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It was cowardice, he knew, but cowardice came so much easier than hope.
Please, he begged silently. This world needs me. “There is no point,” said Osaron aloud, and Holland felt sick to be the thought in their head instead of the word.
One natural,
“One day you will be old and wrinkled, and I will still love you.”
“I’m sorry I left. I’m sorry. But I’m here now, so you can’t die,” he said, his voice finally breaking. “Don’t you see how rude that would be, when I’ve come so far?”
sliding off his skin like sheets in summer.
Alucard did not care about the ball or the tournament or the people beyond this room. He only wanted to touch the prince’s hand.
The color was high in Rhy’s cheeks, the hair curling against his brow a glossy black, rich, at odds with the mussed cushions and wrinkled sheets that spoke of suffering, of struggle.
“Only fools are certain.”
She forgave him nothing. She owed him everything.
“You could break a stone,” her father used to tease, and she didn’t know if she was clumsy or cursed, only that in her hands, things always fell apart. It had seemed a cruel joke when her element proved to be neither steel nor wind, but water—ice. Easily made. Easily ruined.
“Sleep is for the rich and the bored,” she’d said. “I am neither,
sharp knives and soft corners,
She took up so much space in the world—
swaying, dipping, and rolling the way a room did after too many drinks,
Women might be rare in the guard, but if someone questioned Isra’s standing, they only did it once.
It’s a miracle you didn’t fall ill.” “No,” said Rhy slowly, “I don’t think it is.”
it was a talisman he kept his heart inside,
“Well, aren’t you creepy,”
caring was a thing with claws.
“Death comes for us all,” said Holland evenly. “I would simply have mine mean something.”
something like happy.
she’d thought he’d let her kill him.
he ended up doing both and neither.
It had been so long since Rhy’d been able to study his face. Three summers. Three winters. Three years, and the prince’s heart still cracked along the lines Alucard had made.
vaguely remembered but easily forgotten.
“What are we drinking to?” “The living,” said Rhy. “The dead,” said Alucard and Lila at the same time. “We’re being thorough,” added Rhy.
Dawn to dusk. A phrase that meant two things in his native tongue. A fresh start. A good end.
“If something worrisome happens, and you need me to come back, simply take hold of the pin and say ‘tol.’” Tol. Brother.
I’ve never cared for liars, Luc, and I care even less for fools, so don’t make me feel like more of one.
“It’s complicated,” he managed. “Of course it is.”
I loved him the way the moon loves the stars—that is what we say, when a person fills the world with light.”
calling them by their clothes since she didn’t always know their names.
she wondered, absently, if his skin freckled in the summer.
she was tired of running, of letting things go before she had the chance to lose them.
whatever he was going to say, it died on his lips as they met hers.
“Help a friend out?” “We’re not friends,”
“Do you ever get tired of running, Bard?” She cocked her head. “No.” Alucard’s gaze went to the horizon. “Then you haven’t left enough behind.”
her laugh had been the sweet of poison berries, and Vortalis’s was the open rolling of the sea.
the only way to avoid loss is to avoid love. And what a sad world that would be.”
“Dead men can’t hold grudges.”
And his mind screamed until it finally lost its voice.
