The Assassin's Blade

“She knew all the constellations by heart, and she instinctively sought out the Stag, Lord of the North, and the immovable star that crowned his head.”

The symbol of the Lord of the North makes its first appearance as Celaena looks at the night sky in Skull’s Bay while deciding to free the enslaved people. The Lord of the North reminds Celaena of her own desire to survive, a desire she sees mirrored in the other people who have been conquered and oppressed by Adarlan.

“She breathed him in—the smell of his sweat, the tang of the dust and rock, the metallic odor of his blood.”

The sensory details of smell are very important to Sam and Celaena’s relationship. The scent of Sam is what she recognizes when she later finds his body, so the sense of smell connects their first moment of physical touch with the tragic final moment of Celaena hugging Sam’s corpse.

“Yrene could still see the glint of the hidden dagger in her mother’s hand, still feel the blood of that soldier on her bare feet, hear her mother scream at her to run, smell the smoke of the bonfire as they burned her gifted mother alive while Yrene wept from the nearby safety of Oakwald Forest.”

Yrene’s backstory is similar to Celaena’s, as her family was also murdered in front of her by Adarlanian soldiers. Her trauma informs her desire to return to Fenharrow, to heal those also impacted by Adarlan’s violence. Yrene shows that healing can be a response to grief; violence is not the only response. In this way, she helps Celaena along her path of Self-Discovery and Empowerment.

“‘You’d really come back to this continent—to the empire?’ There was such quiet surprise in her voice that Yrene met her eyes. ‘It’s the right thing to do,’ was all Yrene could think of to say.”

Yrene’s response to Celaena is mirrored in Celaena’s response to Rolfe when he asks her why she risked her life to free enslaved people. Both girls have a strong sense of justice and a desire to do what is right. This is contrasted throughout the novellas with characters like Rolfe, Arobynn, and Farran, who only see others as a means to an end, not as human beings with intrinsic worth.

There was such irony, she realized, in them working together—the assassin and the healer. Two opposite sides of the coin.”

Irony and its appearance play a large role in the plot structure of The Assassin’s Blade. It may seem ironic that Celaena, an assassin, pays for a healer to hone her craft, but this really underscores the truth about Celaena’s identity. On the other hand, it is tragically ironic that Celaena ends up enslaved by Arobynn as punishment for her freeing the enslaved people in Skull’s Bay. In the novellas, irony acts as a way to connect actions with their consequences.

“There were so many of them now—the children who had lost everything to Adarlan. Children who had now grown into assassins and barmaids, without a true place to call home, their native kingdoms left in ruin and ash.”

The reference to kingdoms and ash foreshadows the title of the seventh and final book in the Throne of Glass series: Kingdom of Ash. It also further establishes the foil/mirroring relationship between Celaena and Yrene.

“The son of the Mute Master and the protégée of the King of the Assassins. If there was anyone here who was at all similar to her, she realized, it was Ilias. Rifthold might be her realm, but this was his.”

Celaena and Ilias, like Celaena and Yrene, are mirrors for each other. Though Ilias is less similar to Celaena, he still is an assassin trained from a young age who feels loyalty to his master, his father. Ilias also serves as the impetus for Celaena to realize her romantic feelings for Sam.

“Even when they were children, he’d set her and Sam against each other, use their victories and failures against them. He’d made her see everyone but Arobynn and Ben as a potential enemy.”

Sam and Celaena’s complex relationship stems from their childhood, as Arobynn set them up as rivals to keep them from becoming closer and overpowering him. This explains Celaena’s hesitancy to trust others and to make friends. It also makes her acknowledgment of her feelings for Sam part of her journey toward Self-Discovery and Empowerment.

“And suddenly, as the memory of that day echoed through her, she remembered the words Sam kept screaming at Arobynn as the King of the Assassins beat her, the words that she somehow had forgotten in the fog of pain: I’ll kill you!”

When Celaena remembers what Sam yelled at Arobynn, it foreshadows the reveal of his romantic feelings for her. Sarah J. Maas hints throughout the earlier novellas that Sam is in love with Celaena, but it’s not until the fourth novella that Sam finally confesses his feelings.

“For the first time in a long while, she heard the song of a northern wind, calling her home. And she was not afraid.”

The breeze returns as a symbol of Celaena’s true identity. The use of the word home also does not necessarily refer to Rifthold, as Celaena’s true home is Terrasen. The word “afraid” also connects to Sam and Celaena’s relationship, as Sam later teaches her his mantra for keeping his fear at bay: “I am Sam Cortland, and I will not be afraid.”

“She could no sooner sort out her feelings toward the King of the Assassins than she could count the stars in the sky.”

The complexity of Celaena and Arobynn’s relationship plays a large role in all five novellas. He raised her from the age of eight, but she does not know whether he loves her like a daughter or like a lover. He hurts her frequently, yet she still struggles to let go of her loyalty to him, highlighting the theme of The Fine Line Between Loyalty and Betrayal.

“In those horrible minutes, whatever bond had sprung up between her and Sam hadn’t broken. He’d switched loyalties—he’d chosen to stand by her, fight for her. If anything, that made him different from Ansel.”

Celaena is relieved to see that even when Arobynn abuses them, Sam still stands by her side. Sam also helps heal her in the wake of the betrayal from Ansel, showing her that forming friendships is still possible.

“‘Some things are more important than death.’ Sam’s eyes flickered. ‘I know.’”

The gesture of Sam’s eyes flickering hints at his love for Celaena, as he clearly thinks she is more important than death. This is also a moment of emotional vulnerability for Celaena, as she lets Sam see her passion for music.

“He loved her. For years. And he’d endured so much for her sake.”

Celaena’s guilt about how she treated Sam in the past illustrates her changed feelings toward him. She loves him now and regrets the way she acted, the way that Arobynn conditioned her to act by setting her and Sam up as rivals.

“In the silence of her bedroom, she swore an oath to the moonlight that if Sam were hurt, no force in the world would hold her back from slaughtering everyone responsible.”

Celaena’s fear for Sam’s safety foreshadows his death. It also adds a layer of tragic irony to his death, as the people responsible for it are the ones who send Celaena to Endovier. This means she will not have an opportunity for vengeance until later in the series.

“She felt like it watched her, a giant beast of glass and stone and iron. Staring at it made her problems with Sam and Arobynn feel inconsequential—like gnats buzzing before the gaping maw of a creature poised to devour the world.”

Celaena’s view of the glass castle mirrors her view of the Adarlanian empire. The use of the word “devour” is significant, as Adarlan’s conquest of Erilea is based in consumption, in the King of Adarlan’s desire to control the entirety of the continent.

“‘I can wait,’ he said thickly, kissing her collarbone. ‘We have all the time in the world.’”

Time is not in Sam and Celaena’s favor; this dialogue is tragically ironic, as Sam is dead five chapters later, leaving Celaena to live the rest of her life without him. After his death, Celaena will realize the importance of not taking moments like these for granted.

“‘I like you,’ he murmured, and Celaena let him kiss her until she’d again forgotten the dark burden that would always haunt her.”

The “dark burden” refers to Celaena’s true identity as Aelin Galathynius and the throne of Terrasen that was taken from her. She knows the truth of who she is, but she cannot tell anyone else for fear that Adarlan would find her and kill her.

“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.”

The sense of smell comes back into significance when Celaena looks at Sam’s body. She can still smell him, but the smell is masked by the gloriella poison and the soap. The use of the word “selfish” is also an echo of what Ansel called Celaena in the desert, further illustrating the impact of her words on Celaena’s psyche.

“And now, the very thing that had earned her the right to call herself Adarlan’s Assassin would be what sealed her doom.”

Tragic irony rears its head again when Celaena’s notoriety is the cause of her guilty sentence. Arobynn’s insistence on attributing her kills to her makes it easy for the King of Adarlan to sentence her to a lifetime of enslavement.

“Those black eyes were poised to devour the world.”

The word “devour” appears again, this time in Celaena’s view of the King of Adarlan, connecting the empire and the man himself. It also foreshadows the later reveal of what is consuming the King of Adarlan from the inside, which takes place in the third book, Heir of Fire.

“No matter what Arobynn had trained her to do, the memories of those last weeks as Terrasen fell were imprinted upon her blood.”

No matter how hard Arobynn tried to make Celaena into a killer with no regard for her past, she cannot turn her back on her Terrasen heritage. The connection of Terrasen to her blood illustrates the depth of her connection to her past and the intensity with which she will later fight and sacrifice for her people.

“A northern breeze, a breeze of Terrasen. She must stand up.”

The symbol of the breeze returns again, reminding Celaena of who she is and how she must survive Endovier. The breeze also comforts her, taking the stench of the enslaver’s wagon away and replacing it with the familiar scent of pine, adding further importance to the sensory details of smell.