Heir of Fire (Throne of Glass, #3)(29)

Manon risked taking her eyes off her grandmother to study the pit. There were giant chains anchored in one of the walls, and enormous splotches of dark blood stained the stones, as if one of these beasts had been pushed against it. A giant crack spider-webbed from the center. Whatever hit the wall had been tossed hard.

“What are the chains for?” Manon found herself asking. Her grandmother gave her a warning look, but Manon focused on the man. Predictably, his eyes widened at her beauty—then stayed wide as he beheld the death lurking beneath it.

“Chains are for the bait beasts,” he said. “They’re the wyverns we use to show the others how to fight, to turn their aggression into a weapon. We’re under orders not to put any of ’em down, even the runts and broken ones, so we put the weaklings to good use.”

Just like dog fighting. She looked again to the splotch and the crack in the wall. The bait beast had probably been thrown by one of the bigger ones. And if the wyverns could hurl each other like that, then the damage to humans … Her chest tightened with anticipation, especially as the man said, “Want to see a bull?”

A glimmer of iron nails as Cresseida made an elegant gesture to continue. The man let out a sharp whistle. None of them spoke as chains rattled, a whip cracked, and the iron gate to the pit groaned as it lifted. And then, heralded by men with whips and spears, the wyvern appeared.

A collective intake of breath, even from Manon.

“Titus is one of our best,” the man said, pride gleaming in his voice.

Manon couldn’t tear her eyes away from the gorgeous beast: his mottled gray body covered in a leathery hide; his massive back legs, armed with talons as big as her forearm; and his enormous wings, tipped with a claw and used to propel him forward like a front set of limbs.

The triangular head swiveled this way and that, and his dripping maw revealed yellow, curved fangs. “Tail’s armed with a venomous barb,” the man said as the wyvern emerged fully from the pit, snarling at the men down there with him. The reverberations of the snarl echoed through the stone, into her boots and up her legs, right into her husk of a heart.

A chain was clamped around his back leg, undoubtedly to keep him from flying out of the pit. The tail, as long as his body and tipped with two curved spikes, flicked back and forth like a cat’s.

“They can fly hundreds of miles in a day and still be ready to fight when they arrive,” the man said, and the witches all hissed in a breath. That sort of speed and endurance …

“What do they eat?” asked Petrah, freckled face still calm and grave.

The man rubbed his neck. “They’ll eat anything. But they like it fresh.”

“So do we,” said Iskra with a grin. Had anyone but the Yellowlegs heir said it, Manon would have joined in with the other grins around her.

Titus gave a sudden thrash, lunging for the nearest man while using his magnificent tail to snap the raised spears behind him. A whip cracked, but it was too late.

Blood and screams and the crunch of bone. The man’s legs and head tumbled to the ground. The torso was swallowed down in one bite. The smell of blood filled the air, and every single one of the Ironteeth witches inhaled deeply. The man in front of them took a too-casual step away.

The bull in the pit was now looking up at them, tail still slashing against the floor.

Magic was gone, and yet this was possible—this creation of magnificent beasts. Magic was gone, and yet Manon felt the sureness of the moment settle along her bones. She was meant to be here. She’d have Titus or no other.

Because she’d suffer no creature to be her mount but the fiercest, the one whose blackness called to her own. As her eyes met with the endless dark of Titus’s, she smiled at the wyvern.

She could have sworn he smiled back.





Chapter 13


Celaena didn’t realize how exhausted she was until all sounds—Emrys’s soft singing from the table, the thud of dough as he kneaded it, the chopping of Luca’s knife and his ceaseless chatter about everything and anything—stopped. And she knew what she’d find when she turned toward the stairwell. Her hands were pruny, fingers aching, back and neck throbbing, but … Rowan was leaning against the archway of the stairwell, arms crossed and violence beckoning in his lifeless eyes. “Let’s go.”

Though his features remained cold, she had the distinct impression that he was somewhat annoyed at her for not sulking in a corner, bemoaning the state of her nails. As she left, Luca drew a finger across his neck as he mouthed good luck.

Rowan led her through a small courtyard, where sentries tried to pretend they weren’t watching their every move, and out into the forest. The ward-magic woven between the ring of megaliths again nipped at her skin as they passed, and nausea washed through her. Without the constant heat of the kitchen, she was half-frozen by the time they strode between the moss-coated trees, but even that was only a vague flicker of feeling.

Rowan trekked up a rocky ridge toward the highest reaches of the forest, still clouded in mist. She barely paused to take in the view of the foothills below, the plains before them, all green and fresh and safe from Adarlan. Rowan didn’t utter a single word until they reached what looked like the weather-stained ruins of a temple.

It was now no more than a flat bed of stone blocks and columns whose carvings had been dulled by wind and rain. To her left lay Wendlyn, foothills and plains and peace. To her right arose the wall of the Cambrian Mountains, blocking any sight of the immortal lands beyond. Behind her, far down, she could make out the fortress snaking along the spine of the mountain.