Tower of Dawn (Throne of Glass #6) - Sarah J. Maas Page 0,112

to discuss. With Lord Westfall.” She’d promised him as much last night. That they’d consider this precise path, weighing the pitfalls and benefits. They were still a team in that regard, still served under the same banner.

Sartaq nodded solemnly, as if he could read everything on her face. “Of course. Though I leave soon.”

She then heard it—the grunt of servants coming up the aerie stairs. Bringing supplies.

“You leave now,” Nesryn clarified as she noted the spear leaning against the far wall near the supply racks. His sulde. The russet horsehair tied beneath the blade drifted in the wind weaving through the aerie, the dark wood shaft polished and smooth.

Sartaq’s onyx eyes seemed to darken further as he strode to his sulde, weighing the spirit-banner in his hands before resting it beside him, the wood thunking on the stone floor. “I …” It was the first she’d seen him stumble for words.

“You weren’t going to say good-bye?”

She had no right to make such demands, expect such things, tentative allies or no.

But Sartaq leaned his sulde against the wall again and began braiding back his black hair. “After last night’s party, I had thought you would be … preoccupied.”

With Chaol. Her brows rose. “All day?”

The prince gave her a roguish smile, finishing off his long braid and picking up his spear once more. “I certainly would take all day.”

By some god’s mercy, Nesryn was saved from replying by the servants who appeared, panting and red-faced with the packs between them. Weapons glinted from some of them, along with food and blankets.

“How far is it?”

“A few hours before nightfall, then all day tomorrow, then another half day of travel to reach the first of the aeries in the Tavan Mountains,” Sartaq said as he handed his sulde to a passing servant, and Kadara patiently allowed them to load her with various packs.

“You don’t fly at night?”

“I tire. Kadara doesn’t. Foolish riders have made that mistake—and tumbled through the clouds in their dreams.”

She bit her lip. “How long until you go?”

“An hour.”

An hour to think …

She had not told Chaol. That she’d seen his toes move last night. She’d seen them curl and flex in his sleep.

She had cried, silent tears of joy sliding onto the pillow. She hadn’t told him. And when he’d awoken …

Let’s have an adventure, Nesryn Faliq, he’d promised her in Rifthold. She had cried then, too.

But perhaps … perhaps neither of them had seen. The path ahead. The forks in it.

She could see down one path clearly.

Honor and loyalty, still unbroken. Even if it stifled him. Stifled her. And she … she did not want to be a consolation prize. Be pitied or a distraction.

But this other path, the fork that had appeared, branching away across grasslands and jungles and rivers and mountains … This path toward answers that might help them, might mean nothing, might change the course of this war, all carried on a ruk’s golden wings …

She would have an adventure. For herself. This one time. She would see her homeland, and smell it and breathe it in. See it from high above, see it racing as fast as the wind.

She owed herself that much. And owed it to Chaol as well.

Perhaps she and this dark-eyed prince might find some scrap of salvation against Morath. And perhaps she might bring an army back with her.

Sartaq was still watching, his face carefully neutral as the last of the servants bowed and vanished. His sulde had been strapped just below the saddle, within easy reach should the prince need it, its reddish horsehairs trailing in the wind. Trailing southward.

Toward that distant, wild land of the Tavan Mountains. Beckoning, as all spirit-banners did, toward an unknown horizon. Beckoning to claim whatever waited there.

Nesryn said quietly, “Yes.”

The prince blinked.

“I will go with you,” she clarified.

A small smile tugged on his mouth. “Good.” Sartaq jerked his chin to the archway through which the servants had vanished down the minaret. “Pack lightly, though—Kadara is already near her limit.”

Nesryn shook her head, noting the bow and quiver stocked with arrows already atop Kadara. “I have nothing to bring with me.”

Sartaq watched her for a long moment. “Surely you would wish to say good-bye—”

“I have nothing,” she repeated. His eyes flickered at that, but she added, “I—I’ll leave a note.”

The prince solemnly nodded. “I can outfit you with clothes when we arrive. There is paper and ink in the cabinet by the far wall. Leave the letter in the box by the stairs, and