A Torch Against the Night (An Ember in the Ashes, #2)

by Sabaa Tahir

My lungs strain and burn. Elias escaping. Elias free. I drown, die. Elias escaping. Elias free.

“I miss you.” I hope she hears what I’m truly saying. I love you. I’m sorry. I wish I could fix it. “I’ll always miss you. Even when I’m a ghost.”

This is, perhaps, more terrifying than anything I’ve seen from Marcus yet. Because it makes him human.

But you, Helene Aquilla, are no swift-burning spark. You are a torch against the night—if you dare to let yourself burn.”

“Her name,” Tas whispers. “Laia. He cries out her name—and he tells her to run.”

“Stop.” Izzi’s eye flashes. “You always think everyone is your responsibility, Elias. But we’re not. We’re our own people, and we deserve to make our own decisions.” Her voice trembles with an uncharacteristic anger. “I didn’t die because of you. I died because I wanted to save someone else. Don’t you dare take that away from me.”

“Did you tell them how your sister sleeps with her hand on your mother’s armlet?” I ask. “Or that up close, her eyes are gold and brown and green and silver. Or that since the day you told her to run, all she has felt is guilt, and all she has thought about is somehow getting to you? Or that she has a fire inside her that’s more than a match for any Mask, if only she’s willing to believe in it?”

To be Soul Catcher, you must know death intimately, but you cannot worship it. You must have lived a life in which you wished to protect others but found that all you could do was destroy. Such a life instills remorse.