Kingdom of Ash (Throne of Glass, #7)

by Sarah J. Maas

She didn’t tell the Healer on High that she wasn’t entirely sure how much longer she’d be a help—not yet. Hadn’t whispered a word of that doubt to anyone, even Chaol. Yrene’s hand drifted across her abdomen and lingered.

“Nox Owen.” The messenger bowed at the waist. “From Perranth.”

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.

But the words lingered. Blossomed within Aelin, bright as a kindled ember. You do not yield.

“I was her great-grandmother.” Even the whipping wind quieted. “As I am yours.”

“How do you want to play this?” Dorian murmured. “Do you want me to keep quiet, or be at your side?” “Asterin is my Second.” “And what am I, then?” The smooth question ran a hand down her spine, as if he’d caressed her with those invisible hands of his. “You are the King of Adarlan.” “Shall I be a part of the discussions, then?” “If you feel like it.”

Dorian’s magic balked. The severed head hit the ground near him and rolled. A room flashed, the red marble stained with blood, the thud of a head on stone the only sound beyond his screaming. I was not supposed to love you.

Sorscha : (

All would bleed; too many would die.

“A young witch was chosen for him especially. But he did not love her—not with your mother as his true mate, the song of his soul. Tristan made it work nonetheless. Rhiannon was the result of that.”

“You still hate him.”

“Am I not supposed to?”

“You told me he was human. Deep down, he’d remained human, and tried to protect you as best he could. Yet you hate him.” “You’ll forgive me if I find his methods of protecting me to be unpalatable.” “But ...

“It makes no difference.” “Doesn’t it?” Manon frowned. “Most can barely withstand a few months of Valg infestation. You barely withstood it.” He tried not to flinch at ...

“If you’re trying to cast my father as some sort of noble hero, you’re...

“I realized today that the assassin I came to call a friend is actually the queen I believed dead. I think the gods are pointing me in a certain direction, don’t you?”

he had begged Mala to protect Aelin from Maeve when they entered Doranelle, to give her strength and guidance, and to let her walk out alive. Then, he had begged Mala to let him remain with Aelin, the woman he loved. The goddess had been little more than a sunbeam in the rising dawn, and yet he had felt her smile at him.

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

The rage in Rowan’s eyes could devour the world. And that rage was about to extract the sort of vengeance only a mated male could command.

Aside from a bruise along her ribs, there was nothing. Not a mark. Not a callus. Not a single scar. The ones Elide had marked in those days before Aelin had been taken were gone. As if someone had wiped them away.

They had taken her scars. Maeve had taken them all away.

The almost-necklace of them from Baba Yellowlegs: gone. The shackle marks from Endovier: gone. The scar where she’d been forced by Arobynn Hamel to break her own arm: gone. And on her palms …

The scars across her palms, one from the moment they had become carranam, the other from her oath to Nehemia, had disappeared entirely.

his head back on the moss and closed his eyes. Aelin curled on her side next to him, flames encompassing them both. Rowan couldn’t move. None of them moved. Aelin mouthed a short, curt word. Fenrys did not respond. She spoke again, that queen’s face unfaltering. Live. She’d use the blood oath to force him to remain on this side of life.

Aelin spoke a third time, teeth flashing as she gave Fenrys her first order. Live. Rowan didn’t breathe as they waited. Long minutes passed. Then Fenrys’s eyes cracked open.

someone with my manner of magic. To even

Who do you wish to be? “Someone worthy of my friends,” he said into the quiet night. “A king worthy of his kingdom.”

Then she asked softly, “How long?” It took the entirety of his three centuries of training to keep the devastation, the agony for her, from his face. “Two months, three days, and seven hours.” Her mouth tightened, either at the length of time, or the fact that he’d counted every single one of those hours apart.

She took his hand, and he tried not to shudder in relief, tried not to fall to his knees as she slid the ruby ring onto his finger. It fit him perfectly, the ring no doubt forged for the king lying in this barrow. Silently, Rowan grasped her own hand and eased on the emerald ring. “To whatever end,” he whispered. Silver lined her eyes. “To whatever end.” A reminder—and a vow, more sacred than the wedding oaths they’d sworn on that ship.

she had gotten out of the boat to find them. The rings. Raiding the trove had been an afterthought. But if she was to have no scars on her, no reminder of where she’d been and who she was and what she’d promised, then she’d needed this one scrap of proof.

“We’ll face it together,” he swore again. “And if the cost of it truly is you, then we’ll pay it together. As one soul in two bodies.”

“The stygian spiders, the kharankui, answer to their Valg queen. The only Valg queen. To Maeve.”

And so Nesryn did as well. Of how Maeve had somehow found a way into this world, fleeing or bored with her husband, Orcus. Erawan’s elder brother. Of how Erawan, Orcus, and Mantyx had torn apart worlds to find her, Orcus’s missing wife, and only halted here because the Fae had risen to challenge them. Fae led by Maeve, whom the Valg kings did not know or recognize, in the form she had taken.

“But she fears the healers.” A nod toward Yrene. “She keeps that owl, you said—an enslaved Fae healer—should the Valg ever discover her.”

“It is also why she fears fire,” Sartaq said, jerking his chin to Aelin. “Why she fears you so.”

Then Hasar hissed, “We’ll make the bitch pay for that, too, won’t we?” Aelin met the princess’s dark stare. “Yes, we will.”

Perhaps the dark god had wanted him not to swear fealty to Maeve, but to kill her. To get close enough to do so.

the Little Folk. Had saved her life ten years ago, and saved their lives these past few weeks. They had known her, and left gifts for her. Tribute, she’d thought, to Brannon’s Heir. Not to … Gavriel murmured, “The Faerie Queen of the West.”

moved and the other left a dangerous gap exposed. She was not a broken-spirited Wing Leader unsure of her place in the world. She was not ashamed of the truth before her. She was not afraid.

“Rhiannon Crochan held the gates for three days and three nights, and she did not kneel before you, even at the end.” A slash of a smile. “I think I shall do the same.”

The crown’s light danced over Manon’s face as she lifted it above her head and set it upon her unbound white hair.

the Thirteen touched two fingers to their brow in deference. In allegiance to the queen who stared down the two remaining High Witches. The Crochan Queen, crowned anew. The sacred fire leaped and danced, as if in joyous welcome.

Manon was glowing, as if the stars atop her head pulsed through her body. A wondrous and mighty beauty, like no other in the world. Like no one had ever been, or would be again. And slowly, as if savoring each step, Manon stalked toward her grandmother.

This death, though … It was not her death to claim. It did not belong to the parents whose spirits lingered at her side, who might have been there all along, leading her toward this. Who had not left her, even with death separating them. No, it did not belong to them, either. She looked behind her. Toward the Second waiting beside Dorian. Tears slid down Asterin’s face. Of pride—pride and relief.

Manon didn’t move as Glennis lifted the crown and set it again on Manon’s head. Then the ancient witch knelt in the snow. “What was stolen has been restored; what was lost has come home again. I hail thee, Manon Crochan, Queen of Witches.”

“Queen of Witches,” Crochan and Blackbeak declared as one voice. As one people.

Goldryn unfaltering, her shield an extension of her arm, Aelin glowed like the sun that now broke over the khagan’s army as she engaged each soldier that hurtled her way.

“To Lord Chaol! To the queen!” How far they both were from Rifthold. From the assassin and the captain.

Not helpless. Not contained. Never again. Death became a melody in her blood, every movement a dance as the tide of soldiers pouring from the tower slowed.

Death had been her curse and her gift and her friend for these long, long years. She was happy to greet it again under the golden morning sun.