Page 342 of Kingdom of Ash

“Still deadly,” Murtaugh said. “Just in a different way.” The old man frowned at Darrow. “I’ll head down there.”

Evangeline blinked at that. None—noneof the older lords had gone to the front.

“To warn them?” Darrow asked carefully.

Murtaugh patted the hilt of his sword. “Aedion and Ren are stretched thin. Kyllian, too, if you want to keep telling yourself that he’s the one leading them.” Murtaugh didn’t so much as lower his chin to Darrow, who stiffened. “I’ll handle the western wall. And that siege tower.” A wink at Evangeline. “We can’t all be brave messengers, can we?”

Evangeline made herself smile, even though dread pooled in her. “Should—should I warn Aedion that you’ll be there?”

“I’ll tell him myself,” Murtaugh said, and ruffled her hair as he walked by. “Be careful on the ice,” he warned her again.

Darrow didn’t try to stop him as Murtaugh walked off the battlements. Slow. He looked so slow, and old, and frail. And yet he kept his chin high. Back straight.

If she’d been able to choose a grandfather for herself, it would have been him.

Darrow’s face was tight when Murtaugh disappeared at last.

“Old fool,” Darrow said, worry in his eyes as he turned to the battle raging ahead.

CHAPTER101

Human no more.

Aelin’s breath rasped in her ears—her permanently arched, immortal ears—with each step back toward the camped army. Rowan remained at her side, a hand around her waist.

He hadn’t let go of her once. Not once, since she’d come back.

Since she’d walked through worlds.

She could see them still. Even walking in silence under the trees, the darkness yielding toward the grayish light before dawn, she could see each and every one of those worlds she’d broken through.

Perhaps she’d never stop seeing them. Perhaps she alone in this world and all others knew what lay beyond the invisible walls separating them. How muchlifedwelled and thrived. Loved and hated and struggled to claw out a living.

So many worlds. More than she could contemplate. Would her dreams forever be haunted by them? To have glimpsed them, but been unable to explore—would that longing take root?

Oakwald’s branches formed a skeletal lattice overhead. Bars of a cage.

As her body, and this world, might be.

She shook off the thought. She had lived—lived, when she should have died. Even if her mortal self … that had been killed. Melted away.

The outer edges of the camp neared, and Aelin peered down at her hands. Cold—that was a trace of cold now biting into them.

Altered in every way.

Dorian said as they approached the first of the rukhin, “What are you going to tell them?”

The first words any of them had spoken since they’d begun the trek back here.

“The truth,” Aelin said.

She supposed it was all she had to offer them, after what she’d done.

She said to Dorian, “I’m sorry—about your father.”

The chill wind brushed the strands of Dorian’s hair off his brow. “So am I,” he said, resting a hand atop Damaris’s hilt.

At his side, Chaol kept silent, though he glanced at the king every now and then. He’d look out for Dorian. As he always had, Aelin supposed.

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