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“You fight,” he said simply. “We fight. Until we can’t anymore. We fight.”
“I meant every promise I made to you on that beach in Skull’s Bay.”
“I am happier than I can ever express, Yrene, to share this with you. Anything you need, I am yours to command.”
“I’m surprised you’re not groping yourself.” “Who says I haven’t already?”
And in her place, fighting as if she were the very wind, unfaltering against the Matrons, stood someone Dorian had not yet met. Stood a queen of two peoples.
The words hit like a blow. When she had lost hope that he was coming for her. Even the greatest healers in the world hadn’t been able to take that from her until then.
A crown for war, a crown to wear into battle. A crown to lead armies.
An unleashing and release. That’s what the battle had been for his mate.
“I love you,” he whispered in Elide’s ear. “I have loved you from the moment you picked up that axe to slay the ilken.” Her tears flowed past him in the wind. “And I will be with you …” His voice broke, but he made himself say the words, the truth in his heart. “I will be with you always.”
“You would marry me, all so we could aid Terrasen in this war?”
“I am afraid that you will go into Morath and return as something I do not know. Something I shall have to kill.”
Was almost selfish enough, greedy enough for her, that he nearly said yes. Yes, he would take her as his queen. So he might never have to say farewell to this, so that this magnificent, fierce witch might remain by his side for all his days.
As if this might last forever.
She awoke at dawn to a cold bed.
“None came ten years ago. But maybe someone will bother this time.”
Lorcan savored every feature as she grimaced at a crick in her neck. But her eyes settled on him. She went still as she found him staring at her, awake and utterly in awe of the woman who had ridden through hell to find him …
“I meant every word.”
“And I will until the day I fade into the Afterworld.”
Once, he might have scoffed. Declared that far bigger things mattered, in this war especially. And yet the hand grasping his … He’d never known anything more precious.
“Then it will be the scar I treasure most.”
Not in Terrasen, not yet, but in the sense she would always be home, if Rowan was with her.
“I told you that love was a weakness. It would be far easier if we all hated each other.”
but Rowan only smiled. Smiled with that fierce hope, that brutal determination that flared in her own heart, as she began to burn.
I am Queen of Doranelle no longer.”
“You are not a very skilled spy, King of Adarlan.”
A dangerous game. He was playing one hell of a dangerous game.
I was a slave once. You didn’t really think I’d allow myself to be so once again, did you?
The king I wish to be is the opposite of what you are. He gave Maeve a smile. And there is only one witch who will be my queen.
World-walker no longer, he said as his raw magic shifted her own. Changed its very essence. I suggest you invest in a good pair of shoes.
Dorian caught a swift wind, sailing hard and fast. And when he looked behind him, at the mountain and valley that reeked of death, at the place where so many terrible things had begun, Dorian smiled and brought Morath’s towers crashing down.
“I was defenseless when you let my leg remain unhealed,” she said, a steady sort of calm settling over her. “I was a child then, and I survived. You’re a grown man.” She let her lips curl in another smile. “We’ll see if you do, too.”
But just remember that this fear of yours? It means you have something worth fighting for—something you care so greatly for that losing it is the worst thing you can imagine.”
“I lost my family ten years ago. Tomorrow I will fight for the new one I’ve made.” Not only for Terrasen and its court and people. But also for the two ladies in this room.
“Because I am not in love with our other allies.”
Aedion knew that wyvern. Knew the white-haired rider atop it.
A crown of stars. For the last Crochan Queen.
“We came,” Manon said, loud enough that all on the city walls could hear, “to honor a promise made to Aelin Galathynius. To fight for what she promised us.” Darrow said quietly, “And what was that?” Manon smiled then. “A better world.”
The Crochans had returned at last.
“We are the Thirteen,” she said. “From now until the Darkness claims us.”
She’d gotten out. She’d survived. From Endovier—and Maeve.
“I love you.”
With their final stand.
Light. They all burned with it. Radiated it. Light that flowed from their souls, their fierce hearts as they gave themselves over to that power. Became incandescent with it.
All come to honor the Thirteen.
“Be the bridge, be the light. When iron
melts, when flowers spring from fields of blood—let the land be witness, and return home.”
And far away, across the snow-covered mountains, on a barren plain before the ruins of a once-great city, a flower began to bloom.
And as Chaol Westfall dismounted and ran the last few feet toward Dorian, the King of Adarlan wept.
“Why are you allowed to give up your life for this, and no one else?” Yrene challenged.
“What if they brought you together. To not pick one or the other, but to share the burden. With each other.”
