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Some men deserve your mercy, Nina. Of course, Matthias. Nina watched Enok and his father lift Birgir’s body. I’ll let you know when I meet one of them.
Ravka was many things to him: a grand lady who required constant courting, a stubborn child unwilling to stand on its own, and most often, a drowning man—
Nikolai set to opening the Schuyler combination locks he’d learned about from a certain master thief in Ketterdam.
Lesser animals whined and struggled when they’d been caught in a snare. The fox found a way out.
She was only eighteen years old,
I’ve elected to believe this is a typo and everyone is really in their mid twenties.
“I suppose the secret is that I cannot stand being alone.” He uncorked the concoction. “But there are some places no one can go with us.”
“On to the next town, Nazyalensky. We hope or we falter.”
Why did it matter to him what became of Ravka? Broken, needy, frustrating Ravka. The grand lady. The crying child. The drowning man who would drag you under rather than be saved. This country that took so much and gave nothing back. Maybe because he knew that he and his country were the same.
He did it because he liked learning the puzzle of each person. He did it because it felt good to feel his influence and understanding grow. But above all else, he did it because he knew he needed to rescue his country. Nikolai had to save Ravka from his own family.
Dominik was there when Nikolai took his first bullet, and Nikolai was there when Dominik fell at Halmhend, never to rise again.
He took her hand, pressed a kiss to her knuckles. “My ruthless Zoya, I’ll load the gun myself.”
“If you expect me to damn Nikolai for his goodness, you’ll have to wait awhile.” “And if I tell you Ravka needs a more ruthless ruler?” “I’d say that sounds like the excuse of a ruthless man.”
Young Zoya bleeding in the snow, heart full of valor. Zoya of the lost city. Zoya of the garden.
She remembered the lessons she’d learned in Ketterdam, when she’d run not with soldiers bound by honor but with liars, thugs, and thieves. Always hit where the mark isn’t looking.
Because you are strong enough to survive the fall.
Because Zoya was not kind and she was not easy. But she was already a queen.
Hanne looked back at the mirror, blinking her tears away. “The lips are still too full.” “Leave the lips,” said Nina sharply, then rose to hide her blush. “They’re just right.”
“If we don’t dream, who will?”
Nikolai Nothing, snarled the demon. Ravka will never be yours. Perhaps not. But if you loved a thing, the work was never done.
“Stop punishing yourself for being someone with a heart. You cannot protect yourself from suffering. To live is to grieve. You are not protecting yourself by shutting yourself off from the world. You are limiting yourself, just as you did with your training.”
“Zoya of the lost city. Zoya of the garden. Zoya bleeding in the snow. You are strong enough to survive the fall.”
Anything worth doing always starts as a bad idea.
Take it, then, she told him. I am strong enough to survive the fall.
This time I saved you, she thought as she collapsed. This time, I got it right.
“The girl who maimed my father. The Corpsewitch.” “Is that what the Fjerdans are calling me now?” “Among other things.”
If things go wrong, you won’t have any way out.” Nina glanced up at the smoldering wreckage of the factory. “Then I’ll just have to blow a hole in the wall.”
They would build a new world together. But first they had to burn the old one down.
