A ​Sky Beyond the Storm (An Ember in the Ashes, #4)

by Sabaa Tahir

“But you’ll remain human. Is that not worth a bit of madness?”

The wind, which screamed through the trees of the Waiting Place just minutes ago, is muted here, and transformed into a melancholy music that echoes through pipes hidden among the buildings. The melodies are beautiful.

Would that we all knew the cracked terrain of each other’s broken hearts. Perhaps then, we would not be so cruel to those who walk this lonely world with us.

It had not occurred to me that she lacked magic, for to me, she burned with life and wit, humor and beauty.

Watching her is like watching a waterfall thundering down a gorge. Like watching the Northern Dancers illuminate the sky. I cannot describe it. I only know that a tightness in my chest loosens, and I am different—lighter—for witnessing it.

as if it is not extraordinary to gift someone with love.

“Thank you, Soul Catcher.” “Elias,” he says after a moment, the slightest bit of warmth entering those cold gray eyes. “From you I prefer Elias.”

My body feels alive, but in the worst way, a betrayal of all those who are gone.

“You are broken. But it is the broken things that are the sharpest. The deadliest. It is the broken things that are the most unexpected, and the most underestimated.”

I focus instead on memorizing the music of her laugh, the poetry of her body. I savor every touch and every look.

The song is one of healing. Of mothers and daughters. Of my own mother and her quiet love, which bathed me like the rays of the sun for as long as she lived.

“Love can be more powerful in a battle than planning or strategy. Love keeps us fighting. Love drives us to survive.”

A breath then, a slice of time that will mark the before and the after of this moment.

I could not make sense of the world if you did.”

He gazes at me with our mother’s eyes, the eyes of someone who believes in you so deeply that you have no choice but to believe in yourself.

Her cry is endless, sorrow upon sorrow, as if it is not just her screaming but a thousand sisters and daughters and mothers who have lost their loved ones to the madness of war.

Her smile is radiant, hitting me with the force of a sunrise.

She defeated a creature that defies description—more

Perhaps she was never trying to kill me. Perhaps she was trying to kill some part of herself.

You are her mother, Lioness. No power in the universe could wrest her from your heart. She is of you.

“How do we trust our happiness, Laia?” I turn toward her, and she traces my lips with her finger. “How do we go on if we don’t know if it will be taken away?” I’m gratified that she doesn’t answer right away, thankful that she understands why I ask. Laia isn’t who she was. Her joy is tempered, like mine. Her heart tender, like mine. Her mind wary, like mine. “I do not think the answer is in words, love,” she says. “I think it is in living. In finding joy, however small, in every day. We’ll struggle to trust happiness at first, perhaps. But we can trust ourselves to reach for it always.

“I wish I could live a thousand lives so I could fall in love with you a thousand times,”