All the spoilers ahead. Proceed with extreme caution! Celaena Sardothien, Adarlan’s most notorious assassin, trained since the day the Assassin King Arobynn found her near death at the age of eight, has been enslaved in the Endovier salt mines for a year. But today when she leaves the mines, the Captain of the Royal Guard, Chaol Westfall, is waiting for her. He takes her to speak to the Crown Prince of Adarlan, Dorian Havilliard, whose father sentenced her to this life. They discuss her incarceration and her failed suicide/escape attempt, before he tells her that he had a proposition for her. He would like her to work for his father as his personal muscle when certain political figures won’t play along. She was the crown’s assassin for six years and then she earns her freedom. But she must win the job. Each of the king’s twenty-three advisors have chosen a candidate to train and compete for the role, winner gets the job, if she loses, she gets sent back to the mines. She will get a salary, but she will have to use an alias. She agrees, but only after talking them down to a term of four years instead of six. Arobynn found her on the banks of an icy river in her home of Terrasen. Newly orphaned and having jumped out of a window and into the river to avoid death herself. He gave her a new name and trained her to become an assassin, if she’d refused his offer, he would likely have turned her over to those who wanted to kill her. She travels with the crown prince through the forest of Terrasen now, though much of it has been burned by the order of the king. A forest that legend says was the home to King Brannon of the fae, but the soldiers believe the fae and the faeries have been eradicated. The King of Adarlan has outlawed magic in all the areas of his conquest, claiming it an affront to the Goddess. But it wasn’t because of him that magic disappeared. The faeries and Fae fled, and magic disappeared all on its own. Celaena herself used to have a gift, before the magic left. But the next morning, when she wakes up in her tent, there’s tiny white flowers at the foot of her cot with small footprints in and out of the tent. She destroys the evidence so no one but her sees it and keeps her eyes on the forest as they ride that day. She doesn’t see anything else on her two-week ride to Rifthold, the Capitol of Adarlan. But the last night, she speaks to Captain Chaol about how she was caught and how awful the mines were. Inside the city, Celaena sees slaves working the docks and being taken off of boats from lands that have been conquered and she feels sick. The competition starts the next day, she’s shown to her rooms. She given clothes and bathed and meets her personal servant, Philippa, who is more than a match for Celaena’s attitude. Meanwhile, Celaena stores everything she learns about the castle and its layout and people in case she has a need for it. The king is at war with Wendlyn and set on conquering all of Erilea. His eldest son, Dorian, does not agree with nor does he like his father, and it seems that the feeling is mostly mutual, but the alternative is Dorian’s younger, spoiled, and far more volatile brother Hollin. Celaena convinces Chaol to give her a tour of the palace, although she refuses to go in the addition made of glass, and she sees a massive clock that the king had built around the time Dorian was born. It’s awful, it sounds horrible, and it looks scary, but she notices that where one of the gargoyles is pointing, there is a symbol on the pathway. Chaol says he doesn’t know what the symbol is for but agrees that the clock is not enjoyable. Then she finds the library and is enamored, but when she is told she cannot use it without permission from the king or prince, she writes to Dorian to ask to be allowed to borrow some books. He agrees but sends her seven books for her to read first, ones he enjoyed so they might discuss them. Celaena is called to meet the king, along with the other twenty-three competitors, among them the muscled out giant named Cain. The king explains that they will live in the palace and train every day, they will be tested weekly and every week one of them will be eliminated, at the end of thirteen weeks they will have the winner. When there are four contestants left, in a duel until there is only one left. Once she’s dismissed, the prince fills her in on their plan. Her alias is Lillian Gordaina, a wealthy heiress who moonlights as a jewel thief until she gets into a bit of trouble trying to rob the prince. They meet Lady Kaltain Rompier, who is super rich and clearly has set her eyes on Dorian, but it doesn’t seem he feels the same way. The next morning, the competition begins and Celaena trains with Chaol. She sees Cain and they clash right away. Training is interrupted by Theodus Brullo, weapons master and competition judge. The competitors introduce themself with name, occupation, and where they’re from. There’re seven soldiers from the army including Cain), four thieves, three mercenaries, two murderers, two associates of a foreign warlord, and five assassins including one named Grave who is accompanied by five guards. And Celaena. Their first task is to go for a run, whoever can’t finish goes back to prison. It takes everything but Celaena finishes before stumbling to the woods to vomit. Celaena starts to train like she means it. After training the next day, she takes a walk around the palace with Chaol and sees Lady Kaltain again, this time with an Eyllwe woman, Princess Nehemia Ytger. Nehemia, who is called the Light of Eyllwe and may be able to save her people from the king who conquers everywhere, who smuggles (allegedly) information and weapons to the rebels. Celaena has the chance to speak to Nehemia in the princess’ native language. When Chaol offers to escort the princess, she dismisses Kaltain. Nehemia explains that she is there to learn the language and customs to better serve her country when it is her time to rule, but she hopes she won’t be gone from Eyllwe long. Chaol talks to the king’s council about Nehemia’s escorts, and who they should not be, and while he’s busy, Nehemia asks for Celaena to keep her company when she can and Celaena agrees. Chaol and Celaena train together every day before official training begins for the day, until the day before the first trial. She hears at training that one of the murderer competitors was found brutally murdered himself. She starts to train with Nox, the thief that comes from Perranth, the largest city in Terrasen, and they become friendly. That evening, Chaol comes to see her. He refuses to speak of the murder, so she asks him how long he’s been friends with the prince. He explains that they grew up together, the only two noble boys of the same age in the palace. When his father had him come home to learn about being the Lord of Anielle, which he was heir to, he missed Rifthold so much that he abdicated his title to his younger brother and became apprentice to the Captain of the Guard. She tells him her parents are dead. She’s from Terrasen, became an assassin, went to Endovier as a slave, and is here now. The day of the first test comes and it is, underwhelmingly, an archery contest. Each contestant shoots five arrows at five targets that progressively get more difficult. Celaena does well but tries not to show off but is really struggling with Cain being the best. One of the army soldiers is eliminated. Halfway through the next week, another of the army soldiers tries to escape during training and is killed by the palace guards. A day before the next test, Prince Dorian has a visit with his mother, during which she gives him a list of potential brides, none of which pique his interest. On his way from his mother, he sees Celaena training with a sword, and Princess Nehemia. He steps in to tell the two women they can’t spar together, is chastised by Celaena for not speaking to her almost at all since they’ve arrived at the palace and is coerced into sparring with Nehemia himself. Eventually Chaol shows up and makes Celaena go to her room to rest. Kaltain, who had been hoping to catch Dorian as he visited with his mother, instead must see Duke Perrington (Cain’s sponsor). She starts a rumor that Dorian is in love with “Lillian” and is pleased when Perrington reacts with anger. Meanwhile, Chaol tells Dorian that the murder of the champion is still being investigated but that the victim’s organs were all removed. Dorian teases him a bit about liking Celaena though Chaol insists he does not. He does not say that he may like Celaena a little bit too. That night, Celaena plays the piano and remembers her more than a friend Sam, who died. Dorian hears her playing and catches her crying. They argue, then he tells her that he didn’t invite her to the palace because he craved adventure. She tells him a very little about Sam, and that he died thirteen months ago, before Dorian leave. The second test starts the next day, they must scale the castle walls up ninety feet. The last to make it gets eliminated. The winner is the first person to reach the mark, get the flag, and retreat back down the wall. One of the competitors doesn’t show up and no one can find him. The other murderer falls during the climb and dies upon impact. During the climb, one of the assassins, Grave, pushes Nox so that he dangles from his rope, then begins to cut the rope with a knife he should not have. Celaena decides to move from where she is climbing up a drainpipe, commandeer another contestant’s rope, and use it to save Nox’s life. They then have to finish the climb. Celaena comes in eighteenth out of nineteen, Nox right behind her, saved from elimination by the death of the competitor that fell. Later that night, Chaol has dinner in her rooms at they don’t apologize for the mean things they said to each other when he made her leave while Nehemia was sparring, but they decide they’re okay. They find the missing candidate, murdered and organs removed, in the servant’s stairwell. Two more tests come and go, thankfully no one else is murdered, but Celaena is no longer sure that she will be the winner. It is taking too long to recondition her body. She starts to have nightmares of returning to the salt mines. Samhuinn comes and Celaena decides not to attend the church service, and she’s not allowed to attend the festival. She spends part of the day with Princess Nehemia (and Chaol) and they run into Prince Dorian, who knows that Duke Perrington is lobbying to keep Nehemia as a hostage and send more soldiers into Eyllwe to put down the rebels. Dorian wants to warn her but can’t, Perrington would know where the leak came from. He talks to the women for a moment, realizing that Celaena is irritated that she can’t go to the festival. When they leave, he feels a bit shaken but he’s not sure why. Outside, Nehemia requests that Celaena tutor her in Celaena’s language, and she won’t take no for an answer. Celaena and Chaol are trying to explain why Celaena can’t tutor her when they see Chaol bowing before the creepy clock tower. When he hears them approach, he leaves. He’d been digging around the mark that Celaena had noticed in the stones. Nehemia recognizes the mark as a Wyrdmark, from a long dead ancient religion. She can’t read them, but she encourages Celaena to leave them alone. Nehemia is studying Celaena carefully, so Celaena agrees to tutor her to distract her. Just don’t tell Chaol. In her rooms that night, she discovers that a breeze is moving a tapestry even though the window is shut. Moving it, she finds a secret door. She enters the passageway and eventually reaches a three-way split. She takes the middle route and, although there are many paths shooting off, she eventually finds a way out of the castle. She does not leave, knowing they would only pursue her, but she stores this in case she ever needs it. When she retreats to the first branching of the path, she thinks about taking the path to the right but decides to wait when she hears strange whispers. Instead, she goes left and finds herself looking down at the Great Hall. She sees that all the other competitors except Cain are there. Then she sees Chaol start to leave and panics, he might be heading to her rooms. She runs back before he can see that she’s missing. She falls asleep on the bed and does not realize that Prince Dorian comes to her room at two in the morning. Before he does anything more than look at her, Chaol also arrives and chases him away. He came to give her a token from the feast that was being handed out to the women who attended, a small amethyst ring. She wakes up when he enters and puts it on before falling back asleep. He covers her with a blanket before leaving. Celaena dreams of the secret passageway and in her dreams, she takes the right fork. She follows the path to a room where she finds two sarcophagi, a woman and a man. On the women’s sarcophagus, she sees a Wyrdmark like one near the clock. She notices that the floor of this room depicts the sky, the ceiling shows the earth, and there are Wyrdmarks everywhere. She looks to the woman’s sarcophagus again and notices her pointed ears. Only one half-Fae has ever married into the Royal family, these must be the resting places of the first King of Adarlan, Gavin, and his queen, the first Princess of Terrasen, Elena. She sees near the wall are piled jewels and weapons, including Damaris, Gavin’s legendary sword that had killed Dark Lord Erawan. Then the spirit of Elena comes to her, speaks to her. She tells Celaena that it’s dangerous for them to be there, but the guardians are currently distracted. The gargoyles on the clock tower, the guardians that stand over the portal between their worlds. Elena says that something evil lives in the castle and Celaena must stop it before it is too late. She gives Celaena a token of protection and tells her to go, the guardians are coming. She wakes up to find herself holding an amulet on a chain. Chaol finds her in the morning to tell her the test that day was canceled, another champion was found dead. One of the thieves. Not just dead, half eaten. She wonders if this has to do with what she was running from last night. After Chaol leaves, she goes down to the tomb of the king and queen, but she finds no answers there. Instead, she heads to the library, passing the scene of the murder and the corpse on her way. She sees how badly the body has been mutilated, she also sees three Wyrdmarks near the body. Celaena meets with Nehemia and as they talk outside the clock tower, Cain approaches them. He makes it very clear that he knows who Celaena really is, and he knows that she’s faking when she misses her shots or slows down her running. She does some research of Wyrdmarks but finds little information. They’re an alphabet of sorts, incredibly difficult to draw, their meaning changing depending on the Wyrdmarks drawn with them. That Wyrd is what holds the world, worlds together. That possibly their Goddess was from another of those worlds and had crossed into Erilea through a Wyrdgate. That perhaps a civilization existed here before the Goddess, a civilization that had disappeared through a Wyrdgate themselves. Theories she’s never heard a whisper of, that could be called sacrilegious. But nothing that gives her any answers. As she continues to research, she pulls a book from her stack that she doesn’t remember requesting. A book full of monsters that scare her as she looks at them. When she leaves the library, she does not take that one with her. The night before the next test for the champions, Dorian makes up to Celaena for not coming to see her and spends the evening with her teaching her to play billiards. Or he tries to, at least. At the next test, they’re put in pairs to spar. Whoever wins the bout is safe, the losers will be judged by Brullo. Celaena is set to fight Verin, one of the thieves, and he starts goading her before their fight. She decides it’s time to stop pretending to be worse than she is. She beats him in seconds without even unsheathing her sword. One day when she’s training with Chaol, she lets him know that Cain is aware of her identity. As they discuss it, guards approach Chaol and inform him of another murder in the servant’s passage. Possibly from the night before. Chaol takes her with him to investigate. The body has giant holes where it is missing vital organs and two Wyrdmarks drawn in chalk, one on either side. It’s Verin. There are huge claw marks in the stone floor. Celaena points out that there was nowhere to hide, and the hallway would have been well lit the night before. So why did Verin get close? Celaena starts to dream about Wyrdmarks and ancient battles. Dorian comes to see her again and they talk about the murders. They admit that neither one of them is sleeping well, probably nobody is with a murderer roaming the halls. He asks her to play the piano forte, but she refuses, almost saying why but shutting down at the last second. He wants to know more about her past, but she won’t give him any answers. She agrees to one question and he asks her why she likes music so much. She explains that she can lose herself in it. She’s not destroying, for once. That she used to want to be a healer, and music reminds her of that feeling. In response, she asks him why he’s not married, and he tells her he thinks it would kill his soul to marry someone without a similar mind and spirit to his. That you should marry the one you love and no one else. She laughs at him for being so fanciful. He finally notices the ring she wears that Chaol brought to her, he asks who it’s from, but she distracts him with billiards, knowing Chaol wouldn’t want him to be told. Meanwhile, Chaol is watching the members of the court at dinner, wondering who the murderer could be. He’s keeping his eye on Duke Perrington, and he doesn’t think he’s the killer, but he doesn’t like what he’s seeing either. That night, Celaena wakes to find Elena in her room. She asks for more information about the evil in the palace but Elena doesn’t know anything more. She advises Celaena to keep an eye on her right, but all Celaena sees when she looks that direction is the tapestry covering the hidden passage. The next day there’s another test, this one on poisons. She must identify the poisons in the seven goblets and organize them by deadliness. They’ll drink the one that they think is benign, to see if they were right. They’ve got antidotes on hand, so whoever gets the order the most wrong just gets sent home, but it will still suck to be poisoned. Another champion was found dead two days ago. Between the tests and the murders, there’s only thirteen competitors left. She’s spending her nights trying to research Wyrdmarks or listening for an intruder set on murdering her, so she’s running out of time to finish ordering the poisons. She looks to the youngest assassin, Pelor, who has told her he was trained in poisons, and he gives her a little hint. She takes the hint, orders her cups, and then realizes that Pelor is on her right. Brullo starts judging the tables. Everyone has to be given an antidote, except the champion that put what Celaena thought was water as the most benign cup. When he drinks it, he falls to the ground before he can take the antidote but luckily, it’s forced into him (it was bloodbane and incredibly painful, causing hallucinations). Celaena and Pelor are the only ones who get the test correct, not needing any antidotes. She and Nehemia start meeting for an hour daily, practicing both Eyllwe and the common tongue. Nehemia reveals that she knows much bothers Celaena although Celaena does not discuss it, but if Celaena ever needed her, Nehemia would be there. It means so much to Celaena to hear that. They make their way to the kennels where they see Prince Dorian and a puppy with a sour disposition. After seeing them together, Nehemia asks if Celaena likes Dorian, pointing out that he takes a special interest in her. Celaena says with conviction that she would rather cut out her own heart than live a Havilliard. On her way back to her runs, she sees Cain who is acting strangely and runs off without speaking to her, continually glancing down the hall behind him. Later, as Celaena studies Wyrdmarks in her room, Nehemia quietly comes in. She’s been crying. She’s just received word from her father that 500 Eyllwe rebels were caught and killed by Adarlan forces. Celaena comforts her as she grieves. Chaol comes to her time that evening and says that what happened to the rebels makes him sick. He tells her he’s happy that she’s friends with Nehemia and is about to ask her something when she vomits all over the floor. Her menstrual cycle has started again and now she’s sick because of it. Chaol quickly leaves but Dorian comes in instead, a busy night for Celaena’s rooms. After some light banter and a challenge for Dorian to read a romance novel, he apologizes to her for everything his father and country have done and says he understands if she hates him for the things they’ve done. But she says she doesn’t hate him. Dorian invites Celaena on a walk after dinner. There are only six competitors left. Three more have been murdered and Pelor sent home after an obstacle course test. Cain and Nox are still there, as well as Grave, a soldier, and a mercenary named Renault. After walking twice around the garden, Dorian sees Celaena’s necklace she received from Elena. He tells her about how Gavin, Elena’s husband, was his hero when he was young. Elena had a necklace that helped her and her husband defeat the Dark Lord but it’s been lost for centuries. He thinks the necklace Celaena wears may be a replica, it looks like it. Chaol watches them as they talk and realizes he’s starting to trust Celaena. That night, Celaena finds Wyrdmarks drawn under her bed in chalk, like the ones near the murdered men. She quickly washes them away before heading to the library. She’s surprised to find Nehemia there, reading a large tome in the common tongue. When Celaena asks her about it, Nehemia speaks to her fluently in the same language before walking away. But Celaena knows that Nehemia is not that fluent, then she finds a slip of paper with a Wyrdmark on it. Has she been played by someone she thought was her friend? Yulemas comes, and Dorian gets Celaena a bag of candy and a puppy that she saw in the kennel who is not friendly to anyone else. They agree the puppy will train in the kennels as Celaena trains during the day and they will spend the rest of the time together. Celaena gives Dorian a kiss on the cheek in thanks. After he leaves, she realizes that there will be a ball that night and Nehemia will be in attendance. If Nehemia is the one behind the murders, this is a perfect chance to do some damage. Celaena decides to infiltrate the ball to keep an eye on the princess and she manages to convince Philippa to help her. But first she has to get through Yulemas service. During the service, nine blindfolded children chose people in the audience to bestow the gods’ blessings on. Celaena receives the blessing of Deanna, Goddess of the Hunt and Maidens. When she arrives at the ball, everyone notices, including Chaol, so is not pleased. She watches Nehemia, but the princess doesn’t leave the queen’s side until she decides to leave the ball altogether. Celaena stays and dances with Dorian, and when Kaltain sees, she decides it’s time to eliminate Celaena. When Celaena finally leaves the ball, she finds Dorian waiting for her outside her rooms. They kiss and then she gently asks him to leave. He decides as he walks away that he wants to make whatever this is with Celaena work, assassin or not. He feels too strongly about her. And Chaol watches her from afar with longing. Kaltain and Duke Perrington talk about Celaena and Perrington reveals her real identity. He tells Kaltain that she will have to duel the remaining champion in a few days and will drink a toast to the Goddess and gods. Perhaps Kaltain could poison her? Not enough to kill her but enough to give Cain an advantage. Kaltain is hesitant but she agrees after some prodding. Celaena finally makes a breakthrough as she investigates the Wyrdmarks. She sees the symbols in a book and in the margin, someone wrote “for sacrifices to the ridderak.” Using the blood of the victim for the Wyrdmarks, the ridderak will be summoned and eat the organs, and give the summoner the victim’s strength. Celaena goes to find Nehemia, using the passageway, which she suspects Nehemia has been using. But when she finds someone speaking a language she does not recognize, it’s not Nehemia, but Cain. She watches as he summons the ridderak. Cain sees her and locks her in with the ridderak. Celaena does the only thing she can think of and runs for Elena’s tomb. She grabs the sword Damaris, and she swings it as the ridderak jumps for her. She stabs it in its mouth and kills it, but it still manages to bite her. She puts the sword back where it belongs before going back to her room. When she gets there, she starts to collapse, feeling weak, but Nehemia is there to help her. Nehemia saves her life. And then she demands to know how she got bit. Celaena tells her who she really is, deciding to trust her with the information. Nehemia gives Celaena an Eyllwe name: Elentiya, meaning spirit that could not be broken. Celaena is afraid of Cain, she saw him move with supernatural speed in the passageways, but does not tell Chaol about him since she doesn’t want to reveal the passages to him. She has already liked the ridderak, and now she needs to kill Cain. Then the murders will stop, and no one will need to know the truth. The king returns to the palace from the White Fang Mountains, alone. The entire rest of his party is dead. There is one more test before the duel and Celaena warns Nox to stay safe, worried that the ridderak will be summoned again. He asks her what she knows and manages to guess who she is. That night, Nox secretly leaves the competition and the palace. Celaena finds new Wyrdmarks beneath her bed that she washes away again and stays awake as long as she can manage. When she sleeps, she has nightmares of running from someone when she was a child. The next morning, they receive word that because Nox left, the test is canceled and the four remaining players will duel the next day. That night she turns away all visitors. The day of the duel arrives and Kaltain slips something in the goblet meant for Celaena. It should make her dizzy and disoriented. Celaena will face Grave first, they will duel to a position of death but not kill their opponent. Cain fights Renault and wins. Before Celaena faces Grave, Chaol gives her his sword to use. But Nehemia offers her steady, which Celaena chooses to use. She beats him in 2 minutes, beating Cain’s time by 1 minute. Kaltain offers Cain and Celaena the wine which they drink, and they are to duel without any time to rest for Celaena, but her vision feels blurry. She realizes belatedly what they’ve done, and that Cain knows, and she knows she needs to end the bout quickly, before she starts hallucinating. Cain breaks her staff in two and dislocated her shoulder. He starts to taunt her, it’s clear he knows who she was before she was an assassin, and who her parents were. Celaena starts to hallucinate and those that have become her friends watch her as she prepares to die. But then Elena and her armies show up to fight Cain’s army of the dead, which only Celaena and Cain can see. Elena tells her she cannot save her, but she can cleanse her of the poison. Celaena takes what she can get and stands to face Cain again. She stabs him in the side with the broken end of the spear and then puts it to his neck. She’s proclaimed the victor. As Dorian helps her up, calling a healer and trying to decipher who poisoned her, Cain gets a nod from the king and attempts to stab her in the back with a dagger. But Chaol sees it and puts his sword through Cain’s heart. Chaol begins to shake and is taken into the palace. A mark that had appeared on Celaena’s forehead after Elena came starts to fade. Dorian takes Celaena to her room and Kaltain confronts Duke Perrington about why the poison didn’t work. But the Duke betrays her and calls for her arrest. Dorian approaches his father and pleads for Chaol not to be punished. His father agrees. He tells the king of Perrington’s plan to use Nehemia as a bartering chip, holding her hostage, and advises against it. The king seems to take his advice. Nehemia comes to see Celaena as she recovers. During the duel, she had been moving her fingers in strange ways. Nehemia reveals that she saw everything that Celaena did and that she helped to save Celaena’s life during the duel. She also explains that she originally pretended not to Understand the common language as a defense, but she liked Celaena and wanted to be her friend so she continued the charade. She knows how to read and how to use Wyrdmarks, her whole family does, in secret. Cain could summon the demons, but he didn’t know how to control them, so she’s been destroying them for months. Celaena was destroying Wyrdmarks Nehemia placed under her bed for protection. She is the one that called to Elena and opened a portal for her. She does not know where Cain learned any of this and that troubles her. She reveals that she came to the palace to spy on the king, but she won’t involve Celaena with that. One day she wants to hear how Celaena got involved with Elena but for now, she just wants to take Celaena’s puppy (Fleetfoot) for a walk. She gives Celaena back the Eye of Elena, the pendant Elena has given her, which was ripped off during the duel. Dorian visits next and apologizes to her for not interfering and stopping the duel when he realized that she’d been poisoned. He tells her he should have been the one to kill Cain and that no matter what, he’s grateful that she came into his life. The king saw the Wyrdmark on Celaena’s brow, but he does not recognize it, though he is well versed in Wyrdmarks. He knows, he felt, what Celaena could see and knows someone saved her. He speaks to Duke Perrington about his magnification of Kaltain. The duke was using some power on her, and on Cain and the king wants to know the powers capabilities. He tells the duke to stop pushing his idea of using Nehemia, it’s attracting too much attention. They’ll soon have a bigger plan for Kaltain. Chaol finally comes to see Celaina. He apologizes for not seeing her earlier. During the duel, he knelt down with Celaena, outside of the ring, and encouraged her to get up. It is as much because of him as Nehemia that Celaena survived. Chaol overheard what Cain had said about her parents, and he tells her he’s sorry about what happened to them. They’d been killed in their bed, and she had not known. When she climbed into bed next to them, she thought the dampness was from the open window, but she was lying in their blood. She hugs Chaol and Dorian walks in on them. Chaol leaves quickly and Dorian tells Celaena that her contract as the king’s Champion has been drawn up. It’s to be signed the next day. He tries to kiss her but she stops him. She explains that in four years, she will be free. She’s never been free. And in four years she is going to leave. She can’t be with him while she’s the king’s assassin and he’s the king’s heir. And she doesn’t want to think about what happens when she’s free until she has a chance to be herself for a while. Chaol goes back to Celaena’s rooms, looking for Dorian when he can’t find him in his own rooms. When Celaena tells him of her talk with Dorian, she invites him for dinner. He agrees. She dreams that night of the tomb and Elena, thanking Elena for saving her life. Elena responds that blood ties can’t be broken. The next day, she sees the king. She will serve for four years and then gain her freedom. She will not question her orders but do as she is told. If she is caught, she will not reveal that she works for the king. Should she fail or try to escape, he will kill Chaol, Nehemia, Nehemia’s brothers, and Nehemia’s mother. In that order. She signs her name before leaving.