Kingdom of Ash

Aelin’s husband and fated mate Prince Rowan Whitethorn of Doranelle is a point-of-view character. He is a centuries-old, green-eyed, silver-haired Faerie warrior who can shape-shift into a white hawk and wield powers of ice and wind. His smell is described as pine and snow, which Aelin perceives as the smell of home—the snowy, northern kingdom of Terrasen.

Rowan, part of Maeve’s original Cadre of elite Fae warriors, has recently been severed from his blood oath to Maeve. He has a traumatic past of being lied to and manipulated by Maeve—who convinced him that a woman named Lydia was his mate before killing her and his unborn child. For much of his life, Rowan had a way to protect his loved ones; whatever Maeve ordered him to do, he had to do, even if it meant destroying things he cherished. Rowan’s character arc reaches its conclusion after four books as he fights for a future he never expected to have.

Rowan has already faced the traumatic loss of his wife Lyria and has accepted his mating bond with Aelin. The final novel in the series solidifies their future and his reforged friendships with the Cadre. He begins the novel believing it “still strange to work with the Lion, with Lorcan, without the bonds of Maeve’s oath binding them to do so. To know that they were here by choice. What it now made them, Rowan wasn’t entirely certain” (61). By the end of the series conclusion, Rowan believes his Cadre to be more than simply his friends, but his brothers.

The Valg are the antagonists of the series. They comprise the three Valg kings, Queen Maeve, and various monstrous creatures who hail from an unnamed home dimension, including ilken, winged and clawed aerial troops, and the horse-sized kharankui and stygian spiders, handmaidens to Maeve that create impenetrable spider silk.

The main villain of the series, the Valg King Erawan, is the youngest of the three brothers. Erawan has possessed Duke Perrington for years, carefully breeding wyverns and training the Ironteeth witches for battle. In this novel, Erawan sheds his human disguise and takes on his preferred appearance: ivory skin, golden-blonde hair, and gold eyes. Erawan’s goal is to locate all three Wyrdkeys to open a portal to return his brothers— Mantyx and Maeve’s husband Orcus—to conquer Aelin’s world. He is a flatly evil character who lacks empathy, thrives in violence, and desires world domination.

Maeve is an ancient Valg queen who escaped Orcus and the Valg realm, disguised herself as a Fae queen, and left her spiders to guard the Wyrdgate. Her connection to the spiders is apparent in her description as a “dark queen with a spider’s smile” (5). Maeve has the power to weave illusions and twist memories, a power she used to change perceived history and convince the original Fae sister queens, Mab and Mora, that they’d always had a third sister—Maeve. Maeve subverts the flat villain archetype because of her yearning to be free of her controlling Valg husband and the love she eventually finds for Aelin’s world. However, her immorality and lack of empathy for others make her irredeemable.

The Cadre is a band of six Fae warriors blood sworn to Maeve: Rowan, Gavriel, Fenrys, Connall, Lorcan, and Vaughn (who doesn’t appear in the series). At the start of Kingdom of Ash, the Cadre is in tatters. Maeve severed Gavriel and Lorcan from their oaths when she took Aelin captive, but Connall and Fenrys remain under her control. The Cadre experiences significant growth in this novel; for much of the series, they’ve been separated on different missions for Maeve and Aelin, but the war’s final battles reunite them. The Cadre finds not only fellow warriors in each other but also family.

Gavriel, a large, golden-haired Fae warrior capable of taking mountain lion form, is nicknamed the Lion of Doranelle for his honor, loyalty, and courage. Gavriel is a complex father figure for Aedion. Though he’s recently learned he’s Aedion’s biological father, he is unable to form a relationship with him in the midst of war. He has an uncanny resemblance to Aedion in appearance, but otherwise is much different. Where Aedion is assertive with a hard exterior, Gavriel is a “soft-spoken, thoughtful male” (26). Gavriel sacrifices his life for Aedion, becoming the wise protector and father Aedion always wished he had.

Fenrys and Connall are twins: Both are dark-haired and bronze-skinned, but Connall is “without the wildness, without the mischief” of his brother (89). Connall can shift into a black wolf, a contrast to Fenrys’s white wolf. Connall is subject to Maeve’s sexual assaults and is used to keep Fenrys obedient. Fenrys is the Cadre’s jester, as his core traits make him playful, witty, and socially adept. In Kingdom of Ash, Fenrys undergoes significant change. His humor disappears when Maeve forces Connall to fatally stab himself. Fenrys’s trauma at losing his brother results in his subsequent inability to teleport—a power he shared with his twin. As Fenrys slowly heals from this grief, his ability to teleport returns; at the novel’s conclusion, he uses it to kill Maeve and avenge his brother.

Lorcan Salvaterre, a dark, brooding warrior, is the most powerful Demi-Fae in existence. He’s spent centuries faithfully serving Maeve, admiring the dark queen, becoming “Unfeeling. Arrogant. Cruel” (31). At the beginning of Kingdom of Ash, Lorcan betrays Aelin to Maeve. His character arc in the novel is one of redemption: Lorcan is determined to fight for Elide, the woman he’s come to love. Shedding his pessimism, Lorcan “found there was something better out there. Someone better. And he’d go down swinging to defend all of it” (889). In the end, Lorcan swears the blood oath to Aelin, earns back Elide’s love, and finds his first true home in Perranth.

King Dorian Havilliard of Adarlan is a deuteragonist in the novel; though the series mainly focuses on Aelin, the increasing themes of The Burden of Power and Dorian’s equal connection to the gods gives him the second-most important role in the narrative. Dorian is described as having dark hair and sapphire eyes. He has powerful raw magic that manifests in many ways, including ice and wind, fire, and shape-shifting; he wields Damaris, a truth-telling sword first wielded by Gavin, the first King of Adarlan.

Dorian begins the series as a charming, flirtatious prince confident in his future as ruler of Adarlan, but endures a regressive character arc throughout the series. He learns his father has been possessed by a Valg prince since before Dorian’s birth, and Dorian also endures Valg possession. His lover Sorscha is beheaded by a Valg prince, and he’s inheriting Adarlan, a kingdom tainted by Erawan’s atrocities.

At the start of Kingdom of Ash, Dorian doesn’t believe he has anything to live for and is prepared to die while forging the Lock. Dorian considers his father “a monster in every possible way” and has insecurities about having been sired while the King of Adarlan was “possessed by a Valg demon” (46). He no longer knows if he’s Valg or human, if he’s worthy of being a romantic partner or a leader. Entering a sexual relationship with Manon, Dorian is afraid to feel anything because “it made no difference if he cared. […] Caring hadn’t done him any favors. Hadn’t done Sorscha any favors” (45).

Dorian’s character arc comes from learning to love himself again and rediscovering his identity. As he reclaims his humanity, discovers romance with Manon rather than just sexual attraction, and assumes the mantle of leadership, he emerges ready to be a king worthy of Adarlan.

117-year-old Manon Blackbeak, a supporting protagonist and point-of-view character, is the ruthless heir to the Blackteeth Clan, who has been disowned by her grandmother, the Blackbeak Matron, after deserting the Erawan-aligned Ironteeth alongside the elite warrior coven called the Thirteen.

Manon, who has moon-white hair and gold eyes, is nicknamed the “White Demon” by the Crochans for her infamous hunting and slaughter of Crochan witches, including her half-sister and Crochan Heir, Rhiannon. Manon defies traditional Ironteeth savagery by finding romance with Dorian, realizing that the answer to witches thriving lies in not “picking one over the other, Crochan over Ironteeth. It never had” (340). Because Manon is both the last Crochan Queen and the rightful heir to the Blackbeak Clan, she is a bridge to unite these two peoples—something she accomplishes by the end of the series. 

In the Thirteen, Manon’s second-in-command is her cousin Asterin, who has gold hair and “gold-flecked black eyes” (40). She once had a relationship with a human hunter; when their child was stillborn, Manon’s grandmother carved the word “unclean” into Asterin’s abdomen and threw her baby’s body into a fire before Asterin could hold her—traumatic experiences that have made Asterin more compassionate than most Ironteeth witches. The Thirteen also consists of the Shadows (Edda and Briar), Ghislaine, Vesta, Sorrel, Lin, Imogen, Thea, Maya, Faline, and Fallon.

Empathy doesn’t come naturally to Ironteeth witches, yet is displayed by Manon and the Thirteen. Their series arc is finding strength in companionship, love, and selflessness rather than in vicious brutality. 12 of the Thirteen embody this with their ultimate sacrifice—committing a mass Yielding that depletes Morath’s forces and saves Aelin’s armies. This selfless act explicitly results in the blooming of kingsflame flowers on fields of blood, an unlikely magical condition for the breaking of the witch curse that keeps this species from their homeland in the Western Wastes.

Chaol Westfall and Yrene Towers are both point-of-view characters, though their major contributions to the series ended in the previous novel, Tower of Dawn. They end the series looking forward to the future: Yrene’s pregnancy and Chaol’s hinted reconnection with his mother and brother.

Chaol is the Hand of the King of Adarlan who hails from the Adarlan territory of Anielle. He is newly married to Yrene, the woman “who had healed his fractured and weary soul” and body (66). After a battle injury that caused paralysis of his lower body, Chaol uses a cane or wheelchair when not supported by Yrene’s healing magic. In the novel, Chaol provides Aelin with allies from the Southern Continent.

Yrene, a powerful healer from the Southern Continent, has golden-brown skin and eyes, and curly brown hair. In The Assassin’s Blade, Aelin, as Celaena Sardothien, freed Yrene from a doomed work contract and funded her travel to the Torre Cesme to begin her education as a healer. This favor, and the kind and motivating note Aelin left Yrene before her departure, made a lasting impression. When they reunite, Yrene brings her healers to aid Terrasen, in keeping with the theme Kindness Begets Kindness.

Aedion Ashryver and Lysandra are point-of-view characters and supporting protagonists in the novel. Aedion Ashryver is Aelin’s “faithful cousin, her fearless commander who would lead her and Terrasen to victory” (11). He has the same golden hair as Aelin and his father, Gavriel. In the novel, Aedion must come to terms with Lysandra’s decision to impersonate Aelin during the queen’s absence; eventually, the two find love and become engaged. Aedion’s other challenge is Gavriel’s death. Aedion spends his entire life without a father, though Aelin’s father Rhoe acts as a father figure. Though Aedion is unable to have a relationship with Gavriel, he learns about him through Rowan’s stories of their adventures; Aedion is comforted to learn that he shares Gavriel’s courage and undying loyalty.

Lysandra is a beautiful shape-shifter with emerald eyes and “dark tresses,” a form she chooses because she doesn’t know her true face. After spending her childhood unhoused, doing sex work to survive in Madame Clarisse DuVeny’s brothel, Lysandra reconnects with Falkan Ennar, her long-lost uncle. Falkan provides Lysandra with the family she never had, a mentor for her shape-shifting abilities, and the family features she’s long since forgotten. Lysandra was a teenage rival of Aelin in The Assassin’s Blade, as both girls envied the ease of the others’ life without truly understanding each other’s hardships. Eventually, Lysandra becomes Aelin’s closest female friend and is gifted the title of Lady of Caraverre, going “from having to crawl into the beds of lords, doing whatever they asked of her with a smile, to fighting beside them. And she was now a lady herself” (110).

Lysandra’s adopted daughter, Evangeline, has red-gold hair and citrine eyes. She has scars on her face, inflicted by Lysandra to save her from being enslaved as a courtesan as a child. Lysandra and Evangeline find empowerment, family, and a home by the end of the series, completing their shared character arcs.