A Court of Wings and Ruin (A Court of Thorns and Roses #3) by Sarah J. Maas

Amren squirmed out from beneath Nesta, whirling toward the battlefield. “Shields—”

Eris winnowed away—to warn his father, no doubt.

Nesta pushed herself onto her elbows, hair shaking free of her braid, lips bloodless. She heaved into the grass.

Rhys’s magic shot out of him, arcing around our entire army, his breathing a wet rasp—

Nesta’s hands grappled into the grass as she lifted her head, scanning the horizon.

Like she could see right to where the Cauldron was now about to be unleashed.

Rhys’s power flowed and flowed out of him, bracing for impact. Azriel’s Siphons flashed, a sprawling shield of cobalt locking over Rhysand’s, his breathing just as heavy as my mate’s—

And then Nesta began screaming. Not in pain. But a name. Over and over.

“CASSIAN.”

Amren reached for her, but Nesta roared, “CASSIAN!”

She scrambled to her feet, as if she’d leap into the skies.

Her body lurched, and she went down, heaving again.

A figure shot from the Illyrian ranks, spearing for us, flapping hard, red Siphons blazing—

Nesta moaned, writhing on the ground.

The earth seemed to shudder in response.

No—not in response to her. In terror of the thing that erupted from Hybern’s army.

I understood why the king had claimed those rocky foothills. Not to make us charge uphill if we should push them so far. But to position the Cauldron.

For it was from the rocky outcropping that a battering ram of death-white light hurled for our army. Just about level with the Illyrian legion in the sky—as the Attor’s legion dropped to the earth, and ducked for cover. Leaving the Illyrians exposed.

Cassian was halfway to us when the Cauldron’s blast hit the Illyrian forces.

I saw him scream—but heard nothing. The force of that power …

It shredded Azriel’s shield. Then Rhysand’s. And then shredded any Siphon-made ones.

It hollowed out my ears and seared my face.

And where a thousand soldiers had been a heartbeat before …

Ashes rained down upon our foot soldiers.

Nesta had known. She gaped up at me, terror and agony on her face, then scanned the sky for Cassian, who flapped in place, as if torn between coming for us and charging back to the scattering Illyrian and Peregryn ranks. She’d known where that blast was about to hit.

Cassian had been right in the center of it.

Or would have been, if she hadn’t called him away.

Rhys was looking at her like he knew, too. Like he didn’t know whether to scold her for the guilt Cassian would no doubt feel, or thank her for saving him.

Nesta’s body went stiff again, a low moan breaking from her.

I felt Rhys cast out his power—a silent warning signal.

The other High Lords raised shields this time, backing the one he rallied.

But the Cauldron did not hit the same spot twice. And Hybern was willing to incinerate part of his own army if it meant wiping out a strength of ours.

Cassian was again hurtling for us, for Nesta sprawled on the ground, as the light and unholy heat of the Cauldron were unleashed again.

Right into its own lines. Where the Bone Carver was gleefully shredding apart soldiers, draining the life from them in sweeps and gusts of that deadly wind.

An unearthly, female shriek broke from deep in the Hybern forces. A sister’s warning—and pain. Just as that white light slammed into the Bone Carver.

But the Carver … I could have sworn he looked toward me as the Cauldron’s power crashed into him. Could have sworn he smiled—and it was not a hideous thing at all.

There—and gone.

The Cauldron wiped him away without any sign of effort.





CHAPTER

71


I could barely hear, barely think in the wake of the Cauldron’s power.

In the wake of the empty, blasted bit of plain where the Carver had been. The sudden cold that shuddered down my spine—as if erasing the tattoo inked upon it.

And then the silence—silence in some pocket of my mind as a section of that two-pronged leash of control faded into darkness without end. Leaving nothing behind.

I wondered who would carve his death in the Prison.

If he had perhaps already carved it for himself on the walls of that cell. If he had wanted to make sure I was worthy not to taunt me, but because he wanted his end … he wanted his end to be worth carving.

And as I gazed at that decimated part of the plain, the ashes of the Illyrians still raining down … I wondered if the Carver had made it. To wherever he had been so curious about going.

I sent up a quiet prayer for him—for all the soldiers who had been there and were now ash on the wind … sent up a prayer that they found it everything they’d hoped it would be.

It was the Illyrians who drew me out of the quiet, the ringing in my ears. Even as our army began to panic in the wake of the Cauldron’s might, the remaining bulk of the Illyrian legions re-formed their lines and charged ahead, Thesan’s Peregryns wholly interspersed with them now.

Jurian’s human army, made up of Graysen’s men and others … To their credit, they did not falter. Did not break, even as they went down one by one.

If the Cauldron dealt another blow …

Nesta had her brow in the grass as Cassian landed so hard the ground shuddered. He was reaching for her as he panted, “What is it, what—”