl...she really is Pandora's daughter?"

"As far as we know." I answered.

She frowned. "You know, when Scott was born, they kept it pretty quiet. I don't think they even gave out his name until he was at least seven. I heard a rumor he had a twin brother who died when they were kids. But not of a younger sister."

Twin brother?

"A rumor of a brother?" I asked, trying to confirm what I had heard.

She nodded. "Of course, it was probably just a story. We don't have many reliable sources in the Elven Empire-"

"Yeah..." I said slowly. "We don't. Did you need anything else?"

"No." she said. "Thank you honey, I'll see you in the morning." And she shut the door.

So, Pandora and Rohan didn't manage to erase Xornoth from everyone's memories... So, who else knew?

Sausage arrived in the next hour after I sent out the news that Phoenix was on the loose.

"What do we do?" he asked, collapsing backwards onto the couch. "What happens if she starts another war?-"

"I don't know!" I snapped. "Stop asking me like I know all the answers!"

"Well, jeez sorry..." he mumbled.

After a minute I looked back up. "Sorry." I muttered. "Just stressed."

Sausage nodded and rubbed his face with his hands. "This kid could destroy the world with her pinky finger." He said. "How do we stop that?"

I just shook my head. "If we can't find her, we'll just have to wait for her to come to us."

We sat there for a moment in tense silence, but I heard a door being slammed somewhere in the hallway, then the door to the living room we were in flung open.

I instantly stood up, just in time for Gem to run in and hug me tightly, sobbing into my shoulder.

"What the hell Gem!? What happened?" I asked, pushing her away just a little bit and putting my hands on her shoulders. Gem choked down a sob.

"I- I let Scott go back- go back to Rivendale after Erin escaped." She said slowly. She had already informed me of this earlier.

"Yes...?" I said.

"Before- before he left, he- he tried to f-fix this." She said, tugging at her hair, and I realized she meant the ice curse he had placed on her. "But- but he couldn't! He tried so hard, and he couldn't!" Tears began to stream down her face again as she tried to get words out. "I'm going to die Fwhip."

"No, don't say that." Sausage said, standing up. "We won't let you."

I was speechless. I had only seen Gem this distressed twice. During her final exams at the academy and when her predecessor, Forest Quinn, had died and she had to take over the Crystal Cliffs.

I wrapped my arms around her neck. "We'll go to Katherine. We'll find a way." I said quietly. She nodded, but she kept her face buried in my jacket.

Sausage placed a hand on her arm, and I saw in his face we shared the same concern. What if we couldn't? She still didn't have an apprentice, let alone has trained one to take over if anything happened to her... I see what Scott's trying to do. I take away his sister, he takes away mine... If you want to play that game...

I left Gem with Sausage and began to prepare my aircraft for a flight to the Overgrown. It was a long journey from the Grimlands, and we'd have to go around the Elven Empire instead of through it because my planes wouldn't be able to survive the cold.

I sent a raven to Katherine, letting her know we were on our way.

I jogged back inside the mansion to the living room. Sausage was sitting on the couch, twisting his fingers in his hands. Gem was leaned against the fireplace, the fire roaring, and a blanket wrapped around her shoulders. But she was still shivering.

"Hey, the plane's ready to go." I said, sitting down next to Gem. She nodded, but she kept her eyes closed and didn't move. "Gem?"

She opened her eyes. "Ok." She said quietly. She shifted her wait onto her knees, and got up, her legs shaking. I swear it wasn't this bad a few days ago.

I grabbed under her arms, and she leaned heavily on me as Sausage followed us out of the room. I made sure to keep the blanket wrapped around her as we made our way back outside.

The plane was waiting on the runway, and I pressed a button on my remote control and the top popped open. I helped Gem into the seat in the middle and spread the blanket over her.

"Is that ok?" I asked her, and she nodded, closing her eyes again.

Sausage got into the back, and I got into the pilot seat, pulling my goggles on. I flipped the switches and the gear, and the plane started to gain speed going down the runway before we took off and began to cruise at cloud level.

I wish I had heat in the plane, but I didn't.

For the first two hours of our flight, I heard Gem shivering behind me. Soon I couldn't take it anymore. "Alright guys, we're going to land real quick." I said and began to land the plane, descending down into the Forest Between. The Forest Between is the large ovular forest that is right smack dab in the middle of all the empires. There was a war for the territory once, a couple thousand years ago, but now it was all uninhabited space that no one owned.

We made a bumpy landing in a large area void of any trees. I clambered out followed by Sausage, but Gem stayed curled up in her seat, the seat belt making an indent in her neck where she lay.

I felt her hand, and it was ice cold.

"Can- Can you do some magic or something to warm yourself up?" I asked her.

She shook her head. "I haven't been able to do anything like that for days." She croaked. That's when I seriously started getting worried. She's been doing little bits of magic since she was a toddler.

"Can you?" I asked, turning to Sausage.

Sausage looked surprised. "W-What?" he stuttered.

"Can you do some magic to give her something to keep herself warm?"

"I- Fwhip I gave up magic almost a year ago." He said and bit his lip.

"Please."

Sausage looked between me and Gem for a moment before he set his jaw. "Gem, do you have any spellable objects with you?" he asked her.

She nodded and pulled a small pouch attached to her hip before handing it to her, her hand shaking violently.

Sausage took it gently from her and began to search through it before pulling out two objects. A shriveled dark green leaf, and the tiniest plastic bag I had even seen filled with a pinch of what looked like salt.

Sausage murmured something under his breath and the leaf caught on fire immediately and morphed into the flames. He opened the bag using the fingers on his other hand and sprinkled it over the flames, before almost forming the flames into a ball and spinning it around his hands.

When he let go, it was a small, orange, and red orb, with a misty, and extremely warm aura around it. I could feel the warmth from where I was standing, three feet away from him. He held it out to Gem, and she took it in both hands, before holding it close to her chests.

"T-Thank you." She managed.

Sausage nodded and clambered back into his seat. I hopped back in as well and we took off again. Gem's shivering had decreased as well, which was a good sign.

A few hours later I landed us right outside the main village of the Overgrown. I could see the turrets of Katherine's castle in the distance as the three of us climbed out of the plane.

Gem wobbled and I managed to catch her before she began to fall. The heat orb Sausage had made was floating above her right hand and the other was clutching at the blanket around her shoulders.

"Gem...Gem are you going to be able to walk there?" I asked quietly.

She slowly shook her head and her knees buckled. I held her weight up so she wouldn't hit the ground. What had Scott done to make it this much worse than before?

I picked Gem up, putting one of my arms under her knees. She leaned her head against my chest as I carried her towards the castle with Sausage at my side.

When we got to the door, Sausage used the large knocker. A minute later, Katherine answered the door. "Oh, hey guys-" she started, but then she saw Gem in my arms, her expression turned grim. "Come in." She said, leading us into the castle. The floor was made from blue, purple, and pink glass that stretched out across the room. A crystal chandelier hung from the layered ceiling. But we turned right into a very clean looking living room with a white marble fireplace and lavender couch. "Put her there." Katherine said, pointing to the couch, and I laid Gem down.

Gem curled up and I pulled the blanket over her. Katherine crouched down in front of the couch and held Gem's hand in hers very gently. "I was afraid this would happen..." Katherine said quietly. "But she's freezing over quicker than I expected...I thought she would have had a few more months before this."

"Can you do anything?' I asked, not even trying to hide the desperation in my voice.

"I don't know." Katherine said. "I can look her over and see if there's anything but..."

"S-Scott t-tried to h-help. B-But nothing- nothing he d-did worked." Gem said, I could hear her trying to stop her teeth from chattering. "H-How l-long do- do I h-have if you- if you can't?"

"I'm not sure, maybe three weeks at the most." Katherine said slowly.

"No." I said. "No."

"Fwhip- Fwhip if t-there's n-nothing you can d-do, there's- there's n-nothing y-you can d-do." Gem shivered.

"No, Gem, I promise, in two months I'll throw you the best 24th birthday party ever. Right Sausage?" I said.

I saw Sausage bite the inside of his cheek, but he nodded. Katherine gave me a heartbroken look, but I completely ignored it. Gem would live. She had to.

"Well? Get on with the checkup." I said, a little harsher than I meant to.

Katherine bit her lip, but then she nodded. "Just need to get my bag." She said quietly and beckoned me to follow her out of the room silently. I followed her back into the entrance hall. "Fwhip..." she said slowly.

"What?" I snapped.

"You can't promise something-" she started, but I cut her off.

"I can, I did, and I will do it." I said stubbornly and crossed my arms. "She'll live."

"Fwhip...I- I don't think she will." Katherine said, and I heard her voice break. "This is something I don't think I can fix."

"You better." I said, my voice shaking in anger. At least what I convinced myself was anger. Katherine gave me a sympathetic look.

"You're in denial." She said quietly.

"No I am not!" I snapped. "You- you're in denial!"

"Fwhip... Fwhip that doesn't make any sense." She sighed. "I'm sorry."

I felt my eyes stinging and Katherine gave me a hug. I bit my lip before I hugged her back.

"You realize this is how you made Scott feel..." she said slowly after resting her chin on my shoulder, but I shoved her away.

"HE DESERVED IT!" I shouted. "HE DID THAT TO HER! THIS IS ALL. SCOTT'S. FAULT!"

"Fwhip he didn't mean to! You heard Gem, he tried really hard to help her!"

"NO, HE MADE IT WORSE!" I shouted again. "NOW- Now I'm going to lose her..." The reality finally started to set in, and I felt a tear slip down my face.

Katherine took my hand gently. "I'll try my best...but I don't know if I'll be able to do anything."

"Well go try!" I snapped by accident. "Please." I said, trying to be a little nicer. Katherine nodded before fluttering up to the balcony above us and coming back down with her bag filled with her medical tools. Another woman also flew down next to her. She looked extremely like Katherine, with brown eyes and dark hair. It was twisted into an elegant knot at the base of her neck, and she wore a floral dress. Her wings looked like they belonged to a blue monarch.

"Fwhip, this is my mother, Giselle." Katherine said. "She might be able to help."

She gave me a short bow, "I believe we've met a few times." She said, and I bowed back.

"Yes, we have. Thank you- thank you for coming to see my sister." I said. Both of us followed Katherine back into the lounge.

Gem was leaned up against Sausage now, with his jacket on. He had one arm around her, and he had lit the fire for her. If it was any other guy, I would have punched them to the moon for touching her, but we had known Sausage for over ten years, and Gem had clearly expressed many, many, many times they were just friends.

Giselle covered her mouth with her hands. "Oh, I heard what happened." She said quietly and kneeled down in front of the couch. Sausage held her up straighter, and she shuddered. He glanced at me, and I saw the worry in his expression.

Giselle brushed the hair from Gem's face. "We'll help you the best we can, okay?" She said with an encouraging smile. "Now let's get you to the apothecary. Katherine, sweetie, can you get a wheelchair for her?"

Katherine nodded and jogged out of the room. I sat down on the other side of Gem. Her lips were so cracked that they were bleeding, and there was so much frost stuck in her hair it appeared white. She rested her head on my shoulder. "I'm scared." She whispered so that only I could hear her. I rested my arm around her shoulders.

"Don't worry. They're gonna try and help you." I whispered back into her hair. That's when Katherine came back in pushing a wheelchair. Me and Sausage helped Gem into it, and Katherine pushed her out of the door with me, Sausage and her mother following.

We left the palace and took all the gradual pathways down into the village. The apothecary was right at the edge. It was a building made from white stones with a purple curved roof.

Giselle opened the door. "Ella?" she called into the building.

A teenage girl came in. Her blonde hair was braided down her back, and she was carrying a basket of what looked like herbs.

"Yes mom?" she asked.

"Can you go watch mama while I help this young woman?" Giselle asked. I was confused by "mama" for just a second until I remembered, the Overgrown used to have two female guardians until Katherine took over.

The girl called Ella's eyes widened and she shrieked, almost dropping the basket as she set eyes on Gem. "Wizard Gemini!?" she asked in shock.

"Yes. She needs help. You heard what happened right?"

Ella nodded. "O-Okay." She said, setting the basket down on the counter. I caught sight of a pair of purple butterfly wings unfolding as she left the building.

As Katherine pushed Gem farther into the building, I looked around. There was a counter with a huge shelf behind it, filled with colorful liquids and bottles. I assume they had medicines in it. To our right, were three white hospital beds, and I watched as Katherine and Giselle pulled Gem onto one.

Me and Sausage sat in the waiting chairs right opposite of the beds.

Katherine pulled out a few sheets of paper stapled together. "These are from a few months ago when she first got frozen. And these are some of her previous records." She told her mother, and Giselle flipped through them.

"Hm." she said and glanced at Gem. "Are you wearing contacts?" After Gem nodded, she said, "I'll need you to take those out. I don't want the solution to freeze."

"Okay." Gem said, her voice barely above a whisper. Katherine helped her sit up against the metal frame of the bed and she took the contacts out of her eyes.

"What's your prescription?" Giselle asked, going behind the counter.

"N-Negative five." Gem stuttered.

Giselle came back around holding a pair of glasses with a black rim. "You can borrow these." She said and handed them to Gem. Gem put them on and glanced around.

"Thanks." She said. Honestly, it was so weird seeing her wear glasses. I'm pretty sure she started wearing contacts when she was 16.

"Count Fwhip, could you turn up the temperature, she's going to need to take off the coats." Giselle said, helping Gem out of Sausage's jacket and her overcoat.

I stood up and cranked up the heat to 90. It would be sweltering in here soon, but Gem needed it.

Katherine and Giselle had finally gotten Gem's coat off and overshirt, now she was just wearing a black spaghetti strap tank top, revealing the circular mark of frostbite right under her collarbone that Scott had left.

Giselle put pressure on it with three of her fingers, and Gem gasped. Giselle frowned, and took a thermometer from Katherine's bag, and had Gem put it in her mouth. She checked it and began flipping through the papers. She whispered something to Katherine, and her eyebrows raised. I wish I could hear what they were saying.

My knee bounced as I waited, and I stared up at the ceiling for a moment before looking back at what they were doing impatiently. Katherine had stretched out Gem's arm in front of her, and was running a finger down a vein, putting pressure on her arm every once and a while, and asking Gem a question.

Katherine's expression started to slowly get more excited, until a smile broke out on her face. I stood up so fast, my head started to spin, and my vision darkened for a second. But I got over it quickly and crossed the room in three strides. "What!?" I asked.

"I think we can help!" Giselle said with a look of relief. A feeling of absolute joy exploded inside of me.

"Really!?" I cried.

Gem looked between Katherine and her mother. "W-What?" She asked, and I could tell she was trying not to get her hopes up.

"Apparently, Scott did help more than we thought." Katherine said. "It was all focused here before." She said, hovering her fingers over Gem's chest. "But when he tried to fix it, he spread it thinner throughout her body, that's why it seems she's freezing faster. But it'll actually make it easier to create a cure, making it a little weaker throughout her body. I think I know exactly what will help."

"Seriously?" Sausage said from behind me, and I heard the happiness in his voice. Katherine nodded.

I grabbed Katherine and squeezed her. "Thank you." I said, my voice muffled.

"Silly, I haven't done anything yet." Katherine laughed.

"I don't care." I said and let go. "She's going to be, okay?"

"She's going to be okay." Katherine reassured.

"You've got this?" Giselle asked her daughter. Katherine nodded. "Okay, I'm going to go see how mama is doing. Feel better soon, Wizard Gemini." She said, before kissing Katherine on the cheek and leaving the building.

I followed Katherine to behind the counter, where she was pulling things from under the counter.

"Is something wrong with your other mom?" I asked her.

Katherine bit her lip. "Yeah...it's been going on for a little while now." She said.

"You don't have to talk about it." I said quickly.

"No, it's fine. We weren't really public about it outside of the kingdom. A few years ago, Melody, my mom, got sick. We still haven't really figured out what it is yet. We don't think its fatal though, which is good. She just wasn't fit to rule, and mom didn't want to do it without her...So that's why I took over when I was 19. I was ready. I still think it was the best choice."

"Oh...I'm sorry." I said. I didn't really know what else to say.

"It's fine...she remembers who I am most days." Katherine said with a smile, and began to grind an herb in an herb grinder, before sprinkling it into a concoction over a miniature, aqua-colored flame. "Just got to let that sit." She said.

We walked over to Gem's bed, and I sat down on the edge before taking her hand. "I told you so." I smirked.

Gem rolled her eyes. "N-Now's not the- the t-time to b-brag." She said. "C-Can I h-have t-the coats b-back?"

I actually laughed. "It's so hot in here. You can have my coat."

Gem giggled as I wrapped it around her shoulders. I hadn't seen her laugh for ages, and it made me smile.

A few hours later, Katherine took the mixture off the flames, and added a few more ingredients, before pouring the now orange liquid into a glass bottle.

She carried it over, and it seemed to turn pink in the light. She poured some into a shot-like glass and handed it to Gem. Gem, her hands shaking, took it in three gulps, and shuddered. Her breathing became quick, but she exhaled slowly.

I gripped her upper arm. "Hey-" I started, but then I watched as the frost started to melt, and the blue retreated from her fingertips. The frostbitten mark started to shrink slowly, creeping inward. She looked up at me, and the eye that had been turned icy white was now only a few shades lighter than her green eye.

Her face split into the biggest smile and she jumped it my arms, her body felt warm again. I could see the tears of joy spilling down her face as she sobbed happily into my scarf, and I have to admit, I almost cried as well.

Katherine watched us with a smile, and when Gem let go of me, she hugged Sausage as well.

"Just take a capful of this every morning." Katherine told Gem, handing her the bottle. "Come to me once you're out. It'll keep the ice curse at bay for good as long as you keep taking it."

"Thank you so much." Said Gem as she wiped the tears off her face with her hands. Katherine gave her a one-armed hug.

"No problem. Now get out of here you three before you cause any trouble." She smirked.

Maybe I could forgive Scott now...