Queen of Shadows characters

Also known as Celaena Sardothien

Appears from the start

Queen of Terrasen, back in Rifthold under her own name at last, with fire magic she can now control and a very short list of objectives: free her cousin Aedion from the dungeons before he is executed, break the collar on Dorian Havilliard, kill the king of Adarlan, and get the Wyrdkeys away from him. She has spent ten years as the assassin Celaena Sardothien and is not sure how much of that woman she is willing to give up. She is imperious, theatrical, and hard on the people who care about her, and she is carrying more grief and more debt than she will admit.

Appears from the start

A Fae warrior of Doranelle, centuries old, blood-sworn to Aelin and the first member of her court. He has wind and ice magic, can take the shape of a hawk, and is very much out of place in a mortal city where magic does not work. He is the only person Aelin does not perform for.

First appears in chapter 2

Formerly Captain of the Royal Guard, now a hunted man living rough with the rebels in Rifthold, working to free Dorian and to keep the resistance alive. He has lost his position, his oath, and most of his certainties, and he blames himself for what happened to the prince. The woman who comes back from Wendlyn is not the one he sent away, and he does not know how to speak to her.

First appears in chapter 2

A former city guard of Rifthold, a baker's daughter of southern continent descent and a superb archer, now fully committed to the rebellion and working alongside Chaol. She is direct, unsentimental, and unimpressed by titles.

First appears in chapter 3

Crown Prince of Adarlan, wearing a collar of black Wyrdstone that has given a demon prince out of the Wyrdgate the use of his body. What walks the castle in his shape speaks with borrowed courtesy, hunts rebels for his father, and shows no recognition of anyone the prince knew. Whether anything of Dorian is still inside is an open question.

First appears in chapter 3

The ruler of Adarlan, who holds at least one Wyrdkey and whose black-stone towers have kept magic dead on this continent for a decade. He has collared his own son and is preparing something at Duke Perrington's fortress in the south. He is patient, unhurried, and has never yet been surprised.

First appears in chapter 4

General of the Bane and Aelin's cousin, chained in the castle dungeons and condemned to public execution for treason. He spent ten years pretending to serve Adarlan while keeping Terrasen's legion intact for a queen he was never certain had survived. He is proud, reckless, and physically wrecked by his imprisonment.

First appears in chapter 6

King of the Assassins and master of Rifthold's guild, the man who bought Aelin as a child, trained her, and made her what she is. Elegant, generous, and utterly controlling, he greets her return as a homecoming and offers his help. Every gift he gives is a debt, and both of them know it.

First appears in chapter 8

Rifthold's most sought-after courtesan, beautiful and superbly poised, who was sold into the trade as a child and has spent years surviving Arobynn Hamel's household. She and Aelin were rivals long ago and remember it differently. She is raising an orphaned girl named Evangeline and has her own reasons for wanting Arobynn Hamel's household dismantled.

First appears in chapter 14

A scarred girl of about ten with a badly injured face, taken in by Lysandra and treated by her as a daughter.

First appears in chapter 5

Wing Leader of the Ironteeth host, commanding the aerial legions from Duke Perrington's fortress at Morath. She has a wyvern named Abraxos, iron teeth and nails, and a coven of thirteen witches who follow her without question. She is being given orders whose purpose is never explained, and for the first time in a century of obedience she is beginning to want explanations.

First appears in chapter 5

Manon's Second and cousin, the best flier in the Thirteen and the only one who will tell Manon when she is wrong. She carries something she has never spoken about.

First appears in chapter 5

The king's chief commander and lord of Morath, the black fortress in the southern mountains where the wyverns were bred and where the Ironteeth are quartered. He has begun projects in the lower levels that even the witches are not shown, and he wears a ring of black stone.

First appears in chapter 10

A young woman working as a servant in the kitchens of Morath, thin and quiet, one ankle shattered and braced from a childhood injury. She is the daughter of Terrasen's Lady of Perranth and was raised in a tower under lock and key by the uncle who took her mother's lands. She hears everything the fortress says and repeats none of it.

First appears in chapter 10

Lord of Perranth by Adarlan's grant, having taken the title from his brother's family after the conquest. He is at Morath in the duke's service, watching his niece with an interest that is not familial concern.

First appears in chapter 12

Once an ambitious lady of the Rifthold court, now kept at Morath in a haze of opium and worse, wearing a black ring the duke gave her. She is barely lucid, watched constantly, and used for purposes she cannot describe.

First appears in chapter 22

The first Queen of Adarlan, dead a thousand years, whose spirit has been steering Aelin toward this confrontation since the beginning. She appears again with instructions, and with rather less of an explanation than Aelin now demands.