Crown of Midnight (Throne of Glass #2)(70)

“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.

It would have been better if she’d stayed in Endovier. Better to have died there.

Her body didn’t feel quite like hers when she pulled the tray of food toward her, the metal scraping against the old, damp stones. She wasn’t even hungry.

“They drugged the water with a sedative,” Kaltain said as Celaena reached for the iron cup. “That’s what they do for me, too.”

“Good,” Celaena said, and drank the entire thing.

Three days passed. And every meal they brought her was drugged with that sedative.

Celaena stared into the abyss that now filled her dreams, both sleeping and awake. The forest on the other side was gone, and there was no stag; only barren terrain all around, crumbling rocks and a vicious wind that whispered the words again and again.

You are nothing more than a coward.

So Celaena drank the drugged water every time they offered it, and let it sweep her away.

“She drank the water about an hour ago,” Ress said to Chaol on the morning of the fourth day.

Chaol nodded. She was unconscious on the floor, her face gaunt. “Has she been eating?”

“A bite or two. She hasn’t tried to escape. And she hasn’t said one word to us, either.”

Chaol unlocked the cell door, and Ress and the other guards tensed.

But he couldn’t bear another moment without seeing her. Kaltain was asleep next door and didn’t stir as he strode across Celaena’s cell.

He knelt by Celaena. She reeked of old blood, and her clothes were stiff with it. His throat tightened.

In the castle above, it had been sheer pandemonium for the past several days. He had men combing the castle and city for Nehemia’s assassin. He had gone before the king multiple times already to try to explain what happened: how he’d gotten himself kidnapped, and how, even with extra men watching Nehemia, someone had slipped past them all. He was stunned the king hadn’t dismissed him—or worse.

The worst part was that the king seemed smug. He hadn’t had to dirty his hands to get rid of a problem. His main annoyance was dealing with the uproar that was sure to happen in Eyllwe. He hadn’t spared one moment to mourn Nehemia, or shown one flicker of remorse. It had taken a surprising amount of self-control for Chaol not to throttle his own sovereign.

But more than just his fate relied on his submission and good behavior. When Chaol had explained Celaena’s situation to the king, he had barely looked surprised. He’d just said to get her in line, and left it at that.

Get her in line.

Chaol gently picked up Celaena, trying not to grunt at the weight, and carried her out of the cell. He’d never forgive himself for throwing her in this rotting dungeon, even though he hadn’t had a choice. He hadn’t even let himself sleep in his own bed—the bed that still smelled like her. He’d laid down on it that first night and realized what she was lying on, and opted for his couch instead. The least he could do right now was get her back to her own rooms.

But he didn’t know how to get her in line. He didn’t know how to fix what had been broken. Both inside of her, and between them.

His men flanked him as he brought her up to her rooms.

Nehemia’s death hung around him, followed his every step. It had been days since he’d dared look in the mirror. Even if it hadn’t been the king who had ordered Nehemia dead, if Chaol had warned Celaena about the unknown threat, at least she would have been looking out. If he’d warned Nehemia, her men would have been on alert, too. Sometimes the reality of his decision hit him so hard he couldn’t breathe.

And then there was this reality, the reality he held in his arms as Ress opened the door to her rooms. Philippa was already waiting, beckoning him to the bathing chamber. He hadn’t even thought of that—that Celaena might need to be cleaned up before getting into bed.

He couldn’t meet the servant’s gaze as he walked into the bathing chamber, because he knew the truth he’d find there.

He’d realized it the moment Celaena had turned to him in Nehemia’s bedroom.

He had lost her.

And she would never, in a thousand lifetimes, let him in again.

Chapter 32

Celaena awoke in her own bed, and knew there would be no more sedatives in her water.

There would be no more breakfast conversations with Nehemia, nor would there be any more lessons on the Wyrdmarks. There would be no more friends like her.

She knew without looking that someone had scrubbed her clean. Blinking against the brightness of the sunlight in her room—her head instantly pounding after days in the darkness of the dungeon—she found Fleetfoot sleeping pressed against her. The dog lifted her head to lick Celaena’s arm a few times before going back to sleep, her nose nestled between Celaena’s elbow and torso. She wondered if Fleetfoot could sense the loss, too. She’d often wondered if Fleetfoot loved the princess more than her.