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“She wouldn’t need to be let out. We would just need her to create an enchantment to get there and back,” Sorin argued.

“Please, for the love of Anala, tell me we are not talking about the Sorceress,” Eliza said, her face going slightly pale.

“More like for the love of Arius if we’re talking about her,” came the muttered response of Cyrus.

“Who is the Sorceress?”

Everyone turned to Callan. Sorin had forgotten the mortals were even in the room, but before he could explain, Briar spoke. “The Sorceress is not from this world. No one knows where she came from or how she got here. She was incredibly powerful until she was caught hundreds of years ago and imprisoned beneath the Black Halls in the Underwater Prison.” He turned back to Sorin as he finished. “A prison that onlyIcan access and allow others to enter, and I will not do so now.”

“Instead, you will bring Talwyn into this? You will hand her over to Talwyn who will not care what she does to her as long as her revenge is completed?” Fire ignited in Sorin’s veins, and he knew his eyes had turned to embers. Briar’s were glittering like ice as the princes squared off.

“Blood magic is forbidden for a reason, Sorin. The costs are too great.” Briar’s tone was as icy as his eyes.

“No cost is too great for her!” Sorin bellowed.

“She will use that exact attitude to her advantage,” Briar argued.

The entire room fell silent. Rage and panic were emanating off of Sorin, and the others were hardly daring to breathe, let alone move.

“We cannot release her without Talwyn, Sorin. You know this. I may control who enters the Underwater Prison, but the queen’s blood is keyed to the cells,” Briar said slowly.

“I have already told you that I do not want to let her out. I just need her to create an enchantment.”

“Then go to the Witches. Go to Hazel,” Rayner cut in quietly, still leaning against the wall near the balcony.

“The Witches do not practice blood magic. Their spells will not be powerful enough, or I would ask Beatrix. It must be her. You know this. Briar, please.” The longer they debated this, the closer Mikale would be to discovering her if she were indeed in the mortal lands.

Briar looked as if he couldn’t believe what he was hearing, and he shook his head in disbelief when he said, “You promise her nothing. Yougiveher nothing. We talk to her, and see what she has to say. That is it, Sorin.”

“Fine. Agreed. Yes,” Sorin said in relief as a water portal appeared behind Briar.

The two princes stepped through directly into the Underwater Prison. Sorin could see the merfolk who guarded the compound swimming in the waters beyond the windows. Briar led the way quickly down various halls and down into the depths. Neither prince said a word as they walked. Magic could not be used beyond the point they had just entered as an added security measure against the inmates.

Sorin had only been in the Underwater Prison a handful of times accompanying Eliné when she’d needed to speak with prisoners. He honestly didn’t even know how many were imprisoned here, let alone why. He only knew the foulest and deadliest of the world’s creatures were sent here if they were ever captured, and once you entered a cell, you never came back out.

Briar paused before a staircase. “Her cell is down these stairs. She is the only one on this level. Are you absolutely sure about this, Sorin?” Briar had placed a hand on Sorin’s shoulder. A friend concerned for his friend.

“I am,” he answered. “She is worth it, Briar.”

“Give her nothing,” was all Briar said as he turned and descended the stairs.

The set of stairs was short, only twenty or thirty steps, and they found themselves standing before a cell. The bars of the cell were made of shirastone from the Shira Cliffs in the Wind Court.Immune to magic and deadly to magic wielders. Sitting in the corner of the stone cell was a thin woman. Her knees were bent up, her arms encircled them. Her forehead rested on her knees. The woman’s jet black hair fell around her like a drape of midnight sky. She wore a plain beige shift, but her skin was so pale, even that was stark against it.

The Sorceress slowly lifted her head at the sound of their approaching footsteps, and her electric violet eyes settled on them. Her mouth twitched up at the side, and her head tilted in curiosity.

“Visitors? How unexpected.” Her voice was smooth and even, elegant yet tinged with a hint of madness. The Sorceress studied the princes, those violet eyes moving slowly over them. “A Prince of Fire and a Prince of Water and Ice.” She pushed herself to her feet, uncoiling from the ground like a giant serpent. “Those were not your titles the last time I had visitors. The thrones you now sit upon were occupied by others.”

She came to the bars of the cell and raised her hands like she would wrap her long fingers around them and then stopped herself, seeming to remember just what those bars were made of. She inhaled deeply, as if she were breathing in fresh air, and her eyes fluttered closed. “Such power you wield. Yet you, Prince of Fire, there is something extra in your blood. Faint, but it is there.” Those eyes of hers fixed on him, and her half smile grew slightly.

“I am not here to discuss my power nor the Water Prince’s,” Sorin replied, finally finding his voice and stepping forward.

“Then what would you like to discuss, your Highness?” she purred.

“I am in need of your…expertise,” he answered carefully.

“My power was stripped from me when I was imprisoned in this wretched cage. Surely you know this?”

It was true. The Avonleyans had used ancient blood magic to strip her of her magical abilities and had given them to others, creating entirely new bloodlines— Shifters and Witches.