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

She knew who he was. The look conveyed it—the analysis. She knew he’d once held that title, and now was something else. So the name, the age … the questions were bullshit. Or some bureaucratic nonsense. He doubted it was the latter.

A woman from Fenharrow, meeting with two members from Adarlan’s court …

It didn’t take much to read her. What she saw. Where that mark on her throat might have come from.

“If you don’t want to be here,” Chaol said roughly, “then send someone else.”

Nesryn whirled on him.

The healer only held his stare. “There is no one else to do this.” The unspoken words said the rest: They sent their best.

With that steady, self-assured posture, he didn’t doubt it. She angled her pen again. “Describe where the injury begins.”

A sharp knock on the sitting room door cut through the silence. He started, cursing himself for not having heard the approach.

But it was Princess Hasar, clad in green and gold and smirking like a cat. “Good morning, Lord Westfall. Captain Faliq.” Her braided hair swaying with each swaggering step, Hasar strolled over to the healer, who looked up at her with an expression Chaol dared call exasperation, and leaned down to kiss her on either cheek. “You’re not usually so grumpy, Yrene.”

There—a name.

“I forgot my kahve this morning.” The thick, spiced, bitter drink Chaol had choked down with his breakfast. An acquired taste, Nesryn had said when he’d asked about it later.

The princess took up a perch along the edge of the desk. “You didn’t come to dinner last night. Kashin was sulking about it.”

Yrene’s shoulders tightened. “I had to prepare.”

“Yrene Towers locking herself in the Torre to work? I might die of shock.”

From the princess’s tone, he filled in enough. The best healer in the Torre Cesme had become so thanks to that grueling work ethic.

Hasar looked him over. “Still in the chair?”

“Healing takes time,” Yrene said mildly to the princess. Not an ounce of subservience or respect to the tone. “We were just beginning.”

“So you agreed to do it, then?”

Yrene cut the princess a sharp glare. “We were assessing the lord’s needs.” She jerked her chin toward the doors. “Shall I find you when I’m done?”

Nesryn gave Chaol an impressed, wary glance. A healer dismissing a princess of the most powerful empire in the world.

Hasar leaned forward to ruffle Yrene’s gold-brown hair. “If you weren’t gods-blessed, I’d carve out your tongue myself.” The words were honeyed venom. Yrene only offered a faint, bemused smile before Hasar hopped off the desk and gave him a mocking incline of the head. “Don’t worry, Lord Westfall. Yrene has healed injuries similar and far worse than your own. She’ll have you back on your feet and able to do your master’s bidding again in no time.” With that lovely parting shot, which left Nesryn cold-eyed, the princess vanished.

They waited a good few moments to make sure they heard the outer door shut.

“Yrene Towers,” was all Chaol said.

“What of it.”

Gone was the faint amusement. Fine.

“The lack of feeling and movement begins at my hips.”

Yrene’s eyes shot right to them, dancing over him. “Are you capable of using your manhood?”

He tried not to flinch. Even Nesryn blinked at the frank question.

“Yes,” he said tightly, fighting the heat rising in his cheeks.

She looked between them, assessing. “Have you used it to completion?”

He clenched his jaw. “How is that relevant?” And how had she gleaned what was between them?

Yrene only wrote something down.

“What are you writing?” he demanded, cursing the damned chair for keeping him from storming to rip the paper out of her hands.

“I’m writing a giant no.”

Which she then underlined.

He growled, “I suppose you’ll ask about my bathroom habits now?”

“It was next on my list.”

“They are unchanged,” he bit out. “Unless you need Nesryn to confirm.”

Yrene merely turned to Nesryn, unruffled. “Have you seen him struggle with it?”

“Do not answer that,” he snarled at Nesryn.

Nesryn had the good wits to sink into a chair and remain quiet.

Yrene rose, setting down the pen, and came around the desk. The morning sunlight caught in her hair, bouncing off her head in a corona.

She knelt at his feet. “Shall you remove your boots or shall I?”

“I’ll do it.”

She sat back on her heels and watched him move. Another test. To discern how mobile and agile he was. The weight of his legs, having to constantly adjust their position … Chaol gritted his teeth as he gripped his knee, lifting his foot off the wooden slat, and bent to remove his boot in a few sharp tugs. When he finished with the other one, he asked, “Pants, too?”

Chaol knew he should be kind, should beseech her to help him, and yet—

“After a drink or two, I think,” Yrene only said. Then looked over her shoulder to a bemused Nesryn. “Sorry,” she added—and sounded only slightly less sharp-tongued.

“Why are you apologizing to her?”