Page 99 of Ocean of Silver

Time didn’t exist this far below sea level. The prison rested at the deepest part of Earth, and it showed. Everything was damp and dark and desolate. I was given my own cell, but that was only because they wanted me alive… for now. The loners—the high esteemed prisoners—were isolated and only brought out during torture sessions. As long as we were kept alive, the High Councils of both Kingdoms didn’t care what the guards did to us.

Everyone else, the Advenians who were not deemed as important, were known as the trenchers. It was something I wasn’t aware of as the Prince. I hadn’t realized that part of the prison existed until I was brought here in handcuffs myself. The trenchers were all thrown into one large cell called thePuteus.They didn’t get torture sessions. They didn’t need it. Once they were thrown into the trench, no one escaped.

ThePuteuswas below the normal prison. Each loner cell was made out of grates instead of floors, so we were forced to watch the horror that happened below. It was my own sick form of entertainment, wondering which Advenians would die today and if the guards would clear the bodies. They never did. At first, I avoided looking down. ThePuteuswas thirty feet below the cells and the sounds of the dying and fighting were unavoidable.

This place was my own personal living hell. It was so fucked up that I could never have imagined it, and my mind was a living nightmare to begin with.

And the guards were just as vile, the most immoral Advenians I had ever encountered. There was a Luxian guard in particular who possessed both fire and ground abilities and liked to burn my flesh while strangling twine over my neck so I couldn’t scream. I named him Fuchsia because the guards never admitted to who they were. So I started remembering them by physical traits, and this one had the brightest shade of pink eyes I’d ever seen.

His smirk was menacing and radiated pure dominance as he stood over me today. “I have a present for you,Prince.”I sat up in my cell, resting my back against the jagged edges of the cage. Agony shot down my arm, and I was certain that it was broken.

The Advenian in the cell next to mine crawled into the furthest corner of his cage, heaving up before the spewed vomit passed through his grate and onto the trenchers below. Fuchsia was one of the most sadistic guards I’d met so far. He liked to go to everyone’s torture sessions and added impromptu ones whenever he grew bored, which was all the fucking time. And lucky for me, he seemed to be obsessed withbreaking me.

He bent down and opened the hatch to thePuteus.The entrance was situated a few feet from the cell I was in. It was the most heavily guarded area of the entire prison, and I fucking hated it. I hated hearing the screams of the poor Advenians who got sentenced below. Most didn’t even commit horrible crimes, but only became a trencher because they possessed a lower ranking, and the Council didn’t want to waste resources on keeping them alive. No one survived long down there. Most Advenians died by the desperate hands of each other rather than starvation or whatever else they were neglected. I’d quickly realized that if you put a man in darkness and closed him off from the world, they would grow mad, impulsive, and irrational.

They became monsters.

I wondered what poor soul I’d be watching fall to their doomed death today when deep sapphire eyes met mine.No, no, no, fucking no.

“Look who we found.” Fushia’s grin widened as another guard threw Scotlind toward him. He grabbed her by her hair, the long brown ends matted in knots. Her eyes met mine, tears pouring from them and her body shaking profusely. “We found her escaping into the mortal territory with theFire Princeof all people,” he smiled. “Ironic how your love for her ended you a permanent residence here, and she didn’t even return it.”

“Please,” I pleaded, my voice was husky from barely using it. “Please, let her go—”

“As you wish,” Fuchsia cut me off by pushing Scotlind down into the hatch. I pressed my head against the crate that made up the floor, watching in complete horror as she fell into thePuteus. Her screams pierced my heart, hurting more than what anyone could ever do to me. “I thought you’d enjoy watching her die as a trencher. Though I don’t think you’ll have to wait long for the show to start.”

The trenchers below started gravitating toward her, seeing what new Advenian was dropped into their satanic pit. Scotlind looked up at me for a second. One split second was all I got, her blue eyes briefly searing into mine, before she was forced to scramble to her feet. By the way she was limping, I was positive she broke her ankle from the fall, and I knew that she wouldn’t survive long.

“No, no, no,” I screamed as I banged my fists against the crate, not caring that my wrists and hands were bleeding from impact. I begged the crate to fall, trying desperately to rattle it from its hinges to drop me below. It was the first time since I came here that I wished I was a trencher because if Scotlind was going to die, I was damn well going to die with her.

Laughter filled my ears as Scotlind disappeared before my eyes. She was no longer thirty feet below in the hellish nightmare under the lined cages. She was nowhere to be found. I stayed with my head pressed against the crate, trying to calm my breathing.

Illusion users from Tennebris were who I hated the most. It was worse than any physical torture the guards could conjure. I could never tell when I was in an illusion and when I wasn’t. I could no longer tell what was real and what was projected onto me… because itfeltso real.

I stayed curled up on the crate, my wrists still digging into the rusty metal as I watched my blood drip onto the trenchers, hoping this nightmare would never become a reality. They couldn’t bring Scotlind here. That alone would be the last bit of me to break. That would be the only thing that could shatter me completely.

No, she was alive, far away from this hell.

Not real. Not real. Not real.

But the more I tried to convince myself that she was safe, the less I believed it. We were both caught that day, and I had no idea what had happened to her.

I prayed to the Goddesses for the second time in my life, hoping that she was safe, even if that meant she was in the arms of the Fire Prince.