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Chapters (64)
  1. Front Cover
  2. Title Page
  3. Copyright
  4. Contents
  6. Pronunciation Guide
  7. Prologue
  8. Part One
  9. One
  10. Two
  11. Three
  12. Four
  13. Five
  14. Six
  15. Seven
  16. Eight
  17. Nine
  18. Ten
  19. Eleven
  20. Twelve
  21. Thirteen
  22. Part Two
  23. Fourteen
  24. Fifteen
  25. Sixteen
  26. Seventeen
  27. Eighteen
  28. Nineteen
  29. Twenty
  30. Twenty-One
  31. Twenty-Two
  32. Twenty-Three
  33. Part Three
  34. Twenty-Four
  35. Twenty-Five
  36. Twenty-Six
  37. Twenty-Seven
  38. Twenty-Eight
  39. Twenty-Nine
  40. Thirty
  41. Thirty-One
  42. Thirty-Two
  43. Thirty-Three
  44. Thirty-Four
  45. Thirty-Five
  46. Part Four
  47. Thirty-Six
  48. Thirty-Seven
  49. Thirty-Eight
  50. Thirty-Nine
  51. Forty
  52. Forty-One
  53. Forty-Two
  54. Forty-Three
  55. Forty-Four
  56. Forty-Five
  57. Forty-Six
  58. Forty-Seven
  59. Epilogue
  60. Excerpt from The Sun and Its Shade
  61. The Night and Its Moon Playlist
  62. Acknowledgments
  63. About the Author
  64. Back Cover

Nox paused, but it was clear that it brought her anxiety to do so. Her body jittered against the halt in movement. Nox’s eyes weren’t the lovely, bottomless trenches that Emily loved to tumble into. They were distracted, flat with their inability to focus.

Emily shook her head to withdraw her question. It was moot. Nox’s willingness to let the moment slide from her like rain from the roof was just another drop in the lake of evidence that Nox belonged to no one. Especially not her.

Emily wanted to offer to ride with her to Yelagin, but she knew before even asking that Nox would never entertain the idea. She knew how useless it would be to beg Nox to stay, and how heartbroken she’d be to have the one she held so dearly look her in the eyes and tell her that. Though Nox had enjoyed Emily’s intimacy and appreciated her companionship, she would go to the ends of the earth to save Amaris. Emily didn’t need to hear what she already knew.

She continued to watch Nox move around the room and convinced herself not to cry. She was in the worst kind of love: the one that would never be returned. She knew it, and yet, she couldn’t leave.

Her eyes squeezed shut as memories flooded in and out like water passing harmlessly through a net.

Emily had clung to her little sister, enviously watching Nox and Amaris together for nearly fifteen years within the walls of the mill. The pair had always been off in their little worlds, specks of black and white against the earth and its inhabitants. The other children at Farleigh may as well have not existed for all they were worth to those two. Everyone had their reasons for being spiteful toward Amaris and Nox. Their preferential treatment had made them unbearable for everyone within the manor’s miserable walls. They were set apart, and the tallest flower is the first to be cut, after all.

Emily had felt just as much displeasure when she looked at them, but never for the reasons of her peers. Why should Nox give her love so intensely and chaotically to someone with whom no intimate barrier had been crossed? What a waste of time and attention it had been, watching Nox day after day as she had eyes for no one else.

Emily’d had her younger sister, Ana, to keep her company. The two of them kept their heads low and their hands busy. They did their chores, stayed quiet, shared their meals, and planned for an escape that would never come. They’d been little more than flies on the walls to the matrons and orphans alike for years, but nothing about her bond with Ana was the same. What Nox and Amaris had was infuriating. She hadn’t thought it possible for her jealousy to grow with time, and yet here she was.