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Allyson S. Barkley Books

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“She had wanted to break. She had wanted, for one desperate moment, to let herself shatter into a thousand pieces, to reach out and fall apart. She knew he would have been there, welcomed that. But she was afraid that if she broke, she would not know how to put herself back together. So she had stopped it. When the cracks were spreading just wide enough for everything to crumble, Ari had sealed them back up, pulled herself together, and moved on.”

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“Today, we use his star to guide us home,” the ancient little man concluded quietly. “Brighter than any other light in the sky, it reminds us of the sacrifice that one must make to lead as a hero, to hold aloft a flame that might save all, but will ultimately drop the bearer into darkness. No fire can survive forever and one day even the greatest, especially the greatest, must be extinguished.”

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“She ran her fingers over the smooth stone and then tilted her head to look up at the sky, breathing slowly, as if she could smell and taste the stars in her lungs and on her tongue. They would be cool, she imagined, and crisp before breaking sweet under her teeth, like a honeycomb cracking open to ooze out its golden-yellow syrup. Dav had liked to think of touching the stars, of one day rising to live among them, but never had they considered together how they would taste. She shut her eyes. She wished she could ask him and wondered, like she did every night, what he would think of her now.”

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“I like the snow when it falls behind me, not ahead of me.” “Do you ever appreciate anything for its beauty? Or only its usefulness?” She thought of the towering Belem, the quiet of the Nyinan Forest, the sparkling stars hanging their lights in the sky. She thought of the fires, the empty cities, the slaughtered horses. “When has beauty ever fixed anything?” “It doesn’t,” Ely replied, “but it makes the broken things worthwhile.”

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“Three years ago!” he yelled, and all of the emotion seemed to hit at once. “You sent me one letter in four years, Dinar! And I defended you! I defended you to all of them – Mother, Father, Tomaas, even the other families in Parejon that came asking. I told them you were well and happy and doing great, important things. Convinced them it was all for the best. But I have no idea why, because you hurt me worst of all.”

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“Odaan sighed, a slow, breathy huff that sent shivers down Ari’s spine. She could feel it all, the pain and the memory and the deep, aching loss that would never, ever be filled. And she felt a twinge of something else too – jealousy that he had been just a bit older, had just a few more years to learn his parents in a way she would never learn hers. Would her memories be crisper now, if she had been eight, ten, twelve when they left her? Would she still see her father’s face and hear her mother’s voice? She couldn’t bring herself to ask him.”

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“An anger that Ari had never known was crashing down around her, an anger not stemming from his nauseating statements or revolting countenance, but from the knowledge of what he had done, suddenly so tangible in his presence before her. Never had she allowed herself to consider his betrayal as something so real. Never had she stopped to think about what it truly meant to her. It had all been so distant, muddled in her seven-year-old brain. But now Zaid stood there with that self-assured expression plastered upon his pale face and the reality struck Ari with incredible force, burning and boiling up until she thought she might explode from the sheer heat of it.”

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“An officer had stepped forward on the other ship, and though it was difficult to hear his words from their distant position, Ari could sense that he was making some kind of demand. She watched Margeaux’s shoulders shift. Was she tensing in fear? Preparing for combat? The captain tilted her head to the side and Ari saw her lips curl, flashing bright white teeth. She was laughing.”

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“Ari could feel it in her chest like an unwanted heartbeat, the sound of a broken soul thrumming unevenly, desperately against her own. As they locked in battle, she could hear it all, every beat. It was the same way it felt to have Jagger’s heart in hers, and yet so different. Their soul sounded like stuttering, like something had died and grown back wrong.”

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“You dare offend us when you need our help?” It was Louana again, her gaze turned bitter. “You aren’t offended,” Margeaux replied. “You’re putting on a show in hopes of tricking me into submission.” She gave them a well-practiced smile, flashing her teeth wide, letting the delight touch every corner of her face except her eyes. Never her eyes. “And I don’t need your help.”

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“And women who came from the sea could do anything and be anything. They felt the ceaselessness of the tides, knew the crash of the waves, and understood the power of the storms. They carried on because the ocean was infinite, an eternity of pain and wind and sun and hope and beautiful, sparkling horizon. She could tell them about the tiny shack on the outskirts of Aguela, the sound of the waves against her mother’s fishing boat, or the scrape of a good knife against her enemy’s blade under open skies. But none of that meant freedom and power. None of that would the mermaids understand. “These waters that you call home,” she said. “They are my home, too. And it’s about damn time for the tide to rise.”

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“That ache for Dav’s presence struck her heart again, and she felt it in her whole body, a frantic pulse that nearly over- whelmed her with feeling. It scared her, the way it crashed like a wave, no words to give it shape. If only she could describe it, maybe the dark void would shrink and shift and become something she could hold in her palm. When it was in her fingers, she would study it, and then tuck it away in her pocket, or perhaps toss it out into the Plains and let it disap- pear among the grass. But no – she could not throw it away, not when it was all she had left of her mentor. She needed some piece of him to tell her what to do, to remind her who she was.”

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“But this... this was something else, and it burned so deeply that Ely felt it too, the hurt welling up, dark and heavy and suffocating. It felt like his grief from the dragon tunnel, but it was ancient, like the Old Hall, a darkness forged under years of pressure until it had hardened into something sharp, rock- hard, weighted with a feeling of sad, lonely eternity. Stars, it was crushing. He felt it pressing against his heart and it was a vice, a crippling despair that he had to break.”

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“You told me once that you had nothing to learn from your parents because they raised you in times of peace.” He watched the snow pass beneath their feet, then met her eye again. “I disagree. I believe that we all have an opportunity we have not had for fifteen years.” “What’s that?” “To learn to hope. To be caring and kind. To be good again and to love one another because we can, instead of hating each other because it’s safe. Don’t you want to walk in the woods without fearing for your life?”

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