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“It’s not the idea of starting a new life that scares you,” he says, softly. “It’s the idea of doing it alone.”
Giovanni doesn’t seem to share her dread. Perhaps that’s the difference between traveling alone and being alone. No matter where he goes, there will be family waiting for him. Even when his father retires and his travels take him far, Giovanni will always have someone to miss him.
“Two people means two sets of choices. You are not responsible for anyone’s actions but your
“The faces you wear … they’re always society’s standard of beauty. You … you choose the face that best suits the moment, so you can achieve what you want. I want to know which suits you.” His smile dims, his head tilting as he regards her curiously. “This matters to you?” She shrugs, fingers plucking at her hem. “I—when it’s just us, I would rather see you as you see yourself.” “And if I see myself as a monster?” “Then I would see that too. I would take your honesty over your pretty lies.”
The first time Piers calls her mother, is the same day they pack their things. The snow has melted, leaving only thin patches that shrink by the day. As they close their cabin door for the last time, Piers takes her by the hand and points out a patch of crocus that have bloomed at the corner. “Maman, look! Flowers!”
Over the years his pale curls have darkened to a light brown, but in his face she still sees the little boy in the forest with dirt and tears streaking his face.
She thinks of the pity in Eira’s face the moment Anna realized carrying a child was out of reach—how the old god had warned her that some costs were mercies. There is no pain like outliving a child.
she repeats. Even though she knows it’s useless. Even though she knows he’s already decided, and that weak minds are always the last to change.
Strange that the god that saved her from the fire would be the same one to keep her from drowning.
“Was he worth it? Your son? Was knowing him worth the pain of saying goodbye?” Behind her ribs, her heart stutters and her lungs ache for the breath she can’t bring herself to take. She has no doubt that he knows the answer as surely as she does. She can see it in the curve of his smile; the soft understanding in his gaze. Anna swallows the emotion tightening her throat, blinks away the tears before they can fall. “Always.”
Truths are for those who can afford to live it, not for those struggling to find any bright spot of light in a world that casts them into darkness.
There are far less lies to untangle by listening in on a conversation than to be part of one.”
“I wish they spoke more of love and kindness than of the devil.” “The devil strikes fear.”
Funny how a new idea from the mind of man is innovation, but the observations of a woman are written off as fanciful wonderings of a girl made too idle.
“You’re afraid.” A statement, not a question. Anna finds it incredibly unfair. “I’m too old, too experienced, to hope for the things the world has always made clear to be beyond me.”
“Thank you.” “For what?” She thinks of Frederick’s reaction—the way he stripped her words of meaning until they became skeletal shadows of what they were just so his would stand stronger. “For listening. For understanding.” For acknowledging her burdens despite never having to carry them.
His eyes soften. “You’re no monster, Anna. No matter how much guilt you bury yourself under. Your heart is only harder because it has to be.” He places a hand over her chest, high above her heart. She can feel it racing beneath his palm. “It deserves to be protected, too.”
It wasn’t that she was content to be left in the dark, it’s that she was too afraid of what answers might be hiding there. Too scared to shine a light on what could be a monster contently lurking in the shadows.
“You have grown into someone to be proud of.” Anna’s throat goes tight, the heart in her chest aching with remembrance and fulfillment. She wasn’t sure, until that moment, that Eira’s approval was still something she craved. Some deep corner of her heart, still injured by being left behind, never stopped whispering that she wasn’t worth taking.
