A Court of Thorns and Roses eBook Bundle (A Court of Thorns and Roses, #1-4)

by Sarah J. Maas

In the beginning, and in the end, there was Darkness and nothing more.

She turned her head so slowly it was like watching a puppet move. Her eyes met his. Death watched him.

Everyone tensed as he leaned in, head dipping, and kissed her. Nesta’s lips were chips of ice. But he let their coldness sting his own, and brushed his mouth against hers. Nipped at her bottom lip until he felt it drop a fraction. He slid his tongue into that opening, and found the inside of her mouth, usually so soft and warm, crusted with hoarfrost.

“The Bog of Oorid?” Feyre frowned at the spot in the Middle. “The Mask is in a bog?” “Oorid was once a sacred place,” Amren said. “Warriors were laid to rest in its night-black waters. But Oorid changed to a place of darkness—don’t give me that look, Rhysand, you know what I mean—a long time ago. Filled with such evil that no one will venture there, and only the worst of the faeries are drawn to it. They say the water there flows to Under the Mountain, and the creatures who live in the bog have long used its underground waterways to travel through the Middle, even into the mountains of the surrounding courts.”

“An ancient council of the High Lords. The Middle is a place where wild magic still dwells and thrives and feeds. We respect it as its own entity, and do not wish to provoke its wrath by revealing its mysteries.”

The Bog of Oorid was by far the worst. Its very essence spoke of death and decay.

the dead forest that spread below, the black water that had flooded it like an obsidian mirror.

“There are lightsingers: lovely, ethereal beings who will lure you, appearing as friendly faces when you are lost. Only when you’re in their arms will you see their true faces, and they aren’t fair at all. The horror of it is the last thing you see before they drown you in the bog. But they kill for sport, not food.”

“The Middle is full of primal magic. It has its own rules and laws.

Her blood was a cold song, the Mask a slithering echo to it, whispering of all she might do. Home, it seemed to sigh. Home. Nesta did not refuse it. Only embraced it, letting its magic—colder than her own and as old—flow into her veins.

Drifting in the water, the power of the Mask an icy song through her, Nesta summoned the dead. To do what her own body could not.

Cassian gazed where Azriel pointed at the deeper water. The surface was rippling. Golden light shone beneath.

Cold power rippled toward them, and as it hit, Cassian let it surge past him, around him, yielded himself to it. Because to stand against it would be to provoke the Mask’s wrath. To stand against it would be to stand against Death itself. Death herself.

Nesta turned from his stare. “I was about to go into the water when the kelpie appeared. It crawled onto the bank, spoke to me, and then dragged me in.” “It spoke to you?” Rhys asked. “Not in a language I knew.” Rhys’s mouth quirked to the side. “Can you show me?” Nesta frowned, as if unwilling to relive the memory, but nodded. Both of their gazes went vacant, and then Rhys pulled back. “That thing …” He surveyed Nesta with blatant shock that she had survived. Rhys turned to Amren. “Have a listen.” Their eyes became glazed, and none of them spoke as Rhys showed Amren. Even Amren’s face paled at whatever Rhys showed her, and then she was shaking her head, her black bob of hair swaying. “That is a dialect of our tongue that has not been spoken in fifteen thousand years.” “I could only pick up every other word,” Rhys said. Feyre arched a brow. “You speak the language of the ancient Fae?”

Never again. Never again would she be weak. Never again would she be at someone’s mercy. Never again would she fail. Never again, never again, never again.

Roslin had removed her hood, revealing a head of deep red hair and pale skin over delicate features. Her eyes were the color of caramel,

I am the rock against which the surf crashes.

Only when her footsteps vanished did Lucien say, “Mother spare you all.” Cassian was already walking to the wooden beam. A small disc of impact lay in its center, through the padding, all the way to the wood itself. It glowed. Cassian raised shaking fingers to it. To the burn mark, still sparking like an ember. The entire wood block was smoldering from within. He touched his palm to it. The wood was cold as ice. The block dissolved into a pile of cinders. Cassian stared in stunned silence, the smoking wood hissing in the rain. Lucien came up beside him. He only said again, voice solemn, “Mother spare you all.”

According to legend, the pegasuses had come from the island the Prison sat upon—had once fed in fair meadows that had long given way to moss and mist. Perhaps that was part of the decline: their homeland had vanished, and whatever had sustained them there was no longer.

“Put your hands on the headboard.”

He leaned to whisper in her ear, “Hold on tight.”

“Once, the High Fae were more elemental, more given to reading the stars and crafting masterpieces of art and jewelry and weaponry. Their gifts were rawer, more connected to nature, and they could imbue objects with that power.” Cassian instantly knew where this was headed. “Nesta put her power in those swords?” “No one has been able to create a magic sword in more than ten thousand years,” Amren said. “The last one Made, the great blade Gwydion, vanished around the time the last of the Trove went missing.” “This sword isn’t Gwydion,” Cassian said, well aware of the myths regarding the sword. It had belonged to a true Fae High King in Prythian, as there had been in Hybern. He had united the lands, its people—and for a while, with that sword, peace had reigned. Until he had been betrayed by his own queen and his fiercest general, and lost the sword to them, and the lands fell into darkness once more. Never again to see another High King—only High Lords, who ruled the territories that had once answered to the king. “Gwydion is gone,” Amren said, a shade sadly, “or has been gladly missing for millennia.” She nodded toward the great sword. “This is something new.” Azriel said, “Nesta created a new magic sword.” “Yes,” Amren said. “Only the Great Powers could do that—Gwydion was given its powers when the High Priestess Oleanna dipped it into the Cauldron during its crafting.” Cassian’s blood chilled, waves rippling over his skin. “One touch from Nesta’s magic while the blade wa...

“Nesta would create not a Dread Trove,” Amren said, unfazed by his snarling, “but a Trove of Nightmares.”

But inch by inch, the scabbard slid from the blade. And inch by inch, fresh steel glowed—truly glowed, like moonlight lay within the metal.

Iridescent sparks danced along the blade. Pure, crackling magic. The light danced and spurted as if an invisible hammer still struck it.

The dagger radiated cold, its blade gleaming so bright it looked like an icicle in the sun. The second sword seemed hot—angry and willful. But the great sword between the two others … The sparks faded, as if sucked into the blade itself.

“I’d thought today would be a good day to integrate the eight-pointed star, but if you’re already complaining, we can wait until next week.”