The Knight and the Moth (The Stonewater Kingdom, #1)

by Rachel Gillig

“You sound troubled.” “Aren’t you?” “Often, but also rarely.”

he looked at me with unmasked adoration,

“Divination is a gift we give ourselves—that we might avoid the pain that comes from living, from loving, if we see it coming.

I like to think there are times when the thread of our faith in love is so resolute that we forget to search for signs.”

I can’t ask you to choose between—” “You don’t have to.” His eyes were so dark. So soft. “I’ve already chosen.”

a hint of rose in his cheeks. He’d seen me naked. Put his hands and mouth on me. And I marveled that this—standing with me in full armor, talking of the future, our future—should be the thing to make Rodrick Myndacious blush.

“It means something that you care enough to argue.”

The gargoyle sighed. “Really, Bartholomew, when are you going to put her out of her misery and tell her you love her?” Rory’s dark eyes roamed my face. He grinned.

Magic is like a god in that way. All-knowing, and most effective when not fully understood.”

a tapestry is like a memory brought to life.

“Losing something is painful. Sometimes, finding what we’ve lost is just as agonizing.”

I remembered what it was like to love and be loved, to be careful and also carefree, to be good and bad—to be human.

“Little Bartholomew.”

“The story,” I murmured. “The one you’ve tried to tell me. The one with the tragic beginning, and the desolate, interminable middle.”

And then they were like all the other things I’d dared to love. Gone.