The Six of Crows Duology (The Six of Crows, #1-2)

by Leigh Bardugo

“Was that magic?” Anya tapped him on the nose. “Of a sort. The same magic your own body works when given time and a bit of bandage.”

“I’m a business man,” he’d told her. “No more, no less.” “You’re a thief, Kaz.” “Isn’t that what I just said?”

A secret’s not like coin. It doesn’t keep its value in the spending.

Many boys will bring you flowers. But some day you’ll meet a boy who will learn your favourite flower, your favourite song, your favourite sweet. And even if he is too poor to give you any of them, it won’t matter because he will have taken the time to know you as no one else does. Only that boy earns your heart.

But the living asked more of you than the dead. A killing stroke took decision, clarity of intent. Healing was slow, deliberate, a rhythm that required thoughtful study of each small choice.

“I’m Kaelish,” she lied, “and I can speak any language.” “More witchcraft.” “If by witchcraft, you mean the arcane practice of reading.

“The Fjerdans believe all the world is connected through its waters – the seas, the ice, the rivers and streams, the rain and storms. All feed Djel and are fed by him. When we die, we call it felöt-objer, taking root. We become as roots of the ash tree, drinking from Djel wherever we are laid.”

Though he’d trusted her with his life countless times, it felt much more frightening to trust her with this shame.

want to go home. The longing for it hit her hard, a physical ache.

I need someone who can be invisible, who can become a ghost. Do you think you could do that?” I’m already a ghost, she thought. I died in the hold of a slaver ship.

“If it were a trick, I’d promise you safety. I’d offer you happiness. I don’t know if that exists in the Barrel, but you’ll find none of it with me.” For some reason, those words had comforted her. Better terrible truths than kind lies.

A gambler, a convict, a wayward son, a lost Grisha, a Suli girl who had become a killer, a boy from the Barrel who had become something worse.

“Some people see a magic trick and say, ‘Impossible!’ They clap their hands, turn over their money, and forget about it ten minutes later. Other people ask how it worked. They go home, get into bed, toss and turn, wondering how it was done. It takes them a good night’s sleep to forget all about it. And then there are the ones who stay awake, running through the trick again and again, looking for that skip in perception, the crack in the illusion that will explain how their eyes got duped; they’re the kind who won’t rest until they’ve mastered that little bit of mystery for themselves. I’m that kind.” “You love trickery.” “I love puzzles. Trickery is just my native tongue.”

“Prepared to hear the sound of certain doom?” he asked. “You’ve never heard my father mad.” “That sense of humour is getting progressively more Barrel-appropriate. If we survive, I’ll teach you to swear.

For a brief second, every horror came back to her, and she truly was a wraith, a ghost taking flight from a body that had given her only pain. No. A body that had given her strength. A body that had carried her over the rooftops of Ketterdam, that had served her in battle, that had brought her up six storeys in the dark of a soot-stained chimney.

Water had a voice. It was something every canal rat knew, anyone who had slept beneath a bridge or weathered a winter storm in an overturned boat – water could speak with the voice of a lover, a long-lost brother, even a god.

There was no part of him that was not broken, that had not healed wrong, and there was no part of him that was not stronger for having been broken.

Greed may do your bidding, but death serves no man.

“You know you can’t stop them all.” “If I don’t try, I won’t stop any.”

“I will have you without armour, Kaz Brekker. Or I will not have you at all.”

When power shifts, someone always suffers.” “When profit shifts,” Jesper shot back. Van Eck’s expression was bemused. “Aren’t they one and the same?”

By all that was holy, nothing could motivate the Kerch like cash.

The really bad monsters never look like monsters.”

“If you don’t care about money, Nina dear, call it by its other names.” “Kruge? Scrub? Kaz’s one true love?” “Freedom, security, retribution.”

her father had explained that only fools were fearless. We meet fear, he’d said. We greet the unexpected visitor and listen to what he has to tell us. When fear arrives, something is about to happen.

Better terrible truths than kind lies.

“Knowledge isn’t a sign of divine favor. Prosperity is.”

“You haven’t been alive long enough to rack up your share of sin.” “I’m a quick study.”

“Can I trust you?” “No.” Colm took up his crumpled hat again. “Can I trust you to help Jesper through this?” “Yes.”

“Would you throw yourself off a bridge for a man who was?” “I wouldn’t throw myself off a bridge for the king of Ravka.”

“Kaz can pick the locks,” said Wylan. “No,” said Kaz, “I can’t.” “I don’t think I’ve ever heard those words leave your lips,” said Nina. “Say it again, nice and slow.”

“Isn’t that how things are done around here?” asked Wylan. “We all tell Kaz we’re fine and then do something stupid?”

“This is not a negotiation.” “Everything is a negotiation with you, Brekker. You probably bartered your way out of the womb.

Praying and wishing are not the same thing.” But they’re equally useless.

“I would come for you. And if I couldn’t walk, I’d crawl to you, and no matter how broken we were, we’d fight our way out together—knives drawn, pistols blazing. Because that’s what we do. We never stop fighting.”

“Zoya used to say that fear is a phoenix. You can watch it burn a thousand times and still it will return.”

You fight beside each other, sleep on the same furs, your rations are your wolf’s rations. He is not your pet. He is a warrior like you, a brother.”

No mourners, no funerals. Another way of saying good luck. But it was something more. A dark wink to the fact that there would be no expensive burials for people like them, no marble markers to remember their names, no wreaths of myrtle and rose.

“What a luxury to turn your back on luxury.”

You’re weak because you’re afraid of people seeing your weakness.

“It’s shame that lines my pockets, shame that keeps the Barrel teeming with fools ready to put on a mask just so they can have what they want with no one the wiser for it. We can endure all kinds of pain. It’s shame that eats men whole.”

“I don’t hold a grudge. I cradle it. I coddle it. I feed it fine cuts of meat and send it to the best schools. I nurture my grudges, Rollins.”

“Do you know the Suli have no words to say ‘I’m sorry’?” “What do you say when you step on someone’s foot?” “I don’t step on people’s feet.” “You know what I mean.” “We say nothing. We know the slight was not deliberate. We live in tight quarters, traveling together. There’s no time to constantly be apologizing for existing. But when someone does wrong, when we make mistakes, we don’t say we’re sorry. We promise to make amends.”

“I’ve taken knives, bullets, and too many punches to count, all for a little piece of this town,” said Kaz. “This is the city I bled for. And if Ketterdam has taught me anything, it’s that you can always bleed a little more.”

“The Suli believe that when we do wrong, we give life to our shadows. Every sin makes the shadow stronger, until eventually the shadow is stronger than you.”

“Rich men want to believe they deserve every penny they’ve got, so they forget what they owe to chance.