The Assassin and the Underworld

The Assassin and the Underworld is one of the novellas in Sarah J. Maas’s Throne of Glass prequel collection, which gathers together five short pieces about the assassin Celaena Sardothien before the events of the main series. The Assassin’s Blade, the volume that collects all five novellas, became required reading for fans of the wider Throne of Glass saga, and The Assassin and the Underworld is one of the most consequential entries in setting up the woman Celaena will become by the time the main novels begin.

In this novella, Celaena returns to Rifthold, the capital city of Adarlan, and to the Assassins’ Keep where she trained under the king of the assassins, Arobynn Hamel. The relationship between Celaena and Arobynn has always been complicated, and this novella digs into that complication directly. Arobynn is by turns a father figure, a manipulator, a benefactor, and an abuser, and Celaena’s slow recognition of who he actually is drives the emotional core of the story. Alongside this, a job involving a powerful crime lord pushes Celaena and her sometime friend Sam Cortland into a situation that will have consequences neither of them sees coming.

Maas writes Celaena as a particular kind of teenage protagonist. Capable, dangerous, vain, deeply in need of love she does not know how to accept, and just barely beginning to understand what kinds of choices the world is going to demand of her. The novellas in The Assassin’s Blade are essential reading for understanding the woman Celaena is at the start of Throne of Glass, especially the relationship arcs that drive much of her interior life through the main series.

For Throne of Glass fans, The Assassin and the Underworld is required reading. For new readers, starting here is a reasonable option, though many fans recommend reading Throne of Glass first and then coming back to the prequel novellas.