Crown Of Midnight Quotes

I worry because I care. Gods help me, I know I shouldn't, but I do. So I will always tell you to be careful, because I will always care what happens.

Why are you crying?" "Because," she whispered, her voice shaking, "you remind me of what the world ought to be. What the world can be.

The best lies were always mixed with truth.

The rest of the world quieted into nothing. In that moment, after ten long years, Celaena looked at Chaol and realised she was home.

But death was her curse and her gift, and death had been her good friend these long, long years.

Some things you hear with your ears. Others, you hear with your heart.

Then Celaena and the King of Adarlan smiled at each other, and it was the most terrifying thing Dorian had ever seen.

Celaena was the lost Queen of Terrasen. Chaol sank to his knees.

It was like coming home or being born or suddenly finding an entire half of herself that had been missing.

If they wanted Adarlan's Assassin, they'd get her. And Wyrd help them when she arrived.

What does that mean?" he demanded. She smiled sadly. "You'll figure it out. And when you do..." She shook her head, knowing she shouldn't say it, but doing it anyway. "When you do, I want you to remember that it wouldn't have made any difference to me. It's never made any difference to me when it came to you. I’d still pick you. I’ll always pick you.

Who said anything about shame?" She gestured down to her naked body, even though it was covered by the blanket. "Honestly, I'm surprised you're not strutting about, boasting to everyone. I certainly would be if I'd tumbled me. "Does your love for yourself know no bounds?" "Absolutely none.

To escape death, she'd become death.

Enough! We have enough enemies as it is! There are worse things out there to face!" Celaena slowly turned to him, her face splattered with blood and eyes blazing bright. "No, there aren't," she said. "Because I'm here now.

Because she wasn't human, Chaol realized, gaping at her from where he still crouched over Fleetfoot. No - she wasn't human at all. Celaena was Fae.

Dance with me, Celaena," he said again, his voice rough. When her eyes met his she forgot about the cold, and the moon, and the glass palace looming above them. The secret library and the king's plans and Mort and Elena faded into nothing. She took his hand and there was only the music and Chaol.

In every way that counted, I failed him.

But he had no idea what sort of darkness lurked inside her, or what sort of monster she was willing to become in order to make things right.

I don't think you realize who you're dealing with." The man clicked his tongue, "If you were that good, you would be more than just Captain of the Guard." Chaol let out a low, breathy laugh. "I wasn't talking about me." "She's just one girl." Though his guts were twisting at the thought of her in this place, with these people, though he was considering every possible way to get himself and Celaena out of here alive, he gave the man a grin. "Then you're really in for a big surprise.

Roland gave her a courtier’s smile. “And what sort of work do you do for my uncle? ” Dorian shifted on his feet and Chaol went very still, but Celaena returned Roland’s smile and said, “I bury the king’s opponents where nobody will ever find them.

Everyone sounded the same when they died.

He wouldn't let his servants change the sheets on his bed because they still smelled like her, because he went to sleep dreaming that she was still lying beside him.

I'm happy for you, my friend." Celaena smiled back. "I think... I think I'm happy for me, too." And she was. For the first time in years, she was truly happy.

He'd loved her so much that she still felt the echoes of it, even now.

There had never been any line between them, only his own stupid fear and pride. Because from the moment he'd pulled her out of that mine in Endovier and she had set those eyes upon him, still fierce despite a year in hell, he'd been walking toward this, walking to her. So Chaol brushed away her tears, lifter her chin, and kissed her.

She won't understand. And when she goes over the edge, there will be nothing to pull her back." "She will find her way back. She always does." Tears formed, but the princess blinked them away. "For all our sakes, I hope you're right.

Let them tremble in fear at what they had awoken.

You love your country," she said. "I can't let you give all that up." He caught a glimmer of pain and hope in her eyes, and before he knew what he was doing , he'd closed the distance between them, one hand on her waist and the other on her shoulder. "I'd be the greatest fool in the world to let you go alone.

He would move on. Because he would not be like the ancient kings in the song and keep her for himself. She deserved a loyal, brave knight who saw her for what she was and did not fear her. And he deserved someone who would look at him like that, even if the love wouldn't be the same, even if the girl wouldn't be her. So Dorian closed his eyes, and took another long breath. And when he opened his eyes, he let her go.

And because she was young, and so damn clever and amusing and wonderful, wherever she made her home, there would be some man who would fall in love with her and who would make her his wife, and that would be the worst truth of all. It had snuck up on him, this pain and terror and rage at the thought of anyone else with her. Every look, every word from her... he didn't even know when it had started.

Hide from fate all you like,” Baba Yellowlegs said as they turned away. “But it shall soon find you!

I can't tell if I should be ashamed of wanting to hold you on this day, or grateful that, despite what happened before now, it somehow brought me to you.

Perhaps the world would never be perfect, perhaps some things would never be right, but maybe she stood a chance of finding her own sort of peace and freedom.

When you do, I want you to remember that it wouldn’t have made any difference to me. It’s never made any difference to me when it came to you. I’d still pick you. I’ll always pick you.

It was hard to care, she realized as she started the trek back to the castle. Incredibly hard to care, when you didn’t have anyone left to care about.

I'll come back," she said quietly. "I'll come back for you." And he knew that there was more that she wasn't saying, some bigger meaning behind those words. But Dorian still believed her.

Chaol raised his brows. "So I'm just here for decoration?" "Be grateful I consider you a worthy accessory.

I'm impressed you got up here so quickly - and without a pack of court ladies hounding after you. Perhaps you should try your hand at being an assassin." He shook the hair out of his face. "I'm not interested in court ladies," he said thickly, and kissed her.

Celaena Sardothien wasn’t in league with Aelin Ashryver Galathynius. Celaena Sardothien was Aelin Ashryver Galathynius, heir to the throne and rightful Queen of Terranes. Celaena was Aelin Galathynius, the greatest living threat to Adarlan, the one person who could raise an army capable of standing against the king. Now, she was also the one person who knew the secret source of the king’s power—and who sought a way to destroy it. And he had just sent her into the arms of her strongest potential allies: to the homeland of her mother, the kingdom of her cousin, and the domain of her aunt, Queen Maeve of the Fae. Celaena was the lost Queen of Terrasen. Chaol sank to his knees.

There was a time when people valued honor and loyalty — when serving a ruler wasn't about obedience and fear.

Her salary as King’s Champion was considerable, and Celaena spent every last copper of it. Shoes, hats, tunics, dresses, jewelry, weapons, baubles for her hair, and books. Books and books and books. So many books that Philippa had to bring up another bookcase for her room.

Chaol," he said, looking over his shoulder. Dorian's eyes were frozen, his jaw clenched. "Treat her well.

Right," Chaol said. "So you're just...memorizing that information now?" "If you're suggesting that I have no reason to be here and to leave, then tell me to go." "I'm just trying to figure out what's so boring that you dozed off 10 minutes ago." She propped herself up onto her elbows. "I did not!" His eyebrows rose. "I heard you snoring." "You're a liar, Chaol Westfall." She threw her paper at him at ploppedback on the couch. "I only closed my eyes for a minute." He shook his head again and went back to work. Celaena blushed. "I didn't really snore, did I?" His face was utterly serious as he said, "Like a bear.

The ship began moving. And Chaol—the man she hated and loved so much that she could hardly think around him—just stood there, watching her go.

You're remarkably judgmental.' 'What's the point in having a mind if you don't use it to make judgements?

Whatever shred of hope he'd had for a future with her was gone. She still felt something for him, she'd admitted, but she would never trust him. She would always hate him for what he'd done. But he could do this for her. Even if he never saw her again, even if she abandoned her duties as King's Champion and stayed with the Fae in Wendlyn forever-as long as he knew that she was safe, that no one could hurt her... He'd sell his soul again and again for that.

I want you to remember that it wouldn't have made any difference to me. It's never made any difference to me when it came to you. I'd still pick you. I'll always pick you.

There was a poem scribbled at the top of the Ashryver family tree, as though some student had dashed it down as a reminder while studying. Ashryver Eyes The fairest eyes, from legends old Of brightest blue, ringed with gold Bright blue eyes, ringed with gold. A strangled cry came out of him. How many times had he looked into those eyes? How many times had he seen her avert her gaze, that one bit proof she couldn't hide, from the king? Celaena Sardothien wasn't in league with Aelin Ashryver Galathynius. Celaena Sardothien was Aelin Ashryver Galathynius, heir to the throne and righful Queen of Terrasen.

I want you to know,” she whispered to the wind, to the earth, to the body far beneath her, “that you were right. You were right. I am a coward. And I have been running for so long that I’ve forgotten what it is to stand and fight.

You and I... We will always stand apart. We will always have..." She searched for the word. "Responsibilities. We will always have burdens that no one else can ever understand. That they"-she inclined her head toward Chaol and Celaena-"will never understand. And if they did, then they would not want them.

There’s no way in hell I’m getting out of this bed and going for a run,” he murmured onto her head. She chuckled quietly. His hands grazed lower, down her back, not even stumbling over the scar tissue. He’d kissed every scar on her back, on her entire body, last night.

The Crown Prince of Adarlan stared him down. "And consider where your true loyalties lie." Once, Chaol might have argued. Once, he might have protested that his loyalty to the crown was his greatest asset. But that blind loyalty and obedience had started this descent. And it had destroyed everything.

Chaol took one step toward her, though. One step, then he said, “I love you.

It made her the greatest threat he'd ever encountered.

Her rage took her to a place where she only knew three things: that Chaol had been taken from her, that she was a weapon forged to end lives, and that if Chaol was hurt, no one was going to walk out of that warehouse.

In that moment, he looked like mischief and midnight, like a temptation that always slipped away too fast and left you at once relieved and disappointed.

But no matter what I did, Elentiya, I want you to know that in the darkness of the past ten years, you were one of the bright lights for me. Do not let that light go out

And then," Ress was saying, his boyish face set with fiendish delight, "just as he got her into bed, stark naked as the day he was born, her father walked in"- winces and groans came from the guards, even Chaol himself-"and he dragged him out of bed by his feet, took him down the hall, and dumped him down the stairs. He was shrieking like a pig the whole time." Chaol leaned back in his seat, crossing his arms. "You would be, too, if someone were dragging your naked carcass across the ice-cold floor." He smirked as Ress tried to deny it. Chaol seemed so comfortable with the men, his body relaxed, eyes alight. And they respected him, too-always glancing at him for approval, for confirmation, for support. As Celaena's chuckle faded, Chaol looked at her, his brows high. "You're one to laugh. You moan about the cold floor more than anyone else than I know." She straightened as the guards gave hesitant smiles. "If I recall correctly, you complain about every time I wipe the floor with you when we spar." "Oho!" Ress cried, and Chaol's brows rose higher. Celaena gave him a grin. "Dangerous words," Chaol said. "Do we need to go to the training hall to see if you can back them up?" "Well, as long as your men don't object to seeing you knocked on your ass." "We certainly do not object to that," Ress crowed. Chaol shot him a look, more amused than warning. Ress quickly added, "Captain.

She wouldn't mind working with him - but not in the way Roland meant. Her way would include a dagger, a shovel, and an unmarked grave.

It’s never made any difference to me when it came to you. I’d still pick you. I’ll always pick you.

She had never contemplated what it would be like--to yield control. And not have it be a weakness, but a freedom.

So Dorian closed his eyes, and took another long breath. And when he opened his eyes, he let her go.

And she was snarling, snarling like some kind of animal as she snapped for his neck. He reared back, throwing her against the marble floor again. "Stop." But the Celaena he knew was gone. The girl he'd imagined as his wife, the girl he'd shared a bed with for the past week, was utterly gone. Her clothes and hands were caked with the blood of the men in the warehouse.

From now on, there would be no other oaths but this, no other contracts, no other obligations. Never forgive, never forget.

She bellowed the last word with such soul-deep hatred that he felt it like a punch to the gut.

Dorian could only stare at her. This was different from the feral creature she'd become the night Nehemia had died. What she was right now, the edge on which she was balancing... Wyrd help them all. But than Chaol was at her chair, grasping her elbow. "What the hell do you think you're doing?" Celaena looked up at him and smiled sweetly. "Your job, apparently." She shook off his grip with a thrash, then got up from her seat, stalking around the table.

I know you can look after yourself. But I worry because I care. Gods help me, I know I shouldn't, but I do. So I will always tell you to be careful, because I will always care what happens.

But I promise,” she breathed into the soil, “I promise that I will stop him. I promise that I will never forgive, never forget what they did to you. I promise that I will free Eyllwe. I promise that I will see your father’s crown restored to his head.

I would be the greatest fool in the world to let you go alone.

Would you walk Dorian back to his room?" She batted her eyelashes at him, striding through the door as he opened it for her. "Or is this a privilege that only your lady-friends receive?" "If I had any lady-friends, I'd certainly extend the offer. I'm not sure you qualify as a lady, though." "So chivalrous. No wonder those girls find excuses to be in the gardens every morning.

Archer let out a breath, and she turned to find him grinning, slowly shaking his head. "I think ‘stunning,’ ‘beautiful,’ and ‘dazzling’ are the words you're looking for.

She and Chaol would never be a normal boy and girl, but perhaps in that world they could make a life of their own. She wanted that life. Because even though he’d pretended nothing had happened after the dance they’d shared last night, something had. And maybe it had taken her this long to realize it, but this man—she wanted that life with him.

Perhaps there was an unstoppable magic inherent in music and art.

And then that voice from behind her said her name again. "Celaena." They had done this. Her bloody fingers slid down Dorian's face, to his neck. He just stared at her, suddenly still. "Celaena," a familiar voice said. A warning. They had did this. They had betrayed her. Betrayed Nehemia. They had taken her away. Her nail brushed Dorian's exposed throat. "Celaena," the voice said. Celaena slowly turned. Chaol stared at her, a hand on his sword. The sword she'd brought to the warehouse- the sword she'd left there. Archer had told her that Chaol had known they were going to do this. He had known. She shattered completely, and launched herself at him.

She didn’t care what this group wanted with her. She didn’t care what sort of information they expected to twist from her. When they had taken Chaol, they’d made the biggest mistake of their lives. The last mistake, too.

Celaena stared at the dark, tilled earth, a chill wind rustling her veil. Her chest ached, but this was the one last thing she had to do, the one last honor she could give her friend. Celaena tilted her head to the sky, closed her eyes, and began to sing.

Although we are necessarily concerned, in a chronicle of events, with physical action by the light of day, history suggests that the human spirit wanders farthest in the silent hours between midnight and dawn. Those dark fruitful hours, seldom recorded, whose secret flowerings breed peace and war, loves and hates, the crowning or uncrowning of heads.

Only a coward captures men the way you did." "A coward? Or a pragmatist?

Celaena threw her weight into the dagger she held aloft, and gained an inch. His arms strained. She was going to kill him. She truly going to kill him. He made himself look into her eyes, look at the face so twisted with rage that he couldn't find her. "Celaena," he said, squeezing her wrists so hard that he hoped the pain registered somewhere- wherever she had gone. But she still wouldn't lossen her grip on the blade. "Celaena, I'm your friend." She stared at him, panting through gritted teeth, her breath coming quicker and quicker before she roared, the sound filling the room, his blood, his world: "You will never be my friend. You will always be my enemy." She bellowed the last word with such soul-deep hated that he felt it like a punch to the gut. She surged again, and he lost his grip on the wrist that held the dagger. The blade plunged down.

Just be careful." "You keep saying that." "Is there something wrong with saying it?" "Yes, there is! I'm not some silly fool who can't protect herself or her head!" "Did I ever imply that?" "No, but you keep saying 'be careful' and telling me how you worry, and insisting you help me with things, and—" "Because I do worry!" "Well, you shouldn't! I'm just as capable of looking after myself as you are!" "Believe me, Celaena, I know you can look after yourself. But I worry because I care. Gods help me, I know I shouldn't, but I do. So I will always tell you to be careful, because I will always care what happens.

... He'd been about to turn away when she lifted her face to the moon and sang. It was not in any language that he knew. Not in the common tongue, or in Eyllwe, or in the languages of Fenharrow or Melisande, or anywhere else on the continent This language was ancient, each word full of power and rage and agony. She did not have a beautiful voice. And many of the words sounded like half sobs, the vowels stretched by the pangs of sorrow, the consonants hardened by anger. She beat her breast in time, so full of savage grace, so at odds with the black gown and veil she wore. The hair on the back of his neck stood as the lament poured from her mouth, unearthly and foreign, a song of grief so old that it predated the stone castle itself. And the the song finished, its end as butal and sudden as Nehemia's death had been. She stood there a few moments, silent and unmoving.

I know it’s not much—” “No one has ever done anything like this for me.” He shook his head in awe, looking back at the greenhouse. “No one.” “It’s just a dinner,” she said, rubbing her neck and walking to the table, if only because the urge to go to him was so strong that she needed a table between them.

Celaena knew where she was before she awoke. And she didn't care. She was living the same story again and again. The night she'd been captured, she'd also snapped, and come so close to killing the person she most wanted to destroy before someone knocked her out and she awoke in a rotting dungeon. She smiled bitterly as she opened her eyes. It was always the same story, the same loss.

When Sam had died, she had tucked him into her heart, tucked him alongside her other beloved dead, whose names she kept so secret she sometimes forgot them. But Nehemia—Nehemia wouldn't fit. It was as if her heart was too full of the dead, too full of those lives that had ended well before their time.

She paused, frowning at him. But his eyes drifted to the small wooden door just a few feet away. A broom closet. She followed his attention, and a slow smile spread across her face. She turned toward it, but he grabbed her hand, bringing his face close to hers. “You’re going to have to be very quiet.” She reached the knob and opened the door, tugging him inside. “I have a feeling that I’m going to be telling you that in a few moments,” she purred, eyes gleaming with the challenge. Chaol’s blood roared through him, and he followed her into the closet and wedged a broom beneath the handle.

I reached out my hand, England's rivers turned and flowed the other way... I reached out my hand, my enemies's blood stopt in their veins... I reached out my hand; thought and memory flew out of my enemies' heads like a flock of starlings; My enemies crumpled like empty sacks. I came to them out of mists and rain; I came to them in dreams at midnight; I came to them in a flock of ravens that filled a northern sky at dawn; When they thought themselves safe I came to them in a cry that broke the silence of a winter wood... The rain made a door for me and I went through it; The stones made a throne for me and I sat upon it; Three kingdoms were given to me to be mine forever; England was given to me to be mine forever. The nameless slave wore a silver crown; The nameless slave was a king in a strange country... The weapons that my enemies raised against me are venerated in Hell as holy relics; Plans that my enemies made against me are preserved as holy texts; Blood that I shed upon ancient battlefields is scraped from the stained earth by Hell's sacristans and placed in a vessel of silver and ivory. I gave magic to England, a valuable inheritance But Englishmen have despised my gift Magic shall be written upon the sky by the rain but they shall not be able to read it; Magic shall be written on the faces of the stony hills but their minds shall not be able to contain it; In winter the barren trees shall be a black writing but they shall not understand it... Two magicians shall appear in England... The first shall fear me; the second shall long to behold me; The first shall be governed by thieves and murderers; the second shall conspire at his own destruction; The first shall bury his heart in a dark wood beneath the snow, yet still feel its ache; The second shall see his dearest posession in his enemy's hand... The first shall pass his life alone, he shall be his own gaoler; The second shall tread lonely roads, the storm above his head, seeking a dark tower upon a high hillside... I sit upon a black throne in the shadows but they shall not see me. The rain shall make a door for me and I shall pass through it; The stones shall make a throne for me and I shall sit upon it... The nameless slave shall wear a silver crown The nameless slave shall be a king in a strange country...

He tried not to think about last night—how the brief touch of Celaena’s fingers through his hair and on his face had sent a pang of desire through him so strong he’d wanted to grab her and pin her on the couch. It had taken all his self-control to keep his breathing steady, to keep pretending that he was asleep. After she’d left, his heart had been pounding so hard it took him an hour to calm enough to actually sleep.

Chaol positively hated Roland, and whenever he came up in conversation, it was usually accompanied by phrases like "conniving wretch" and "sniveling, spoiled ass." At least, that's what Chaol had been roaring three years ago, after the captain had punched Roland so hard in the face that the youth blacked out.

The world slowed to the beat of an ancient, ageless drum. Celaena behold the room. The blood was everywhere. Before the bed, Nehemia's bodyguards lay with their throats cut from ear to ear, their internal organs spilling out onto the floor. And on the bed... On the bed... She could hear the shouts growing closer, reaching the room, but their words were somehow muffled, as though she were underwater, the sounds coming from the surface above. Celaena stood in the center of the freezing bedroom, gazing at the bed, and the princess's broken body atop it. Nehemia was dead.

His eyes blazed with hunger that matched her own, and she kissed him again, tugging him into her bedroom. He let her pull him, not breaking the kiss as he kicked the door shut behind them. And then there was only them, and skin against skin, and when they reached that moment when there was nothing more between them at all, Celaena kissed Chaol deeply and gave him everything she had.

So,” he said, flicking her nose, “how long have you wanted—” “I don’t see how that’s any of your business, Captain Westfall. And I won’t tell you until you tell me.” He flicked her nose again, and she batted away his fingers. He caught her hand in his, holding it up so he could look at her amethyst ring—the ring she never took off, not even to bathe. “The Yulemas ball. Maybe earlier. Maybe even Samhuinn, when I brought you this ring. But Yulemas was the first time I realized I didn’t like the idea of you with—with someone else.” He kissed the tips of her fingers. “Your turn.” “I’m not telling you,” she said. Because she had no idea; she was still figuring out when it had happened, exactly. It somehow felt as if it had always been Chaol, even from the very beginning, even before they’d ever met. He began to protest, but she pulled him back down on top of her. “And that’s enough talking. I might be tired, but there are still plenty of things to do instead of going for a run.

We’ll never be a normal boy and girl, will we?” she managed to say. “No,” he breathed, eyes blazing. “We won’t.” And then the music exploded around them, and Chaol took her with it, spinning her so that her cloak fanned out around her. Each step was flawless, lethal, like that first time they’d sparred together so many months ago. She knew his every move and he knew hers, as though they’d been dancing this waltz together all their lives. Faster, never faltering, never breaking her stare. The rest of the world quieted into nothing. In that moment, after ten long years, Celaena looked at Chaol and realized she was home.

If they let you out,” Kaltain said, both of them staring into the blackness of their prisons, “make sure that they're punished someday. Every last one of them.” Celaena listened to her own breathing, felt Chaol's blood under her nails, and the blood of all those men she'd hacked down, and the coldness of Nehemia's room, where all that gore had soaked the bed. “They will be,” Celaena swore to the darkness. She had nothing left to give, except that.

Fleetfoot just zoomed on by, a blur of gold. A moment later, when the little librarian came waddling into view and asked if they'd seen a dog, Celaena only shook her head and said that she had heard something--from the opposite direction. And then she told him to keep his voice down, because this was a library. His eyes shooting daggers at her, the man huffed and scuttled away, his shouting a bit softer. When he was gone, Dorian turned to her, brows high on his head.

... the doors to his father's council room were thrown open and Celaena prowled in, her dark cape billowing behind her. All twenty men at the table fell silent, including his father, whose eyes went straight to the thing dangling from Celaena's hand. Chaol was already striding across the room from his post by the door. But he, too, stopped when he beheld the object she carried. A head. The man's face was still set in a scream, and there was something vaguely familiar about the grotesque feature and mousy brown hair that she gripped. It was hard to be certain as it swung from her gloved fingers.

After a moment, his father looked up from the list and surveyed her. "Well done, Champion. Well done indeed." Then Celaena and the King of Adarlan smiled at each other, and it was the most terrifying thing Dorian had ever seen. "Tell my exchequer to give you double last month's payment," the king said. Dorian felt his gorge rise- not just for the severed head and her blood- stiffened clothing, but also for the fact that he could not, for the life of him, find the girl had loved anywhere in her face. And from Chaol's expression, he knew his friend felt the same. Celaena bowed dramatically to the king, flourishing a hand before her. Then, with a smile devoid of any warmth, she stared down Chaol before stalking from the room, her dark cape sweeping behind her. Silence.

Say the planet is born at midnight and it runs for one day. First there is nothing. Two hours are lost to lava and meteors. Life doesn’t show up until three or four a.m. Even then, it’s just the barest self-copying bits and pieces. From dawn to late morning—a million million years of branching—nothing more exists than lean and simple cells. Then there is everything. Something wild happens, not long after noon. One kind of simple cell enslaves a couple of others. Nuclei get membranes. Cells evolve organelles. What was once a solo campsite grows into a town. The day is two-thirds done when animals and plants part ways. And still life is only single cells. Dusk falls before compound life takes hold. Every large living thing is a latecomer, showing up after dark. Nine p.m. brings jellyfish and worms. Later that hour comes the breakout—backbones, cartilage, an explosion of body forms. From one instant to the next, countless new stems and twigs in the spreading crown burst open and run. Plants make it up on land just before ten. Then insects, who instantly take to the air. Moments later, tetrapods crawl up from the tidal muck, carrying around on their skin and in their guts whole worlds of earlier creatures. By eleven, dinosaurs have shot their bolt, leaving the mammals and birds in charge for an hour. Somewhere in that last sixty minutes, high up in the phylogenetic canopy, life grows aware. Creatures start to speculate. Animals start teaching their children about the past and the future. Animals learn to hold rituals. Anatomically modern man shows up four seconds before midnight. The first cave paintings appear three seconds later. And in a thousandth of a click of the second hand, life solves the mystery of DNA and starts to map the tree of life itself. By midnight, most of the globe is converted to row crops for the care and feeding of one species. And that’s when the tree of life becomes something else again. That’s when the giant trunk starts to teeter.

We’ll find that place, then,” he said quietly. “What?” Her brows narrowed. “I’ll go with you.” And though he hadn’t asked, they both knew those words held a question. He tried not to think of what she’d said last night—of the shame she’d felt holding him when he was a son of Adarlan and she was a daughter of Terrasen. “What about being Captain of the Guard?” “Perhaps my duties aren’t what I expected them to be.” The king kept things from him; there were so many secrets, and perhaps he was little more than a puppet, part of the illusion that he was starting to see through … “You love your country,” she said. “I can’t let you give all that up.” He caught the glimmer of pain and hope in her eyes, and before he knew what he was doing, he’d closed the distance between them, one hand on her waist and the other on her shoulder. “I would be the greatest fool in the world to let you go alone.

She didn’t know how long they stood on that roof, tangled up in each other, mouths and hands roving until she moaned and dragged him through the greenhouse, down the stairs, and into the carriage waiting outside. And then there was the ride home, where he did things to her neck and ear that made her forget her own name. They managed to straighten themselves out as they reached the castle gates, and kept a respectable distance as they walked back to her room, though every inch of her felt so alive and burning that it was a miracle she made it back to her door without pulling him into a closet.But then they were inside her rooms, and then at her bedroom door, and he paused as she took his hand to lead him in. “Are you sure?” She lifted a hand to his face, exploring every curve and freckle that had become so impossibly precious to her. She had waited once before—waited with Sam, and then it had been too late. But now, there was no doubt, no shred of fear or uncertainty, as if every moment between her and Chaol had been a step in a dance that had led to this threshold. “I’ve never been so sure of anything in my life,” she told him. His eyes blazed with hunger that matched her own, and she kissed him again, tugging him into her bedroom. He let her pull him, not breaking the kiss as he kicked the door shut behind them.

Is that … chocolate cake?” “I thought you might need some.” “Need, not want?” A ghost of a smile was on her lips, and he almost sagged in relief as he said, “For you, I’d say that chocolate cake is most definitely a need.” She crossed from the fireplace to where he stood, stopping a hand’s breadth away and staring up at him. Some of the color had returned to her face. He should step back, put more distance between them. But instead, he found himself reaching for her, a hand slipping around her waist and the other twining itself through her hair as he held her tightly to him. His heart thundered through him so hard he knew she could feel it. After a second, her arms came up around him, her fingers digging into his back in a way that made him realize how close they stood. He shoved that feeling down, even as the silken texture of her hair against his fingers made him want to bury his face in it, and the smell of her, laced with mist and night, had him grazing his nose against her neck. There were other kinds of comfort that he could give her than mere words, and if she needed that kind of distraction … He shoved down that thought, too, swallowing it until he nearly choked on it. Her fingers were moving down his back, still digging into his muscles with a fierce kind of possession. If she kept touching him like that, his control was going to slip completely. And then she pulled back, just far enough to look up at him again, still so close their breath mingled. He found himself gauging the distance between their lips, his eyes flicking between her mouth and her eyes, the hand he had entwined in her hair stilling. Desire roared through him, burning down every defense he’d put up, erasing every line he’d convinced himself he had to maintain.