A Reaper at the Gates (An Ember in the Ashes, #3)

by Sabaa Tahir

All around me, Mariners walk the streets with a surety I fear I will never possess. The freedom of this place, the ease of it—it feels like none of it is for me or my people. All this belongs to others, to those who do not abide at the crossroads of uncertainty and despair. It belongs to people so used to living free that they cannot imagine a world in which they are not.

Your mother—my mother—we can never understand their torments. Their hurts. We may suffer the consequences of their mistakes and their sins, but we should not carry them on our hearts. We don’t deserve that.”