Crown of Midnight

The person outside the library probably had nothing to do with the king, Celaena told herself as she walked—still not sprinting—down the hall to her room. There were plenty of strange people in a castle this large, and even though she rarely saw another soul in the library, perhaps some people just … wished to go to the library alone. And unidentified. In a court where reading was so out of fashion, perhaps it was merely some courtier trying to hide a passionate love of books from his or her sneering friends.

Some animalistic, eerie courtier. Who had caused her amulet to glow.

Celaena entered her bedroom just as the lunar eclipse was beginning, and groaned. “Of course there’s an eclipse,” she grumbled, turning from the balcony doors and approaching the tapestry along the wall.

And even though she didn’t want to, even though she’d hoped to never see Elena again … she needed answers.

Maybe the dead queen would laugh at her and tell her it was nothing. Gods above, she hoped Elena would say that. Because if she didn’t …

Celaena shook her head and glanced at Fleetfoot. “Care to join me?” The dog, as if sensing what she was about to do, made a good show of turning circles on the bed and curling up with a huff. “I thought so.”

In a matter of moments, Celaena shoved the large chest of drawers from its spot in front of the tapestry that hid the secret door, grabbed a candle, and began walking down, down, down the forgotten stairs to the landing far below.

The three stone archways greeted her. The one on the far left led to a passage that allowed for spying on the Great Hall. The one in the center led to the sewers and the concealed exit that might someday save her life. And the one on the right … that one led down to the ancient queen’s forgotten tomb.

As she walked to the tomb, she didn’t dare look at the landing where she’d discovered Cain summoning the ridderak from another world, even though the debris of the door the creature had shattered still littered the stairs. There were gouges in the stone wall where the ridderak had come crashing through, chasing her down to the tomb, until she’d just barely reached Damaris, sword of the long-dead King Gavin, in time to slay the monster.

Celaena glanced at her hand, where a ring of white scars punctured her palm and encircled her thumb. If Nehemia hadn’t found her that night, the poison from the ridderak’s bite would have killed her.

At last, she reached the door at the bottom of the spiral staircase and found herself staring at the skull-shaped bronze knocker in its center.

Perhaps this hadn’t been a good idea. Perhaps the answers weren’t worth it.

She should go back upstairs. Come to think of it, this could only be bad.

Elena had seemed satisfied that Celaena had obeyed her command to become the King’s Champion, but if she showed up, then it would seem like she was willing to do another one of Elena’s tasks. And the Wyrd knew that she had enough on her hands right now.

Even if that—that thing in the hall just now hadn’t seemed friendly.

The skull knocker seemed to smile at her, its hollow eyes boring into hers.

Gods above, she should just leave.

But her fingers were somehow reaching for the door handle, as if an invisible hand were guiding her—

“Aren’t you going to knock?”

Celaena leapt back, a dagger already in her hand and angled to spill blood as she pressed herself into the wall. It was impossible—she had to have imagined it.

The skull knocker had spoken. Its mouth had moved up and down.

Yes, this was certainly, absolutely, undeniably impossible. Far more unlikely and incomprehensible than anything Elena had ever said or done.

Staring at her with gleaming metal eyes, the bronze skull clicked its tongue. It had a tongue.

Maybe she’d slipped on the stairs and smacked her head into the stones. That would make more sense than this. An endless, filthy stream of curses began flowing through her head, each more vulgar than the next, as she gaped at the knocker.

“Oh, don’t be so pathetic,” the skull huffed, its eyes narrowing. “I’m attached to this door. I cannot harm you.”

“But you’re”—she swallowed hard—“magic.”

It was impossible—it should be impossible. Magic was gone, vanished from the land ten years ago, before it had even been outlawed by the king.

“Everything in this world is magic. Thank you ever so kindly for stating the obvious.”

She calmed her reeling mind long enough to say, “But magic doesn’t work anymore.”

“New magic doesn’t. But the king cannot erase old spells made with older powers—like the Wyrdmarks. Those ancient spells still hold; especially ones that imbue life.”

“You’re … alive?”

The knocker chuckled. “Alive? I’m made of bronze. I do not breathe, nor do I eat or drink. So, no, I am not alive. Nor am I dead, for that matter. I simply exist.”

She stared at the small knocker. It was no larger than her fist.

“You should apologize,” it said. “You have no idea how loud and tiresome you’ve been these past few months, with all your running down here and slaying foul beasties. I kept quiet until I thought you’d witnessed enough strange things that you could accept my existence. But apparently, I am to be disappointed.”

Hands trembling, she sheathed her dagger and set down her candle. “I’m so glad you finally found me worth speaking to.”

The bronze skull closed its eyes. The skull had eyelids. How had she not noticed it before? “Why should I speak to someone who doesn’t have the courtesy to greet me, or even to knock?”

Celaena took a calming breath and looked at the door. The stones of the threshold still bore gouges from where the ridderak had passed through. “Is she in there?”

“Is who in there?” the skull said coyly.

“Elena—the queen.”

“Of course she is. She’s been in there for a thousand years.” The skull’s eyes seemed to glow.

“Don’t mock me, or I’ll peel you off this door and melt you down.”

“Not even the strongest man in the world could peel me from this door. King Brannon himself put me here to watch over her tomb.”

“You’re that old?”

The skull huffed. “How insensitive of you to insult me about my age.”

Celaena crossed her arms. Nonsense—magic always led to nonsense like this. “What’s your name?”

“What is your name?”

“Celaena Sardothien,” she ground out.

The skull barked a laugh. “Oh, that is too funny! The funniest thing I’ve heard in centuries!”

“Be quiet.”

“My name is Mort, if you must know.”

She picked up the candle. “Can I expect all of our encounters to be this pleasant?” She reached for the door handle.

“Aren’t you even going to knock, after all that? You truly have no manners.”

She used all of her self-control to avoid banging on his little face as she made three unnecessarily loud knocks on the wooden door.

Mort smirked as the door silently swung open. “Celaena Sardothien,” he said to himself, and began laughing again. Celaena hissed in his direction and kicked the door shut.

The tomb was dim with foggy light, and Celaena approached the grate through which it poured, carried down from the surface by a silver-coated shaft. It was normally brighter in here, but the eclipse made the tomb increasingly murky.

She paused not too far from the threshold, set the candle on the floor, and found herself staring at—nothing.

Elena wasn’t there.

“Hello?”

Mort chuckled from the other side of the door.

Celaena rolled her eyes and yanked the door back open. Of course Elena wouldn’t actually be here when she had an important question. Of course she’d only have something like Mort to talk to. Of course, of course, of course.

“Is she coming tonight?” Celaena demanded.

“No,” Mort said simply, as if she should have known already. “She nearly burnt herself out helping you these past few months.”

“What? So she’s … gone?”

“For the time being—until she regains her strength.”

Celaena crossed her arms, taking yet another long, long breath. The chamber seemed the same as it had been the last time she was here. Two stone sarcophagi lay in the center, one depicting Gavin, Elena’s husband and the first King of Adarlan, and the other Elena, both with eerily lifelike quality. Elena’s silver hair spilled over the side of the coffin, disrupted only by the crown atop her head and the delicately pointed ears that marked her as half human, half Fae. Celaena’s attention lingered on the words etched at Elena’s feet: Ah! Time’s Rift!

Brannon, Elena’s Fae father—not to mention the first King of Terrasen—had carved the words into the sarcophagus himself.

The whole tomb was strange, actually. Stars had been carved into the floor, and trees and flowers adorned the arched ceiling. The walls were all etched with Wyrdmarks, the ancient symbols that could be used to access a power that still worked—a power that Nehemia and her family had long kept secret until Cain had somehow mastered it. If the king ever learned of their power, if he knew it could summon creatures as Cain had done, he could unleash endless evil upon Erilea. And his plans would become even more deadly.

“But Elena did tell me that if you deigned to come here again,” Mort said, “she had a message for you.”

Celaena had a feeling of standing in front of a cresting wave, waiting-waiting-waiting for it to break. It could wait—the message could wait, the oncoming burden could wait—for another moment or two of freedom. She walked to the back of the tomb, which had been piled with jewels and gold and trunks overflowing with treasure.

Before it all was displayed a suit of armor and Damaris, the legendary sword of Gavin. Its hilt was silvery gold and had little ornamentation save for a pommel in the shape of an eye. No jewel lay in the socket; it was only an empty ring of gold. Some legends claimed that when Gavin wielded Damaris, he would see only the truth, and that was why he had been crowned king. Or some nonsense like that.

Damaris’s scabbard was decorated by a few Wyrdmarks. Everything seemed connected to those blasted symbols. Celaena scowled and examined the king’s armor. It still bore scratches and indentations upon its golden front. From battles, no doubt. Perhaps even the fight with Erawan, the dark lord who had led an army of demons and the dead against the continent when the kingdoms had been little more than warring territories.

Elena had said that she was a warrior, too. But her armor was nowhere to be seen. Where had it gone? It was probably lying forgotten in a castle somewhere in the kingdoms.

Forgotten. The same way legend had reduced the fierce warrior-princess to nothing more than a damsel in a tower, whom Gavin had rescued.

“It’s not over, is it?” Celaena asked Mort at last.

“No,” Mort said, quieter than he’d been before. This was what Celaena had been dreading for weeks—for months.

The moonlight in the tomb was fading. Soon the eclipse would be complete, and the tomb would be dark, save for the candle.

“Let’s hear her message,” Celaena said, sighing.

Mort cleared his throat, and then said in a voice that sounded eerily like the queen’s, “ ‘If I could leave you in peace, I would. But you have lived your life aware that you will never escape certain burdens. Whether you like it or not, you are bound to the fate of this world. As the King’s Champion, you are now in a position of power, and you can make a difference in the lives of many.’ ” Celaena’s stomach turned over.

“Cain and the ridderak were just the beginning of the threat to Erilea,” Mort said, the words echoing around the tomb. “There is a far deadlier power poised to devour the world.”

“And I have to find it, I suppose?”

“Yes. There will be clues to lead you to it. Signs you must follow. Refusing to kill the king’s targets is only the first and smallest step.”

Celaena looked toward the ceiling, as if she could see through the tree-carved surface to the library far, far above. “I saw someone in the castle hallway tonight. Something. It made the amulet glow.”

“Human?” Mort asked, sounding reluctantly intrigued.

“I don’t know,” Celaena admitted. “It didn’t feel like it.” She closed her eyes, taking a steadying breath. She’d been waiting for this for months. “It’s all connected to the king, isn’t it? All of these awful things? Even Elena’s command—that’s about finding whatever power he has, the threat he poses.”

“You already know the answer to that.”

Her heart thundered—with fear, with anger, she didn’t know. “If she’s so damn powerful and knows so much, then she can go find the king’s source of power herself.”

“It is your fate, and your responsibility.”

“There is no such thing as fate,” Celaena hissed.

“Says the girl who was saved from the ridderak because some force compelled her down here on Samhuinn, to see Damaris and learn it was here.”

Celaena took a step closer to the door. “Says the girl who spent a year in Endovier. Says the girl who knows that the gods care no more for our lives than we care for an insect beneath our feet.” She glared into Mort’s gleaming face. “Come to think of it, I can’t quite recall why I should bother helping Erilea, when the gods so clearly don’t bother to help us, either.”

“You don’t mean that,” he said.

Celaena gripped the hilt of her dagger. “I do. So tell Elena to find some other fool to impose upon.”

“You must discover where the king’s power comes from and what he plans to do—before it’s too late.”

Celaena snorted. “Don’t you understand? It’s already too late. It’s been too late for years now. Where was Elena ten years ago, when there was a whole host of heroes that she could have had her pick of? Where were she and her ridiculous quests when the world truly needed them—when Terrasen’s heroes were cut down or hunted and executed by Adarlan’s armies? Where was she when the kingdoms fell, one by one, to the king?” Her eyes burned, but she shoved the pain down to that dark place where it dwelled inside of her. “The world is already in ruin, and I won’t be set on some fool’s errand.”

Mort’s eyes narrowed. Inside the tomb, the light had faded; the moon was almost fully covered now. “I am sorry for what you have lost,” he said in a voice that was not quite his. “And I am sorry about your parents’ deaths that night. It was—”

“Don’t you ever talk about my parents,” Celaena snarled, pointing a finger at his face. “I don’t give a damn if you’re magic or if you’re Elena’s lackey or if you’re just some figment of my imagination. You talk about my parents again, and I’ll hack this door to pieces. Understand?”

Mort just glowered at her. “You’re that selfish? That cowardly? Why did you come down here tonight, Celaena? To help us all? Or just to help yourself? Elena told me about you—about your past.”

“Shut your rutting face,” she snapped, and stormed up the stairs.