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"But Marek wasn’t here, and Sefa hadn’t eaten more than four stale pieces of bread in the same number of days."

Good God

"A tear slid from the corner of my unblinking eye. I let it roll to my chin before catching it with my thumb. (...) The first and final tear I planned to shed for Arin of Nizahl."

Let's see how long till I decide to skip to chapter THIRTY (200 pages from here onwards mind you) to see them reunited 😭

"How unbearably pathetic that the person whose advice I trusted most, whose counsel I wanted so badly in that moment, was the same one preparing to kill me."

How are you so sure? Wouldn't you think he would want an explanation before anything else?

"I was in the mountains. Miles and miles away from everything and everyone I knew.
I tasted salt on my lips and knew it was not seawater."

I hope this book explore more the whole ordeal with her grandparents bc this is their fault

“Welcome home, Malika Essiya,” Namsa said.
I wasn’t home. I didn’t know these people, and they didn’t know me."

Literally that meme of SpongeBob in shackles but his arms are so thin he could easily get out of them

"I would never be just Sylvia again."

😩

“Unusual cruelty is your specialty, she had said once, her tone accusatory and full of spite. And maybe she was right, but one thing Arin knew: He would never have done this to her. He would never have let her step toward this precipice with a lie wrapped around her neck. He would never have watched her willingly drop herself over the edge.”

Not bc I believe him

“Sylvia sent them—”
“Sylvia doesn’t exist.” Rage buckled in the void where Arin had thrust it, straining against its chains. “There is only the Jasad Heir.” A dry curl of his lips. “The Jasad Malika.”

😞

“What am I, Counselor Rodan?” (...) “Nizahl’s doom,” Rodan whispered. “The end of everything we have built.”

😞

"A time before a dark-eyed Jasadi became the fastest blade under which Arin could bleed."

😩

"Arin hated it when she was punished because of him."

I hate his father sm

What the fuck do you mean by the words "Epilogue: Arin: Ten years later" 😭

"The Nizahl Heir traced Essiya’s cuffs, and he started to plan."

Arin pov but at what cost?

"Somewhere, Arin would be reeling at my betrayal. His eyes would go icy and unforgiving, and a scar to match the one on his jaw would gouge into his soul. Perhaps he’d hunt me as he hunted Soraya."

No this is gonna hurt more 😭

"My silver cuffs clattered to the floor. Iridescent cracks raced across my body, the glowing streaks breaking open over my skin. I saw my reflection in Queen Hanan’s chalice just as silver and gold rolled over my eyes."

Oh my god she did it

“I allowed myself to look up at Arin. Like a dying woman at an oasis, I drank my fill of the beautiful Heir. Horror twisted across his features. As hard as he tried to plan every conceivable outcome, even the Nizahl Heir could not prepare for the hidden shadows of a broken mind—nor what might happen if light was turned upon them.”

NO DON'T DO THIS TO YOURSELF

“Love was not submission. It was not testing how far I could bend before I broke. Love was Sefa’s hand finding mine in the dark to reassure herself of my presence. Love was Marek entering the kingdom of his nightmares to help me. Raya’s squash soup on my birthday, Rory’s gruff smile when I named an herb correctly, (...) Love was Arin cradling my face in a burning room and telling me to run.”

🥹🤍

"Arin offered his hand. “I believe we have an agreement.”
“Have you learned your steps?”
Arin swept me in a turn, hooking me under his arm and spinning me out (...) He reeled me in with a grin that I wanted to pocket. “At the age of nine.”
“Liar.” I shook my head with mock outrage."

Let them stay here pls 😩

“Do you have the faintest clue how you frustrate me?” (...) . “How you fascinate me?”

What if I just stop reading here and imagine they lived happily ever after? What put me through such pain hahaha right?

“I am not immortal, lofty, mighty, or magnificent. I cannot be, because I am just a man.” (...) Ice-blue eyes, eyes that saw too much, saw through my careful pretenses, searched my own. “I am only a man.”
Later, I wouldn’t recall who reached first. (...) We met in a collision that should have rocked the very foundations of the Citadel."

It only took us 360 pages hehe no biggie

“A gloved hand closed around the necklace. He tied it around his neck without looking away from me, patting the spot where it settled. “As though I would turn away a gift from Suraira herself,” he mused. A shake of his head, as though the very concept thwarted rationality. “From the Alcalah’s Victor.”

When she reveals her identity oh my lord 😞

"The sheer effort it took to extend the fig necklace in the Nizahl Heir’s direction. “I bought this for you,” (...) “You don’t have to wear it, of course, I just thought. If you wanted. The violet color reminded me of the ravens on your coat.” I didn’t say that figs reminded me of safety and comfort. Two things that—in a painfully ironic twist of fate—I had come to associate with Arin.”

FUCK ME

"Arin looked at me. Not his calculating, considering glances, or his wary stare. He just looked at me, almost helplessly."

You cannot write a man like this and expect me to hate him 😭

“Our bargain is fulfilled.”
A muscle jumped in Arin’s jaw. “So it is. Freedom is yours.” (...) “Here.” Arin held out my cloak. “I didn’t want to leave it in the carriage.”
I took the bundle and flipped it over. To my disbelief, the moth-eaten collar had been repaired. I thumbed along the new stitching. “Thank you.”

🥹🥹🥹🥹

"I launched myself at the Nizahl Heir. He caught me with a surprised grunt, arms winding around my waist. (...) I wrapped my arms around his shoulders. Arin exhaled, warm against my neck, and held me fast. (...) I wanted to stay there. I wanted to tell him that even though one day I would kneel before Jasad’s judges in the afterlife to account for it, I would not renounce a single moment of loving the Nizahl Heir."

There was a real chance I would not see him again.
I spun around. Arin cut an imposing figure (...) I trotted to him, stripping off my cloak. I held it out. “Would you take care of this for me?” (...) He took the cloak, folding it carefully over his arm. “I’ll treat it like my own.” (...) “Wool—”
“—is a difficult material to launder,” Arin finished. “I remember.”

You cannot do this to me

I fluttered my hand, infusing my voice with a confidence I didn’t feel. “Save me a dance at the Victor’s Ball, Your Highness.”

GOOD GRACIOUS

“I am glad to hear you speak my name outside of imminent danger,” Arin said softly, and the battle was lost. (...) I smiled shakily. “I will make frequent use of it, then.”
After a lifetime of running, he was my homecoming."

Shaking my feverish head rn

“I brushed his arm as we walked past the first of the metal buildings. “You care about your people, Arin. That is not a quality to be embarrassed about.” The statement felt like a confession, meant for whispering in the lonely dark. “You will be an excellent Supreme one day.”