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Within a minute they were crawling through pitch blackness, and the tunnel declined more steeply. Remy’s forearms strained to slow her descent. She worried that the prince behind her would lose purchase and collide with her.

A faint, eerie green glow began to form in front of her. As she moved, she could make out the tunnel more clearly as the green light amplified. The tunnel moved into a straight drop into open air. Peering down the hole, she saw the ground beyond.

“Wait here while I descend or you will crush me,” Remy warned.

She prayed the drop would not be big and that she would not fall face-first into stone. She pressed her hands and legs hard into the rock as she crawled. Already-tired muscles screamed at her. She saw that the ground was close, the drop only an arm’s length.

Her hand slipped, and with a grunt she slid the rest of the way to the ground below. She twisted enough that her shoulder and not her face took the hit. She made a pathetic thwack as she crumpled onto the ground.

“Are you all right?” Hale called.

“I’m fine,” Remy grumbled, dusting herself off. She would be covered in scrapes, but nothing more. “Let’s see if you can be a bit more graceful, Your Highness.”

She heard Hale’s echoing laugh as he slid forward. One hand appeared and then the other, reaching to the ground. The muscles on his arms and shoulders bulged as he lowered himself from a handstand into a push-up and down onto his stomach. Remy gave a begrudging huff as he sat up, trying to not acknowledge how impressive or attractive that was. But Hale was looking toward the green glow to his right.

Stretched far out before them was a bioluminescent lake. Its glow lit up the giant cavernous walls that stretched high into the darkness of the mountain. In the center of the lake was a small island holding a large rectangular slab of stone, and on top of that stone was a goblet and a shining red necklace: the amulet of Aelusien.

Hale coughed, pulling his tunic up over his nose, and that’s when the rotten smell hit Remy. She thought she had overcome the stench outside, but this was far worse. Yanking her shirt up over her nose, too, Remy looked and saw them around the shoreline: bodies. Dozens of bodies in various stages of decay dotted the craggy rock floor. Many of them were already skeletons from hundreds of years ago. She looked at her boot, standing on a piece of cloth—it looked like a coat of some sort but no corpse was inside it. She shuddered. Many more articles of torn and shredded clothing lay strewn about. She wondered if the people had disrobed before attempting to swim across the lake so they could cross faster. There was far more clothing than bodies.

Hale nudged Remy with his elbow, “Can you read this?”

He was looking at the cave wall above them. Mhenbic, the witch’s ancient language, was etched into the stone. Remy spoke Mhenbic with Heather and Fenrin occasionally, but Heather preferred they used Ific, the common tongue. Remy had never read it before but the lettering was close enough to Ific that she tried to speak a translation.

“If the Amulet you seek, then go for a swim. But beware the poison waters. Reach the antidote before the poison claims you. There is enough to save one life. Only the worthy will reach the goblet. Only the worthy will claim the amulet. May the red magic bless you.”

Remy shuddered. A poison lake. They designed the waters to kill. It seemed many a seeker of the amulet had panicked and retreated to the shores only for the poisons to claim them.

Hale stripped off his tunic.

“Wh—what are you doing?” Remy stuttered even as her eyes moved to his sculpted, muscular torso. If the poison lake would not kill her, that body surely would.

“I’m going in,” Hale said as if she were the crazy one.

“Are you a fast swimmer?” she asked. She knew he must be a powerful swimmer. He had told her of his teen years at his mother’s fishing village, learning to battle mighty waves. But surviving giant waves was not the same as moving quickly, and it was speed he needed now.

“Are you worried about me?” Hale grinned. He was being awfully cavalier about his own life. Meanwhile, Remy was having a hard time keeping her eyes off his bare chest.

“Of course I am!” she barked and his grin widened.

“If I don’t make it, then the coin and the horses are yours.” Hale winked. “You can bribe your way back into the South and buy yourself your very own little witch tavern.”

“Great,” Remy said bitterly as Hale removed his shoes. She looked toward the wall and the ancient warning carved into it.

May the red magic bless you.

“Wait!” she said.

Hale turned toward her. She reached out and grabbed his arm, placing her palm on his bare chest above his heart.

“What are you—”

“Sh,” she reprimanded.

She summoned her well of red witch magic. She pulled up as much as she could and pushed it out into her palm. Muttering ancient Mhenbic words, she pressed onto Hale’s chest and let her magic flow through him.

She looked into his eyes. They were wide with shock. Remy wasn’t sure what it must feel like for him to have her magic coursing through him.

“This is a protection spell, stronger than that red string,” Remy said, holding his gaze and repeating the words sliced into the mountain: “May the red magic bless you.”