Kingdom of Ash (Throne of Glass, #7)

by Sarah J. Maas

In memory of the stillborn witchling who had been thrown by Manon’s grandmother into the fire before Asterin had a chance to hold her.

He kept his feet beneath him, as Rhoe had taught him. As Quinn had taught him, and Cal Lochan. As all his mentors and the warriors he’d admired above all others had taught him. For this moment, when he would be called to defend Orynth’s very walls.

It was for them he swung his sword, for them he took blow after blow.

His tools, the numbing pain, halted. Then his lips brushed the top of her spine, right above the start of the new tattoo. The same tattoo he’d had Gavriel and Fenrys inking on his own back these past few days, whenever they stopped for the night. “I’m glad to be here, too, Fireheart.”

Aelin awoke to dim braziers and the pine-and-snow scent of her mate wrapped around her.

Tired. She was so, so tired. Aelin stared into the dark for long hours and did not sleep again.

Rowan stayed by her side, always remaining on her left—as if he might be a shield between her and Endovier—while

He’d finished the tattoos the night before. Had taken a small hand mirror to show her what he’d done. The tattoo he’d made for them. She’d taken one look at the spread wings—a hawk’s wings—across her back and kissed him.

And she said to Abraxos, touching his spine, “I love you.”

Her Second, her cousin, her friend, smiled, eyes bright as stars. “Live, Manon.” Manon blinked. Asterin smiled wider, kissed Manon’s brow, and whispered again, “Live.” Manon didn’t see the blow coming. The punch to her gut, so hard and precise that it knocked the wind from her. Sent her to her knees. She was struggling to get a breath down, to get up, when Asterin reached Narene and mounted the blue mare, gathering the reins. “Bring our people home, Manon.”

Manon began screaming then.

Screaming, endless and wordless, as that thing in her chest, as her heart, shattered.

Light that flowed from their souls, their fierce hearts as they gave themselves over to that power. Became incandescent with it. Asterin tackled the Blackbeak Matron to the ground, Manon’s grandmother little more than a shadow against the brightness. Then little more than a scrap of hate and memory as Asterin exploded. As she and the Thirteen Yielded completely, and blew themselves and the witch tower to smithereens.

A few bore flowers, but many brought small stones to lay on the site.

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

For hours, Manon knelt on the battlefield, Abraxos at her side. As if she might stay with them, her Thirteen, for a little while longer. 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.

But then he’d landed at the crossroads. And then he’d seen them. Seen her. Aelin, galloping for him.

Maeve had believed Aelin had headed to Terrasen. And here she was, with the khagan’s army.

Dorian only winked, a ghost of the man he’d been before. “All bad things, I hope.”

Taking after our beloved Aelin?

And Chaol realized that it was indeed a queen standing before them, not the assassin he’d dragged out of a salt mine a few miles down the road. Not even the woman he’d seen in Rifthold.

“Like hell it is,” Dorian said, sapphire eyes flashing. “The same blood, the same debt, flows in my veins.”

Rowan was shaking, whether with restraint or in dread, Chaol couldn’t tell.

He nodded toward Aelin, silent and watchful while it took all of Rowan’s training not to hurl up his guts.

But it was Fenrys who asked Chaol, voice deadly soft, “You’d rather my queen die than your king?” Chaol stiffened. “I’d rather neither of my friends die. I’d rather none of this happen.”

“Why.” Rowan’s low question was out before he could halt it. Slowly, his mate turned toward him. “Because we’re not.” Sharp, icy words. She cut Dorian a look, and the King of Adarlan opened his mouth. “We’re not,” she snarled.

He walked to the edge of the trees, prepared to run if he began to vomit. Then Aelin said, “You’re last, Rowan.” “I vote no. Not now, not ever.”

Rowan just stared and stared at his mate. His reason for breathing. Elide asked softly, “What is your vote, Aelin?” Aelin tore her eyes from Rowan, and he felt the absence of that stare like a frozen wind as she said, “It doesn’t matter.”

Because the alternative is losing you.” The rage in his eyes fractured, right along with his voice. “I would go in your stead, if I could.” Her own heart cracked. “I know.” Rowan fell to his knees before her, putting his head in her lap as his arms wrapped around her waist. “I can’t bear it, Aelin. I can’t.” She threaded her fingers through his hair. “I wanted that thousand years with you,” she said softly. “I wanted to have children with you. I wanted to go into the Afterworld together.” Her tears landed in his hair. Rowan lifted his head. “Then fight for it. One more time. Fight for that future.” She gazed at him, at the life she saw in his face. All that he offered. All that she might have, too.

Aelin closed her eyes, and he couldn’t tell if it was from relief or regret. He laid a hand on her shoulder. He didn’t want to know what the argument had been like between her and Rowan to get her to agree, to accept this. For Aelin to have even said yes …

No, she had not ever really escaped at all, had she?

“No sweet farewells, Princess?” Rowan asked as she traced the mark with her foot. “They seem dramatic,” Aelin said. “Far too dramatic, even for me.” But Rowan halted her, the second symbol half-finished. Tipped back her chin. “Even when you’re … there,” he said, his pine-green eyes so bright under the moon. “I am with you.” He laid a hand on her heart. “Here. I am with you here.” She laid her own hand on his chest, and breathed his scent deep into her lungs, her heart. “As I am with you. Always.” Rowan kissed her. “I love you,” he

whispered onto her mouth. “Come back to me.”

But she took the Amulet of Orynth from him. “I thought you might be the one who wished to open it,” Dorian said quietly. Here in the place where she’d suffered and endured, here in the place where so many things had begun. Aelin weighed the ancient amulet in her palms, ran her thumbs along the golden seam of its edges. For a heartbeat, she was again in that cozy room in a riverside estate, her mother beside her, bequeathing the amulet into her care. Aelin traced her fingers over the Wyrdmarks on the back. The runes that spelled out her hateful fate: Nameless is my price. Written here, all this time, for so many centuries. A warning from Brannon,

Aelin turned the amulet back over, brushing her fingers along the immortal stag on its front. Borrowed time. It had all been borrowed time.

She’d take those words, that face with her, too. Even when the Lock demanded everything, that would remain. Would always remain.

My name is Aelin Ashryver Galathynius, and I will not be afraid. I will not be afraid. I will not be afraid.

Something in Rowan’s chest, intricate and essential, began to strain.

Aelin began screaming. Screaming and screaming.

Aelin was sobbing now—sobbing through her teeth.

“No,” Dorian rasped, scrambling toward her, trying to grip her hand again, to join her.

“No, no!” Dorian shouted, and Rowan knew then.

The king sobbed, unbuckling the ancient sword from his side and hurling it away. Damaris thunked hollowly as it hit the earth.

Over—she had said so many times that she wished it to be over. He should have listened. Chaol gripped Dorian, and the young lord said to Rowan, softly and sadly, “I’m sorry.” She had lied. His Fireheart had lied. And he would now watch her die.

Payment for ten years of selfishness, ten years away from Terrasen, ten years of running.

He would never forgive her. Her mate.

She would never have been able to do it, to come here, had he been begging her not to, had he been weeping as she had wanted to weep when she had kissed him one last time.

“I was given a message for you,” he said softly. His edges blurred, as the last of his power drained away. But he still smiled. Still looked at peace. “Your parents are … They are so very proud of you. They asked me to tell you that they love you so very much.” He was nearly invisible now, his words little more than a whisper of wind. “And that the debt has been paid enough, Fireheart.”

A lifeline into eternity. One last deceit. Another voice whispered past then, a fragment of memory, spoken on a rooftop in Rifthold. What if we go on, only to more pain and despair? Then it is not the end.

The debt has already been paid enough.

She would live. She would live, and they could all go to hell.