Sapphique
Catherine Fisher
 It is the sequel to “Incarceron.” The setting is in two places, a place of peace and less starvation which is all fake and governed by protocol in which they call “The Realm” and the other place is a prison called “Incarceron” which is microscopic in size but once inside it is a huge world and the prison itself is alive that looks at its prisoners through millions of red glowing eyes that dot everywhere. There is no technology in the realm because of protocol and Finn who escaped the prison believes the realm is just as bad as Incarceron. The story starts off with Attia who helped Finn escape but wasn’t able to escape herself. She goes to a magic show pretending to be an average bystander because she is the magician’s helper. His name is Rix and he is known as the Dark Enchanter. She tags along with him for a while and they go to a few places then she turns on him, leaving him to die but he comes back with a vengeance later on. She steals his glove which is Sapphique’s glove (a man who was the only one to escape from the prison, Finn did too as previously mentioned). She hatches a ride with Keiro, Finn’s oath brother, and they fight a twelve headed monster together. They are then summoned by Incarceron to go to a certain location, that has its humanoid body, and along the way they go to a nursery that gets them in contact with Finn. The prison wants to escape itself to see the stars, if it does this, it will leave millions of prisoners left to die. Meanwhile, Finn is told by Claudia that he is the long lost prince Giles but he has a hard time remembering. He has visions that depict this but he has a hard time putting it all together. To make matters worse, somebody else claims that they are Giles. There are some trials and testimonies between the two and we learn later that somebody else has taught this fake Giles, all of Finn’s old unrecoverable memory. The council decides that the pretender is actually Giles so they decide that Finn is going to be executed for lying (which he didn’t lie). He has a little battle with the pretender nearly killing him but he aims for his arm. Finn and Claudia run away to the wardnery, the portal to the prison and they do all in their power to hold off the Queen’s huge advancing army. Jared is Claudia’s mentor and he meets them there nearly getting killed by a plot from the Queen. Jared knows more about the portal then them and he starts working on it. Meanwhile, Keiro reaches the humanoid statue after becoming Rix’s apprentice. Keiro said the magic line that Rix wanted to hear that tells Rix who his apprentice is. If it wasn’t for Keiro, Attia would be dead because Rix's revenge would’ve killed her. Keiro decides to not give the prison the glove and puts it on himself. He trades places with Claudia. He is put in the place where Claudia was in the realm and she was put in his place in Incarceron. Incarceron recognizes her because Claudia was a baby when the Warden took her from the prison and wanted her to become queen. Now outside, Keiro gets the nice clothes he always wanted as well as the food but he realizes he is in the middle of a battle. They capture the Queen’s son and she holds fire. Some of the Queen’s soldiers get in by following a Steel Wolf (the warden’s protectors) and there is a little standoff but Finn’s team manages to pull through. The realm is fake, as previously mentioned, and all of its power is lost revealing its ugliness. It was all an illusion. Jared puts on the glove and we realize that he was Sapphique. He decides to keep the portal open so there is a constant connection between the Realm and Incarceron. Attia steps out of the prison for the first time and she is awed by the stars. Finn makes a pledge to put an end to protocol and to fix up both the prison and the realm. Sapphique (Jared) decides to do most of the tidying up for the prison. The story has several mini climaxes. The mini climaxes are surprising questions or conflicts that are raised and then another character’s viewpoint is seen. Finn was the main character and the bad guy was the prison. The conflict from the last book; “Incarceron” is solved when everybody gets a chance to escape.