Throne of Glass (Throne of Glass #1) by Sarah J. Maas

Chapter 24

Celaena lay on the bed, staring at a pool of moonlight on the floor. It filled in the dusty gaps between the stone tiles, and turned everything a bluish silver that made her feel as if she were frozen in an everlasting moment.

She didn’t fear the night, though she found little comfort in its dark hours. It was just the time when she slept, the time when she stalked and killed, the time when the stars emerged with glittering beauty and made her feel wonderfully small and insignificant.

Celaena frowned. It was only midnight, and even though they had another Test tomorrow, she couldn’t sleep. Her eyes were too heavy to read, she wouldn’t play the pianoforte for fear of another embarrassing encounter, and she most certainly wouldn’t amuse herself with fantasies of what the feast was like. She was still wearing her emerald-blue gown, too lazy to change.

She traced the moonlight to where it lapped upon the tapestry-covered wall. The tapestry was odd, old, and not very carefully preserved. Images of forest animals amongst drooping trees dotted the large expanse. A woman—the only human in the tapestry—stood near the floor.

She was life-size and remarkably beautiful. Though she had silver hair, her face was young, and her flowing white gown seemed to move in the moonlight; it—

Celaena sat up in bed. Did the tapestry sway slightly? She glanced at the window. It was firmly shut. The tapestry was barely blowing outward, not to the side.

Could it be?

Her skin tingled, and she lit a candle before approaching the wall. The tapestry stopped moving. She reached to the end of the fabric and pulled it up. There was only stone. But . . .

Celaena pushed back the heavy folds of the work and tucked it behind a chest to keep it aloft. A vertical groove ran down the face of the wall, different from the rest. And then another one, not three feet from it. They emerged from the floor, and just above Celaena’s head they met in a—

It is a door!

Celaena leaned her shoulder into the slab of stone. It gave a little, and her heart jumped. She pushed again, the candle flickering in her hand. The door groaned as it moved slightly. Grunting, she shoved, and finally it swung open.

A dark passage loomed before her.

A breeze blew into the black depths, pulling the strands of her hair past her face. A shiver ran down her spine. Why was the wind going inward? Especially when it had blown the tapestry out?

She looked back at the bed, which was littered with books she wasn’t going to read tonight. She took a step into the passage.

The light of the candle revealed that it was made of stone and thickly coated in dust. She stepped back into her room. If she were to go exploring, she’d need proper provisions. It was a pity she didn’t have a sword or a dagger. Celaena put her candle down. She also needed a torch—or at least some extra candlesticks. While she might be used to darkness, she wasn’t foolish enough to trust it.

Moving through her room, trembling with excitement, Celaena gathered two balls of yarn from Philippa’s sewing basket, along with three sticks of chalk and one of her makeshift knives. She tucked three extra candlesticks into the pockets of her cape, which she wrapped tightly around herself.

Again, she stood before the dark passage. It was terribly dark, and seemed to be beckoning to her. The breeze blew into the passage again.

Celaena pushed a chair into the doorway—it wouldn’t do to have it slam shut on her and leave her trapped forever. She tied a string to the back of the chair, knotting it five times, and held the ball in her spare hand. If she got lost, this would lead her back. She carefully folded the tapestry over the door, just in case someone came in.

Striding into the passage, she found it to be cold, but dry. Cobwebs hung everywhere, and there were no windows, only a very long stair that descended far beyond the light of her little candle. She tensed as she stepped down, waiting for a single sound that would send her springing back to her rooms. It was silent—silent and dead and completely forgotten.

Celaena held the candle aloft, her cape trailing behind her, leaving a clean wake on the dust-covered stairs. Minutes passed, and she scanned the walls for any engravings or markings, but saw none. Was this just a forgotten servants’ passage? She found herself a bit disappointed.

The bottom of the stairs soon appeared, and she came to a halt before three equally dark and imposing portals. Where was she? She had difficulty imagining that such a space could be forgotten in a castle filled with so many people, but—

The ground was covered with dust. Not even a hint of a footprint.

Knowing how the story always went, Celaena lifted the candle to the arches above the portals, looking for any inscriptions regarding the sure death that would meet her if she walked beneath a specific arch.

She took stock of the ball of yarn in her hand. Now it was little more than a lump of string. She set down her candle and tied another ball to the end of the string. Perhaps she should have taken another. Well, at least she still had the chalk.

She chose the door in the middle, if only because it was closer. On the other side, the staircase continued downward—in fact, it went so far down that she wondered if she were beneath the castle. The passage became very damp and very cold, and Celaena’s candle sputtered in the moisture.

There were many archways now, but Celaena chose to go straight, following the moisture that grew by the inch. Water trickled down the walls, and the stone became slick with whatever fungus had grown over the centuries. Her red velvet shoes felt flimsy and thin against the wetness of the chamber. She would have considered turning back were it not for the sound that arose.