“ Are the Trials starting?” The girl claps her hands over her mouth. “I'm sorry,” she whispers. “I—”“It's all right.” I don't smile at her. It will only scare her. For a female slave, a smile from a Mas… Sabaa Tahir
“ Rage colors her every movement. Rage that has nothing to do with her so-called bodyguards and everything to do with me and her and the confusion rolling around inside the both of us. This should be in… Sabaa Tahir
“ When did you star here?” I ask her.“Three days ago. Sir. Aspirant. Um—” She wrings her hands.“Veturius is fine.”She walks carefully, gingerly—the Commandant must have whipped her recently. And yet she… Sabaa Tahir
“ Exhaustion is temporary. Pain is temporary. But Helene dying because I didn't find a way to get her back on time—that's permanent. Sabaa Tahir
“ So you've made a few bad decisions. So have I. So has Elias. So has everyone attempting to do something difficult. That doesn't mean that you give up, you fool. Do you understand? Sabaa Tahir
“ She's still clinging to the side of her mountain, just like I'm still wandering lost in my battlefield. Sabaa Tahir
“ We match each other stroke for stroke until I get a hit on her right arm. She tries to switch sword arms, but I jab my scim at her wrist faster than she can parry. Her scim goes flying, and I tackle h… Sabaa Tahir
“ Disappear! I scream the word in my mind, queen of the desolate landscape therein, ordering her ragged troops to a last stand. Sabaa Tahir
“ There are two kinds of guilt: the kind that drowns you until you’re useless, and the kind that fires your soul to purpose. Sabaa Tahir
“ Fight back, Laia. For Darin. For Izzi. For every Scholar this beast has abused. Fight. A scream bursts from me, and I claw at Marcus’s face, but a punch to my stomach takes the wind out of my lungs. I… Sabaa Tahir
“ I don't smile at her. It will only scare her. For a female slave, a smile from a Mask is not usually a good thing. Sabaa Tahir
“ You’re sure this is what you want?” I search her eyes for doubt, fear, uncertainty, but all I see is that fire. Ten hells“I’m sure”“Then I’ll find a way Sabaa Tahir
“ Failure doesn't define you. It's what you do after the failure that determines whether you are a leader or a waste of perfectly good air. Sabaa Tahir
“ The voice is deep and soft, not a sound so much as a feeling. It is storm and wind and leaves twisting in the night. It is roots sucking deep at the earth, and the pale, sightless creatures that live… Sabaa Tahir
“ It takes only a split second for life to go horribly wrong. To fix the mess, I need a thousand things to go right. The distance from one bit of luck to the next feels as great as the distance across o… Sabaa Tahir
“ Failure doesn't define you. It's what you do after you fail that determines whether you are a leader or a waste of perfectly good air. Sabaa Tahir
