“How did you manage to convince Cook to let you take the dungeon guards their food?”
Tristan shrugged. “The boy who usually takes it hurt his leg.”
I raised an eyebrow.
“With a little help, of course,” Tristan added with a half smile.
I rolled my eyes. “Of course.”
Tristan bent down, took the keys from the guards, and opened the dungeon door—a slab of heavy wood over a foot thick. It creaked and groaned as it opened, a dank musty smell wafting out. We descended the rough stone stairs, slick with moss in places, into the bowels of the castle. Penelope had told me about these dungeons, a place of horror and brutal torture in the time of the old kings. Now they were mainly dimly lit prisons with torches attached to iron sconces along the wall. These dungeons were a part of the old structure of Caeleron Castle built nearly a thousand years ago. They ran in a series of maze-like caves twenty feet below the castle.
We kept to the shadows and moved by the dim light of the torches, which were recently lit. As the shadows from the flickering torches settled, I could see ragged figures huddled in corners as we moved past. I checked all the cells, but I didn’t want to call out Rafe’s name in case there were more guards down here. When we reached the last one, dread raced down my spine.
“He’s not here.” I spun around. “Maybe we should go back and recheck all the cells.”
“There’s no more time,” whispered Tristan, proceeding farther into the darkness of the dungeons. “Maybe they have put him where the children are being held, in the last cells beyond the ruins of the ancient vaults.”
I nodded, my heart hammering in my chest as I followed Tristan. The maze-like corridors darkened. There were no more torches on the walls as we reached the end of the prison cells. We didn’t want to use magic until it was absolutely necessary, so Tristan held back his powers. I only used a smidgeon of mage magic, creating a ball of light in my hand, one of the first things I had been taught when I discovered I had magic.
We entered a high-ceilinged room, the remnants of a vast vault where the old kings used to keep their treasure. Now, of course, it was empty, but I could picture what it must have looked like with chests of gold and jewels heaped all over the place. Impressive pillars rose above us, branching out into gothic arches and lined with rows of decaying statues devoured by time. I gasped and moved closer to Tristan when I spotted a pile of bones at the base of one of the statues.
A chill had seeped into the very stone around us, and the damp air was putrid with the stench of blood and decay. I thought of the children and Erien, who must be so scared to be trapped here for who knows how long. That thought made me press on. The map Rafe had shown us was stamped into my brain. If he was right about the layout of the dungeons, then the children should be imprisoned in cells that lay just beyond this hall.
We were nearly there.
Through the stillness of the dungeons, I heard voices, the sound of someone crying. “They are here,” I said softly, moving toward the sound.
Tristan had to bend as he followed me through an archway and into the tunnel at the end of the hall. There were no torches burning here, and we were plunged into pitch darkness. I removed my glamour and held up my palm, the mage light shining on the rows of iron bars lining small cave-like cubicles in which the children were held.
Dirty hands grasped the bars and peered through. “Aurora! Is that you?”
“Erien,” I gasped and ran toward my cousin. His face was drawn and pale, dark circles shadowing his once-bright blue eyes. My blood boiled. I could kill Delacourt for putting them here in a state not fit for animals.
Suddenly there was a sound behind us. I spun around as Tristan yelled a warning and dashed toward the mouth of the tunnel. But it was too late; a heavy iron portcullis came crashing down over the arched entrance, sealing us in.
Tristan’s eyes narrowed. “Create the portal now.” He held up the keys we had stolen from the sleeping guards. “I will release them from their cells. We need to leave now.”
I took off my amulet, willing my magic to awake, but it didn’t. “Tristan, something’s wrong.”
Tristan drew his sword, but it didn’t light up. “Something is blocking my magic as well.”
Increasing the mage light in my hand, I looked closely at the walls lining the tunnel, touched them, and gasped as realization took hold. “Blackened iron.”
I spun around. The blackened iron was everywhere—the bars were made of it, and it was hammered into the very stone that lined the cramped tunnel. My fae magic would not work in here, and neither would Tristan’s.
We were trapped.
The End of the Road
“I told you she would come,” said a voice I recognized immediately.
A light emerged in the dark hall behind the blackened iron portcullis as Calisto and Brandon came into view.
“Aurora Firedrake behind bars at last,” sneered Brandon, stepping forward into the light, his hands clasped behind him. “My predecessor swore it couldn’t be done. I guess that’s why I am archmage now.” Delacourt was wearing his coronation robes, cloth of gold and purple adorned with ermine and studded with amethysts the size of duck eggs. His light blond hair was styled elaborately; upon it rested a gold crown that he would soon replace with the more ornate and heavy state crown of Eldoren
