Queen of Shadows

Tern shrugged. “There was a storm. The murderer probably waited until then to kill him.” He gave her another long look, wicked violence dancing in his dark eyes.

“Why don’t you just say it, Tern? Why don’t you ask me where I was last night?”

“We know where you were,” Harding said, coming to tower over Tern. There was nothing kind on his long, bland face. “Our eyes saw you at home all night. You were on the roof of your house, and then you went to bed.”

Exactly as she’d planned.

“Are you telling me that detail because you’d like me to hunt down your little eyes and blind them?” Aelin replied sweetly. “Because after I sort out this mess, that’s exactly what I plan to do.”

Mullin sighed sharply through his nose and glared at Harding, but said nothing. He was always a man of few words—perfect for dirty work.

“You don’t touch our men, and we won’t touch yours,” Tern said.

“I don’t make bargains with piece-of-shit, second-rate assassins,” she chirped, and gave him a nasty smile as she swept down the hall, past her old room, and down the stairs, Rowan a step behind.

She gave Aedion a nod as she entered the sitting room. He kept up his watchful position, still smiling like a wolf. Lysandra hadn’t moved an inch. “You can go,” she said to her. Lysandra’s head snapped up.

“What?” Tern barked.

Aelin pointed to the door. “Why would these two money-grubbing whores kill their biggest client? If anything,” she said over her shoulder, “I’d think you three would have more to gain.”

Before they could start barking, Clarisse coughed pointedly.

“Yes?” Aelin hissed.

Clarisse’s face was deathly pale, but she held her head high as she said, “If you would allow it, the Master of the Bank will be here soon to read Arobynn’s will. Arobynn …” She dabbed at her eyes, the perfect portrait of grief. “Arobynn informed me that we were named. We would like to remain until it has been read.”

Aelin grinned. “Arobynn’s blood hasn’t yet dried on that bed, and you’re already swooping in for your bequest. I don’t know why I’m surprised. Maybe I’ve dismissed you as his murderer too soon, if you’re that eager to snatch whatever he’s left you.”

Clarisse paled again, and Lysandra began shaking. “Please, Celaena,” Lysandra begged. “We didn’t—I would never—”

Someone knocked on the front door.

Aelin slid her hands into her pockets. “Well, well. What good timing.”

The Master of the Bank looked as if he might vomit at the sight of blood-covered Lysandra, but then he sighed with something like relief when he spied Aelin. Lysandra and Clarisse now sat in twin armchairs while the Master took a seat behind the little writing desk before the towering bay windows, Tern and his cronies hovering like vultures. Aelin leaned against the wall beside the doorway, arms crossed, Aedion flanking her left side and Rowan her right.

As the Master went on and on with his condolences and apologies, she felt Rowan’s eyes on her.

He took a step nearer, as if to brush his arm against hers. She sidled out of reach.

Rowan was still staring at her when the Master opened a sealed envelope and cleared his throat. He spouted some legal jargon and offered his condolences again, which gods-damned Clarisse had the audacity to accept as though she were Arobynn’s widow.

Then came the long list of Arobynn’s assets—his business investments, his properties, and the enormous, outrageous fortune left in his account. Clarisse was practically drooling on the carpet, but Arobynn’s three assassins kept their faces carefully neutral.

“It is my will,” the Master read, “that the sole beneficiary of all my fortune, assets, and holdings should be my heir, Celaena Sardothien.”

Clarisse whipped around in her chair, fast as an adder. “What?”

“Bullshit,” Aedion blurted.

Aelin just stared at the Master, her mouth a bit open, her hands falling slack to her sides. “Say that again,” she breathed.

The Master gave a nervous, watery smile. “Everything—all of it, is left to you. Well, except for … this sum to Madam Clarisse, to settle his debts.” He showed Clarisse the paper.

“That’s impossible,” the madam hissed. “He promised I was in that will.”

“And you are,” Aelin drawled, pushing off the wall to peer over Clarisse’s shoulder at the small number. “Don’t get greedy, now.”

“Where are the duplicates?” Tern demanded. “Have you inspected them?” He stormed around the table to examine the will.

The Master flinched, but held up the parchment—signed by Arobynn and utterly legal. “We verified the copies in our vaults this morning. All identical, all dated from three months ago.”

When she’d been in Wendlyn.

She stepped forward. “So, aside from that teensy sum for Clarisse … all of this—this house, the Guild, the other properties, his fortune—it’s all mine?”

The Master nodded again, already scrambling to pack up his case. “Congratulations, Miss Sardothien.”

Slowly, she turned her head toward Clarisse and Lysandra. “Well, if that’s the case …” She bared her teeth in a vicious smile. “Get your whoring, blood-sucking carcasses the hell off my property.”

The Master choked.

Lysandra couldn’t move fast enough as she rushed for the door. Clarisse, however, remained seated. “How dare you—” the madam began.

“Five,” Aelin said, holding up five fingers. She lowered one, and reached for her dagger with her other hand. “Four.” Another. “Three.”

Clarisse hauled ass from the room, bustling after a sobbing Lysandra.

Then Aelin looked at the three assassins. Their hands hung limp at their sides, fury and shock and—wisely enough—something like fear on their faces.

She said too quietly, “You held Sam back while Arobynn beat me into oblivion, and then didn’t raise a finger to stop it when Arobynn beat him, too. I don’t know what role you played in his death, but I will never forget the sounds of your voices outside my bedroom door as you fed me the details about Rourke Farran’s house. Was it easy for you three? To send me to that sadist’s house, knowing what he’d done to Sam and what he was aching to do to me? Were you just following orders, or were you more than happy to volunteer?”

The Master had recoiled in his chair, trying to make himself as invisible as possible in a room full of professional killers.

Tern’s lip curled. “We don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Pity. I might have been willing to listen to some paltry excuses.” She looked at the clock on the mantel. “Pack your clothes and get the hell out. Right now.”

They blinked. “What?” Tern said.

“Pack your clothes,” she said, enunciating each word. “Get the hell out. Right now.”

“This is our home,” Harding said.

“Not anymore.” She picked at her nails. “Correct me if I’m wrong, Master,” she purred, and the man cringed at the attention. “I own this house and everything in it. Tern, Harding, and Mullin haven’t yet paid back their debts to poor Arobynn, so I own everything they have here—even their clothes. I’m feeling generous, so I’ll let them keep those, since their taste is shit-awful anyway. But their weapons, their client lists, the Guild … All of that is mine. I get to decide who’s in and who’s out. And since these three saw fit to accuse me of murdering my master, I say they’re out. If they try to work again in this city, on this continent, then by law and by the laws of the Guild, I have the right to hunt them down and chop them into itty-bitty pieces.” She batted her eyelashes. “Or am I wrong?”

The Master’s gulp was audible. “You are correct.”

Tern took a step toward her. “You can’t—you can’t do this.”

“I can, and I will. Queen of the Assassins sounds so nice, doesn’t it?” She waved to the door. “See yourselves out.”