“A decent attempt, but Celaena Sardothien looked a little more amused when she cut men into ribbons.”
He knew—who Aelin was, what she’d been. Lysandra said nothing, and kept walking toward her tent. If she told Aedion, how quickly could Nox be buried under the frozen earth?
“Your secret is safe,” Nox murmured. “Celaena—Aelin was a friend. Is still one, I’d hope.”
“How.” She’d admit no more than that regarding her role in this.
“We fought in the competition together at the glass castle.” He snorted. “I had no idea until today. Gods, I was there for Minister Joval as a spy for the rebels. It was my first time out of Perranth. My first time, and I wound up unwittingly training alongside my queen.” He laughed, low and amazed. “I’d been working with the rebels for years, even as a thief. They wanted me to be their inside eyes on the castle, the king’s plans. I reported the strange goings-on until it became too dangerous. Until Cel—Aelin warned me to run. I listened, and came back here. Joval is dead. Fell in a skirmish with a band of rebels by the border this spring. Darrow plucked me up to be his own messenger and spy. So here I am.” A sidelong glance at her, awe still on his face. “I am at your disposal, even if you’re not … you.” He angled his head. “Who are you, anyway?”
“Aelin.”
Nox smiled knowingly. “Fair enough.”
Lysandra paused before the queen’s too-small tent, nestled between Aedion’s and Ren’s own. “What’s the cost of your silence? Or does Darrow already know?”
“Why would I tell him? I serve Terrasen, and the Galathynius family. I always have.”
“Some might say Darrow has a strong claim to the throne, given his relationship with Orlon.”
“I realized today that the assassin I came to call a friend is actually the queen I believed dead. I think the gods are pointing me in a certain direction, don’t you?”
She lingered between the tent flaps. Delicious warmth beckoned within. “And if I were to tell you we needed your help tonight, and that the risk was being branded a traitor?”
Nox only sketched a bow. “Then I’d say I owe my friend Celaena a favor for her warning at the castle, plus saving my life before that.”
She didn’t know why she trusted him. But she’d developed an instinct for men that had always proved correct, even if she had been unable to act on it in the past. Had only been able to brace herself for them.
But Nox Owen—the kindness in his face was true. His words were true. Another ally Aelin had wrangled for them, this time unwittingly.
She knew Aedion would agree to the plan, even if he still hated her. So Lysandra leaned in, her voice dropping to a whisper. “Then listen carefully.”
It was done quietly and without a trace.
Every intricate element played out without issue, as if the gods themselves aided them.
At dinner, Nox Owen laced the wine he’d personally served—as a groveling apology for letting in the Valg soldier—to Lords Darrow, Sloane, Gunnar, and Ironwood. Not to kill them, but to send them into a deep, dreamless sleep.
Even a roaring bear couldn’t wake this lout, Ansel of Briarcliff had sniffed when she’d stood over Lord Gunnar’s cot, lifted his limp arm, and let it drop.
The lord didn’t stir, and Lysandra, wearing a field mouse’s form and tucked into the shadows behind the queen, deemed it proof enough.
The four lords’ loyal banner men also found themselves sleeping deeply that night, courtesy of the wine that Galan Ashryver, Ilias, Ren, and Ravi had made sure was handed out at their fires.
And when they all awoke the next day, there was only whipping snow beyond their tents.
The camp was gone.
The army with it.
CHAPTER 18
No one in Anielle or the gray-stoned keep looming over its southern edge shouted with alarm at the ruk that descended from the skies and alit upon the battlements.
The keep sentries who’d been on watch had only drawn their weapons, one racing into the dim interior, and pointed them at Chaol and Yrene as they slid off the mighty bird.
The cold on the open ocean was nothing compared to the wind off the wall of mountains the city had been built against, or the blistering chill from the sprawling Silver Lake it curved around, so flat that it looked like a mighty mirror spread beneath the gray sky.
Yrene knew Anielle’s layout was as familiar to Chaol as his own body—and knew, from the memories she’d seen in his soul and what he’d told her these months, that the gray shingles of the roofs had been hewn from the slate quarries just to the south, the timber of the houses taken from the tangle of Oakwald lurking beyond the flat plain that bordered the southern side of the lake. A small offshoot of peaks jutted like an arm from the snaking body of the Fangs, hemming in the city between it and the Silver Lake—and it was into the barren slopes that the keep had been built.
Level after level, Westfall Keep rose from the plain to the higher reaches of the mountain behind it, the lowermost gate opening onto the flat expanse of snow, while other levels flowed into the city to its left. It had been built as a fortress, the countless levels, battlements, and gates all designed to outlast an enemy assault. The gray stones bore the scars of just how many it had witnessed and survived, none more so than the thick curtain wall that encompassed the keep.
Intimidating, imposing, unforgiving—Chaol had told her the keep had never been built for beauty or pleasure. Indeed, no colorful banners flapped in the wind. No scent or spices drifted on it, either. Just chill, thick dampness.
From the lichen-crusted upper towers, Yrene knew that one could monitor any movements on the lake or the plain, in the city or the forest, even along the slopes of the Fangs. How many hours had her husband spent on the tower walkways, gazing toward Rifthold, wishing he were anywhere but this cold, dark place?
Chaol stayed close to Yrene, his chin high, as he announced to the dozen guards aiming their swords at them that he was Lord Chaol Westfall, and he wished to see his father. Immediately.
She’d never heard him use that voice. A different sort of authority. A lord’s voice.
A lord—and she was a lady, she supposed. Even if flying had forced her to abandon her usual dresses in favor of rukhin leathers, even if she was certain her braided hair had been whipped in about a dozen directions and would take hours and a bath to detangle.
They lingered on the battlements in silence, and Chaol’s gloved hand slid into her own, the wind ruffling the fur along his heavy cloak collar. His face revealed nothing but grim determination, yet the hand he squeezed around her own … She knew what this homecoming meant.
She’d never forget the memory she’d witnessed of the father who had thrown him down the stone steps a few levels below, granting Chaol the hidden scar just past his hairline. A child. He’d hurled a child down those stairs and forced him to make his way to Rifthold on foot.
She doubted her second impression of her father-in-law would be any better.
Certainly not as a gaunt-faced man appeared in a gray tunic and said, “Come this way.”
No title, no honorific. No welcome.
Yrene tightened her grip around Chaol’s hand. They had come to warn the people of this city—not the bastard who had left such brutal scars upon her husband’s soul. Those people deserved the warning, the protection.
Yrene reminded herself of that fact as they entered the gloomy keep interior.
The tall, narrow passageway wasn’t much better than the exterior. Slender windows set high in the walls permitted little light, and ancient braziers cast flickering shadows on the stones. Threadbare tapestries hung intermittently, and no sounds—not music, not laughter, not conversation—greeted them.
This drafty, ancient house had been his home? Compared to the khagan’s palace, it was a hovel, not fit for ruks to roost.
“My father,” Chaol murmured so their escort wouldn’t hear, no doubt reading the dismay on Yrene’s face, “doesn’t believe in wasting his coffers on improvements. If it hasn’t collapsed, then it’s not broken.”
Yrene tried to smile at the attempt at humor, tried to do it for his sake, but her temper roiled with every step down the hall. Their silent escort at last paused before two towering oak doors, the wood as old and rotting as the keep itself, and knocked once.