2_-_court_of_mist_and_fury_a_-_sarah_j._maas

“So I planned to kill her. I told no one. Not even Amren. I’d let Amarantha think I was
interested in trade, in alliance. I decided I’d go to the party thrown Under the Mountain for
all the courts to celebrate our trade agreement with Hybern … And when she was drunk,
I’d slip into her mind, make her reveal every lie and crime she’d committed, and then I’d
turn her brain to liquid before anyone could react. I was prepared to go to war for it.”
I turned, leaning against the counter. Rhys was looking at his hands, as if the story were
a book he could read between them.
“But she thought faster—acted faster. She had been trained against my particular skill
set, and had extensive mental shields. I was so busy working to tunnel through them that I
didn’t think about the drink in my hand. I hadn’t wanted Cassian or Azriel or anyone else
there that night to witness what I was to do—so no one bothered to sniff my drink.
“And as I felt my powers being ripped away by that spell she’d put on it at the toast, I
flung them out one last time, wiping Velaris, the wards, all that was good, from the minds
of the Court of Nightmares—the only ones I’d allowed to come with me. I threw the
shield around Velaris, binding it to my friends so that they had to remain or risk that
protection collapsing, and used the last dregs to tell them mind to mind what was
happening, and to stay away. Within a few seconds, my power belonged wholly to
Amarantha.”
His eyes lifted to mine. Haunted, bleak.
“She slaughtered half the Court of Nightmares right then and there. To prove to me that
she could. As vengeance for Tamlin’s father. And I knew … I knew in that moment there
was nothing I wouldn’t do to keep her from looking at my court again. From looking too
long at who I was and what I loved. So I told myself that it was a new war, a different sort
of battle. And that night, when she kept turning her attention to me, I knew what she
wanted. I knew it wasn’t about fucking me so much as it was about getting revenge at my
father’s ghost. But if that was what she wanted, then that was what she would get. I made
her beg, and scream, and used my lingering powers to make it so good for her that she
wanted more. Craved more.”
I gripped the counter to keep from sliding to the ground.
“Then she cursed Tamlin. And my other great enemy became the one loophole that
might free us all. Every night that I spent with Amarantha, I knew that she was half
wondering if I’d try to kill her. I couldn’t use my powers to harm her, and she had shielded
herself against physical attacks. But for fifty years—whenever I was inside her, I’d think
about killing her. She had no idea. None. Because I was so good at my job that she thought
I enjoyed it, too. So she began to trust me—more than the others. Especially when I
proved what I could do to her enemies. But I was glad to do it. I hated myself, but I was
glad to do it. After a decade, I stopped expecting to see my friends or my people again. I
forgot what their faces looked like. And I stopped hoping.”
Silver gleamed in his eyes, and he blinked it away. “Three years ago,” he said quietly, “I
began to have these … dreams. At first, they were glimpses, as if I were staring through
someone else’s eyes. A crackling hearth in a dark home. A bale of hay in a barn. A warren