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

Yrene looked to Chaol, but he was sizing up the room, the stairs and exits.

The dark power twining around Duva’s fingers.

“So,” Duva said, taking one step down the dais. “Let’s begin.”

She made it a second step before it happened.

Chaol did not move. But Hafiza did.

She hurled her body, chair and all, the entire weight of that golden throne, down the stairs.

Right atop Duva.

Yrene screamed, running for them, Chaol launching into motion.

Hafiza and the baby, the baby and Hafiza—

Crone and princess tumbled down those steep stairs, wood snapping. Wood, not metal. The throne had been painted, and now it shattered as they rolled, Duva shrieking and Hafiza so silent, even as her gag came free—

They hit the stone floor with a crack that Yrene felt in her heart.

Chaol was instantly there, not going for Duva, sprawled on the ground, but for Hafiza, limp and unmoving. He hauled her back, splinters and ropes clinging to her, her mouth gaping—

Eyes cracking open—

Yrene sobbed, grabbing Hafiza by the other arm and helping him heave her out of the way, toward a towering statue of a Fae soldier.

Just as Duva rose up on her elbows, hair loose around her face, and seethed, “You rotting pile of shit—”

Chaol shot upright, sword angled before them while Yrene fumbled for her magic to heal the ancient, frail body.

The old woman managed to raise her arm long enough to grip Yrene’s wrist. Go, she seemed to say.

Duva climbed to her feet, long splinters embedded in her neck, blood dripping from her mouth. Black blood.

Chaol gave Yrene all of one look over his shoulder. Run.

And take Hafiza with her.

Yrene opened her mouth to tell him no, but he had already faced ahead again. Toward the princess who advanced one step.

Her dress was torn, revealing the firm, round belly beneath. A fall like that with a baby—

A baby.

Yrene gripped Hafiza under her thin shoulders, hauling her slight weight across the floor.

Chaol wouldn’t kill her. Duva.

Yrene sobbed through her clenched teeth as she dragged Hafiza back and back through that gold-lined avenue, the statues looking on unfeelingly.

He wouldn’t so much as harm Duva, not with that baby in her womb.

Yrene’s chest caved in at the low hum of power that filled the room.

He would not fight back. He would buy Yrene time.

To get Hafiza out and to run.

Duva purred, “This will likely hurt a great deal.”

Yrene whirled back just as shadows lashed from the princess, aimed right at Chaol.

He rolled to the side, the blast going wide and striking the statue he ducked behind.

“Such theatrics,” Duva tutted, and Yrene hurried, sliding Hafiza toward those distant stairs. Leaving him—leaving him behind.

But movement caught her eye, and then—

A statue crashed into the princess’s path.

Duva blasted it aside with her power. Gold showered the room in chunks that thundered atop the sarcophagi, the cracking echoing through the chamber.

“You will make this boring,” Duva tsked, and hurled a handful of darkness toward where he’d been. Yrene stumbled as the room shuddered, but she kept upright.

Another blow.

Another.

Duva hissed, rounding the sarcophagus where she’d guessed Chaol was hiding. She fired her power blindly.

Chaol appeared, shield in hand.

Not a shield—an ancient mirror.

The power bounced off the metal, shattering glass, even as it rebounded into the princess.

Yrene saw the blood first. On both of them.

Then saw the dread in his face as Duva was blasted back, slamming into a stone sarcophagus so hard her bones cracked.

Duva hit the ground and did not move.

Yrene waited one breath. Two.

She lowered Hafiza to the floor and ran. Ran right for Chaol, where he panted, gaping at the woman’s fallen body.

“What have I done,” he breathed, refusing to take his eyes off the too-still princess. Blood slid down his face from the shards of that mirror, but nothing major—nothing lethal.

Duva, however …

Yrene shoved past him, past his sword, to the princess on the ground. If she was down, she could potentially get the Valg demon out, potentially try to fix her body—

She turned Duva over.

And found the princess smiling at her.

It happened so fast. Too fast.

Duva lunged for her face, her throat, black bands of power leaping from her palms.

Then Yrene was not there. Then she was on the stones, thrown to the side as Chaol hurled himself between her and the princess.

No shield, no weapon.

Only his back, utterly exposed, as he shoved Yrene away and took the full brunt of the Valg attack.





63

Agony roared through his spine. Down his legs. His arms. Into his very fingertips.

Worse than it had been in the glass castle.

Worse than in those healing sessions.

But all he could see, all he’d seen, was Yrene, that power spearing for her heart—

Chaol hit the ground, and Yrene’s scream shattered through the pain.

Get up get up get up

“Such a pity all that hard work amounted to nothing,” Duva trilled, and pointed a finger at his spine. “Your poor, poor back.”

That dark power slammed into his spine again.

Something cracked.