She’s looking around the forest, as though if she can prove it isn’t magic, then nothing else is, either. Which is stupid. All forests are magic.
Yes, my great villan, my darling god. I will be as sober as a stone carving, just as soon as I can.
Well fine, then. I could send you out to win my favor. Possibly on a quest involving bringing a large mug of coffee and a doughnut. Or the wholesale slaughter of all my enemies. I haven’t decided which.
We have about three hours of homework a night, and our evening study period is only two hours, so if you want to spend the break at half-past-nine not freaking out, you have to cram. I’m not sure that the picture of the wide-eyed zombie girl biting out the brains of senior douchebag James Page is part of Sam’s homework, bit if it is, his physics teacher is awesome.
All power is cursed,” I say. “The most terrible among us will do anything to get it, and those who’d wield power best don’t want it thrust upon them. But that doesn’t mean they can avoid their responsibilities forever.
That boy is your weakness.
I’ve wanted this and feared it, and now that it’s happening, I don’t know how I will ever want anything else.
I like for things to happen, for stories to unfold. And if I can’t find a good enough story, I make one.
Let’s start with a love story. Or maybe it’s another horror story. It seems like the difference is mostly in where the ending comes.
You have only seen the least of what I can do.
Cardan grins at me as though we’ve been great friends all our lives. I forgot how charming he can be – and how dangerous that is.
Sweet Jude, you’re my dearest punishment.
That’s what mortal means,” I say with a sigh that I don’t have to fake. “We die. Think of us like shooting stars, brief but bright.
His mouth curls into a smile. His eyes shine with wicked intent. “Look at them all, your subjects. A shame not a one knows who their true ruler is.
It turns out that having kissed someone, the possibility of kissing hangs over everything, no matter how terrible an idea it was the first time.
It’s shocking,” he says, as though he’s giving me some great compliment. “I know humans can lie, but to watch you do it is incredible. Do it again.
And yet, I don’t regret it now. Having stepped off the edge, what I want to do is fall.
Why am I the way I am?” His tone makes it clear he’s proposing something I might suggest he ask, not really wondering about it. “There are no real answers, Jude. Why was I cruel to Folk? Why was I awful to you? Because I could be. Because I liked it. Because, for a moment, when I was at my worst, I felt powerful, and most of the time, I felt powerless, despite being a prince and the son of the High King of Faerie.
He saw now the ways in which they tried to be careful with each other, afraid of hitting those raw places where they might hurt each other almost without trying. But sparing another person is a tricky thing. It’s easy to think you’re succeeding when you’re failing spectacularly.
Faeries make up for their inability to lie with a panoply of deceptions and cruelties. Twisted words, pranks, omissions, riddles, scandals, not to mention their revenges upon one another for ancient, half-remembered slights. Storms are less fickle than they are, seas less capricious.