Queen of Shadows by Sarah J. Maas
The words slammed into her like a barrage of arrows, but she shut out the sorrow for a man she had never taken the time to consider as anything but one of Arobynn’s dogs. She wouldn’t put it past Arobynn to use Lysandra, to make up this entire story to get her to trust the woman. The Lysandra she’d known would have been more than happy to do it. And Aelin could have played along just to learn where it would take her, what Arobynn was up to and whether he’d trip up enough to reveal his hand, but …
What he asked Farran to do to Sam.
She’d always assumed Farran had just tortured Sam in the way he so loved to hurt and break people. But for Arobynn to request specific things be done to Sam … It was good she didn’t have her magic. Good it was stifled.
Because she might have erupted into flames and burned and burned for days, cocooned in her fire.
“So you came here,” Aelin said, as Lysandra discreetly wiped at her eyes with a handkerchief, “to warn me that Arobynn might be manipulating me, because you finally realized what a monster Arobynn truly is after he killed your lover?”
“I promised Wesley I would personally give you that letter—”
“Well, you gave it to me, so get out.”
Light footsteps sounded, and Evangeline burst from the kitchen, rushing to her mistress with a quiet, nimble grace. With surprising tenderness, Lysandra slipped a reassuring arm around Evangeline as she rose to her feet. “I understand, Celaena, I do. But I am begging you: read that letter. For him.”
Aelin bared her teeth. “Get out.”
Lysandra walked to the door, keeping herself and Evangeline a healthy distance from Aelin. She paused in the doorway. “Sam was my friend, too. He and Wesley were my only friends. And Arobynn took them both away.”
Aelin just raised her brows.
Lysandra didn’t bother with a good-bye as she vanished down the stairs.
But Evangeline lingered on the threshold, glancing between her disappearing mistress and Aelin, her lovely hair glimmering like liquid copper.
Then the girl gestured to her scarred face and said, “She did this to me.”
It was an effort to keep seated, to keep from leaping down the stairs to slit Lysandra’s throat.
But Evangeline went on, “I cried when my mother sold me to Clarisse. Cried and cried. And I think Lysandra had annoyed the mistress that day, because they gave me to her as an acolyte, even though she was weeks away from paying her debts. That night, I was supposed to begin training, and I cried so hard I made myself sick. But Lysandra—she cleaned me up. She told me that there was a way out, but it would hurt, and I would not be the same. I couldn’t run, because she had tried running a few times when she was my age, and they had found her and beat her where no one could see.”
She had never known—never wondered. All those times she had sneered at and mocked Lysandra while they’d grown up …
Evangeline continued, “I said I’d do anything to get out of what the other girls had told me about. So she told me to trust her—and then gave me these. She started shouting loud enough for the others to come running. They thought she cut me out of anger, and said she’d done it to keep me from being a threat. And she let them believe it. Clarisse was so mad that she beat Lysandra in the courtyard, but Lysandra didn’t cry—not once. And when the healer said my face couldn’t be fixed, Clarisse made Lysandra buy me for the amount I would have cost if I had been a full courtesan, like her.”
Aelin had no words.
Evangeline said, “That’s why she’s still working for Clarisse, why she’s still not free and won’t be for a while. I thought you should know.”
Aelin wanted to tell herself not to trust the girl, that this could be part of Lysandra and Arobynn’s plan, but … but there was a voice in her head, in her bones, that whispered to her, over and over and over, each time clearer and louder:
Nehemia would have done the same.
Evangeline curtsied and went down the stairs, leaving Aelin staring at the worn envelope.
If she herself could change so much in two years, perhaps so could Lysandra.
And for a moment, she wondered how another young woman’s life would have been different if she had stopped to talk to her—really talk to Kaltain Rompier, instead of dismissing her as a vapid courtier. What would have happened if Nehemia had tried to see past Kaltain’s mask, too.
Evangeline was climbing into the rain-gleaming carriage beside Lysandra when Aelin appeared at the warehouse door and said, “Wait.”
CHAPTER
10
Aedion’s vision was swimming, his every breath gloriously difficult.
Soon. He could feel Death squatting in the corner of his cell, counting down the last of his breaths, a lion waiting to pounce. Every so often, Aedion would smile toward those gathered shadows.
The infection had spread, and with two days until the spectacle at which he was to be executed, his death was coming none too soon. The guards assumed he was sleeping to pass the time.
Aedion was waiting for his food, watching the small barred window in the top of the cell door for any sign of the guards’ arrival. But he was fairly sure he was hallucinating when the door opened and the Crown Prince strolled in.
There were no guards behind him, no sign of any escort as the prince stared from the doorway.
The prince’s unmoving face told him immediately what he needed to know: this was not a rescue attempt. And the black stone collar around the prince’s throat told him everything else: things had not gone well the day Sorscha had been murdered.
He managed to grin. “Good to see you, princeling.”
The prince ran an eye over Aedion’s dirty hair, the beard that had grown during the past few weeks, and then over to the pile of vomit in the corner from when he hadn’t been able to make it to the bucket an hour ago.
Aedion drawled as best he could, “The least you could do is take me to dinner before looking at me like that.”
The prince’s sapphire eyes flicked to his, and Aedion blinked past the haze covering his vision. What studied him was cold, predatory, and not quite human.
Quietly, Aedion said, “Dorian.”
The thing that was now the prince smiled a little. The captain had said those rings of Wyrdstone enslaved the mind—the soul. He’d seen the collar waiting beside the king’s throne, and had wondered if it was the same. Worse.
“Tell me what happened in the throne room, Dorian,” Aedion wheezed, his head pounding.
The prince blinked slowly. “Nothing happened.”
“Why are you here, Dorian?” Aedion had never addressed the prince by his given name, but using it, reminding him, somehow seemed important. Even if it only provoked the prince into killing him.
“I came to look at the infamous general before they execute you like an animal.”
No chance of being killed today, then.
“The same way they executed your Sorscha?”
Though the prince didn’t move, Aedion could have sworn he recoiled, as if someone yanked on a leash, as if there was still someone in need of leashing.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” the thing inside the prince said. But its nostrils flared.
“Sorscha,” Aedion breathed, his lungs aching. “Sorscha—your woman, the healer. I was standing beside you when they cut off her head. I heard you screaming as you dove for her body.” The thing went a bit rigid, and Aedion pressed, “Where did they bury her, Dorian? What did they do with her body, the body of the woman you loved?”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” it said again.
“Sorscha,” Aedion panted, his breathing uneven. “Her name was Sorscha, and she loved you—and they killed her. The man who put that collar around your neck killed her.”
The thing was quiet. Then it tilted its head. The smile it gave him was horrifying in its beauty. “I shall enjoy watching you die, General.”
Aedion coughed out a laugh. The prince—the thing he’d become—tur
No.
The thing must have smelled it on him.
Aedion could do nothing as a healer was summoned—an older woman named Amithy—and he was held down, too weak to fight back as she attended his wounds. She shoved a tonic down his throat that made him choke; his wound was washed and bound, and his shackles were shortened until he couldn’t move his hands enough to rip out the stitching. The tonics kept coming, every hour, no matter how hard he bit, no matter how forcefully he tried to clamp his mouth shut.
So they saved him, and Aedion cursed and swore at Death for failing him, even as he silently prayed to Mala Light-Bringer to keep Aelin away from the party, away from the prince, and away from the king and his Wyrdstone collars.
The thing inside him left the dungeons and headed into the glass castle, steering his body like a ship. And now it forced him to be still as they stood before the man he often saw in those moments that pierced through the darkness.
The man was seated on a glass throne, smiling faintly as he said, “Bow.”
The thing inside him yanked hard on their bond, lightning spearing his muscles, ordering them to obey. It was how he’d been forced to descend into those dungeons, where that golden-haired warrior had said her name—said her name so many times that he began screaming, even if he made no sound. He was still screaming as his muscles betrayed him yet again, bringing him to his knees, the tendons on his neck lashing with pain, forcing him to bow his head.
“Still resisting?” the man said, glancing at the dark ring on his finger as though it possessed the answer already. “I can feel both of you in there. Interesting.”
Yes—that thing in the darkness was growing stronger, now able to reach through the invisible wall between them and puppet him, speak through him. But not entirely, not for long amounts of time. He patched up the holes as best he could, but it kept breaking through.
Demon. A demon prince.
And he saw that moment—over and over and over—when the woman he’d loved had lost her head. Hearing her name on the general’s raspy tongue had made him start whaling on the other wall in his mind, the barrier that kept him locked in the dark. But the darkness in his mind was a sealed tomb.
The man on the throne said, “Report.”
The command shuddered through him, and he spit out the details of his encounter, every word and action. And the thing—the demon—delighted in his horror at it.
“Clever of Aedion to try to quietly die on me,” the man said. “He must think his cousin has a good chance of arriving at your party, then, if he’s so desperate to rob us of our entertainment.”
He kept silent, as he had not been instructed to speak. The man looked him over, those black eyes full of delight. “I should have done this years ago. I don’t know why I wasted so much time waiting to see whether you’d have any power. Foolish of me.”
He tried to speak, tried to move, tried to do anything with that mortal body of his. But the demon gripped his mind like a fist, and the muscles of his face slid into a smile as he said, “It is my pleasure to serve, Majesty.”
CHAPTER
11
The Shadow Market had operated along the banks of the Avery for as long as Rifthold had existed. Maybe longer. Legend claimed it had been built on the bones of the god of truth so that it would keep the vendors and would-be thieves honest. Chaol supposed it was ironic, considering there was no god of truth. As far as he knew. Contraband, illicit substances, spices, clothes, flesh: the market catered to any and all clientele, if they were brave or foolish or desperate enough to venture inside.
When he’d first come here weeks ago, Chaol had been all of those things as he climbed down the half-rotted wooden stairs from a crumbling section of the docks into the embankment itself, where alcoves and tunnels and shops were tunneled into the riverbank.
Cloaked, armed figures patrolled the long, broad quay that served as the only path to the market. During rainy periods, the Avery would often rise high enough to flood the quay, and sometimes unlucky merchants and shoppers drowned inside the labyrinth of the Shadow Market. During drier months, you never knew what or who you might find selling their wares or meandering through the dirty, damp tunnels.
The market was packed tonight, even after a day of rain. A small relief. And another small relief as thunder reverberated through the subterranean warren, setting everyone murmuring. The vendors and lowlifes would be too busy preparing for the storm to take notice of Chaol and Nesryn as they strode down one of the main passageways.
The thunder rattled the hanging lanterns of colored glass—strangely beautiful, as if someone had once been determined to give this place some loveliness—that served as the main lights in the brown caverns, casting plenty of those shadows the market was so notorious for. Shadows for dark dealings, shadows to slip a knife between the ribs or to spirit someone away.
Or for conspirators to meet.
No one had bothered them as they’d slipped through one of the rough holes that served as an entrance to the Shadow Market’s tunnels. They connected to the sewers somewhere—and he would bet that the more established vendors possessed their own secret exits beneath their stalls or shops. Vendor after vendor had set up stalls of wood or stone, with some wares displayed on tables or crates or in baskets, but most valuable goods hidden. A spice dealer offered everything from saffron to cinnamon—but even the most fragrant spices couldn’t conceal the cloyingly sweet stench of the opium stashed beneath his displays.
Once, long ago, Chaol might have cared about the illegal substances, about the vendors selling whatever they pleased. He might have bothered to try to shut this place down.
Now, they were nothing but resources. As a city guard, Nesryn probably felt the same way. Even if, just by being in here, she was jeopardizing her own safety. This was a neutral zone—but its denizens didn’t take kindly to authority.
He didn’t blame them. The Shadow Market had been one of the first places the King of Adarlan had purged after magic vanished, seeking out vendors who claimed to have banned books or still-working charms and potions, as well as magic-wielders desperate for a cure or a glimmer of magic. The punishments hadn’t been pretty.
Chaol almost heaved a sigh of relief when he spotted the two cloaked figures with a spread of knives for sale at a makeshift stand tucked into a dark corner. Exactly where they’d planned, and they’d done a hell of a job making it look authentic.
Nesryn slowed her steps, pausing at various vendors, no more than a bored shopper killing time until the rain ceased. Chaol kept close to her, his weapons and prowling gait enough to deter any foolish pickpockets from trying their luck. The punch he’d taken to his ribs earlier that night made maintaining his crawling pace and scowl all the easier.
He and a few others had interrupted a Valg commander in the midst of dragging a young man into the tunnels. And Chaol had been so damn distracted by Dorian, by what Aelin had said and done, that he’d been sloppy. So he’d earned that blow to the ribs, and the painful reminder of it each time he drew breath. No distractions; no slip-ups. Not when there was so much to do.
At last, Chaol and Nesryn paused by the little stall, staring down at the dozen knives and short swords displayed across the threadbare blanket.
“This place is even more depraved than the rumors suggested,” Brullo said from the shadows of his hood. “I feel like I should cover poor Ress’s eyes in half these chambers.”
Ress chuckled. “I’m nineteen, old man. Nothing here surprises me.” Ress glanced at Nesryn, who was fingering one of the curved blades. “Apologies, Lady—”
“I’m twenty-two,” she said flatly. “And I think we city guards see a great deal more than you palace princesses.”
What Chaol could see of Ress’s face flushed. He could have sworn even
“Any news?” he managed to say to Brullo, who was watching him too closely, as if his old mentor could see the agony ripping through him.
“We got the layout of the party this morning,” Brullo said tightly. Chaol picked up a blade as Brullo reached into the pocket of his cloak. He made a good show of examining the dagger, then holding up a few fingers as if haggling for it. Brullo went on, “The new Captain of the Guard spread us all out—none of us in the Great Hall itself.” The Weapons Master held up his own fingers, leaning forward, and Chaol shrugged, reaching into his cloak for the coins.
“You think he suspects anything?” Chaol said, handing over the coins. Nesryn closed in, blocking any outside view as Chaol’s hand met Brullo’s and coppers crunched against paper. The small, folded maps were in Chaol’s pocket before anyone noticed.
“No,” Ress answered. “The bastard just wants to demean us. He probably thinks some of us are loyal to you, but we’d be dead if he suspected any of us in particular.”
“Be careful,” Chaol said.
He sensed Nesryn tensing a heartbeat before another female voice drawled, “Three coppers for a Xandrian blade. If I’d known there was a sale happening, I would have brought more money.”
Every muscle in Chaol’s body locked up as he discovered Aelin now standing at Nesryn’s side. Of course. Of course she’d tracked them here.