The Assassin and the Pirate Lord

How could Arobynn expect her to do that?

This meeting was undeniably important. She’d known that from the moment the serving girl pounded on her door, insisting Celaena come downstairs and not even bother to get dressed.

Perhaps if you hadn’t been reading all night, you wouldn’t be so exhausted

She cocked her head. “As you said, I don’t need an introduction. And as for the privilege of seeing my beautiful face, I’m afraid that’s something few men receive.”

Celaena walked to the wooden desk and picked up a piece of paper, her black-gloved hands turning it over to read the contents.

Ben. Ben was dead and gone, and she’d never again run into him in the halls of the Keep. He’d never set her injuries with his cool, deft hands, never coax a laugh from her with a joke or a lewd anecdote.

Beneath the cape and the cloak and the dark tunic, Celaena was not just famished, but also hot and tired. And thirsty. Which, combined with her temper, usually turned out to be a lethal combination. Of course, they couldn’t see any of that.

Seated in the council room of the Assassin’s Keep, Celaena Sardothien leaned back in her chair. “It’s past four in the morning,” she said, adjusting the folds of her crimson silk dressing gown and crossing her bare legs beneath the wooden table. “This had better be important.

But don’t expect me to extend the same courtesy to the rest of you when your time comes.”

I’m going to retrieve Ben’s body.”