Queen of Shadows (Throne of Glass #4) - Sarah J. Maas Page 0,101

the mushrooms. “You’re even more dramatic than I am.”

Aedion snorted. “Hurry up with the eggs. I’m going to die of starvation.”

“Make the bacon, or you don’t get to eat any.”

Aedion could hardly move fast enough.

30

There was a room deep below the stone castle that the demon lurking inside him liked to visit.

The demon prince even let him out sometimes, through the eyes that might have once been his.

It was a room cloaked in endless night. Or maybe the darkness was from the demon.

But they could see; they had always been able to see in the blackness. Where the demon prince had come from, so little light existed that it had learned to hunt in the shadows.

There were pedestals arranged in the round room in an elegant curve, each topped with a black pillow. And on each pillow sat a crown.

Kept down here like trophies—kept in darkness. Like him.

A secret room.

The prince stood in the center of it, surveying the crowns.

The demon had taken control of the body completely. He’d let him, after that woman with the familiar eyes had failed to kill him.

He waited for the demon to leave the room, but the demon prince spoke instead. A hissing, cold voice that came from between the stars, speaking to him—only to him.

The crowns of the conquered nations, the demon prince said. More will be added soon. Perhaps the crowns of other worlds, too.

He did not care.

You should care—you will enjoy it as we rip the realms to shreds.

He backed away, tried to retreat into a pocket of darkness where even the demon prince couldn’t find him.

The demon laughed. Spineless human. No wonder she lost her head.

He tried to shut out the voice.

Tried to.

He wished that woman had killed him.

31

Manon stormed into Perrington’s massive war tent, shoving aside the heavy canvas flap so violently that her iron nails slashed through the material. “Why are my Thirteen being denied access to the Yellowlegs coven? Explain. Now.”

As the last word snapped out of her, Manon stopped dead.

Standing in the center of the dim tent, the duke whirled toward her, his face dark—and, Manon had to admit with a thrill, a bit terrifying. “Get out,” he said, his eyes flaring like embers.

But Manon’s attention was fixed on what—who—stood beyond the duke.

Manon stepped forward, even as the duke advanced on her.

Her black, filmy dress like woven night, Kaltain was facing a kneeling, trembling young soldier, her pale hand outstretched toward his contorted face.

And all over her, an unholy aura of dark fire burned.

“What is that?” Manon said.

“Out,” the duke barked, and actually had the nerve to lunge for Manon’s arm. She swiped with her iron nails, sidestepping the duke without so much as glancing at him. All her focus, every pore of her, was pinned on the dark-haired lady.

The young soldier—one of Perrington’s own—was silently sobbing as tendrils of that black fire floated from Kaltain’s fingertips and slithered over his skin, leaving no marks. The human turned pain-filled gray eyes to Manon. Please, he mouthed.

The duke snatched for Manon again, and she darted past him. “Explain this.”

“You do not give orders, Wing Leader,” the duke snapped. “Now get out.”

“What is that?” Manon repeated.

The duke surged for her, but then a silken female voice breathed, “Shadowfire.”

Perrington froze, as if surprised she had spoken.

“Where does this shadowfire come from?” Manon demanded. The woman was so small, so thin. The dress was barely more than cobwebs and shadows. It was cold in the mountain camp, even for Manon. Had she refused a cloak, or did they just not care? Or perhaps, with this fire … Perhaps she did not need one at all.

“From me,” Kaltain said, in a voice that was dead and hollow and yet vicious. “It has always been there—asleep. And now it has been awoken. Shaped anew.”

“What does it do?” Manon said. The duke had stopped to observe the young woman, like he was figuring out some sort of puzzle, like he was waiting for something else.

Kaltain smiled faintly at the soldier shaking on the ornate red carpet, his golden-brown hair shimmering in the light of the dimmed lantern above him. “It does this,” she whispered, and curled her delicate fingers.

The shadowfire shot from her hand and wrapped around the soldier like a second skin.

He opened his mouth in a silent scream—convulsing and thrashing, tipping his head back to the ceiling of the tent and sobbing in quiet, unheard agony.

But no burns marred his skin. As if the shadowfire summoned only pain, as if it