Kingdom of Ash (Throne of Glass, #7)

by Sarah J. Maas

“I didn’t want to hurt you.” “Why would it ever hurt me to know the truth that was already in my heart? The truth I hoped for?”

“Even if I had my choice of any dream-realities, any perfect illusions, I would still choose you, too.”

A thread in a tapestry. That’s what it had felt like the night she’d left the gold for Yrene in Innish. Like pulling a thread in a tapestry, and seeing just how far and wide it went.

Gone was the witch who had slept and wished for death. Gone was the witch who had raged at the truth that had torn her to shreds. 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.

“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.”

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.”

“All of us who fight here today do so with someone standing invisible behind us.”

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

Dorian had no words, couldn’t find them. Not as Aelin turned to him, tears sliding down her face as she said, “One of us has to rule.”

“Your parents are … They are so very proud of you. They asked me to tell you that they love you so very much.”

“We’re a long way from Innish,” Yrene whispered. “But lost no longer,” Aelin whispered back, voice breaking as they embraced. The two women who had held the fate of their world between them. Who had saved it.

“To whatever end?” she breathed. Rowan followed her, as he had his entire life, long before they had ever met, before their souls had sparked into existence. “To whatever end, Fireheart.”