Najwa

“Yes, stop playing, Kestrel, she told herself. Clear the bets, clear the table. Walk away from the game. Now.”
― Marie Rutkoski, The Winner's Crime

“Saying good-bye, perhaps to her father -- her favorite person in this world. this is how she would remember him. Not by the sad unknowing in his eyes, or the grim set of his jaw as he led her to church, but by the things he loved. By the way he showed her how to hold a stick of charcoal, coaxing shapes and shades with the weight of her hand. The songs and stories, the sights from the five summers she went with him to market, when Adeline was old enough to travel, not old enough to cause a stir. By the careful gift of a wooden ring, made for his first and only daughter when she was born -- the one she then offered to the dark.”
― V.E. Schwab, The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue

“Stay,” she panted. Tears leaked from her eyes. “Stay till the end.”
“And after,” he said. “And always.”
“I want to feel safe again. I want to go home to Ravka.”
“Then I’ll take you there. We’ll set fire to raisins or whatever you heathens do for fun.”
“Zealot,” she said weakly.
“Witch.”
“Barbarian.”
“Nina,” he whispered, “little red bird. Don’t go.”
― Leigh Bardugo, Six of Crows

“I didn’t go there looking for you. I went looking for me.” My voice is soft, low, and shaky. “But now, here you are, and somehow, in finding you, I think I’ve found myself.”
― Tamara Ireland Stone, Every Last Word