Tower of Dawn (Throne of Glass #6) by Sarah J. Maas

But that woman backing toward the door, trying to keep the tears from falling—tears from the hurt he’d caused her, tears of the anger he so rightfully deserved—

She reached the handle. Fumbled blindly for it.

And if she left, if he let her walk out …

Yrene pushed down on the handle.

And Chaol took a step toward her.





39

Chaol did not think.

He did not marvel at the sensation of being so high. At the weight of his body, the sway of it as he took that staggering step.

There was only Yrene, and her hand on the doorknob, and the tears in her furious, lovely eyes. The most beautiful he’d ever seen.

They widened as he took that step toward her.

As he lurched and swayed. But he managed another.

Yrene stumbled toward him, studying him from head to toe, a hand rising to cover her open mouth. She stopped a few feet away.

He hadn’t realized how much smaller she was. How delicate.

How—how the world looked and seemed and tasted this way.

“Don’t go,” he breathed. “I’m sorry.”

Yrene surveyed him again, from his feet to his face. Tears slipped down her cheeks as she tipped her head back.

“I’m sorry,” Chaol said again.

Still she did not speak. Tears only rolled and rolled.

“I meant none of it,” he rasped, his knees beginning to ache and buckle, his thighs trembling. “I was spoiling for a fight and—I meant none of it, Yrene. None of it. And I’m sorry.”

“A kernel of it must have been in you, though,” she whispered.

Chaol shook his head, the motion making him sway. He gripped the back of a stuffed armchair to stay upright. “I meant it about myself. What you have done, Yrene, what you are willing to still do … You did this—all this not for glory or ambition, but because you believe it is the right thing to do. Your bravery, your cleverness, your unfaltering will … I do not have words for it, Yrene.”

Her face did not change.

“Please, Yrene.”

He reached for her, risking a staggering, wobbling step.

She took a step back.

Chaol’s hands curled around empty air.

He clenched his jaw as he fought to remain upright, his body swaying and strange.

“Perhaps it makes you feel better about yourself to associate with meek, pathetic little people like me.”

“I do not …” He ground his teeth, and lurched another step toward her, needing to just touch her, to take her hand and squeeze it, to just show her he wasn’t like that. Didn’t think like that. He swayed left, throwing out a hand to balance him as he bit out, “You know I didn’t mean it.”

Yrene backed away, keeping out of reach. “Do I?”

He pushed forward another step. Another.

She dodged him each time.

“You know it, damn you,” he growled. He forced his legs into another jerking step.

Yrene sidled out of the way.

He blinked, pausing.

Reading the light in her eyes. The tone.

The witch was tricking him into walking. Coaxing him to move. To follow.

She paused, meeting his stare, not a trace of that hurt in them, as if to say, It took you long enough to figure it out. A little smile bloomed on her mouth.

He was standing. He was … walking.

Walking. And this woman before him …

Chaol made it another step.

Yrene retreated.

Not a hunt, but a dance.

He did not remove his eyes from hers as he staggered another step, and another, his body aching, trembling. But he gritted through it. Fought for each inch toward her. Each step that had her backing up to the wall.

Her breath came in shallow pants, those golden eyes so wide as he tracked her across the room. As she led him one foot after another.

Until her back hit the wall, the sconce on it rattling. As if she’d lost track of where she was.

Chaol was instantly upon her.

He braced one hand upon the wall, the wallpaper smooth beneath his palm as he put his weight upon it. To keep his body upright as his thighs shook, back straining.

They were smaller, secondary concerns.

His other hand …

Yrene’s eyes were still bright with those tears he’d caused.

One still clung to her cheek.

Chaol wiped it away. Another one he found down by her jaw.

He didn’t understand—how she could be so delicate, so small, when she had overturned his life entirely. Worked miracles with those hands and that soul, this woman who had crossed mountains and seas.

She was trembling. Not with fear, not as she looked up at him.

And it was only when Yrene settled her hand on his chest, not to push him away but to feel the raging, thunderous heartbeat beneath, that Chaol lowered his head and kissed her.



He was standing. He was walking.

And he was kissing her.

Yrene could barely breathe, barely keep inside her skin, as Chaol’s mouth settled over hers.

It was like waking up or being born or falling out of the sky. It was an answer and a song, and she could not think or feel fast enough.

Her hands curled into his shirt, fingers wrapping around fistfuls of fabric, tugging him closer.

His lips caressed hers in patient, unhurried movements, as if tracing the feel of her. And when his teeth grazed her lower lip … She opened her mouth to him.