And even Aelin could not have known that in saving a barmaid from those mercenaries, in teaching her to defend herself, in giving her that gold and this note …
Even Aelin could not have known or dreamed or guessed how that moment of kindness would be answered.
Not just by a healer blessed by Silba herself, capable of wiping the Valg away.
But by the three hundred healers who had come with her.
The three hundred healers from the Torre, now spread across the one thousand ships of the khagan himself.
A favor, Yrene had asked of the man in return for saving his most beloved daughter.
Anything, the khagan had promised.
Yrene had knelt before the khagan. Save my people.
That was all she asked. All she had begged.
Save my people.
So the khagan had answered.
With one thousand ships from Hasar’s armada, and his own. Filled with Kashin’s foot soldiers and Darghan cavalry.
And above them, spanning the horizon far behind the flagship on which Chaol and Yrene now sailed … Above them flew one thousand rukhin led by Sartaq and Nesryn, from every aerie and hearth.
An army to challenge Morath, with more to come, still rallying in Antica under Kashin’s command. Two weeks, Chaol had given the khagan and Kashin, but with the autumn storms, he had not wanted to risk waiting longer. So this initial host … Only half. Only half, and yet the scope of what sailed and flew behind him …
Chaol folded the note along its well-worn lines and carefully set it back within Yrene’s locket.
“Keep it a while longer,” he said softly. “I think there’s someone who will want to see that.”
Yrene’s eyes filled with surprise and curiosity, but she asked nothing as Chaol again slid his arms around her and held her tightly.
Every step, all of it, had led here.
From that keep in the snow-blasted mountains where a man with a face as hard as the rock around them had thrown him into the cold; to that salt mine in Endovier, where an assassin with eyes like wildfire had smirked at him, unbroken despite a year in hell.
An assassin who had found his wife, or they had found each other, two gods-blessed women wandering the shadowed ruins of the world. And who now held the fate of it between them.
Every step. Every curve into darkness. Every moment of despair and rage and pain.
It had led him to precisely where he needed to be.
Where he wanted to be.
A moment of kindness. From a young woman who ended lives to a young woman who saved them.
That shriveled scrap of darkness within him shrank further. Shrank and fractured into nothing but dust that was swept away by the sea wind. Past the one thousand ships sailing proud and unyielding behind him. Past the healers scattered amongst the soldiers and horses, Hafiza leading them, who had all come when Yrene had also asked them to save her people. Past the ruks soaring through the clouds, scanning for any threats ahead.
Yrene was watching him warily. He kissed her once—twice.
He did not regret. He did not look back.
Not with Yrene in his arms, at his side. Not with the note she carried, that bit of proof … that bit of proof that he was exactly where he was meant to be. That he had always been headed there. Here.
“Will I ever hear an explanation for this dramatic reaction,” Yrene said at last, clicking her tongue, “or are you just going to kiss me for the rest of the day?”
Chaol rumbled a laugh. “It’s a long story.” He slung an arm around her waist and stared out toward the horizon with her. “And you might want to sit down first.”
“Those are my favorite kinds,” she said, winking.
Chaol laughed again, feeling the sound in every part of him, letting it ring clear and bright as a bell. A final, joyous pealing before the storm of war swept in.
“Come on,” he said to Yrene, nodding to the soldiers working alongside Hasar’s men to keep the ships sailing swiftly for the north—to battle and bloodshed. “I’ll tell you over lunch.”
Yrene rose onto her toes to kiss him before he led them toward their spacious stateroom. “This story of yours had better be worth it,” she said with a wry grin.
Chaol smiled back at his wife, at the light he’d unknowingly walked toward his entire life, even when he had not been able to see it.
“It is,” he said quietly to Yrene. “It is.”
Fireheart
They had entombed her in darkness and iron.
She slept, for they had forced her to—had wafted curling, sweet smoke through the cleverly hidden airholes in the slab of iron above. Around. Beneath.
A coffin built by an ancient queen to trap the sun inside.
Draped with iron, encased in it, she slept. Dreamed.
Drifted through seas, through darkness, through fire. A princess of nothing. Nameless.
The princess sang to the darkness, to the flame. And they sang back.
There was no beginning or end or middle. Only the song, and the sea, and the iron sarcophagus that had become her bower.
Until they were gone.
Until blinding light flooded the slumbering, warm dark. Until the wind swept in, crisp and scented with rain.
She could not feel it on her face. Not with the death-mask still chained to it.
Her eyes cracked open. The light burned away all shape and color after so long in the dim depths.
But a face appeared before her—above her. Peering over the lid that had been hauled aside.
Dark, flowing hair. Moon-pale skin. Lips as red as blood.
The ancient queen’s mouth parted in a smile.
Teeth as white as bone.
“You’re awake. Good.”
Lovely and cold, it was a voice that could devour the stars.
From somewhere, from the blinding light, rough and scar-flecked hands reached into the coffin. Grasped the chains binding her. The queen’s huntsman; the queen’s blade.
He hauled the princess upright, her body a distant, aching thing. She did not want to slide back into this body. Struggled against it, clawing for the flame and the darkness that now ebbed away from her like a morning tide.
But the huntsman yanked her closer to that cruel, beautiful face watching with a spider’s smile.
And he held her still as that ancient queen purred, “Let’s begin.”