I think it’s different, when you’re trying to fight for something. You’re trying to preserve a part of yourself so that you have enough left over for tomorrow. We’re all a little like that, no matter how far off the edge we’ve been.

Do mages land on their feet, like cats? Because I swear to Sakku if you don’t shut up and leave right now I’m going to push you through that window.” The tone of her voice must have got to him, then, because he finally got up. He sulked along the wall for a few moments, hoping perhaps that she would change her mind, which made her start thinking that strangling was so unsophisticated; it was probably easier to cut him with a knife and drop all the bits in the lake for the fish to feed on.

I found it hard to believe that Rai used his charm to pull off such a feat – the man was about as charismatic as the bottom of a chamber pot.

Betrayal has a funny way of turning your world upside-down. As familiar as I had already been with it by that point, it still amazed me how far I could stretch that moment of denial. The thought of what had been – of what could yet be – persisted. Perhaps it is not the same for most people. Perhaps, when you love less, it is easier not to let the emptiness become a cavern from which you could no longer see the sun.

Five years of regret has a funny way of fermenting inside someone – like wine, it had only gained potency over the years.

The true story, as always, is in the details.

I sat on one of the sofas, pretending I wasn’t disconcerted by the music, which paused long enough for a new, more sorrowful tune to play out. I twiddled my thumbs. I stared at the fish and named it “Sparky.

Ancient oak, actually, is what the boy used to call her, back when he was still a boy. Like all men, he had aged too fast. She still remembers long, summer nights back in Hafod, when she would bake bread with the windows open while he would take his crutches to read his books on the kitchen table. He used to tell her how much he loved her bread, that he thinks it is the most wonderful thing in the world. He was always a flatterer, that one.

Some memories come at you like a wave. You’re not quite sure when the swell starts, but you know before it hits how it all ends; that after the rise and fall you will still be engulfed by the sea.

Betrayal has a funny way of turning your world upside-down.