“Whenever you made a choice, especially one you'd been resisting, it always affected everything else, some in big ways, like a tremor beneath your feet, others in so tiny a shift you hardly noticed a change at all. But it was happening.”

“It seemed like this day could go in so many directions, like a spiderweb shooting out toward endless possibilities. Whenever you made a choice, especially one you'd been resisting, it always affected everything else, some in big ways, like a tremor beneath your feet, others in so tiny a shift you hardly noticed a change at all. But it was happening.”

“You're talking like the choices others made were the only choices someone could make given the choices you made." Mireya paused. "I think.""That's quite a mouthful."“But it's what you're thinking. Yes, you made specific choices, bad ones too. But the choices others make, they make them. You don't. Just because you made the wrong choices, doesn't mean you deserved everything bad that happens to you. Don't you see?""Not all the consequences are bad, Mireya," Faela said her voice soft.”

“Above all else, guard your heart for it affects everything else you do.”

“Some decisions are hard, some are easy, but either way it's our choices that matter. Who we chose to align with. What we choose to give in to. What we choose to resist. And most of all, who we choose to be. Because it is always our choice.”

“Nothing, nothing felt better than the way sand felt beneath my feet. It was both solid and shifting. Constant and ever-changing. It was summer.”