Amarantha's Court · Beneath the Mountain

Under the Mountain

“Down here, there is no sun, no moon, no mercy — only the Queen who buried them.”

Under the Mountain · A Court of Thorns and Roses

The dark beneath Prythian.

Forty-nine years of Amarantha ruling the whole realm from a sealed stronghold of black stone. We still flinch at the words. Same.

At a glance

The shape of the dark. We never forgot it.

What it isAmarantha's sealed mountain stronghold

Ruled byAmarantha, the Deceiver

Heldall seven High Lords and their courts

Forforty-nine years, after the War

Lightnone — only blood-red torch and faelight

The way outthe trials, or the breaking of the curse

The reign · Forty-nine years

She took the courts and buried them whole.

After the War, Amarantha set herself over all of Prythian, stripped the High Lords of most of their power, and held court in the dark for half a century. A blight crept across the land above. Below it she ruled absolutely — and kept Rhysand as her plaything the whole length of her reign. We are not over the plaything part. We are not elaborating.

The trials · A mortal's bargain

Three trials, and one last riddle.

A monstrous wyrm loosed in a pit of mud. A deadly puzzle to solve through a fog of mind-clouding. And the cruelest test of all, three faeries' lives. Over every one of them hung Amarantha's riddle, and the one word she never thought a mortal would land on. Love. We knew the answer and still didn't breathe.

The breaking

It ended where it was meant to never end.

The dark beneath the mountain was built to keep its prisoners forever. Instead it's where the curse came undone — paid for in death and resurrection — and where Amarantha's long reign finally broke. What walked back out into the light was not what walked in. We will never recover.

Who passed through it