The Fragile Threads of Power (Threads of Power, #1)

by V.E. Schwab

“They took his sword hand. Cut it off right at the wrist. Even burned the wound so he wouldn’t bleed out. They thought that living like that was a fate worse than death. And do you know what he did?” Lila sat forward in the chair, and Kell looked at her. He couldn’t help it. “He found those men, and he used his sword to cut their throats. Every single one.” “How?” asked Kell, and Lila flashed him a wicked smile, and rose to her feet again. “Isn’t it obvious?” she said, walking past Kell, and the blade she’d left beside him. “He learned to use his other hand.”

It was the kind of place that fostered grudges, and turned them into bad ideas.

Caring could drown you, if you let it. But it could also help you float.

Hundreds left scarred, veins scorched silver from having fought the poison in their blood. And countless more who survived the night unscathed, not because they were deserving, but because they chose not to fight at all. Untold masses who felt the darkness at their door and simply let it in.

He had a smile that could charm a shadow into the light. She had a glare that could send it back.

“Why didn’t you stay on the ship?” he asked again, because now and then, it was not enough to dance around the truth. He wanted to hear her say it. Even if she did not wear the ring. He wanted to know that she chose to be here, with him. Lila held his gaze so long he could have counted the shards of light in her good eye. And then, at last, almost grudgingly, she said, “Because the bed would feel empty. Without you in it.”

“Brother,” said Rhy, holding him tight. And unlike the coat, and all the other trappings of Kell’s old life, this one, at least, still fit.