Kingdom of Ash (Throne of Glass, #7)

by Sarah J. Maas

And tell him thank you—for walking that dark path with me back to the light. It had been his honor. From the very beginning, it had been his honor, the greatest of his immortal life. An immortal life they would share together—somehow. He’d allow no other alternative. Rowan silently swore it to the stars. He could have sworn the Lord of the North flickered in response.

It is the strength of this that matters. No matter where you are, no matter how far, this will lead you home.

You do not yield. Then she was gone, like dew under the morning sun. But the words lingered. Blossomed within Aelin, bright as a kindled ember. You do not yield.

They’d walked this dark path together back to the light. He would not let the road end here.

“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.”

I missed you. Lorcan allowed himself a rare smile.

“Be the bridge, be the light. When iron melts, when flowers spring from fields of blood—let the land be witness, and return home.”

She passed through a world where a great city had been built along the curve of a river, the buildings impossibly tall and glimmering with lights.

She passed through a world of snowcapped mountains under shining stars. Passed over one of those mountains, where a winged male stood beside a heavily pregnant female, gazing at those very stars. Fae.

Her name was Aelin Ashryver Whitethorn Galathynius. And she would not be afraid.

“I already have everything I need.”

And smiling through her tears, laughing in joy and sorrow, Manon laid that precious flower from the Wastes upon the ground. In thanks and in love. So they would know, so Asterin would know, in the realm where she and her hunter and child walked hand in hand, that they had made it. That they were going home.

Aelin wept then. Wept in joy that lit her heart, brighter than any magic could ever be. For across every mountain, spread beneath the green canopy of Oakwald, carpeting the entire Plain of Theralis, the kingsflame was blooming.