Throne of Glass 2
Sarah J. Maas
PART ONE
1. The King’s assassin creeps through a manor in the outskirts of Bellhaven. She creeps into Lord and Lady Nirall’s bedroom. He opens his eyes just as she starts to swing her sword to deliver the death blow
2. Upon arrival at the King of Endovier’s castle, Celaena is immediately taken to see the king. She presents him with a severed head and a hand with Lord Nirall’s ring. She then presents him with a lady’s hand. The king is satisfied and tells her the next person on her list is someone she used to know: Archer. She is sent on her way. Dorian cannot look at her the same way he did when she was in the king’s competition to become his champion. Chaol meets her outside the throne room and walks with her to dispose of the severed body parts in the river. He tells her he was worried about her because there were rumors Nirall had put up a fight. He was about to go out and find her when she arrived. He embraces her and she relishes in it. He tells her she smells and she reminds him she has been traveling with rotting body parts for several days. She goes up to her room and thinks about how she gives each person she is sent to kill an option to die or run away and never return or use their given name again. All have decided to leave, and she uses body parts from corpses found at sick houses. She knows there could be trouble if anyone finds out. She wonders how she will take Archer’s death since he lives close and is well known.
3. Celaena has a nightmare about running from Cain and glowing Wyrdmarks. Early in the morning, she takes Fleetfoot with her to play fetch and meets with Nehemia. They talk quietly in Eyllwe to prevent being overheard. Celaena tells her the king has a plan to take out anyone that opposes him. Nehemia doesn’t know anything about them, but wants Celaena to keep her informed. Celaena knows she can’t tell anyone about what she is really doing because it would out their lives in danger. Nehemia is worried about the number of her people that are being sent to the Calaculla labor camp. It is rumored to be even worse than Endovier. Nehemia feels the need to help her people and she isn’t sure trying to gather information in Rifthold is of any use anymore. Celaena doesn’t respond and Nehemia goes back towards the castle.
4. Chaol meets Celaena for the planned morning run. He is awes by her speed and grace and tries to keep up. He asks her how often she thinks of the people she has killed. At first, she thinks he is upset about her recent missions, but when she sees his face she stops the run and asks if it is about Cain. He nods and she tells him she has never forgotten anyone she has killed. What he did was hi we able and to save a life. She tells him she will never forget that. He tries to keep from crossing a line with her and jokes that having Ardlan’s assassin in his debt might be useful. They continue their run and then head through the courtyard on their way to breakfast. Celaena is appalled at the number of women that get dressed up to stare at Chaol’s muscles after his run. Dorian stops them and introduces Celaena (as Lillian) to his cousin Roland, whom the king has just given a position in his council. Celaena doesn’t like something about Roland but can’t quite figure out what it is about him. Chaol clearly doesn’t like him either and makes an excuse for them to get away from them and back on their way to breakfast. Roland has a few questions about Celaena and Dorian keeps his answers vague. He doesn’t really get along with his cousin and wonders why his father appointed him. Roland asks if Celaena is strictly for the king’s use and says he only asks out of curiosity. Dorian thinks his cousin is harmless, but sometimes questions it. He remembers the time Chaol punched him and knocked him out and didn’t get in trouble for it because Roland deserved it. After breakfast, getting cleaned up, and a shopping spree, Celaena returns to her room to find Dorian in her foyer waiting for her. She misses him and hates the idea of him with other women, but she knows she has to keep her distance. She says she has to go back into Rifthold and plans to trail Archer. He asks if she wants him to fight for her and she tells him she wants him to leave her alone. He leaves and she is disgusted by all her pretty packages.
5. Celaena trials Archer as he goes to visit different clients at their houses. She would pretend to be a courier and ask the servants about who lived in the house. Creeping around Rifthold makes her feel like the year and a half that has passed since she lost her freedom never happened and Sam should be right behind her. After dinner, Celaena goes to Choal’s rooms. He pretends he is annoyed by her, but never kicks her out. During her journey through Rifthold, she avoided the house of the crime lord, Rourke Farrah. She asks Chaol if he knows him. Chaol tells her Farrah and his top three men were killed nine months ago by Arobynn Hamel’s personal guard, Wesley. He was found a day later impaled on a spike of Farran’s fence. Celaena is surprised because Wesley was the one that tries to stop her from going after Farran after he killed Sam. He tried to tell her it was a trap, but she did my listen. She and Sam had been hired to kill Farran, but the whole thing was a trap and she never found out who set it. Farran was the bait and he captures, tortured and killed Sam. She was captured the night she went for revenge. She is upset that she failed him, but Chaol points out he would have wanted her to live. He tells her he was in love with a girl named Lithaen. Roland made it a point to make sure Chaol caught them in bed together. He doesn’t know what happened to her, but she had been rumored to go back to Meah with Roland. He walks her back to her room and she tells him if Lithaen picked Roland over him, she is a great fool. A few minutes after Chaol leaves, Celaena heads down to the library. As she approaches the door, she stops when she sees a hooded figure between the doors. It turns towards her and hisses. The jewel in the eye of Elena necklace she wears glows bright blue. The creature runs away from it and Celaena quickly goes back to her own room.
6. Celaena goes down to Elena’s tomb. As she is about to enter, the skull knocker, Mort, on the door tells her it is rude not to knock. She is surprised it is talking and he says he was waiting to reveal his existence for when he thought she could handle it. She threatens to take him off the door, but he was out there when the queen died and no one could remove him. She knocks and enters the tomb, but Elena is not there. Mort tells her the queen is weak from protecting her the last few months, but has left a message for Celaena. There is a darker power that threatens Erilea and it is Celaena’s fate and destiny to find it and stop it. She guesses it is connected to the king. She doesn’t think the world that is ignored by the gods is worth saving. She says it is already too late since the Magic and heroes have been wiped out. Mort tries to apologize for all she has lost. When he mentions her parents, she threatens to have the door shredded. She leaves.
7. Celaena dresses up and takes Chaol with her to “run into” Archer. The snow is soaking into the bottom of her dress and she thinks they probably should have taken a carriage. They wait outside a high class, members only tea restaurant where he usually has lunch and then bumps into him pretending like she was about to go in. Archer is surprised to see her and is weary about saying anything in front of Chaol. She says he knows everything, so Archer asks how she got out. She explains she works for the king now and he baulks a bit at that. He asks her about Arobynn and she admits she hasn’t seen or talked to him since she has been out. Celaena asks him to dinner the next night and he gives her a card to tell her where to send the invitation for their meeting. After Archer is gone, she continues walking through the snowy streets with Chaol. He is surprised at how jealous he gets over Celaena’s flirting with Archer.
8. Chaol informs Celaena she has to work guard duty for the King’s dinner that night. The hall is filled with novels that are more important the closer they are to the king’s table. After dinner, the king and queen leave the room and the rest of the nobles stay to socialize. Celaena doesn’t trust Roland and intends to tell Dorian to be careful around him. Dorian assumes Roland is in town because his mother wants him to find a wife, but he intends to sleep with every woman he can before then. He becomes irritated when he sees Celaena looking over at Chaol. He storms off and Celaena follows to warn him about his cousin. He accuses her of using him to become his father’s champion. She says she warned him and it up to him to watch out for himself. She goes down to Kalrain’a cell for the first time since the girl was arrested for poisoning her.
9. Kaltain is in bad shape with bruises on her wrists from where the night guards allow Perrington to visit her. She tells Celaena something is coming and she is meant to greet it. Celaena thinks she is just going crazy. She remember how cold jail cells can be and gives Kaltain her cloak before she leaves. The next morning, Celaena and Nehemia have breakfast together and discuss what was happening to Kaltain. Celaena did tell Chaol about it and he made some changes to the guard. Nehemia says the courts weren’t always like they are now. Her father told her if Terrasen had had a chance to raise an army, it would have been able to destroy Adarlan. Some believe it could still happen. All requests for aide to Wendlyn across the see have been ignored, but it is said they still follow the old ways. Celaena asks if she has any new information about the king. Nehemia says Roland was added to the counsel and assigned to deal with placating her as she tries to free her people and improve conditions at the labor camps. The conversation ends when Fleetfoot steals some bacon from their tray. Nehemia says she has things to do that day and Celaena has to get ready for dinner with Archer.
10. Celaena wears a revealing red dress that Chaol does not approve of. She tells him she will see him the next day as she leaves implying that she will be staying with Archer that night. She and Archer flirt a bit when they arrive and are seated. She has sent off her carriage to further Chaol thinking she is staying with Archer. They share his carriage back to his place. He invites her in and she asks if he wants a night off. He admits sex is different when he chooses it. He longs for the day he has enough money to pay off Clarissa (pulled him off the street and trained him) and retire. She tells him she was sent to kill him.
11. Archer puts a dagger between them and begs her not to kill him. He tells her he is not a traitor, but there are whispers among his clients of a group who believe the king has something very dark planned. They think the heir of Terrasen, Arlin Galatbynius, is alive and she might be their best hope at stopping the king. She gives him the option to fake his death that night or spend a month discreetly getting his affairs in order. He chooses the latter and says he can get her into a ball the following night. She may be able to sneak into the hosts office and get information. She warns him that if he tries to betray her or isn’t discreet enough, she will kill him. He says he wouldn’t dare cross Arobynn’s protege. The carriage takes her back to the castle and she goes to Chaol’s room. He is pacing in front of the fire in his disheveled uniform when she enters. He is surprised to see her. She makes it sound like she found out the information about the rebel group from Archer being too careless with his speech. She tells him about the ball and he tells her to be careful. She is upset that he keeps saying it because she feels like he thinks she can’t take care of herself. He says it because he care about her and she smiles.
12. As Archer leads her around the masquerade party, Celaena recognizes a few faces. Archer tells her the host, a man named David, is one of his clients and has been getting increasingly paranoid. Archer keeps touching her as they slip off to make it look like they are just going to have sex. They get to the office door and he picks the lock. He leaves her to look around knowing Clarisse will want to auction him off for the night. He locks her in and she looks around the office. She doesn’t find anything incriminating until she looks at the bookshelf. There is a book with a red Wrydmark on it. She pulls it out to look at it, but doesn’t know the language. Davis unlocks the door and she pulls out a handkerchief and acts like she is crying because her fiancé left her. He says no one has a key to that room and pulls out a dagger. She is able to deflect it, but her forearm is cut. She takes him down easily, but he tells her the blade had gloriella on it. She smells the blade and recognizes the scent of the paralyzing poison from the night she was captured. She slits his throat and the goes out to window. She rushes out of the gates and to the castle as quickly as she can. She makes it in the guard’s door and to Choal’s room in just enough time to tell him the poison’s name before passing out.
13. Chaol panicked at how much blood was on Celaena. He laid her down and tore off her dress to reveal her only wound was the cut on her arm. He remembers that she said gloriella and has his most trusted guard fetch the nearest healer. He covers her up and gets her to her own room. She is given the antidote and is sick from it. He sends his must trusted guards out to find out what happened. They find Davis was killed with his own daggerWhen she wakes up, she finds Chaol sleeping in a chair by her bedside. She says his name and he wakes up. He asks if she was snooping around Davis’ office and got caught. She nods and he is furious she put herself in that much danger. She is worried how much he did to cover for her. He says he will deal with any consequences that come of it. He threatens to throw her in the dungeon if she tries anything like that again. She says she barely remembers making it to the castle. She just knew she had to get somewhere safe and with Chaol would be the safest place for her.
14. Celaena conceals her weapons and goes down to the library. She heads for a perimeter wall and starts walking towards the back. The marble turns to stone bricks and the sconces become fewer. She reaches a corner and sees there are no lights ahead, but someone left a small torch by the last sconce. She decides to keep going. Dorian wakes up sweating from a nightmare and noticed his room is frigid. He gets up to change out of his wrinkled clothes and thinks he sees a ring of frost on the couch he was sleeping on out of the corner of his eye, but it is fine when he goes to look. He tells himself it was all just because of what Chaol told him of what happened to Celaena. Celaena continues down the dark hall until she finds a dark tapestry on the wall. It strikes her as odd because it is the first decoration she has run into. She pulls it back to reveal a door. She goes in and finds a groove along a spiral staircase. There is an oil canister that she pours into the groove and lights with her torch. She heads down the stairs and the carvings in the wall depict a great battle. She finds herself in an old filing room and keeps going until she finds another staircase. She fills and lights this groove and sees these carvings are of the woods and fae. She figures if anyone knew about them, they would have already been destroyed . At the bottom. She finds an iron (impervious to magic) door and tries to open it, but it won’t budge. She puts a long dagger under it and see light and two green eyes reflected back. She pulls back her dagger and tells herself it was only an animal. She looks again, but sees nothing. She leaves knowing she will not be able to open the door that day.
15. That night at dinner, Rena Goldsmith was hired to perform for the royal family in celebration of Hollin (Dorian’s younger, spoiled brother) returning from school (the queen pulled him out). Rena mesmerizes the audience as she sings about an elf woman who falls in love with a knight because he sees her for who she is and not what she can do. Celaena is surprised the king doesn’t raise a fuss about it considering she sings about the magic he banned ten years ago. She finds herself close to crying and Chaol grabs her hand under the table. They smile at each other. Dorian sees the way Celaena and Chaol look at each other. He is sad she never looked at him that way, but knows it could never work between them. He decides to let her go. The king, Roland, and Perrington are all present when the executioner cuts off the heads of the minstrels. He asks Rena for her last words and she tells him she has worked for 10 years to become famous enough to be invited to sing at the palace. She wanted to remind everyone there are still people who practice the old ways. She lists off people he had killed for practicing magic as the executioner swings his ax.
16. The next morning, Nehemia questions whether she can keep being friends with Celaena when she blindly follows a tyrant king for her own freedom. Celaena decides to tell her the truth and takes her down to Elena’s tomb. While Nehemia is reading the inscriptions on the wall (all typical words for a tomb), Celaena notices the stars in the floor form the constellations. She moves from the first to the last and ends up on the ninth: the stag. When she is on the stag, she can see an eye on the wall with a clear hole in the center. When she steps off the drag, she can no longer see it. She steps in the stag and looks through the hole, but she doesn’t see anything but another empty room. Nehemia tries to examine Mort, but he is not forthcoming with information and they go back to Celaena’s room. Philippa comes in with a note from Archer that includes a list of names he believes are involved in the movement. Nehemia warns her that it is odd that the list should be written out. They agree they will start their first Wyedmark lesson the next morning over breakfast. Celaena goes into the city to track the men in the list, but isn’t able to learn anything useful. When she gets back to her room at the castle, she finds a note from Chaol that she is on guard duty for the ball that night.
17. When Celaena arrives for duty, Chaol can tell she is in a bad mood. He positions her outside to hide in the shadows so he can focus on his own tasks. When he looks over and noticed her missing, he heads outside to check on her. He finds her dancing a waltz to the music. When she turns and sees him, she stops. She was trying to feel like a normal girl. He goes up to her and asks her to dance and they do. She feels like she is finally home. When Dorian gets a break from dancing with most of the eligible nobles, he goes to the open door for some air and sees Celaena and Chaol dancing. Nehemia comes up to him and asks him not to punish them. He tells her he decided to let her go and has felt lighter since. Roland told her the king is looking to expand Calaculla to accommodate more prisoners. She asks him to stop it, but he says he cannot. She puts her hand in his chest and tells him he has more power than he knows. When the time comes, she says she will help him. Something inside him seems to wake up.
18. The next day. She goes to visit Archer. She catches his butler trying to listen at the door. He asks her for more time to gather info, but she tells him the king only gave her a month and she cannot give him more. He doesn’t have anything new for her and suggest the Prince or Captain of the Guard might. She warns him he has six days to get useful information to her or her next visit will be unpleasant. Dorian attends the next counsel meeting and notices his father, Roland, and Perrington are all wearing the same black ring. No one seems surprised. By how big the expansion of Calaculla is planned to be. He asks where the additional slaves will be housed and Roland tells him they can sleep in the mines. His father is not happy with his behavior. Dorian is disgusted and immediately gives his negative vote before storming out of the room. He punches a wall and it cracks up to a window that shatters. He looks around and see the glass and wood fell in a circle around him and his hand doesn’t have any damage. He thinks it must be magic and gets sick. Things have changed between Celaena and Chaol since their dance. She spends more time in his room and suggests he gets a servant to bring them treats. He goes to the kitchen and brings her back chocolate cake. She wants a life with him and wonders if it is possible. She thinks about Nehemia’a questions about a court that could challenge the king. She thinks it could be possible, but not while the king is still ruling. She wonders if there really is a rebel faction and if they know enough to take down the king. She slips out of Chaol’s room and leaves him sleeping on the couch. When she gets back to her room with what is left of the cake, Dorian is sitting on the floor outside her door. At first she tells him it is a bit late for him to be there, but she notices something seems different about him. She asks if he is okay. He says he is and was hoping Nehemia was with her. He gets up to leave and Celaena notices how cold it is in the hallway.
19. Chaol was not asleep and thinks about Celaena running her hands through huis hair and over his face before she left his room the previous night. He goes to give his morning report to the king and the king tells him they need to watch Nehemia closer. He tells him her influence is impacting the court and he has heard threats on her life. Chaol is confused, but promises to increase her guards. The king tells him not to tell her about it. He decides not to tell her or Celaena as his loyalty is to the crown. Dorian cannot sleep that night and goes to the gym early in the morning to find a sparing partner. He goes through several guards, but he thinks they are all taking it easy on him. Roland challenges him and they start sword fighting. Roland apologizes for his behavior and makes like he is on Dorian’s side about Calaculla. He says he called off the vote after Dorian left. Dorian thinks he and Roland might be able to change some minds and make a difference. Dorian makes an excuse to leave and Roland say he will find them pretty women for dinner that night. Dorian goes to the carnival that is being set up for his brother’s homecoming and wonders why his mother would hire such a show that usually borders on treason. Chaol and Celaena show up as well. Celaena wants to see what is under the covered cages, but Chaol stops her. A witch that calls herself Baba Yellowlegs comes out asking to read their fortunes. Celaena is terrified of the iron toothed old woman. Dorian thinks she is a fake. Celaena was told horrible stories about witches eating children when she was young. She now wonders if they were lies, but doesn’t want to take the risk. Dorian leads them to the stables and gives Chaol his birthday present - Asterion stallion. Chaol doesn’t want to accept, but Dorian insists and Celaena tells him he deserves it. Dorian asks if he has plans for his birthday in two days and Celaena quickly and sharply answers they do; she has been planning it for weeks. She tells them she once had an Asterion mare she stole from the Lord of Xandria and promises to tell them the story later. She leaves them and avoids the carnival. She decides she will go back to the tomb without telling Nehemia and see if the amulet fits in the open eye hole.
20. Celaena’s attempt to use the amulet in the eye hole does nothing and Mort laughs at her. She knows the riddle has something to do with the room and Mort confirms it, but says she still isn’t asking the right questions. She storms out of the tomb. That night, she has a dream about her trip to Endovier where she saw a stag across a ravine. It was as if it was beckoning her to join him, but she was too afraid of the ravine to try to get over it. The Stag walks away into the woods. Celaena wakes up and stares into the darkness of the ravine. She leaves the castle before dawn. Chaol is surprised when Celaena doesn’t show up for training. He goes up to her room figuring she just didn’t want to go out in the cold. He finds Nehemia there and she has a note from Celaena. She is taking the day off because it is the tenth anniversary of her parent’s death.
21. Chaol is surprised at what he doesn’t know about Celaena and Nehemia. He asks if Celaena told her about her parents. Nehemia said she learned by listening with her heart instead of her ears. Celaena said she wouldn’t be back until after nightfall. She didn’t want to spend any of the daylight in the castle of the man that had her family slaughtered. Celaena is far from the castle and sits on a cold rock. Fleetfoot joins her. She remembers a year ago when she gave up at Endovier and started killing guards. She made for the wall and killed any guards that got in her way hoping they would finally end it. She was an inch from the wall and surrounded by about 40 guards when she passed out laughing. Chaol is in Celaena’s room when she returns that night. She gets ready for bed without a word to him and then tells him she doesn’t want company. He says he intends to stay on her couch knowing she needs someone with her. He also brought her chocolate cake, which he also thinks she needs. He hugs her and she holds him back. When he looks at her, he wants to cross the line he keeps toeing. She tells him she is confused about how she can be happy to see him on that day, but is glad the events of her life led her to him. He realizes she has a lot more to work through than he realized. She goes to the table to eat the cake.
22. Dorian is in the library researching his family line to find if anyone else had magic. He wonders if Hollin will get it too when he gets older. He knows his father would destroy either of them if he knew. He goes through several books about different houses that had stemmed from Gavin and Elena’s marriage - Ardalan was their marriage gift from her father. Through the years, Ardalan never tried to invade Terrasen until his father. He’d met the heir, Aelin Galathynius, a few times when they were younger. She’d had her friend Aedion Ashryver, now a mighty warrior, teach him a lesson for spilling tea on her dress. He always got the impression Aedion wanted to kill him. He couldn’t even blame him. He gets frustrated not finding the information he wants and the books fly off the shelves. He quickly puts them back and leaves the library. He thinks Baba Yellowlegs might have the answers he needs. Celaena dresses up for Chaol’s birthday dinner and meets him in the entrance hall. They take a carriage to an apothecary where the leads him up the stairs and into a greenhouse she has decorated with lights. It looks like the garden. He is grateful for all the effort she put into the evening. She noticed his favorite stew and tries to play it off like she just asked the cook. After dinner, they look out over the balcony and she tells him she hasn’t been killing the men the king tell her to.
23. Chaol is furious that Celaena would put herself at such risk, but on the other hand, he is glad that she has been letting the men free. He is worried about what will happen to her if the king finds out. She tells him she intends to be long gone before he does. Chaol thinks about what that means for them and says he will go with her. He doesn’t feel right serving a corrupted king who keeps too many secrets from the captain of his guard. They kiss. They go back to the castle and have sex. When they wake up in the morning, they decide they will have to keep their relationship a secret to keep them both out of trouble. They also decide not to tell Dorian. They have sex again.
24. Dorian goes to Baba Yellowlegs while she is eating lunch. He pays double for the interruption. He asks if she really is a witch (Valg demons stole Fae to breed with them; Crochan witches take after the Fae, Ironteeth take after the demons). He is impressed that she would be at least 500 years old based on her “last born witch of the Witch Kingdom” title. He asks if it would be possible for a person to acquire magic. She says all magic has left the continent 10 years prior. Even some Fae are stuck in their animal forms. She tells him if there was an exception, he should look into why it was gone from only their continent in the first place. She says the witches were cursed long before the rest of them as a darkness falls over her. Dorian tries to summon his new found power around him to protect himself from her and then starts to leave. Roland is close by and says he came to find him, but stopped when he saw him with the witch. Dorian isn’t sure if Roland was telling the truth or following him, but Roland seems to have taken his side in the past few meetings. Celaena goes out to trail the mend on Archer’s list to find them and their families being boarded onto a ship to leave the country. Archer finds her and tells her he couldn’t let the king kill the innocent men. She threatens to kill him if she doesn’t get him useful information by the next night. She wonders if they really did have a connection to someone in Terrasen that could help take down the Ardarlan King. She starts back to the castle to find Chaol. Chaol’s mind keeps drifting back to Celaena as he gets reports and gives orders to his guards. Celaena comes in to tell him the king wants to see him, but he can tell she is lying. They don’t have much time before his next meeting, so they have sex in a broom closet. Celaena tells Nehemia about her escapades with Chaol. Nehemia tells Celaena that the king wants her to go tell the rebels to back off so he doesn’t have to kill them. She doesn’t want to leave the castle because rheee are still things she needs to do there, though she doesn’t say what. She wants Celaena to help her start a revolution to take out the king that has a dark force around him. She says something is waiting in the mountains for them. Celaena witness her people’s slaughter as a child and has no intent to start a revolution that would get more people killed. Nehemia points out it should have been impossible for the king to overtake Terrasen, but somehow he did. Celaena points out that he is only growing stronger and cannot be taken down. Nehemia calls her a coward and she leaves.
25. Elena tells the Princess one of them has to break for it to begin. Nehemia tells Elena that the prince is not ready and it has to be Celaena. Nehemia understands what is asked of her, but worries Celaena will go over the edge and not be able to be pulled back. Elena says Celaena always finds her way back.
26. Chaol doesn’t like hunting with the lords. Most of them cannot shoot a moving target and he has to discreetly kill prey for them. This time, the king, Perrington, Dorian, and Roland were out with the others. The king comes up to him to tell Chaol they will be questioning Nehemia the next night and will need six guards at the door. After the king rides off, Dorian comes up to ask Chaol what that was about. Chaol doesn’t tell him and says he has been busy. He asks after the prince, but Dorian just says he has been busy too and starts to ride off. He tells him to take care of her. That night, Chaol slips out of Celaena’s bed for fresh air. He thinks the information the king gave him is a test of loyalty. He decides to keep it to himself. He daydreams about marrying and starting a family with Celaena. Someone attacks him from behind and puts a rag to his mouth and nose. He passes out.
27. Chaol isn’t in bed when Celaena wakes up. A new list of names (in code) arrives from Archer and Celaena spends the day stalking them. When she returns, Chaol doesn’t show up for dinner. She sits on her couch reading until 10pm. When he still doesn’t show, she goes to his room and finds a note addressed to her on his sword. It tells her to meet them at a warehouse by morning or they’ll leave his body on the banks of the Avery. Chaol is chained to a wall. Every time he tries to free himself or ask questions, he is beaten. He knows if they are trying to blackmail the king, he is dead, so he doesn’t let himself think about it. When they mention “she has until dawn,” Chaol realizes the trap is for Celaena. He threatens to kill them all if they hurt her, but they are not worried. He says they are in for a surprise when she arrives, but they are not worried about one girl.
28. Celaena arms herself to the teeth and starts out to the warehouse where Chaol is being held. When she gets there, she scouts out the building before breaking through a second story window to make an entrance. She starts taking out archers before dropping to the first floor to free Chaol. An old man unmasks himself to tell them all to stop. Celaena keeps going and eggs on the guard nearest Chaol that is clearly itching for a fight. She sees an arrow go past her and into Archer’s shoulder. She finally stops and Archer explains he and Nehemia have been organizing a force to take down the king. Nehemia would feed them information she got from Celaena. They thought Chaol was going to be the one to question Nehemia and didn’t learn it was the king himself until after they had him there. They think it is already too late to save Nehemia.
29. Celaena runs back to the castle planning how to keep Nehemia safe. She climbs the garden wall and rushes in the door. She barely registers that she passes Dorian. She gets to the door and sees it is closed without any signs of entry. She plans to kill whoever comes for Nehemia while the princess hides. Celaena opens the door to find the princess and her guards dead.
PART TWO
30. When Dorian arrives behind Celaena, he is crying. She runs her hand down his face and her finger nails across his neck. When Chaol tries to get her attention, she attacks him. She leaves four scratches on his cheek with her fingernails. He takes her to the ground, but she is able to knee him between the legs and get on top of him. She pulls out her daggers and tries to stab him with both, but he catches her wrists. He tries to remind her that he is her friend. She tells him he is the enemy because he knew what was going to happen to Nehemia. He knows the woman he dreamed of making his wife is gone. One of Chaol’s guards, Ress, hits her in the back of the head with the hilt of his sword and knocks her out.
31. Celaena is put into the cell next to Kaltain’s. Dorian asks Chaol how long he will keep her there and he says until she won’t kill them all. They leave the dungeon and sit together trying to figure out what happened. Dorian says he was with his father at dinner right before Celaena ran into him. He thinks about how the bodies were arranged artistically. When Celaena wakes up, Kaltain asks if they got sick of her. Celaena says she got sick of them. Kaltain says she was given the option to rot in the cell or marry Perrington and go to Morath with him in a few days. She asks her to punish them all when she gets out. Lastly, she says her headaches are getting worse and she hears wings. Celaena thinks about what Nehemia said about wings in the mountains. As Celaena takes the food that was left for her, Kaltain warns her they are drugged with a sedative. Celaena takes them anyway. Her dreams are haunted by Nehemia calling her a coward. Four days later, Chaol comes to Celaena’s cell an hour after she drank the water. He Carrie’s her to her own rooms. The king had just told him to get her in line. He was not upset about the situation at all. Chaol had to restrain from killing his own king. He knows that he has lost Celaena.
32. Celaena wakes up in her own bed, but she can’t get out of it for days. She doesn’t find the point of living while Nehemia is dead. Phillippa lets her know she missed the funeral while she was in the dungeon. She is disgusted at the idea of her not being buried in Ellywe.
33. A girl has lasted six months in Calaculla, much longer than anyone else has lasted. She keeps telling herself to keep breathing because Princess Nehemia was working to free them all. She used to listen to her dad’s rebel group taking about it. When the announcement was made that the Princess was assassinates, the girl finally said enough. She swung her ax at the overseer.
34. Chaol has his men keep an eye on Celaena. He tells them not to stop her if she tries to leave, but to try to slow her down. He leaves them to it as he attends more meetings with the gathering lords from the south that he knew would soon include his father. Dorian hates being constantly watched by Chaol’s men. He sits in his tower room with papers he is supposed to be reading before the next meeting, but he questions whether or not his father should be blindly followed. He knows there is a game he will have to play. He tries to use his new Found power to move a pen, but it doesn’t work and he starts to think he imagined the whole thing. Nehemia said she would be there to help when the time came, so he is taking her death pretty hard as he now has to do it alone. Phillips convinces Celaena to get out of bed so she can change the sheets. The assassin thinks about who could have murdered her friend. She thinks it was an outside job, but it wasn’t Arobynn’s style. She thinks it could have been a competitor in the king’s champion tournament, Grave.
35. No weapons have been left in Celaena’s rooms, so she dresses in the darkest clothes she has and makes her way down to the tomb. Mort expresses his condolences at the loss of Nehemia. Celaena ignore him and takes some of the gold and jewels as well as whatever weapons she can strap to herself. Mort tries to warn her against taking Damaris (sword if Favin, first king of Adarlan), but she just smiles as she leaves with it strapped to her back. She uses the tunnel that leads out through the sewers and heads for the slums. She goes directly to the vaults not caring that she had killed the previous owners. The tavern quiets when she walks in and she asks the bar for information on Grave. He recognizes her, but doesn’t have an answer. She puts down some of the gold and jewels. Grace is in the corner when she arrives and he runs out of the bar. He runs as far as he can until he finds himself in a dead end alley where he decides he will make his stand. Just when he starts to think he lost her, she appears in the mist. She cuts his shins and he can feel she even cut the bone. He isn’t able to walk and scurries back to the wall. She pins him to it with her daggers and asks him who hired him. He refuses to tell her even after she had put daggers all the way through both legs. When she threatens to cut off fingers, he says he is ready to talk.
36. Dorian watches as Celaena bursts into a council meeting with the severed head of Grace. She puts it on the stack of papers in front of Minister Mulligan. She tells the king he was the one that hired Grace to kill Nehemia. She gives him Archers list of me. She killed when she went to rescue Chaol and says Archer lead her right to them. She gives him a wicked smile and the king smiles back. He says she will be paid double. Dorian cannot see any part of her that is still the woman he loved. Celaena goes to Archer’s place and tells him he has five days to get himself ready to go. She never wants to see him again after that. He apologizes for the stunt he pulled trying to get her to trust him. He wants her to be their new eyes and ears in the castle. She refuses and says if he isn’t ready to go by her timeline. She will kill him. Chaol agrees to meet with his father and immediately regrets it. His father points out the mistakes he has made and tries to convince him to go back home to Anielle with him because he needs an heir that is a warrior, not a scholar like Terrin. He wants Chaol to protect Anielle and use his friendship with Dorian for more land and a title. He crosses a line when he mentions Celaena and how much he has heard about their relationship. Chaol says if he talks to her, he will make him regret it. He leaves the room before his father can reply.
37. Celaena goes to Nehemia’a rooms and starts packing up her things. She finds Wyrdmarks written on papers and then the same book she had seen in Davis’ office. She takes them hoping she will still be able to learn what she can of how to read them. She goes down to the tomb and pulls Damaris from its holder. She puts it to the eye and it reveals a poem about three powerful objects and where they are hidden. She decides to try to find out what they are before she does any searching for them. Before any of that, she goes to the royal moselleum to visit Nehemia’s grave. She sings a song. Chaol has been following her and listens to her sing in an ancient language he has never heard. When she is done. She looks over and sees him. She doesn’t say anything. He knows he made a mistake by not telling either of the girls about the threat against Nehemia and he thinks losing Celaena is the price he will have to pay for it. He walks away.
38. Dorian searches the library for any books about magic, but he cannot find anything. When he hears someone coming, he pulls a book out of his jacket and ore made to be reading it. He is surprised when Celaena and Fleetfoot are the ones approaching. Neither are there for the reasons they state, but they both have their secrets and don’t want to be questioned. She apologizes for not being herself and he says he understands. Fleetfoot runs by with a scroll in her mouth. The librarian arrives to ask after the dog and Celaena sends him in the wrong direction. Chaol is wandering through the library when he sees Dorian and Celaena from a balcony. He leaves them alone and finds the head librarian who complains to him about the dog. He asks the librarian if there are any books on Terrasen funeral dirges, but the librarian said none were really written down. Chaol asks if any where in a different language. The librarian says they were all in the common tongue, but it was rumored the courts would secretly sing the songs in the language of the fae, but no one ever heard those but members of the royal court. He wonders what territory Celaena’s parents ruled over. He suddenly realizes she is a threat to them all.
39. Celaena goes watch Archer’s house. On outside observer would think he was having a dinner party, but Celaena recognizes some of the people from the warehouse. She notes that the man with the two swords strapped to his back (challenged her when she was trying to rescue Chaol) comes with two guards that watch the street while everyone else is inside. As the others leave, Celaena takes note of who goes which ways. The man with two swords stays behind and his guards join him inside for a bit. When they leave Archer’s house, it appears the man had an argument with the host. Celaena goes back to the castle and knocks on Dorian’s door to accept his invitation to dinner. He welcomes her into his tower and she thinks it is cozy with all the books all around them. He clears off the table for them to eat and she falls asleep in the couch. Dorian recognizes she probably wants to be away from anything that reminds her too much of Nehemia. Celaena goes down to the tomb and tries to figure out what the objects in the riddle are. Mort points out she can’t get a quick answer from a oracle because the magic is gone. She points out that Mort is still animated by magic and therefore some must still exist. He tells her whatever she is thinking is probably a bad idea and she agrees.
40. Celaena goes to see Yellowlegs just as the carnival is being packed up. She offers three coins to have her questions answered and Yellowlegs says the prince gave her four. She offers six to answer her questions and to keep quiet about Dorian’s. Yellow legs leads her into the wagon that seems impossibly large in the inside. She asks for Celaena’s name, but she refuses to give it. They walk through a pathway of mirrors and sit at a table. Celaena says her friends have a bet to see who can solve a riddle first and she wants the answer. After she reads the riddle, the witch says that is not meant for everyone. Once she tells Celaena about it, there is no going back. Celaena wants to know. Yellowlegs explains there are an endless amount of worlds stacked on top of each other. Eyed gates can be used to travel between worlds. The Valg took a piece of the Wrydgate and split it into three pieces - Wyrdkeys. The Fae were eventually able to steal them from the Valg. The fae queen, Maeve, sent them to another continent with Brannon, the first king of Terrasen. The riddle is a map to the keys, which in themselves are power. Celaena realizes the king probably has some of the wrydkeys and the witch agrees he probably has at least one. Suddenly, the witch realizes that Celaena intends to kill her to keep her quiet about her and Dorian’s questions. She disappears and Celaena tries to find her. She ends up shattering a mirror with one of her daggers before she is knocked out by a chain to her head.
41. Chaol and Dorian watch the carnival being dismantled from a balcony. Dorian asks if he will return to Anielle with his father. Chaol says he doesn’t want the power of leading Anielle and Dorian points out he hasn’t wanted much for himself aside from his position and Celaena. Chaol asks why Dorian hasn’t asked his father to set Celaena free. Dorian knows she would most likely run if he did, but he also knows it would upset his father who is. It above taking it out honbhim as well as her. Celaena wakes up as the witch is trying to chain her arms. She is able to get herself free from the chain quickly thanks to her training. She finds an ax hanging on the wall and goes for it. Just as she reaches it, the witch pulls the chain and gets Celaena to the ground. The iron teeth get closer to her neck and Celaena throws her to the side. When the witch charges her saying she and the prince would regret meeting her, Celaena uses the ax to cut off her head. Celaena doesn’t want anyone to know what happened and looks at the large oven grate.
42. When Celaena goes down to the tomb, Mort can tell that she killed the witch. He explains the Ironteeth clans will likely form an alliance once they find out the Yellowlegs leader was killed and demand answers from the king. She asks if the scrapes she left on her neck will hurt her. He thinks they will not be a normal wound. She starts to head back up to her room for a nap, but decides to go to the library and see if she can find any answers in The Walking Dead. She goes back to the tomb and takes Damaris and any other weapons she can carry. Chaol goes to Celaena’s room hoping to be able to talk to her. He finds papers and books all over her desk and is surprised to find Wyrdmarks on them. Underneath a few, he finds her will dated two days before Nehemia’s death. She leaves everything to him assuming she doesn’t die a traitor (the. Everything would go back to the king). She appears behind him and says she doesn’t plan on changing it before she tells him to get out and closer herself in the bedroom. Chaol has to stop in a broom closet to cry.
43. Celaena can’t seem to bury her grief. She sits at the piano and runs her fingers over the keys, it can’t bring herself to make music. She goes to the library and down the spiral staircase behind the hidden door. the Walking Dead is on a table waiting for her. She finds a spell for unlocking a door and memorized it. She tries it out on a locked closet and is surprised when it works consistently. She goes down the second spiral staircase and uses the u lock spell on the iron door. She is surprised when it clicks open because Magic isn’t supposed to work on iron. She finds a hallway lined with doors numbered 1 to 99. She wonders if it is a dungeon. At the end, she u locks another door to find a turn followed by a hallways with 66 doors. The pattern continues until she comes to a torn apart room with only three doors and one cell door off its hinges. She wonder what escaped from there. She can’t help thinking there wasn’t enough dust for the last person to have used the room to have been gone for too long. At the end, she finds a spiral staircase going up. Her head hurts as she continues yes upward. She comes to the bottom of a tower that is made of something that looks like black glass. She thinks it is the same material in the ring she has see on the king, Perrington, and Cain. There is a sudden boom and she realizes she is in the clock tower.
44. Dorian follows Celaena when he sees her go into the library with weapons and her hair braided. When he gets to the list catacombs, the magic in him tells him he shouldn’t be there. He wants to go back for help, but he can’t leave Celaena alone that long in there. Celaena gets out of the tower as quickly as she can. She remembers the dead coming after her in Samhuinn and Elena telling her to stay far away from the eight guardians in the clock tower. She hears something fown there with her and claws on stone. She puts out her torch and makes her way by the faint glow of the amulet. The creature following her thinks she is one of the ones that trapped it in there because she knew the symbols to unlock the doors. It forgot it’s name and what it was, but it learned how to hunt. Celaena stops when the other breathing stops. She out her hand to her chest and the amulet glows. The creature has tried to go out, but the light scares it away. It doesn’t think the amulet will have enough light to scare it off down there. It has lived a long time down their surviving off rats. It saw Celaena when she tried to see beyond the door before. It wants to eat her. Celaena runs and when she finds Dorian, she tells him to run and drags him with her as fast as she can. They close the iron doors behind them, but the creature keeps coming. When the get to the last iron door, the creature grabs Celaena’s shoulder. Dorian’s magic tries to seal the door, but it is useless agains the iron. She tells him to run back to the library and get the Walking Dead and they it will find him. He does and then comes back to cut off the hand holding her. He holds the door while she looks for the spell to help them. She uses the blood from her shoulder to draw the Wyrdmarks in the door. She tells Dorian to let go and the monster is frozen in the threshold. She decapitates it and then removes the marks. The body and head fall to the floor. She cuts open the body to reveal a human heart. They go back to Dorian’s tower. She tells him about the book following her since she found it and how it would always just appear. She thinks the obsidian tower in the click might be the Wrydkey and the king used it to create the rings and maybe the creature. Dorian tells her his powers just appeared one day and he has been trying to trace them back. She realizes this was the secret Yellowlegs planned to sell, possibly to the king himself. She points out he just watched her break several laws and couldn’t turn him in without expecting punishment for herself. They decide to keep an eye on the door and take it day by day.
45. Celaena rushes down to the dungeon to check on Kaltain. She remembers that she is from a historically magically powerful line. She had wondered if she was there for a reason other than marrying Perrington. And Cain came from a tribe lead by powerful Shamen. Kaltain is already gone when she gets there. Celaena asks where she is and the guard tells her she went to Morath with Perrington and Roland. She wonders if the king is using the wrydkeys to manipulate more then just people. Nehemia and Kaltain had both mentioned hearing wings. She needs to find out how many keys the king has and the locations of any he doesn’t have. She pulls out papers from her pocket to clean up a bit and sees Time’s Rift. Suddenly, she wonders if the words written on Elena’s tomb were jumbled like how the stars were on the floor and the trees on the ceiling. Maybe the answer was out in the open. She thinks she knows who can answer her questions.
46. When Celaena gets to the tomb, she asks mort if the inscription is an anagram. He confirms it says “I am the first.” Celaena is able to move aside a jewel in the staue’s crown and there is a compartment there, but it is empty. Mort confirms the king found it nearly 20 year prior. He thinks to be able to stop Magic for everyone but him (and Dorian by extension) he would most likely need two Wyrdkeys. Celaena decides to use the marks to open a portal to the other world so she can talk to Nehemia. Gavin, first king of Adarlan, comes to Dorian in a dream and tells him to where to go in Celaena’s room to stop her before he loses her forever. The prince wakes up and starts sprinting for her room.
47. Celaena carefully makes the Wyrdmarks in an archway and open a portal to the Otherworld. She waits begging for Nehemia to appear. When she finally does, she scolds Celaena for opening the portal and tells her never to do it again. Celaena continually apologizes, but Nehemia vanishes.
48. Celaena points Damaris at Archer and tries to wipe the Wyrdmarks from the wall to close the portal, but it just seems to change the marks and where the portal leads to. She sees his tattoo of a black snakelike creature and realizes Nehemia was trying to tell her not to trust Archer. He asks if she found the Wrydkeys. He planted the clue in Davis’ office. They knew about the first riddle, but couldn’t seem to solve it. He wants them to find the Wrydkeys together so they can take out the king and rule the kingdom themeelves. She plays along with his plans until he admits he was the one who dressed as the minister and hired Grave to kill Nehemia. Archer appears behind her saying Nehemia told him about the passages. Celaena goes to stab him, but he is able to dodge. Before they can get to far into their fight, a monster appears in the door or the portal and steps into their side. Chaol is already getting dressed when Dorian comes to his door to tell him Celaena is in trouble. Dorian has trouble keeping a walking pace knowing they may already be too late. They get to her room and Chaol has to break the lock on her bedroom door to get in. Dorian points out the pulled back tapestry. Chaol tells him to stay behind, but Dorian follows him down into the chamber. When they get to the commotion, Archer is in the corner chanting from a book, Celaena is on the ground and Fleetfoot is trying to protect her. Chaol tells Dorian to go after her while he goes after the monster.
49. While Chaol is fighting the monster, Dorian is able to wake up Celaena. Dorian is able to use his magic to fling the monster away from Chaol and Celaena realizes he has a very dangerous type of magic: raw magic. Celaena tells him she needs the book to close the portal. She calls out for Archer to give it to her, but he take it and runs down the hall away from them. Celaena can’t leave Chaol. Chaol tells them to run and Celaena only agrees because she knows she will be a hinderance to him. When they get to the stairs, she sees him square off with the monster and calls out for Fleetfoot. The monster grabs the injured dog and goes back to its own side of the portal. Chaol follows. Celaena goes after them and changes. Her Fae features (pointy ears and sharp cainines) are out and she roars at the monster.
50. Celaena is able to hold off the monster but can hear other roaring in the distance and on their way. She tells Chaol to get out and she hears him get Fleetfoot out. She pushes all of her power in Damaris and thrusts it into the ground. She creates a chasm between her and the monster. She runs out of power, reverts back to her human form and collapses. Chaol pulls her back to their side of the portal. Dorian comes to join them. She says she does not have enough left to close the portal, but she can with Dorian’s help. He cuts his arm for her to use his blood to use the binding spell she used on the iron door earlier. The portal closes. Chaol Carrie’s Fleetfoot and Dorian suggest they talk about what happened. Celaena looks after where Archer ran to. Chaol steps in front of her and tries to tell her not to go after him, but she takes off down the stairs.
51. Celaena gets to the river and senses just before Archer is about to strike her. They fight and he tries to tell her they are working for freedom and are on the same side. She remembers Nehemia telling her not to let her light go out. Celaena is about to let him go and tells him to get his entire group out of Rifthold by morning or she would kill them. He thanks her and calls her a good person, but he follows it up with a look like he has won. She goes back and drives her dagger into his heart.
52. A healer is brought to Celaena’s room and Fleetfoot is looked at first. Celaena insists Dorian is looked at second. When he is taken care of. She promises to come to his room to explain everything. While Chaol is being looked at, Celaena get cleaned up. Her wounds were all healed when she shifted into her fae form. The healer is gone when she emerges and Chaol is waiting. She tells him her grandmother was Fae and she got the ability to shift, but had trouble controlling it. She was close to mastering it when magic disappeared. She tells him about the book she used to open the portal and how she has been learning to read Wyrdmarks. She doesn’t tell him about the Wrydkeys, gates, or Dorian’s magic. He promises not to tell anyone about her secret. She tells him she does still have feelings for him, but she doesn’t think she could ever trust him again. She takes off down the passage to go take care of Archer’s body. Chaol goes to his father to ask a favor. He wants to suggest sending the king’s Champion to Wendlyn to assassinate the royal family and wants his father’s support. He figure this was the best chance he could give her to get away from the king and she could stay there if she wished. His father asks what is in it for him and Chaol agrees to go home with him.
53. Celaena goes to Dorian’s room and tells him what she told Chaol. She asks about his power and he says he can’t control it and they were lucky it worked earlier that night. She says she’ll try to introduce him to Mort in the tomb and see if he can help him. Chaol presents his idea to the king the next day and he is impressed with the ruthlessness of it. He wishes his son would be more like that. He also wishes Perrington were there to hear the plan, but he is actually in Calaculla discretely handling an uprising. He thinks about the wyverns he has been breeding and how they will need riders when Celaena brings back the naval plans of Wendlyn. Celaena is summoned and the king has Chaol explain the plan to her. She gives the king a wicked smile and he is pleased with her enthusiasm for the job. He wonders what it meant when the “nameless” Wyrdmarks showed up on her forehead during the final championship fight. They all agree she can leave the next day and study Wendlyn ways in the two week journey. While Wendlyn wonmt allow foreign men into their country, they do let woman and children in to seek refuge. Celaena freaks out and ends up in the tomb. She is worried what will happen to Chaol if she doesn’t complete the mission. She worries about finding the Wrydkeys. Elena tells her to calm down. She must go to Wendlyn and do what she needs to do. Celaena asks if Nehemia planned her own death and Elena says she is not ready to know what happened. Celaena thinks she knows the real answer. They agree she must go to Wendlyn.
54. Dorian confronts Chaol on his plan. Chaol keeps his cool and tells Dorian he doesn’t need Celaena’s forgiveness or her sticking around and opening portals that could them all killed. He hopes he can make Dorian mad enough that leaving will be easier on him. The next morning, Celaena goes to Nehemia’s grave. She apologizes for being a coward. She cuts her hand and lets the blood fall on the grave and vows to see Ellywe freed.
55. Dorian comes to Celaena’s room to say goodbye. She asks him to watch over Fleetfoot and he promises to treat her as one of his own. He tells her he plans to store books in her room and she approves and warns him the Walking Dead will probably show up as well. He says he has a meeting to attend when her ship takes off and they depart as friends. She promises to come back for him. Chaol shows up at the dock as she is about to board the ship. They only have five minutes until it leaves. She tells him everything she knows about the Wrydkeys, Wrydgates, and Baba Yellowlegs. She tells him the proof is in the tomb. She whispers something in his ear she says he will understand when he figures it out. She says she will always choose him and then boards the ship. She stars at him even after she can’t see him until she nods off on the deck. She the. Turns to prepare herself for Wendlyn.
56. Chaol goes to Celaena’s room to search for clues as he thinks over all that she told him. Her whispered words were just a date, the day her parents were killed. He finds the genealogy books Dorian left behind and starts going through them. There is one chronicling the events from 10 years ago. He looks up the date she told him. He reads about the assassination of the king and queen of Terrasen. The assassin missed the daughter and had to go back for her the next day, but a body was never found. He remembers her telling him Arobynn found her. He reads about Aelin Galathynius’ blue eyes rimmed with gold. He realizes Celaena is the long lost heir to the Terrasen throne and he just sent her back to her mother’s family, Queen Maeve of the Fae.