Enigma

by RuNyx

The girl stood on the edge of the cliff. There was no moonlight for anyone to witness her demise, not a concerned soul around to make her question herself, not a sound beyond the sea and the whispers of her own moral decay.

They were watching as she lay on the dark sand on a dark night, and died.

No, she wasn’t scared. She was angry. Mildly aroused, which was disturbing in its own way, but not scared.

could recognize him by touch alone, by smell; I would know him blind, by the way his breaths came and his feet struck the earth. I would know him in death, at the end of the world. —Madeline Miller, The Song of Achilles

The man behind her growled—growled—though whether in warning or threat, she couldn’t tell.

When does a war end? When can I say your name and have it mean only your name and not what you left behind? —Ocean Vuong, On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous

“Try it. Try walking off a cliff, I will block you. Try making yourself bait, I will catch you. And try being with another man, I will use his blood and make you the canvas.”

“You could bring gods to their knees, you know that?” he murmured softly, his hands tightening on her hips, before drifting to the corners of her eyes, tracing them like he did. “Just one glance from these eyes would have driven men to murder in old times. Still might.” Salem tilted her head to the side. “Would it drive you to murder?” He pulled her closer. “Oh, little asp. It would drive me beyond.” “What is beyond murder?” “Damnation.”

“Because I was a man on the path to damnation and I saw salvation instead. Because being near you makes me feel something beyond rage. Because the chaos inside me quietens when I’m near you.” His words were shaking by the end of his sentence, his hands holding her possessively. “You’ve become my muse, little asp.”

If all else perished, and he remained, I should still continue to be; and if all else remained, and he were annihilated, the Universe would turn to a mighty stranger. —Emily Brontë, Wuthering Heights

“Insanity is a spectrum,”

“I want to be the only villain you see. I want to be the only devil who drags you to hell.”

You give me a modicum of peace in a world of chaos.

Love, deep, true love, was immortal.

Why should you love him whom the world hates so? Because he loves me more than all the world. —Christopher Marlowe, Edward II

But then he had, and in a very public way. “Why did you?” He huffed a laugh. “Because I saw you smiling at another boy and didn’t think going to prison again was too bad.”