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

“Wards and spells far older than Prythian,” was all Rhys said. He jerked his chin to Cassian. “Don’t let each other out of your sight.”

It was the dead seriousness with which Rhys spoke that kept me from retorting.

Indeed, my mate’s eyes were hard—unflinching. While we were here, he and Azriel were to discuss what he’d found out about Autumn’s leanings in this war. And then adjust their strategy for the meeting with the High Lords. But I could sense it, the urge to request he join us. Watch over us.

“Shout down the bond when you’re out again,” Rhys said with a mildness that didn’t reach his gaze.

Cassian looked back over a shoulder. “Get back to Velaris, you mother hen. We’ll be fine.”

Rhys leveled another uncharacteristically hard stare at him. “Remember who you put in here, Cassian.”

Cassian just tucked in his wings, as if every muscle shifted toward battle. Steady and solid as the mountain we were about to climb.

With a wink at me, Rhys vanished.

Cassian checked the buckles on his swords and motioned me to start the long trek up the hill. My gut tightened at the climb ahead. The shrieking hollowness of this place.

“Who did you put in here?” The mossy earth cushioned my steps.

Cassian put a scar-flecked finger to his lips. “Best left for another time.”

Right. I fell into step beside him, my thighs burning with the steep hike. Mist chilled my face. Conserving his strength—Cassian wasn’t wasting a drop of energy on shielding us from the elements.

“You really think unleashing the Carver will do the trick against Hybern?”

“You’re the general,” I panted, “you tell me.”

He considered, the wind tossing his dark hair over his tan face. “Even if you promise to find a way to send him back to his own world with the Book, or give him whatever unholy thing he wants,” Cassian mused, “I think you’d better find a way to control him in this world, or else we’ll be fighting enemies on all fronts. And I know which one will hand our asses to us.”

“The Carver’s that bad.”

“You’re asking this right before we’re to meet with him?”

I hissed, “I assumed Rhys would have put his foot down if it was that risky.”

“Rhys has been known to hatch plans that make my heart stop dead,” Cassian grumbled. “So, I wouldn’t count on him to be the voice of reason.”

I scowled at Cassian, earning a wolfish grin in return.

But Cassian scanned the heavy gray sky, as if hunting for spying eyes. Then the moss and grass and rocks beneath our boots for listening ears below. “There was life here,” he said, answering my question at last, “before the High Lords took Prythian. Old gods, we call them. They ruled the forests and the rivers and the mountains—some were those things. Then the magic shifted to the High Fae, who brought the Cauldron and Mother along with them, and though the old gods were still worshipped by a select few, most people forgot them.”

I grappled onto a large gray rock as I climbed over it. “The Bone Carver was an old god?”

He dragged a hand through his hair, the Siphon gleaming in the watery light. “That’s what legend says. Along with whispers of being able to fell hundreds of soldiers with one breath.”

A chill rippled down my skin that had nothing to do with the brisk wind. “Useful on a battlefield.”

Cassian’s golden-brown skin paled while his eyes churned with the thought. “Not without the proper precautions. Not without him being bound to obey us within an inch of his life.” Which I’d have to figure out as well, I supposed.

“How did he wind up here—in the Prison?”

“I don’t know. No one does.” Cassian helped me over a boulder, his hand gripping mine tightly. “But how do you plan on freeing him from the Prison?”

I winced. “I suppose our friend would know, since she got out.” Careful—we had to be careful when mentioning Amren’s name here.

Cassian’s face grew solemn. “She doesn’t talk about how she did it, Feyre. I’d be careful how you push her.” Since we still had not told Amren where we were today. What we were doing.

I thought about saying more, but ahead, far up the slope, the massive bone gates opened.



I’d forgotten it—the weight of the air inside the Prison. Like wading through the unstirred air of a tomb. Like stealing a breath from the open mouth of a skull.

We both bore an Illyrian blade in one hand, the faelight bobbing ahead to show the way, occasionally dancing and sliding along the shining metal. Our other hands … Cassian clenched my fingers as tightly as I clutched his while we descended into the eternal blackness of the Prison, our steps crunching on the dry ground. There were no doors—none that we could see.

But behind that solid, black rock, I could still feel them. Could have sworn a faint scratching sound filled the passage. From the other side of that rock.

As if someone were running their nails down it. Something huge—and old. And quiet as the wind through a field of wheat.

Cassian kept utterly silent, tracking something—counting something.

“This could be … a very bad idea,” I admitted, my grip tightening on his hand.

“Oh, it most certainly is,” Cassian said with a faint smile as we continued down and down into the heavy black and thrumming silence. “But this is war. We don’t have the luxury of good ideas—only picking between the bad ones.”