Fly away, little bird.

— At the end as at the start, and through all the in-betweens, I love you.

I’d been kissed before, drunken mistakes, awkward fumblings. This was nothing like that. It was sure and powerful and like my whole body had just come awake. I could feel my pounding heart, the press of silk against my skin, the strength of his arms around me, one hand buried deep in my hair, the other at my back, pulling me closer. The moment his lips met mine, the connection between us opened and I felt his power flood through me. I could feel how much he wanted me.

Inspired by this graphic set by @ifbin 

One raven for uncertain peril. Six for danger sure to arrive. A dozen for death, if not avoided. The enchantment is sealed.

I wish this could be like in the movies. That I was the type of person who could reach out and trace the letters of her name and feel peaceful. I wish I could speak to this hunk of marble like it was her, feel comforted that her body is six feet below, believe that her spirit is watching from above.

But I’m not that girl. I never was. Not before or after or now. I can live with this knowledge— a simple gift to myself, quiet acceptance of who I’m becoming from the pieces that remain.

i like good strong words that mean something.

“I’m a business man,“ he’d told her. "No more, no less.” “You’re a thief, Kaz.” “Isn’t that what I just said?”

She’s the only divine thing he’s ever believed in. The only creature in this vast, cruel land who could kill him. And sometimes, in his loveliest dreams, he imagines she does.

- R.F. Kuang, The Drowning Faith

— She needed to believe she was meant for enormity; that the fulfilment of a destiny could make for the privilege of salvation, even if it didn’t feel that way right now.

i always wondered why the plants preferred me to the sunlight when it was in a plant’s nature to reach for it. mo told me once it was because i was the light.

celia had loved the sea. loved the whitecaps that foamed like milk, the waltz of sunlight atop the peaks. kasey did not. the sea was a trillion strands of hair, infinitely tangled on the surface and infinitely dense beneath. it distorted time: minutes passed like hours and hours passed like minutes out there. it distorted space, made the horizon seem within reach. and it was the perfect place for hiding secrets.