The Dawn Chorus: A Bone Season novella (The Bone Season)

by Samantha Shannon

‘Thank you,’ I said. ‘For not giving up on me.’ ‘Never.’

I wished he would hold me. I wished I could bear it.

Beware, the mask said. The lord of hindsight is purblind. Look to the all- gifted for the key. Knowledge has a terrible price. Come and see, pale rider, come and see.

I ached for the comfort of absence. I longed to exist less severely.

‘What reason has the world given us to trust anyone?’

‘I am with you out of loyalty and fondness, not a sense of obligation. You said I was your friend, and no matter what else we are – or have been – to each other, you are also mine.’ Warden held my gaze. ‘I am here for as long as you want me with you, Paige Mahoney.’

‘Glimpsing the trap doesn’t make me any less caught in it,’

‘Fear does not extinguish courage.

We didn’t fit together as easily as we once had. We were like broken jigsaw pieces, trying to form a picture of a time that we could never get back.