I'm sorry," he says, "for that time I kissed you at that party and for that time at the wedding and more than anything for the thousand times that I wanted to and didn't have the guts to.

You know what? You didn't do anything wrong. I did. It's this dumb thing I do. I look into things and see more than I'm supposed to.

We pass more women with swollen bellies hurrying towards the godshouse and Arjuro presses a kiss to Tariq's outstretched fingers. 'She's mocking me, runt of our litter,' Arjuro tells him. 'The Oracle is mocking me for choosing a man to share my bed. And her punishment is that I spend the rest of eternity staring between the legs of women.

Love’s easy. It kind of comes with the territory. But liking is another story.

It still amazes him how they could have been misled by her personality in Year Eleven. It's what depression does to a person, it changes them completely.

Do you love me?’ he asked instead. ‘Because if you don’t, I’d wait until you did. I’d wait weeks and months and years.

Up in the distance the whistle of the wind sang to her from the mountain. From Lucian’s mountain. It beckoned and taunted and she wanted to run towards it. To be enveloped in its coat of fleece and to hear its safe sounds.