Crown of Midnight (Throne of Glass #2) by Sarah J. Maas

She’d been alone for five and a half months now; alone, yet surrounded by thousands. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d seen the sky, or the grasslands of Eyllwe undulating in a cool breeze.

She would see them both again, though—the sky and the grasslands. She knew she would, because she’d stayed awake on nights she was supposed to have been sleeping, listening through the cracks in the floorboards as her father and his fellow rebels talked of ways to bring down Adarlan, and of Princess Nehemia, who was in the capital at that very moment, working for their freedom.

If she could just hold on, if she could just keep drawing breath, she might make it until Nehemia accomplished her goal. She would make it, and then bury her dead; and when the mourning months were over, she would find the nearest rebel group and join them. With every Adarlanian life she took, she would say the names of her dead again, so that they would hear her in the afterlife and know they were not forgotten.

She swung her pickax into the unforgiving wall of stone, her breath ragged in her parched throat. The overseer lounged against a nearby wall, sloshing water in his canteen, waiting for the moment when one of them would collapse, just so he could unfurl that whip of his.

She kept her head down, kept working, kept breathing.

She would make it.

She didn’t know how much time passed, but she felt the ripple go through the mines like a shudder in the earth. A ripple of stillness, followed by wails.

She felt it coming, swelling up toward her, closer and closer with each turned head and murmured words.

And then she heard it—the words that changed everything.

Princess Nehemia is dead. Assassinated by Adarlan.

The words were past her before she had time to swallow them.

There was a scrape of leather against rock. The overseer would tolerate the pause for only a few seconds longer before he started swinging.

Nehemia is dead.

She stared down at the pickax in her hands.

She turned, slowly, to look into the face of her overseer, the face of Adarlan. He cocked his wrist, pronged whip ready.

She felt her tears before she realized they were falling, sliding through six months’ worth of filth.

Enough. The word screamed through her, so loudly she began to shake.

Silently, she began to recite the names of her dead. And as the overseer raised his whip, she added her name to the end of that list and swung her ax into his gut.





Chapter 34


“Any changes in her behavior?”

“She got out of bed.”

“And?”

Standing in the sunlit hall of the upper levels of the glass castle, Ress’s usually jovial face was grim. “And now she’s sitting in a chair in front of the fire. It’s the same as yesterday: she got out of bed, sat in the chair all day, then got back into bed at sundown.”

“Is she still not speaking?”

Ress shook his head, keeping his voice low as a courtier passed by. “Philippa says she just sits there and stares at the fire. Won’t speak. Still barely touches her food.” Ress’s eyes grew warier as they took in the healing cuts that ran down Chaol’s cheek. Two had already scabbed and would fade, but there was a long, surprisingly deep one that was still tender. Chaol wondered whether it would scar. He’d deserve it if it did.

“I’m probably overstepping my bounds—”

“Then don’t say it,” Chaol growled. He knew exactly what Ress would say: the same thing Philippa said, and anyone who saw him and gave him that pitying glance. You should try talking to her.

He didn’t know how word had gotten out so quickly that she’d tried to kill him, but it seemed they all knew how deep the break between him and Celaena went. He’d thought the two of them had been discreet, and he knew Philippa wasn’t a gossip. But perhaps what he felt for her had been written all over him. And what she now felt for him … He resisted the urge to touch the cuts on his face.

“I still want the watch posted outside her door and windows,” he ordered Ress. He was on his way to another meeting; another shouting match about how they should deal with the fallout in Eyllwe over the princess’s death. “Don’t stop her if she leaves, but try to slow her down a bit.”

Long enough for word to get to him that she’d finally left her rooms. If anyone was going to intercept Celaena, if anyone would confront her about what happened to Nehemia, it would be him. Until then, he’d give her the space she needed, even if it killed him not to speak to her. She’d become entwined in his life—from the morning runs to the lunches to the kisses she stole from him when no one was looking—and now, without her, he felt hollow. But he still didn’t know how he’d ever look her in the eye.

You will always be my enemy.

She’d meant it.

Ress nodded. “Consider it done.”

The young guard saluted as Chaol headed for the meeting room. There would be other meetings today—lots of meetings, since the debate was still raging over how Adarlan should react to Nehemia’s death. And though he hated to admit it, he had other things to worry about than Celaena’s unending grief.

The king had summoned his southern lords and retainers to Rifthold.

Including Chaol’s father.



Dorian usually didn’t mind Chaol’s men. But he did mind being followed around, day and night, by guards who were on the lookout for any threat. Nehemia’s death had proved that the castle was not impregnable. His mother and Hollin were sequestered in her chambers, and many of the nobility had either left the city or were lying low, too.