Ninth House (Alex Stern, #1)

by Leigh Bardugo

If Alex could have told Darlington anything, it would have been, Come back. She would have said it in English and Spanish. She would have used the imperative.

She’d seemed promising until he’d gotten to her personal essay, in which she’d compared herself to Emily Dickinson. Darlington had just tossed her folder onto the no pile

This was why he had done it, not because of guilt or pride but because this was the moment he’d been waiting for: the chance to show someone else wonder, to watch them realize that they had not been lied to, that the world they’d been promised as children was not something that had to be abandoned, that there really was something lurking in the wood, beneath the stairs, between the stars, that everything was full of mystery.

That was what magic did. It revealed the heart of who you’d been before life took away your belief in the possible.

Colin’s enthusiasm always seemed genuine, but sometimes its sheer wattage made her want to do something abruptly violent like put a pencil through his palm.

Peasant was a word poor people didn’t use. Just like classy was a word that classy people didn’t use.

“The purest Marxists are always men. Calamity comes too easily to women. Our lives can come apart in a single gesture, a rogue wave. And money? Money is the rock we cling to when the current would seize us.”

“I c-c-class p-p-profanity with declarations of love. Best used sparingly and only when wholeheartedly m-m-meant.”

You couldn’t keep sidling up to death and dipping your toe in. Eventually it grabbed your ankle and tried to pull you under.

Ladino. She’d been speaking Spanish and Hebrew and he wasn’t sure what else. It was the language of diaspora. The language of death.

“Suffocating beneath a pile of books seems an appropriate way to go for a research assistant.”

It was strange to Alex that the smell of books was always the same.

Was she really supposed to hit up the president of the university and invite him over for cold meats?

Eventually his grandfather had put a stop to it with a growled “Stop trying to turn him into a goddamn Catholic.”

“Because people who can’t be bothered with manners pretend to be amused by them.

The stairs seemed to go on forever, turning and turning until Darlington had no idea how long they’d been climbing. He wanted to look back to make sure that Alex was still there, but he’d read enough stories to know you never looked back on your way out of hell.

“There are worse things than death, Miss Stern.”

“And Darlington isn’t … he isn’t there? With you?” “Even the dead don’t know where Daniel Arlington is.”

Danny could go to Dalton or board at Exeter.” His grandfather would say, “Private schools turn out pussies. I’m not making that mistake again.” Danny’s father had gone to Exeter.

“You went to the underworld,” said Dawes. “You earned a treat.” “Not all the way to the underworld.” “Then give the marshmallow back.” She said it shyly, as if afraid to make the joke, and Alex cradled her cup close to show she was playing along. She liked this Dawes, and she thought maybe this Dawes liked her.

All true. But would it have mattered if she’d been someone else? If she’d been a social butterfly, they would have said she liked to drink away her pain. If she’d been a straight-A student, they would have said she’d been eaten alive by her perfectionism. There were always excuses for why girls died.

“I’m not a racist!” said Dawes. “We’re all racists, Dawes,” said Alex. “How did you even make it through undergrad?”

Peace was like any high. It couldn’t last. It was an illusion, something that could be interrupted in a moment and lost forever. Only two things kept you safe: money and power.

blood staining the goat’s milk in veins of pink. It looked like a strawberry sundae cup, the kind with the wooden spoon.

“Not used to seeing a black man with a badge?” “I haven’t been holed up in my tomb for the last hundred years, Miss Stern. I know the world has changed.”

The terrified victima inside North, North inside Alex. They were like a nesting doll of the uncanny.

“What did you see in my head, Miss Stern?” “Sorry! You’re breaking up!” Alex released the plug in the drain.

“I’m pretty sure when my mother was talking about the devil, she had you in mind.” “I’m a delight.”

She wore a well-cut black coat and knee-high black boots. She looked very New York to Alex, though Alex had never been to New York.

Are there any Grays here right now?” Alex took a long sip of her wine. “Yup. One has his hand on your ass.” Zelinski whirled. Sandow looked pained.

Dawes’s hand brushed against Alex’s, startling her. It was a little thing, but Alex let her knuckles do the same.

North had possessed her. He’d been inside her. He might as well have shoved his hand up her ass and used her as a puppet.