Celaena Sardothien · The full story

The hidden-name years

The most feared assassin on the continent, and a nineteen-year-old who wanted a library and a dog.

Who Celaena is

Adarlan's most feared assassin, trained from childhood by Arobynn Hamel of the Assassins' Guild, and by the time we meet her a slave in the salt mines at Endovier. She is arrogant on purpose. It is armour and she knows it.

Endovier, and the offer

Captain Chaol Westfall pulls her out of the mines and brings her before Crown Prince Dorian, who offers freedom if she wins a competition to become the King's Champion — a killer for the man who destroyed everything she came from.

What she loses here

Sam. Nehemia. The last of the version of herself that thought she could keep her head down and survive it. The assassin years end because the cost of staying in them gets too high.

The hidden-name years

Freeing the slave galleys with Sam
Sent to broker a slave-trade deal with the Pirate Lord in Skull's Bay, she and Sam Cortland defy Arobynn outright and free the enslaved Eyllwe captives in the galleys — torching the deal to do it. The first time she chooses the cost.
Exiled to the Red Desert
Arobynn sends her to train under the Mute Master of the Silent Assassins and earn a letter of approval. She comes back with the letter, a friendship with Ansel of Briarcliff, and a lesson about betrayal she does not recognise as one yet.
Sam's death
She and Sam plan to buy their freedom from Arobynn and disappear to the Southern Continent. Arobynn sells them out. Sam is tortured and killed by Rourke Farran, and a grief-shattered Celaena is taken and sentenced to Endovier.
The Endovier killing spree
On the anniversary of her parents' deaths, a year into the salt mines, she snaps and kills twenty-four guards, her overseer among them. It is not an escape attempt. It is grief with nowhere to go.
Recruited for the King's Champion
Dorian Havilliard and Chaol Westfall come to Endovier and offer her freedom: win his father's competition and serve as the King's Champion. A killer for the man who burned her kingdom.
Elena's tomb
Behind a tapestry in her chamber she finds a passage to the tomb of Elena Galathynius and Gavin, first queen and king of Adarlan. Elena's ghost gives her the Eye of Elena. She has no idea yet why a dead queen would bother.
Nehemia, and the Wyrdmarks
Under the name Lillian she befriends Princess Nehemia Ytger of Eyllwe. They trade lessons — the common tongue for the Wyrdmarks, the ancient written magic Adarlan made a capital crime. It is the closest thing to a real friendship she has had since Sam.
Killing the Ridderak
Cain locks her in the passages with the creature he has been summoning through the clock tower. She runs for Gavin's tomb, takes Damaris off a dead king, and kills it.
The Yulemas ball
She sneaks into the masked ball. Chaol recognises her instantly and lets her stay. Nobody will dance with her; Chaol refuses as too dangerous. She dances with Dorian instead, and kisses him.
Nehemia's assassination
The murder that ends the assassin years. Believing Chaol knew, a grief-maddened Celaena attacks him and scars his face. Whatever she was up to that point does not survive it.

“We all bear scars, Dorian. Mine just happen to be more visible than most.”

“But it wasn't by some stuffed shirt, pompous, arrogant princeling!”
THRONE OF GLASS

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We're Caffeine and Curses. The Library started as my design research — I can't put Aelin on a shirt without knowing which hand holds Goldryn — so we keep the notes here where everyone can use them. The pages are fan-made, not official; the licensed designs are in the shop.

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