All This Twisted Glory (This Woven Kingdom, #3)

by Tahereh Mafi

Cyrus, on the other hand, had spent every free hour in his youth tearing down the secret train tunnel with abandon, flowers blooming in his hair as he hurtled himself through the clouds and into the arms of the Diviners. Over the years, he’d devoted himself to the study of divination, forsaking the high shine of the material world for the hazy wonders of the ethereal—and was endlessly mocked for it by his royal family. Learning the basics of magic they could understand, but no one believed a prince would willingly strip himself of a title and refuse an inheritance of riches only to join the ranks of nameless Diviners.

“Are you implying that I’m vain?” “I’m not implying it, Kamran. I’m delivering the statement to you directly.”

God, he’d wanted her. He’d wanted her with an all-consuming thirst, with the desperation of a man waiting to die.

He had no choice but to relegate his impossible dreams to the dusty bins of childhood. Besides, the devil was waiting. With that final, bitter thought—he vanished.

Fate, he thought bitterly, was only romantic when one was destined to be the hero.

He’d been afraid to go near her; he hadn’t been ready to hear her voice, to look into her eyes. He was terrified she’d go and do something brutal, like smile at him.

He only closed his eyes against her hair and fought the desperate crush of his chest, the violence of his affection for her. How she managed to disarm him even now, on the brink of death, he could not understand. She’d wept for his pain, wiped the blood from his eyes, taken an arrow in the back for him. She’d shown him more loyalty and tenderness in two days than he’d ever felt in his life, and he knew then, with a force that drove the air from his lungs, that he would never survive her.

CYRUS HAD FALLEN INTO AN endless pit of darkness, the tug of sleep so severe that, at first, he wasn’t even certain he was dreaming.

She appeared as the dawn did: a slow burn of light that soon suffused with color, focusing into a radiance that blinded him. Always, the sight of her was miraculous. Always, his body trembled in anticipation.

“I want it all, angel. Not just your joy but your sorrow. Not just your hope but your fear. I want your anger and disdain, your frustration and contempt—”

“Melt the ice in salt, braid the thrones at sea. In this woven kingdom, clay and fire shall be.”

“You must not resist life when it becomes inconvenient to live. You cannot outrun fear. You should not ignore pain. You will not outlive death.”

But life cannot be experienced one emotion at a time. It is a tapestry of sensation, a braided rope of feeling. We must allow for reflection even when we suffer. We must reach for compassion even when we triumph. If you spend your days waiting for your sorrows to end so that you might finally live”—he shook his head—“you will die an impatient man.”

“Master yourself so that you will never be mastered. Know yourself so that you might live with conviction. Live with conviction so that your steps never falter.” He paused. “The mastery of self means never fearing the consequences of doing what is right.”

“When you suffer,” Rostam went on, “you can choose to endure, or you can choose to overcome.” He gestured around them, to the vast expanse of the meadow. “Here, even in the midst of your discomfort, there existed elements of relief, if only you had bothered to search.”

He wanted to press his face against her neck, wanted to breathe in the fragrance of her skin, the perfume of the flowers he’d grown himself. He wanted to make her laugh. He wanted to hold her hand. He wanted to bring her tea and walk with her through the seasons. He wanted to watch her conquer the earth. He wanted to glide his hand down her naked back, wanted to taste the salt of her, wanted to bite her bottom lip and lose himself inside her.

“You can’t lie to me forever, Cyrus. I’m going to find out the truth about you, and when I do, I promise you this: I’ll ruin him. I’ll make the devil regret the day he was born.”