Rachel

“Inej looked down at the fingers digging into her flesh. For a brief second, every horror came back to her, and she truly was a wraith, a ghost taking flight from a body that had given her only pain. No.

A body that had given her strength. A body that had carried her over the rooftops of Ketterdam, that had served her in battle, that had brought her up six storeys in the dark of a soot-stained chimney.”
― Leigh Bardugo, Six of Crows

“But all he could think of was Inej. She had to live. She had to have made it out of the Ice Court. And if she hadn't, then he had to live to rescue her.
The ache in his lungs was unbearable. He needed to tell her... what? That she was lovely and brave and better than anything he deserved. That he was twisted, crooked, wrong, but not so broken that he couldn't pull himself together into some semblance of a man for her. That without meaning to, he'd begun to lean on her, to look for her, to need her near. He needed to thank her for his new hat.”
― Leigh Bardugo, Six of Crows

“He had to be joking. “You can’t be asking me to marry you.”
He sighed with annoyance. “I am a duke. I’m not asking you to marry me. I am offering to marry you. It’s a different thing entirely.”
― Tessa Dare, The Duchess Deal

“To me, the truth doesn’t ruin anything. Why should understanding the universe diminish our sense of wonder at it?”
― Tessa Dare, The Governess Game