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“Cassian told me only twelve have made it this far,' Nesta murmured to her friends. 'We've already earned the title of Oristian just by being here.'

Emerie stirred. 'We could stay up here today, wait it out overnight, and be done at dawn. To hell with any titles.' It was the wise thing to do. The safe thing to do.

'That path,' Nesta said, pointing to a small one along Ramiel's base, 'could also take us down south. No one would go that way, because it takes you away from the mountain.'

'So we'd come all this way and just hide?' Gwyn said, voice hoarse.

'You're hurt,' Nesta countered. 'And that is a mountain in front of us.'

'So rather than try and fail,' Gwyn demanded, 'you would take the safe road?'

'We would live,' Emerie said carefully. 'I'd love nothing more than to wipe the smirks off the lips of the males in my village, but not at this cost. Not if it costs us you, Gwyn. We need you to live.'

Gwyn studied Ramiel's craggy, unforgiving slope. Not much snow graced its sides. Like the wind had whipped it all away. Or the storms had avoided its peak entirely. 'Is it living, though? To take the safe road?'

'You're the one who's been in a library for two years,' Emerie said.

Gwyn didn't flinch. 'I have. And I am tired of it.' She surveyed the blood-soaked leather along her thigh. 'I don't want to take the safe road.' She pointed to the mountain, to the slender path upward. 'I want to take that road.' Her voice thickened. 'I want to take the road that no one dares travel, and I want to travel it with you two. No matter what may befall us. Not as Illyrians, not for their titles, but as something new. To prove to them, to everyone, that something new and different might triumph over their rules and restrictions.'

A cold wind blew off Ramiel's sides.
Whispering, murmuring.

'They call this climb the Breaking for a reason,' Emerie countered gravely.

Nesta added, 'We haven't eaten in days. We're down to the last of our water. To climb that mountain-'

'I have been broken once before,' Gwyn said, her voice clear. 'I survived it. And I will not be broken again- not even by this mountain.”
― Sarah J. Maas, A ​Court of Silver Flames