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Kindle Notes & Highlights
by
S.M. Gaither
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July 10 - July 26, 2025
For everyone who’s ever been told they’re ‘too much’— Go ahead and burn as brightly as you want to.
“You’re not going mad.” A humorless smile tugged up one corner of his full lips. “No more mad than the rest of us, at least.”
Me 🙃
If I die in this temple tonight, at least my death will fan the flames of our rebellion.
sometimes what was considered monstrous changed depending on the lighting.
sometimes what was considered monstrous ✍🏻✍🏻✍🏻 changed depending ✍🏻✍🏻✍🏻 on the lighting ✍🏻✍🏻✍🏻
So this was him—the middle-god of Fire and Forging. The one this new temple was meant to be dedicated to during the upcoming Feast of the Shade celebration. Dra’ Zerachiel, my kind called him. The humans called him Dravyn.
🤪🤪🤪🤪
Patterns were everywhere if you bothered to look for them.
The gods were many things. Safe was certainly not one of them.
The gods could never see the world the way I did.
I’d often thought it a cruel metaphor for our kind as a whole—so much power coursing through our veins and our histories, yet we couldn’t seem to properly harness our collective strength and put an end to all our problems.
“I am not afraid.” The god studied me for one last, long beat. “You aren’t, are you?”
throne of glass follows me everywhere now y’all this is not cool 😭
The being closest to me appeared to be a male. His skin was ivory, his lean but muscular arms covered in faint markings in various shades of blue, the half-unbuttoned shirt he wore revealing similar markings upon his chest.
Always the half unbuttoned shirt
Well, I hadn’t come here with any plans to shrink.
It was reflex—and maybe a touch of panic—that swung my hand forward, tossing the water from my cup toward his face.
LMAOOO
“I admit I made a mistake going into the Death God’s territory without giving it enough thought,” I said fiercely, “but you made a mistake if you believe I came here to be nothing more than your slave.
you tell him queen
“I guess I’m just curious about other ways you might be serving him.” “It’s a good thing I haven’t eaten yet,” I said, “because what you’re suggesting is making me feel like I might vomit.”
“If you want to prove you belong,” she said, twisting and securing a thin braid against the side of my head, “then you must burn so brightly the gods cannot ignore you.”
“You seem to have enjoyed yourself tonight.” “I did, thank you. And did you enjoy yourself last night?” “Last night?” “While thinking of me.”
I legit just gasped
“Your appearance doesn’t make me want to claw my eyes out tonight,” I informed him. “You’re almost pleasant to look at, even.
“Are you afraid I might let some of that truth slip? Afraid to hear what I really think of you?” “Afraid?” His eyes flashed to a deeper shade of silver as they fixed on me. “Nothing would delight me more.”
🤪🤪🤪
I want to do regrettable things with him.
I mean... I don't blame ya girl
Chaos, hatred, misery…they all loved company, I suppose,
“Is it not exhausting to be angry all the time?” “Is it not exhausting to run your mouth so incessantly as you do?”
If they wanted a show, I would fucking give them one.
WE RIDE AT DAWN
“Well, I suppose it’s lucky I’ve never based my worth on how useful I could be to a man. Or to a god, for that matter.”
MIC DROP
“Well, I would tell you to feel free to think of this mouth while I’m gone,” I said, “but I’m sure you were already planning to think about it.” His gaze finally fixed on me, burning with possibility and promise as he said, “Among other things.”
the woman was too stunned to speak
In my head, I’d written our story much differently.
It was a long moment before my surroundings came back into focus, before I looked down and saw bits of red glass scattered like drops of blood over the ground—the bracelet Dravyn had given me, shattered into too many pieces to count.
NO HE DID NOT
“If you ever touch her like that again, I will find you, and I will not simply remove your hands—I will carve them off in the most painful, gruesome manner possible.”
we love a touch her and die moment 🤗
Yet, tonight…tonight it felt like all of us were devils, and I just didn’t want to be alone in this hell.
“Sometimes we hold on to painful things, I think, because letting them go feels like letting go of the person who gave them to us.”
“Better too curious than willingly ignorant,”
When I looked back at Dravyn a few minutes later, I found him watching me as though I was the only thing in the world just then—in this realm or otherwise.
“There are so many things I could show you, Little Sparrow.”
As I stared at him, a thought struck me—that what I’d told him was true. I really had been surrounded by fighting my entire life. But I’d rarely experienced someone fighting for me the way he kept doing.
“Though I still don’t need you to burn the world down for me,” I said, “just so we’re clear. The divine world or otherwise. Nothing has changed regarding that.” He smiled, his other hand finding its way to my lower back, pulling me more fully into his lap. “You can do it yourself, as I recall.”
“So perhaps I’ll just stand among the ashes with you,” he said, “and admire your work.”
But gods how I wanted to burn with him.
“Why do you want to know? Are you thinking of praying to me again, as you mentioned last night?” “You were the one praying at my altar last night, if I recall correctly.”
OKURRRR
“How does it end?”
And maybe I could finally put down my daggers, as he’d asked me to all those days ago, if it meant freeing up my hands to reach for his.
“I fell asleep with you in my arms, woke up the same way, and now everything else feels unbalanced in comparison.
“Are all the gods such show-offs?” I asked with a wry grin. “Yes,” he said. “But I’m one of the worst.”
I’d wanted to burn with him before. Now I realized I wanted to build with him, too.
Because you are more than a pawn.
PERIODT
“Just tell me you’ll stay. Tell me you’re mine. At least for tonight.”
“I don’t think I ever stood a chance.”
But I was beginning to think that a mind that was unwilling to change was not necessarily a strength.
