Mirage (Mirage, #1)

by Somaiya Daud

He feels hungry, the sort of hungry that gnaws at him day and night, until it is so much his companion he does not know how to live without it. He feels hard, because he knows how to take a beating, how to fall just so when a guard hits him with a baton. He feels angry, so angry, the sort of anger that does not need fuel.

And endurance was strength, to be sure, but even a rock wore away to nothing if asked to endure enough rain.

He would risk his life in the name of an idea rather than live to fight another day.

“She told me, everyone in the Ziyaana will tell you to resign yourself to being crushed,” she said. “Do not. Even your happiness is rebellion.”

“It means she—you are not defined by the men in your life, no matter how powerful. You lived before them and you shall live after them. You can’t let them determine your path.”