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Illuht her closer to the body on the table She didn’t knohere to look first

At the fingers that went the wrong way, at the burns and careful, deep slices in his flesh, at the face, the face she still knew, even when so nition

The world swayed beneath her feet, but she kept upright as she finished the walk to the table and looked down at the naked, mutilated body she had--

She had--

Farran had taken his tih that face was in ruins, it betrayed none of the pain he must have felt, none of the despair

This was soone to hell after all, because she couldn’t exist in the world where this had been done to hiht while he suffered, while Farran tortured him, while he ripped out his eyes and--

Celaena vomited on the floor

Footsteps, then Arobynn’s hands were on her shoulder, on her waist, pulling her away

He was dead

Sam was dead

She wouldn’t leave him like this, in this cold, dark roorasp Wordlessly, she unfastened her cloak and spread it over Sae that had been so carefully inflicted She cli an ar him close

The body still smelled faintly like Sam And like the cheap soap she’d made him use, because she was so selfish that she couldn’t let him have her lavender soap

Celaena buried her face in his cold, stiff shoulder There was a strange, musky scent all over him--a sain It clung to his golden-brown hair, to his torn, bluish lips

She wouldn’t leave hi toward the door--then the snick of it closing as Arobynn left

Celaena closed her eyes She wouldn’t leave him

She wouldn’t leave him

Chapter Nine

Celaena awoke in a bed that had once been hers, but so in the world, so vital She arose fro ht have thought that she akening in her bed in the Keep, still Arobynn’s protégée, still Sam’s rival, still content to be Adarlan’s Assassin forever and ever She ht have believed it if she hadn’t noticed that sofros that were now in her apartone

Reality opened wide and sed her whole

She didn’talong because of the shifting light on the wall of the bedroom She knew the world still passed by, unaffected by the death of a young man, unaware that he’d ever existed and breathed and loved her She hated the world for continuing on If she never left this bed, this room, maybe she’d never have to continue on with it

TheHad his eyes been olden brown, or soil brown? She couldn’t reet the chance to find out

Never to see that half sh, never to hear hiAdarlan’s Assassin could ever o out into a world where he didn’t exist So she watched the light shift and change, and let the world pass by without her

So outside her door Three men with low voices The rumble of thehts glowing beyond the s

"Jayne and Farran will be expecting retaliation," a , one of Arobynn’s more talented assassins, and a fierce couards will be on alert," said another--Tern, an older assassin

"Then we’ll take out the guards, and while they’re distracted, sogy o--up from that dark room that smelled of death and into her bed

Muffled replies froht," Arobynn growled "Farran lives at the house, and if we tiht, we’ll kill the to the second floor isn’t as sied "Even the exteriors are guarded If we can’t get through the front, then there’s a s the roof of the house next door"

"A leap like that could be fatal," Tern countered

"Enough," Arobynn cut in "I’ll decide how to break in e arrive Have the others ready to go in three hours I want us on our way at ht And tell them to keep their mouths shut Someone must have tipped off Farran if he knew to set a trap for Sa"

Grunted acquiescence, then footsteps as Tern and Harding walked away

Celaena kept her eyes closed and her breathing steady as the lock turned in her bedroo of the Assassins striding toward her bed Sers as they stroked through her hair, then along her cheek

Then the steps leaving, the door shutting--and locking She opened her eyes, the glow of the city offering enough light for her to see that the lock on the door had been altered since she’d left--it now locked only from the outside

He had locked her in