Roshani Chokshi Quotes

A small light floated between us, only to vanish in an instant.
"What are those?"
Amar followed my gaze. "Wishes."
My eyes widened. "They grant wishes?"
"Sadly, no. They're wishes already made."
"Of what?"
"Or who?" countered Amar.
"Is this another secret the moon keeps from me?"
"No," said Amar with a grin. "It is a secret that I choose to keep from you."
"Why won't you tell me?"
"Because then this would lose all its fun.

The worms do not take heed of caste and rank when they feast on our ashes," the Raja said. "Your subjects will not remember you. They will not remember the shade of your eyes, the colors you favored, or the beauty of your wives. They will only remember your impression upon their hearts and whether you filled them with glee or grief. That is your immortality.

Amar loosed a breath. "I understand, you know."
I looked up.
"The forced silence…the voices of this palace."
We stood there, not saying anything. I felt too aware of the space between us. Even with Akaran's secrets spiraling in the shadows of my head, I couldn't ignore the weightless feeling that had gripped me. Standing beside Amar did something to me. Like my center had shifted to make room for him.
"You do not trust me, do you?"
"No," I said. I had no reason to lie. "I told you in the Night Bazaar that trust is won in actions and time. Not words."
"I wish you trusted me."
"I don't place my faith in wishes," I said. "How can I? I can't even--"
I bit back the rest of my words. I can't even see your face. Perhaps Gupta was lying and he really did have a disfiguring scar. Amar moved closer until we were only a hand space apart.
"What?" he coaxed, his voice hovering between a growl and a question.
"I can't even see your face."
A strange chill still curled off of him like smoke and even though the glass garden was teeming with little lights, shades veiled him.
"Is that what you want?" he said. "Would it make you trust me?"
"It would be a start."
"You are impossible to please."
I said nothing. Amar leaned forward, and I felt the silken trails of his hood brush across my neck. My breath constricted. "Is that what you want? An unguarded gaze can spill a thousand secrets."
"I would know them anyway," I s

I hadn't known until now, but I saw it, felt it. I came here for her. Because it didn't matter whether I had lived in another realm for years that I thought were mere days. It didn't matter that I had tasted fairy fruit, fallen in love and broken a heart. Some bonds were impervious to all manner of experience. And the truth was that, no matter what happened, we were sisters.

I will not let us be beings of regret. I know my past. What I want is my future.

I wanted a love thick with time, as inscrutable as if a lathe had carved it from night and as familiar as the marrow in my bones. I wanted the impossible, which made it that much easier to push out of my mind.

Superstitons are useless. And a gut cannot have an instinct

Sometimes she wondered if grief could break someone, for all of them bore fractures, new hollows.

What I saw in Vikram's gaze rooted me to the spot:
understanding. Those secrets had coaxed a shadowed part of us to step into the light. Understanding felt like a hand reached for and found in the dark. No one had ever looked at me that way because no one, until now, could.

When we had closed the door to the star room, Amar reached up to brush his fingers against the constellation in my hair.
"It suits you," he said.
Warmth crept to my cheeks. For a long moment, we stood in that alcove. The mirror portals faintly shimmered. In the distance, I could see the lines of cities and flush of daybreaks, but everything felt dim compared to the space between us. It felt so charged it could have been alive.

Perhaps Choices spring up when history makes way for them. Perhaps they will grow, like legends upon dead conquerors.

The person you received word from," I said after a while. "You love one of them, don't you?"
Gauri started, a protest on the tip of her lips.
"I…," she began before weakly trailing off. She quickly regained composure and her eyes narrowed. "That's none of your concern."
You are my concern, I wanted to say. You are my sister. But I said nothing. I just let her words hang in the air.
"The best motivation is love," I offered.
Beside me, Kamala nodded vigorously. "And food!"
Gauri's eyes widened. Like a ghost of sound laid atop the other, I heard what Gauri did--a sort of mangled neighing.
"Your horse is rather strange."
Kamala nodded again.

There's always impossibilities in dreams. Dream more.

His smile banished my loneliness and limbed the hollows of my anema with starlight, pure and bright...his touch hummed in my bones like an aria -- a song to my dance, a beginning of a promise.

For sometimes, when we take the deadliest aim, we are nothing if not reckless.

Does that mean I get to do magical things, too? Do I get powers? Or a cape?"
"There shall be no capes."
"A hat?"
"No."
"Theme song?"
"Please stop.

I'm not swayed by flattery," I said. "I think a woman could feel insulted by a compliment. But I suppose that depends on the delivery."
"I think it depends on the sincerity. If you tell a woman she sings beautifully when she knows the sound of her voice might as well drop a slab of stone on the person next to her, then a compliment would be insulting."
I crossed my arms. "She could think you're blinded by love."
"Or deafened.

History is a myth shaped by the tongues of conquerors.

Do these past days mean nothing?" he asked, so gently that my weak self curled around his words.
But I would no longer be weak. I tapped into that power in my veins and a shimmering wall of flames sprang up between us. Amar jumped back, shocked and then…amused.
"A little ruthlessness is to be admired, but it's cruel to play with a powerless heart."
"Crueler still to promise equality and hide a person's true self."
"I thought it was best for you," he repeated.
"Strange how something that only affected me was decided by you."
Amar's smile turned cold. "My promises were true. You seek to punish an illusion without fully knowing. What were your kisses, then? Vengeance?"
The wall of flames shimmered away. Anger still flared inside me, but now it was mixed with something else. Something I couldn't push away, despite fury. Want.
"They were nothing," I lied. "They meant nothing."
I didn't look at him. And then, a bloom of cold erupted beside me and Amar was at my side. His fingers traced a secret calligraphy along my arms.
"Nothing at all?"
My heart twisted. I reached forward, my hands tangling in his hair as I kissed him. It was a kiss meant to devour, to summon war. And when I broke it, my voice was harsh:
"My kisses mean nothing."
"Cruel queen," he murmured, tilting my head back. His lips skimmed down my neck. Amar's hands gripped my waist, before tracing the outline of my hips. Heat flared through my body. But just

What were your kisses, then? Vengeance?"
The wall of flames shimmered away. Anger still flared inside me, but now it was mixed with something else. Something I couldn't push away, despite fury. Want.
"They were nothing," I lied. "They meant nothing."
I didn't look at him. And then, a bloom of cold erupted beside me and Amar was at my side. His fingers traced a secret calligraphy along my arms.
"Nothing at all?

I can't believe you didn't have a real weapon on hand," I said.
"I have my mind," he said. "You should thank me."
I raised my chained hands. "I am bursting with gratitude.

I remembered…

…how acrid heartbreak tastes. I remembered the walk to the edge of the reincarnation cycle--the chill of marble, my plumed breath, betrayal prizing apart my heart.
I remembered fury enthralling me body and bone. I remembered light lapping over my eyes and my soul unraveling, fracturing into prisms of amethyst, lapis, topaz. I remembered a needling twinge of regret and the secret, terrible knowledge that somewhere in Naraka my abandonment would leave behind a chasm of obsidian threads--a chronic rift.

I saw Amar. Perched on a towering throne of thorns. There was no compassion in his eyes. Only steel. But there was also a blank look to his expression, as though he couldn't quite remember how he'd gotten there or what he was supposed to do next. Images rustled beneath my skin, lighting up behind my eyes. I saw us along the ocean at the edge of the world, his hands twisting the black curls of my hair. I saw him standing near the shore, smiling as he placed a wreath of rosemary and honey myrtle around my head like a crown. I saw our fingers interlace, felt the roughness of his hands against my own and heard him speak my name like a prayer.

How many times have answers been so simple and yet someone is determined to take the path of thorns instead of roses?" "It's not earned." "That's a very human thing to say." "An inclination I can't help." "It's not about things that are earned, but just things as they are.

Brynne shuddered. 'You're my best friend, but I would never like you. One, because you're basically my brother. Two, I prefer boys who can beat me in a wrestling contest.' She thought about this and added, 'Or girls.

Can we be happy for Goliath from behind a sheet of glass and a net and a fence? Maybe a ring of fire for good measure?" asked Enrique

-we wish you-"
"-a tale-"
"-worth telling."
"Not luck?" asked Vikram.
The gate heaved with wet laughter.
"-what good is-"
"-such a thing.

"-a tale-""-a tale-"

What she coaxed out of me was a visceral need to live, and wasn't that what fueled immortality and made it worthwhile anyway? That there were wonders still left to be uncovered?

Naraka was gone. No marble met my feet, no splintered branches filled with burning memories fell across my ankles. There was no Amar, pulling my face to his--one last kiss before I damned him.

I am the Dharma Raja for a reason. I would not have my own impartiality questioned by favoring you. Surely, you knew this."
"What would you have done if I failed?"
"You couldn't fail," said Amar. "That's why I did not worry. You were meant to be the queen of these lands. We were meant to rule together. For all of eternity."
"I would rather die than rule by the side of a coward."
Shadows curled away from Amar's body.
"Coward?" he hissed. "Cowardice is running from the difficult choices made by the ones that love you most. If I have been a coward, so have you, jaani. But we may start anew. Let us not speak of this time any longer."
He tried, once more, to tilt my face into a kiss, but I moved away.
"I saw you spread the rumors yourself in the Otherworld. I watched you take solace in another's arms. And if surviving the agni pariksha means spending eternity with you, then I would rather live life as a mortal."
The room became damp and sticky with darkness.
"What lies you hurl at me," he murmured.
"I don't trust you."
He stepped back, wounded. "Has your judgment become so compromised? If you truly do not believe the truth in my words, then you have no place here."
We stared at one another, fury swelling between us. The silence expanded, solidifying our words like manacles.
"Once, I thought you loved me," I said in a broken voice. "I refuse to live in your shadow for the rest of eternity."
His eyes widened, obsi

Aru didn't want to see all those gray spaces between good and bad - she just wanted things to be easy.

They may have covered their lips with silk, but their words were unseathed daggers.

But Vikram had seen through every facet, holding me against the light as if I truly were translucent, and instead of making me feel as if I had been looked through and found wanting, I felt . . . seen.

Her kiss burned in his bones. And maybe it was the magic of Alaka or maybe his mind was splintering from every thing they'd gone through, but he would have sworn she tasted like cold honey and caught magic.

I looked at him and love filled me. I loved him with the force of a thousand lifetimes, made greater by the fact that my love was returned.
I clasped his hands around the noose. A touch of color returned to his cheeks.
"You are my life too," I said and then I pressed my lips to his.

I pulled myself out of the memory. My breathing was ragged. I couldn't push out the feeling that the memory left. Something so whole that my body craved and curled around it. I thought my soul was leaning toward the stone, wishing desperately to cling to a truth, a beacon that could guide me back to myself. That raw tenderness. That kiss that said goodbye, come back, and I love you all at once. This memory showed me hope. And that was something I could chase to the ends of the earth.

Her mother's voice rang in her ears: 'Don't capture their hearts. Steal their imagination. It's far more useful.

You are the Daughter of Death," hissed Aru. "You don't walk into a telephone pole because of a boy.

What was sureness and certainty? I used to hold on to certainty like a light inside me, hoping it would chase out the dark unknown. But certainty was a phantom strung together on hopes. It would lead you astray at the first chance.

Have you never heard the saying 'you attract more flies with honey than vinegar'?" "Why would I want to attract flies?" "Never mind.

We need a soul, my lord. You said so yourself. If I do as you ask, the sadhvi must take his place. A soul for a soul."
Amar wasn't laughing anymore. The muscles in his neck tightened. His jaw clenched. But he didn't say anything. Nritti's grip on the noose turned her knuckles white. She was controlling him. I bit back a snarl.
Nritti turned back to me and her face was triumphant. "No soul, no bargain."
Kamala shinnied, pulling against Gupta. I dropped my gaze to the ground, my heart frantic when I saw my sandals--mud crusted, tearing at the seams. I grinned. Don't worry, Kamala, I thought, I'm not dying.
"I have one."
When I spoke, my gaze was for Amar alone.
"Here," I said, tearing off the sandal and throwing it at Nritti's feet, "a sole for a soul."
Kamala began to laugh and the deranged sound pitched off the walls, scattering between the bodies of the dark Otherworld beings. They stood slack-jawed and still. Only their eyes moved--bounding between me and Nritti and back. Before Nritti could speak, a creaking sound clattered through the room.
Amar scooped the dirtied sandal in one hand before pulling me away from Nritti. His grip crushed into my arm, strong as iron. But there was something else…he was trembling. I could feel it through my skin.
"I accept her barter.

Love is like Death without the guarantee of its arrival. Love may not come for you, but when it does it will be just as swift and ruthless as Death and just as blind to your protestations. And just as Death will end one life and leave you with another, so will Love.

What kind of lover has cold hands?"

"One who makes up for temperature with talent.

I reached out to hold a daydream. They looked like they were spun from glass and yet their touch was silk-soft. As they drifted between my fingers, I felt them - a nap in the sleepy sunshine of a winter afternoon, a reverie where a sea alight with flowers and bright candles washed over my ankles.

Tell it to me."
"Why? We both know the tale."
"Even so. I want to hear it from your lips. Tell the tale. The room will keep rhythm."
Tell the tale. My heart clenched. I miss you, Gauri. Sinking into my old habit was easy enough. I sat on the floor, crossing my legs in front of me, my gaze flickering between Amar and the pillar. Amar's eyes were closed, his head tilted back to expose his bronzed throat. I spun my tale and the sky shimmered with images. I told Amar of the demon king who wished to escape death so he performed the most severe penances until he was granted a boon by the gods.
"He prayed that he would not die inside or outside his home. He prayed that he would die neither at night or day nor in the ground or in the sky. He prayed that neither man nor beast could kill him. He prayed no weapon could harm him."
Amar's head snapped up. He looked at the pillar with a wicked smile.
"And yet death found its way to him."
I nodded. "One day, the god appeared as part-man, part-lion and burst forth from the pillar."
A being of shadow tore through the pillar. A lion's mane cast a torn shadow across the marble. Fangs lengthened in its mouth.
"He came upon the demon king at twilight--"
"--which is neither night nor day," said Amar.
"And he appeared on the threshold of a courtyard--"
"Neither indoors nor out."
"And he spread the king across his lap."
"Neither above nor below ground."
The shadow story playe

"Why?" title="Roshani Chokshi Quotes: Tell it to me."
"Why?" width="913px" height="515px" loading="lazy"/>

The day was on its way to being uneventful. That should have been her first warning. The world has a tendency to trick people. It likes to make a day feel as bright and lazy as sun-warmed honey dripping down a jar as it waits until your guard is down...

And that's when it strikes.

Ruling Akaran is a strange task. In many ways, it is like balancing an illusion. You must separate the illusion of what you see and the reality of its consequences," he said. "Tell me, my queen, are you ready to play with fate?

Quickly, I slid into the rifts between stars. I imagined the space as a sphere bedizened with little astral ornaments, and soon those heavy celestial bodies became small as candies held in one's palms. The thread easily looped them together.
I grinned, turning to Amar. Between us was a sphere thick with stars and around us twined soft shadows like cats weaving between ankles.
"Magnificent," he said.
His gaze was full of awe, but I saw something else in his eyes. Longing. Then, he reached into the sphere, drawing out the string with the three stars. He twisted them between his hands, fashioning a constellation no larger than a sparrow. Amar stepped forward, sliding the stars above my ear. It cast a glow that turned his face silvery and beautiful.
"There, my queen," he said. "A constellation to wear in your hair.

Wakey! Wakey!" shouted the vetala, slapping his face. "I jumped off because I thought you were a husk of a thing. But the pretty monster came back for you.

Why don't we play a game of riddles?"
...
Gupta beamed.

And what is this?" asked Airavata, leaning forward. His voice was rich and deep, streaked with friendliness and a wizened timber. "A demon near my waters and someone who smells of secrets."
Kamala turned to me, whispering, "Which one am I?"
"The person full of secrets," I muttered.
Kamala whinnied. "Oh, I hope you are a queen. You are funny. Funny, funny. What does funny taste like?" She paused. "Maybe I hope you are not a queen. I would like to taste funny."
"I am certain you do.

Fashion, my love, just like the universe, owes you neither explanation nor rationale.

Wrath was the second of Séverin's seven fathers.

When you are who they expect you to be, they never look too closely. If you're furious, let it be fuel.

Aru was twelve years old. Even she knew that half the time she didn't know what she was doing.

You are merely a child, and children are sometimes the cruelest of all.

I want you - " he started.
I glowered, pressing the chair leg into his neck. "I would die before I let you touch me."
"What an improvement. First it was me who would die. Now it is
you who offers to die before touching me," he said. "Another man might be insulted. Now, if you would allow me to finish - "
I glared.

You know just as well as I do that Vikram's thread never budged," I said stonily.
Amar bowed his head. Good, I thought. At least he could fake some guilt.
"I know."
"Why couldn't I? Why did you made it sound like I could? All this talk about being a true ruler here, this…awakening of power. Or control. I had no control over that thread. I couldn't even pull it from one side to another."
"It takes time. But it's a start. It's a new beginning," he said. A chill ran up my spine. "For you and me."
He braced his elbows against his knees, the sleeves revealing the bracelet of my hair around his wrist. He had tethered a part of me to him, but I had nothing of his. He kept all his secrets from me.
"Trust me," said Amar. "And tonight, we shall celebrate. Where shall I take you, my queen? Your will is where I lay my head."
My mind twisted into a snarl.
"How can I trust you?"
Amar's grin slipped off his face and his eyes narrowed. "Have I not proven myself? I rescued you from death--"
"You don't know that," I retorted, my voice raising. "Perhaps I would've made a last-minute escape. Perhaps the kingdom would've changed its mind."
"But they didn't, did they?" said Amar coldly. "I'm the one who took you to safety. I'm the one who made you a queen."
"Queen? I'm no better than a caged bird," I bit out. The words tasted like bile.
"What would that make me? An owner? You have free rein, as always, over this kingdom. Much more fr

The way you seek before me now is the way of self-worth, and that you have not earned."
"There are demons inside the Otherworld. Flesh-eating bhuts and wraiths the size of whole countries and you're telling me that I have to prove myself to join them?"
"I never said it had to be good self-worth.

A particularly good book had a way of opening new spaces in one's mind. It even invited you to come back later and rummage through what you'd learned.

How many years had he spent believing that he was meant for more? Sometimes he thought his head was a snarl of myth and folktales, where magic coaxed ignored princes out of the shadows and gave them a crown and a legend to live in. He used to wait for the moment when magic would drape a new world over his eyes. But time turned his hopes dull and lightless.

And, more than anything, I began to recognize a little of that woman from the memory. The woman who had pruned a crystal rose in a garden of glass. The woman whom Amar had looked at, as though she held the universe in her gaze, as if galaxies lined her smile, as though she were myths and love and song contained in one body.

Before he came to Alaka, he dared to hope that he was meant for something more. Now he dared to hope that he could shape that meaning for himself. All this time, he had expected that magic would stitch his future together. But all magic had done was show him how to stitch it together for himself.

The warning rhyme flickered in my heart, dredging up old nightmares: I know the monster in your bed.
So did I--
Death.

Gauri laughed when he stumbled through the movements of the dance.
"You are a discredit to your title, Vikram. Fox Prince, indeed," she said. "I've never seen a clumsier fox."
"What I lack in skill, I make up for in enthusiasm."
"Do you even know how to dance?"
"Not at all," he said, spinning her in a circle.
"I can tell. Were you lulled by the music?"
"The company."
"Now you're just trying to be sly and charming."
"I am a credit to my title, after all.

I never glanced at the moon for the next week. I knew, buried beneath my happiness, that it was temporary and that sooner or later I would have to pull Vikram's thread, but I ignored it. I was too lost in the magic of Akaran and Amar.

Between a demon that could end the world and a seventh-grade girl, Aru (and probably most people) would choose the demon any day.

Ah, desire. Such a poisonous thing.

I scrambled off the water buffalo, biting back a wince as I struggled for some balance. Catching my breath, I backed away from Amar. In the shadows, the hood over his face glinted sinister.
"Do not come near me!" I hissed.
Amar halted.
"Let me explain," he began. "I understand that this is not--"
I lunged for a stick and brandished it at him.
"Who are you?"
Amar laughed. "A stick? I've brought you to the Night Bazaar; do you really think a stick would protect you?" I gripped the stick harder. "Not that you need protection from me," he added quickly.
"Who are you?"
"Amar."
"Where are you from?"
"Akaran."
I gave him a hard look, but I wasn't sure how much he could see through his covering. "What are you?"
He drew himself up. "A raja and your husband."
There was no hesitation in his voice.
"Why have you brought me here?" My voice shook. I couldn't stop staring at the Night Bazaar. There it was. And here I was. Standing on the same plot of land shared with beings that--until now--had only existed in stories. "What do you want from me?"
He stopped. The smile was gone from his lips.
"I want your perspective and honesty," he said, before adding in a softer voice, "I want to be humbled by you.

A knock at the door pulled me from my thoughts. I opened it, expecting to see Gupta, but it was Amar. His expression looked carved in stone and his lips were set in a grim line. But the moment we held each other's gaze, something in him relented. His hands tightened at his side.
"I would never want to cause you pain."
I flinched. "I am not in pain."
Lie.
"I am not some animal you wounded," I added.
Truth.
"It is only a night longer," he said.
The warning voice from the halls echoed back to me: You are running out of moon time. Listen to my warning rhyme. What would happen tomorrow?
Amar hesitated, before reaching out to hold my hand. I stared at the circlet of my hair around his wrist. Bitterness rose in my throat. I glanced from my bracelet to the other one on his wrist--black leather and knotted--dull and malevolent.
"Do these past days mean nothing?" he asked, so gently that my weak self curled around his words.
But I would no longer be weak. I tapped into that power in my veins and a shimmering wall of flames sprang up between us. Amar jumped back, shocked and then…amused.
"A little ruthlessness is to be admired, but it's cruel to play with a powerless heart.

Broken-bone, broken-bone, smash her with a silver stone," trilled Kamala in my ear. "Maybe-queen-maybe-liar, you share something with this crone. Is it blood? Is it sinew? Let me rend and taste her tissue."

I shoved Kamala. "Why don't you go graze?"

"Graze?" she retorted. "I do not graze."

"Go stalk a peacock."

"You are not very nice," said Kamala, huffing and trotting away.

A story had no owner ship. A story could break its bones, grow wings, soar out of reach and dive out of sight in the time it took just to draw breath. It meant we weren't walking a cut path. We carved it into existence with
every step.

This was the same hair that Amar had cut a length of and wrapped a bracelet from its strands, slid it onto his wrist and proclaimed it the finest piece of jewelry he had known.

The only rules to follow were instincts and color palettes.

I take inspiration where I can, and devour it in one piece like I'm starving. Not because I think it's something fleeting that will never return but because I think the best inspiration is the kind that makes you feel urgent. Like you're racing against yourself to get a story on the page while you still remember what that magic feels like.

You broke it," said Laila.
"My elbow fell into it.

Four p.m. is like a basement. Wholly innocent in theory. But if you really think about a basement, it is cement poured over restless earth. It has smelly, unfinished spaces, and wooden beams that cast too-sharp shadows. It is something that says almost, but not quite. Four p.m. feels that way, too. Almost, but not quite afternoon anymore. Almost, but not quite evening yet. And it is the way of magic and nightmares to choose those almost-but-not-quite moments and wait.

There are certain horrific moments in life when the only way to fix an awkward situation is to be awkward.

Lust is safer than love, but both can ruin you.

More than anything she wanted the world to be uncomplicated, for right and wrong to be as easily divided as the black and white sections of an Oreo. But the world was not a cookie.

Though the room was nearly dark, whatever light clung to its corners now raced to illuminate Laila. It seemed the world couldn't help but want to be near her...every bean of light, pair of eyes, atom of air. Maybe that's why sometimes he couldn't breathe around her.

In my experience , big words ornament bad news.

Is there a reason why you seek every opportunity to annoy me?"
"It's fun. Your scar flashes when you frown. It almost looks like a dimple," said Vikram. "I'm still waiting for your face to turn red with anger. It might make you look like you're blushing. Or perhaps I am making you blush?

And I come in warning."
"Of what?"
"Your Dharma Raja has turned on you, sister.

I could have been verse made flesh or compressed moonlight. Anything other than who I was now.

Fairness is but an idea conceived by someone who has the power to make such pronouncements.

It's bad to be a dragon."
"Says who? Nothing wrong with a little bit of viciousness. Would you rather be a dove or a dragon?

Wouldn't it be easier keep your victim faceless?"
I shuddered. "Not a victim."
"What else do you call one hemmed in by fate?"
"Human," I said, bitterness creeping into my voice.
"What about guilt, then? Why open yourself to pain?"
"Guilt is what makes you accountable.

But for the first time, I wanted to believe in the things that outlasted us: the stories that came to life in a child's head, the fear of the dark, the hunger to live. Those were the footsteps that not even Time could discover and erase, because they lived far out of reach, in the song of blood coursing through veins and in the quiet threads that made up dreams. I wanted to hold the hope of those tales within me and follow it like a lure all the way back to myself.

I used to think fear either numbed or nudged. Now I knew fear did neither. Fear was a key that fit every person's hollow spaces---those things that kept us cold at night and that place where we retreated when no one was looking---and all it could do was unlock what was already there.

In the distance, I could see Skanda sitting on a pavilion wreathed in lotus blossoms and flanked with serving girls. He was, as I had guessed, fat. And in his golden jacket, he indeed looked like a toad.
"Ah, I remember him," muttered Kamala.
"He's my half-brother."
"Nasty, nasty."
"I know."
"Would you like me to eat him?"
"Definitely not," I said, a little too quickly. I patted Kamala's neck. "But I appreciate your offer. It was almost nice."
"It is nice to be nice," said Kamala with a sage nod. "And it is also nice to eat people," she added as an afterthought.

Enrique had brought her a cookie and made her laugh, and it felt like sitting beside a fire in one's own home, knowing exactly where everything was and who would come to the door.

Are you real?" he managed, his voice a shadow. "Or are you an illusion? Some final punishment for losing my way?"
"I'm no illusion," I said, staring into his eyes.
The ferocity of his stare laid my soul bare for him to judge.
"I thought I would be lost forever," he said hoarsely, pulling me to him.
His hands tangled in my hair, the kiss resonating at my core. He pressed his lips to mine with the intensity of lifetimes and when we finally broke apart, his lips curved into a fragile smile.
"You've saved me.

Have some faith."
"Between faith and distrust, which one is more likely to keep you alive?"
"And which one is more likely to let you experience living?"
I threw up my hands. "Why is everything so philosophical with you?"
He shrugged. "I like thinking.

"Between" title="Roshani Chokshi Quotes: Have some faith."
"Between" width="913px" height="515px" loading="lazy"/>

What is it?" I hissed at Kamala. "I thought you were going to talk right then and there and then we would've been thrown out."
Kamala wouldn't look at me. "It's the Dharma Raja."
I froze. "What about him?"
"I can sense him." The blue veins that once stood out so prominently on her skin had begun to sink beneath pearlescent hair. Even the garnet gaze of her eyes had receded into something bright and black. Thoroughly animal.
"And?"
"He was here, but only for a moment."
"Where did he go?"
"I couldn't tell you that, not for all the salk-skin in the world." Kamala sighed.
"Do you know where he was?"
"That's the thing I was trying to tell you, maybe-queen!" exclaimed Kamala, pawing at the ground. "He was at the Chakara Forest. You were right."
I was right. There was a soft glow of warmth in that knowledge, even if knowing that I had just missed him rent through me like a new wound. I had trusted my instinct and it had been right.

You once said your soul could never forget mine," I said, sliding the mended bracelet around his wrist. "Do you remember now?

There was more she wanted to say. He could feel the words scrabbling at the clasps of her thoughts, eager to be known. Freed. But she stood there, stony- faced and impassive. And he remembered the girl he had glimpsed from the Grotto - the one who let her shoulders drop when no one looked, the one who fought every day when no one noticed. The one who had once hoped that the Night Bazaar traded on dreams. She deserved more than loneliness.

The archives were cut like honeycombs and golden light clung to them, dousing every tome, painting, treatise and poem the soft gold of ghee freshly skimmed from boiling butter. (p. 11)

Love looked different to everyone.

Even now, even bruised, he looked like a king.