The Assassin and the Empire (Throne of Glass 0.5)(20)

Good.

This was her kill, her revenge to take. No one else’s.

A black fire rippled in her gut, spreading through her veins as she hopped onto the windowsill and eased outside.

Her fingers found purchase in the large white stones, and, with one eye on the guards at the distant gate, she climbed down the side of the house. No one noticed her, no one looked her way. The Keep was silent, the calm before the storm that would break when Arobynn and his assassins began their hunt.

Her landing was soft, no more than a whisper of boots against slick cobblestones. The guards were so focused on the street that they wouldn’t notice when she jumped the fence near the stables around the back.

Creeping around the exterior of the house was as simple as getting out of her room, and she was well within the shadows of the stables when a hand reached out and grabbed her.

She was hurled into the side of the wooden building, and had a dagger drawn by the time the thump finished echoing.

Wesley’s face, set with rage, seethed at her in the dark.

“Where in hell do you think you’re going?” he breathed, not loosening his grip on her shoulders even as she pressed her dagger to the side of his throat.

“Get out of my way,” she growled, hardly recognizing her own voice. “Arobynn can’t keep me locked up.”

“I’m not talking about Arobynn. Use your head and think, Celaena!” A flicker of her—a part of her that had somehow vanished since she’d shattered that clock—realized that this might be the first time he’d ever addressed her by her name.

“Get out of my way,” she repeated, pushing the edge of the blade harder against his exposed throat.

“I know you want revenge,” he panted. “I do, too—for what he did to Sam. I know you—”

She flicked the blade, angling it just enough that he reared back to avoid her slicing a deep line across his throat.

“Don’t you understand?” he pleaded, his eyes gleaming in the dark. “It’s all just a—”

But the fire rose up in Celaena and she whirled, using a move the Mute Master had taught her that summer, and Wesley’s eyes lost focus as she slammed the pommel of her dagger into the side of his head. He dropped like a stone.

Before he’d even finished collapsing, Celaena was sprinting for the fence. A moment later, she jumped it and vanished into the city streets.

She was fire, she was darkness, she was dust and blood and shadow.

She hurtled through the streets, each step faster than the last as that dark fire burned through thought and feeling until all that remained was her rage and her prey.

She took alleys and leapt over walls.

She’d slaughter them all.

Faster and faster, sprinting for that beautiful house on its quiet street, for the two men who had taken her world apart piece by piece, bone by shattered bone.

All she had to do was get to Jayne and Farran—everyone else was collateral. Arobynn had said they’d both be in their beds. That meant she had to get past all those guards at the front gate, the front door, and on the first floor … not to mention the guards that were sure to be outside the bedrooms.

But there was an easier way to get past all them. A way in that didn’t involve possibly alerting Farran and Jayne if the guards at the front door raised the alarm. Harding had mentioned something about a window on the second floor that he could leap through … Harding was a good tumbler, but she was better.

When she was a few streets away, she climbed the side of a house until she was on the roof and running again, fast enough to make the leap across the gap between houses.

She’d walked past Jayne’s house enough times in the past few days to know that it was separated from its neighbors by alleys probably fifteen feet wide.

She leapt across another gap between roofs.

Now that she thought of it, she knew there was a second-floor window facing one of those alleys—and she didn’t give a damn where that window opened to, just that it would get her inside before the guards on the first floor could notice.

The emerald roof of Jayne’s house gleamed, and Celaena skidded to a halt on the roof next door. A wide, flat stretch of the gabled roof stood between her and the long jump across the alley. If she aimed correctly and ran fast enough, she could make that leap and land through that second-floor window. The window was already thrown open, though the curtains had been drawn, blocking any view of what was within.

Despite the fog of rage, years of training made her instinctively scan the neighboring rooftops. Was it arrogance or stupidity that kept Jayne from having guards on the nearby roofs? Even the guards on the street didn’t look up at her.

Celaena untied her cloak and let it slide to the ground behind her. Any additional drag might be fatal, and she had no intention of dying until Jayne and Farran were dead.

The roof on which she stood was three stories high and faced the second-floor window across the alley. She factored in the distance and how fast she’d be falling, and made sure the swords crossed to her back were neatly tucked in. The window was wide, but she still needed to worry about the blades catching on the threshold. She backed up as far as she could to give herself running space.

Somewhere on that second floor slept Jayne and Farran. And somewhere in this house, they had destroyed Sam.

After she had killed them, perhaps she’d tear the house down stone by stone.