Holly Black

In the woods is a glass coffin. It rests on the ground, and in it sleeps a boy with horns on his head and ears as pointed as knives.... Hazel and her brother, Ben, live in Fairfold, where humans and the Folk exist side by side. Tourists drive in to see the lush wonders of Faerie and, most wonderful of all, the horned boy. But visitors fail to see the danger. Since they were children, Hazel and Ben have been telling each other stories about the boy in the glass coffin, that he is a prince and they are valiant knights, pretending their prince would be different from the other faeries, the ones who made cruel bargains, lurked in the shadows of trees, and doomed tourists. But as Hazel grows up, she puts aside those stories. Hazel knows the horned boy will never wake. Until one day, he does.... As the world turns upside down, Hazel has to become the knight she once pretended to be. But as she's swept up in new love, with shifting loyalties and the fresh sting of betrayal, will it be enough? The Darkest Part of the Forest, is the bestselling author Holly Black's triumphant return to the opulent, enchanting faerie tales that launched her YA career.

The Darkest Part of the Forest

avarni

"I loved him and he's dead and gone and bones. I loved him and they took him away from me. Where is he? Where is he? Dead and gone and bones. Dead and gone and bones. Where is he?"

Lilly-May Price

And, pressing her back against the blackened trunk of a tree, he kissed her. His lips were hot, his mouth sweet. And inside her, a warm, numb darkness flooded her thoughts, making her skin shiver.

Leaning over, not speaking, he brought his mouth to hers. For a  wild moment she wondered if he wanted her. Her and not just this. At first, the kiss seemed part of the night and the dancing, full of dreamy madness. Jack kissed her as though he could reassure himself she was awake and okay only so long as they were touching, He kissed her as though he thought she'd turn to smoke the moment he stopped. 

“Hazel, I just want to say that l like you. And I mean... maybe I'rn crazy, but I don’t know if you'd do this with me if you knew that. I kind of think you wouldn't, so that's why I'm telling you. But if you want to keep doing whatever we're doing, then I am fully prepared to shut up now.”

Severin studied him for a long moment, the leaned forward and pressed his mouth to Ben's. It was a searching, hungry kiss, His hand Wrapped around Ben's head. holding on to him instead of the tree.

“I love you like in the storybooks. I love you like in the ballads. I love you like a lightning bolt. I've loved you since the third month you came and spoke with me. I loved that you made me want to laugh. I loved the way you were kind and the way you would pause when you spoke, as though you were waiting for me to answer you. I love you and I am mocking no one when I kiss you, no one at all.”

"Go," she said finally. "Be Jack Gordon. But mortality is a bitter draught." 

"And yet I would have the full measure," he told her.

“You better have kissed him! You better have kissed him so hard he choked on your tongue. And if not, you better go that he kiss him like that right now."

 "I don't want anyone normal. I don't want anyone safe. I want you. I have loved you from almost the first moment I saw you, wild and fierce and brave, running through the woods, your lips stained purple from blackberry juice. I figured that just made me like every- one else loving you, but that didn't keep me from doing it."

“I’m not afraid of things getting messy or messed up, because it's us. There don't have to be first dates and second dates. We're not normal. We can do this any way you want. A relationship can be whatever you want it to be. We get to make this part up. We get to tell our own story."

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