Bound to Fall (Villains & Virtues)

by A.K. Caggiano

D elphine Delacroix was dead. For most who had known her in life, this was a relief, which isn’t a particularly nice thing to say about a dead woman, but Delphine had not been very nice herself.

The sun didn’t have wings, didn’t need them to ascend every morning into the sky to warm the earth and light the way, but she imagined it would certainly help on days when rising felt like too much.

It was, of course, the very definition of playing with fire, which is a bit on the nose, even for this kind of book, but sometimes metaphors just work themselves out like that.

Despite that it hurt, he didn’t want her to be done with it. She could stab him for all he cared at the moment, as long as she was touching him.

It crashed on them all at once, and as water was wont to do, it filled up the space in an instant, sweeping through the cavern and taking everything with it.

Huh

“No one will hurt you,” he vowed. “With credence that the sun will rise, the whole of the realm will have to cut through me before it touches you.”

“The truth is, that I think about waking up beside you,” he said, and she halted her hands’ exploration. “I think about you all the time, about how you share blueberries with Plum and how you braid your hair. I think about how you’ll hopefully stand close the next time you’re showing me how to knead dough, and about how I can ask you to lay your head in my lap again so I can touch your hair, and about how I wish you wouldn’t be afraid to tell me everything because I would never hurt you.”

“I’m meant to worship at the altar of the sun, but it’s this light that I would be devoted to, if you would let me.”