Heir of Fire Read Free

continue blockade running. Blockade running . Th e prince—­her target—­was a gods-­damned blockade runner against Adarlan, and his people loved him for it.
    She’d trailed the prince and his men through the city, leaping from roo ft op to roo ft op, and all it would have taken was one arrow through those turquoise eyes and he would have been dead. But she followed him all the way to the city walls, the cheers growing louder, people tossing fl owers, everyone beaming with pride for their perfect, perfect prince.
    She’d reached the city gates just as they opened to let him through. And when Galan Ashryver rode o ff into the sunset, o ff to war and glory and to fi ght for good and freedom, she lingered on that roof until he was a speck in the distance.
    Th en she had walked into the nearest taberna and gotten into the bloodiest, most brutal brawl she’d ever provoked, until the city guard was called in and she vanished moments before everyone was tossed into the stocks. And then she had decided, as her nose bled down the front of her shirt and she spat blood onto the cobblestones, that she ­wasn’t going to do anything .
    Th ere was no point to her plans. Nehemia and Galan would have led the world to freedom, and Nehemia should have been breathing. Together the prince and princess could have defeated the King of Adarlan. But Nehemia was dead, and Celaena’s vow—­her stupid, pitiful vow—­was worth as much as mud when there ­were beloved heirs like Galan who could do so much more. She’d been a fool to make that vow.
    Even Galan—­Galan was barely making a dent against Adarlan, and he had an entire armada at his disposal. She was one person, one complete waste of life. If Nehemia hadn’t been able to stop the king . . . then that plan, to fi nd a way to contact Maeve . . . that plan was absolutely useless.
    Mercifully, she still hadn’t seen one of the Fae—­not a single damn one—­or the faeries, or even a lick of magic. She’d done her best to avoid it. Even before she’d spotted Galan, she’d kept away from the market stalls that o ff ered everything from healing to trinkets to potions, areas that ­were usually also full of street performers or mercenaries trading their gi ft s to earn a living. She’d learned which tabernas the magic-­wielders liked to frequent and never went near them. Because sometimes she felt a trickling, writhing thing awaken in her gut if she caught a crackle of its energy.
    It had been a week since she’d given up her plan and abandoned any attempt to care at all. And she suspected it’d be many weeks more before she decided she was truly sick of teggya, or brawling every night just to feel something, or guzzling sour wine as she lay on roo ft ops all day.
    But her throat was parched and her stomach was grumbling, so Celaena slowly peeled herself o ff the edge of the roof. Slowly, not because of those vigilant guards, but rather because her head was well and truly spinning. She didn’t trust herself to care enough to prevent a tumble.
    She glared at the thin scar stretching across her palm as she shimmied down the drainpipe and into the alley o ff the market street. It was now nothing more than a reminder of the pathetic promise she’d made at Nehemia’s half-­frozen grave over a month ago, and of everything and everyone ­else she’d failed. Just like her amethyst ring, which she gambled away every night and won back before sunrise.
    Despite all that had happened, and Chaol’s role in Nehemia’s death, even a ft er she’d destroyed what was between them, she hadn’t been able to forfeit his ring. She’d lost it thrice now in card games, only to get it back—­by what­ever means necessary. A dagger poised to slip between the ribs usually did a good deal more convincing than actual words.
    Celaena supposed it was a miracle she made