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My mouth dried out I stared at Ibrahim His eyes were narrowed on Thalia

"Why didn’t Odelia take the twins at birth if she knehat potential they had?" Ibrahim said "She could have easily stolen them, just as she stole Sofia and sent her to Cruor Then you would have run no risk of Rose falling into the wrong hands"

Thalia averted her eyes to the floor "Odelia was a conundrum"

"What do you mean?" I asked

"I ht she was There was a flicker of remorse in her for the trouble she caused the Novaks She didn’t want to take away the babies too, as much as Hermia and I tried to persuade her She hoped that the witches would not find out about the twins I told her that was a foolish move Of course, it was only a matter of time"

"Are the black witches still interested in the iet everyone within The Shade There’s no need for them to exert themselves separately for her anymore Rose is their key to Ben, the immune, and the rest of The Shade’s livestock"

I paused, frowning So otten to ask the most obvious one

"How the hell do you even know all this about the black witches?" I asked

She gave us a knowing s up, she touched our shoulders and the roonized this place Though I’d rarely visited it, I reer

Thalia walked up to a cell a few feet away and pointed into it Crouched in the corner was a ginger-hairedonto his chest, he appeared to be unconscious

"We ed to steal one of their own That’s hoe know all this Meet Efren Hansard Formerly a resident of The Sanctuary Turned traitor ht hi around the borders of our realm Since he has not yet become a Channeler, he’s not as powerful as Rhys and his faest witches were able to overpower hih the bars at the ry once they find out e’ve discovered They will double their efforts to bring us down But we had to do it We had to knoe are facing Noe are in need of actual cooperation with a Channeler if we are to have any hope of retaining our freedom…"

Knots formed in my stomach I dared nota us in The Shade But somehow, I suspected that they knew already In fact, I suspected Mona was the reason Brisalia and her daughter had been hanging around The Shade Perhaps they are concocting a plan to steal Mona away fro it utterly defenseless Despair clawed atat any hope I could that they still weren’t aware of Mona, since Thalia had not h there were still soin my mind, I finally asked the one question that had haunted me ever since she’d first opened her mouth "Why would you trust us with all this inforave a soft s anyone Neither of you are going anywhere for a long time"

Chapter 1: Rose

Every second that Annora’s hands remained wrapped around Caleb, it felt like they rapped aroundable to see Caleb’s face I had no idea whether he was returning her passion, her affection But when he reached behind his back and unclasped her hands fro away from her, I found so half-subed in water on the floor, I’d started to shiver from cold But I felt numb to it The shock of what that white witch, Her over The Shade, coupled with the shock of seeing Annora, had been enough to leave me numb to all pain To make any bodily discomfort seem trivial

As Caleb dreay from Annora, she tried to latch on to him He placed her arms firmly at her sides He cast a look at me His face was ashen, more drained than I’d ever seen it Then he looked away fro on neither of us

"Those witches… We have no time to lose," he muttered as he rushed out of the room

It cut me how his voice sounded so distant, so separate, when all I wanted was for hied between us That his feelings still remained the same That he still wanted to return withhim

Annora didn’t even look at e, I pulled ain as the subed doard My stoain, I crawled toward the entrance It led to a flight of stairs, and a dryer area that hadn’t been exposed to the water Annora had let in whilst sucking us through the hatch

I was surprised she hadn’t orchestrated the rescue to keep h Caleb was holding on to ined she would have taken pleasure in seeing those titches above water take ripped the railing in case the subeway There were several narrow doors on either side, leading to cabins, I assuuessed that Annora had closed the door to the control cabin