Page 58 of In Rising Tides

His mother appeared behind the bars. A wooden torch was clutched between trembling fingers.

Tears ran like a stream down her reddened, glassy eyes.

Wilder hardly recognized the woman before him.

Queen still wore the silver gown she had been wearing the night he arrived, but it was rumpled and wrinkled. No longer did it resemble moonlight on the ocean, but more like the glow of a specter, matching the haunted look in her eyes.

“Darling,” she whispered, reaching through the bars towards him.

Wilder couldn’t stand, but clasped his mother’s hand. A sob slipped through her lips, and the flame of the torch fluttered as her shoulders shook.

“I didn’t—” she began. “I didn’t know.”

Wilder nodded. That much had been apparent.

Queen Aine had been as distraught as he had upon learning of the king’s plans for him and Lyra.

“What has happened?” he asked, steeling himself for whatever her answer might be.

The cold stones seeped into his legs, and he shivered.

“The court is in an uproar. There have been riots,” she spoke quickly, her voice trembling. “There is talk that your f—” she cleared her throat, “the king will be challenged. They want him usurped for this.”

“Who has challenged him?”

Wilder’s anger rose. He had been the one who wanted to challenge his father.

Not because he wanted the throne, but because he needed to rescue Lyra.

Someone was derailing and stealing his plans.

“No one yet,” she replied. “The nobles are rallying behind Warick.”

The pieces clicked together, and a heavy sigh slipped from his lips.

Warick had seized the moment for his own. The rising tension had been palpable in the air to everyone.

It shouldn’t have come as a surprise that Warick, who had always longed for the throne, had snatched it.

“I need to get out of here,” Wilder ground out. “I have to get to the sea.”

Aine squeezed his fingers. “The bars are spelled against magic. The only way out is with a key.”

Wilder surveyed the bars and the perimeter of the cell.

Moonlight poured through tiny holes in the ceiling. The dungeons were kept outside the castle walls, underground.

But they weren’t too deep if the collection of leaves and pebbles on the ground of his cell hinted at anything.

“Am I being kept on the east or west side?” he asked, trying to tell from the slant of the moonlight.

“Neither,” his mother whispered. Her face twisted with grief. “These are the king’s private cells.”

He took a deep breath and forced all the air out of his lungs. He had never heard of such a dungeon before.

“Where are Maelys and Ridge?” Wilder asked, feeling a lump form in his throat. “Were they behind this, too?”

Otto had betrayed him, but surely Maelys and Ridge had not.