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

by Rachel Gillig

Its water was oily and dark and smelled of rotting flowers.

Ew David

Its design was different than the others, depicting no stone object, but rather a flower with five peculiar petals that, when I studied them, looked all the world like the delicate wings of a moth.

“Creatures of the land can’t be trusted. There’s no room for mercy, even for the little ones. Large or small, handsome or monstrous, all sprites are violent and impossible to control.”

“This is better than any dream,” One said to me as we spun.

Why do I feel like One is gonna die soon...

“The pretty one.” Rory’s eyes flitted to me.

“Just as well. Sometimes, Bartholomew, I think her quite the bitch.”

His craggy voice became small—like a child’s. “I will tell you the story I know someday, Bartholomew. Would that we were living one of your tales instead. Would that things were different for you and me.”

He sniffled. “The abbess promised you’d be the one to stay with me.”

I think she kidnaps them for something awful and they arent actually free after 10 years

“Take me with you, Bartholomew! I don’t want to start over again and again and watch children dream and never see beyond this place. I don’t want to be in the middle of the story anymore. Please.”

“Shut up. He doesn’t have much sense or memory or even a name—just a strange compulsion to serve Aisling. He’s a bit… peculiar.”

Diviners get turned into gargoyles maybe?

“Quick! Fly us out of here.” He looked at me like I’d spat in his eye. “And be mistaken yet again for a bird?”

Bow, I mouthed to the gargoyle. He made a crude sound of flatulence and didn’t get up.

“How undignified.” The gargoyle let out a whimper. “Did anyone see me fall?”

He grinned. “It ends when you kiss me.” “You mean it ends after I’ve won, and there is one less Omen in the world—and I hit you as hard as I can.” “With your mouth.”

“You’ve seen another Diviner?” “She came as they always do. Utterly still.” The Omen came closer, his steps crashing over the platform. “Every ten years, they come.”

“That sounds like my dream, gargoyle. The one I had of the moth.” His stone eyes held me. “I imagine it does.”

*after reading* OMGGGGG BECAUSE IT WAS HIM WHO MADE HER DREAM THAT

“They’re starving. All the sprites are. The knighthood makes sure of it. Even Maude.” Turmoil lined his brow. “Hunger is a slow, maddening torture. If the sprites are monsters, it’s because we’ve made them so.”

“If you value your friend when he fights your battles for you—when he is rogue and ruthless—you must value him when he is gentle, too. Otherwise you do not value him at all.”

“It’s hard to see who I am when I am lost in what’s expected of me.”

“Six.” He smiled, then nodded at the door.

Why does he still not use her name

Benji’s eyes lowered to our hands together.

I'm losing trust for Benji

When I became but one of her many stone creatures. An inhuman gargoyle.” She coughed, and dust flew. “Just like that first Diviner I’d made a robe for.”

“That’s it. The foundling upon the tor. The first Diviner.” The newborn moths fluttered, their pale wings beating over stone. The Heartsore Weaver watched them with unseeing eyes, her last words quiet as a prayer. “Little Bartholomew.”

Did you know that, Bartholomew? That all the dreams you had were by my own design?

“Where are we going?” the gargoyle asked again. He looked back at me. “We can’t go without Bartholomew.”

CRYING