The Jasad Crown (The Scorched Throne, #2)

by Sara Hashem

Arin firmly believed an attempt on one’s life was the highest form of flattery.

But his worst flaw, universally agreed upon by all, was Arin’s curiosity. Once a question blossomed in the Heir’s mind, he could not rest until he found an answer. His curiosity eclipsed everything—his sense, his reason, his very sanity.

A time before a dark-eyed Jasadi became the fastest blade under which Arin could bleed.

Power hoarded where it doesn’t belong is power borrowed, and I intend to collect on the debt.”

He would give anything to reach inside his chest and tear out the rot of her. To close his eyes without seeing her face.

How unbearably pathetic that the person whose advice I trusted most, whose counsel I wanted so badly in that moment, was the same one preparing to kill me. A tear slid from the corner of my unblinking eye. I let it roll to my chin before catching it with my thumb. Raising my hand to blot out the moon, I studied the droplet. The first and final tear I planned to shed for Arin of Nizahl.

Sylvia had the power to make the most careful man in the kingdoms reckless.

They could set fire to the world and convince us to dance in its ashes.

If I were a sensible woman, I would slit your throat while you slept.

His first instinct when he saw her wasn’t to reach for his blade or summon the guards. It was to shout run.

I wished I could look away, but in a room of beautiful things, Arin of Nizahl outshined them all.

“I am his blood, but I am no one’s daughter.”

Life does not allow you opportunities to travel down every path, to see the outcome of every choice. You can spend your entire existence frozen in one spot, squinting into the future, or you can decide to move. Pick a path and never look back.”

“There is no if you survive. There is no future where it is my hand that ends your life.” This close, I could make out the austere lines of anguish twining around his rage. “If your magic takes you, I will drag you back. It cannot have you.”

I can’t promise to always stay, I said to his skin. But I can promise to never stop trying to come back.

I couldn’t breathe. “Everything I have is hers to command. What she wills, I will create. What she hates, I will destroy. I am the weapon of the Malika, and it is her alone I pledge myself to.”

“I will never sit on the Jasad throne,” Arin said. “The Jasad crown will belong to my wife, and my wife alone.”