We Set the Dark on Fire (We Set the Dark on Fire, #1)

by Tehlor Kay Mejia

Faith, it so often seemed, was for the lacking.

You’re a hundred shades of a girl. You hold those shadows and bring them to life when you need them, and they’re flawless. Look how far you’ve risen, how many people you’ve fooled.”

“I’m talking now,” she said, and he closed his mouth. “I don’t need you to tell me how impressive I am, or how well-suited to your task. I’m well aware of my own skills. You think you can see something in me first? Give a purpose-starved girl a compliment and turn her to putty in your hands? Think again. I know I’d be good at what you’re asking. But you said it yourself: I value myself and my potential above all. So what you’ve failed to tell me, besides some run-of-the-mill attempt at blackmail, is why I’d want to risk my life for you.”

“The liberation of those who have been unfairly oppressed. The upset of a power structure that prioritizes the wealthy and leaves the rest to suffer. We’re fairly consistent in that regard.”

anti capitalist legend

Carmen’s curves pulled on the tide of her blush like a honey moon.

The pleasant buzz of alcohol was the only thing that kept her from committing an act of physical violence.

same

Was Dani just dizzy? Or was the space between them closing? She blinked, hard, but Carmen didn’t stop until they were less than an arm’s distance apart. Until they could have reached out and touched each other.

She just wanted to live in this moment for a little longer, where she and Carmen could lock eyes and share a blush.

She’d been a hungry child. A criminal, moments from arrest or death. She’d been a daughter who couldn’t do enough to save her parents, and a victim of blackmail, and a girl who dreamed of kissing a Segunda in a sun-filled glade.

That she wanted to do more than exist on the fringes. That she wanted to fight back against the husband who thought he could control her, the government who thought they could decide who deserved to live and die. That she wanted to make her own choices, and she was ready to start today.

She would become a hundred shades. She would lie until they believed.

She’s radiant, Dani thought, almost deliriously. Much more than beautiful. “The me who can’t keep her eyes off you,” Carmen said, biting her lip in the firelight.

Dangerous as it was, she found herself wanting the satisfaction of a more visible mark. How could she be sure it had been real otherwise? That she’d actually jumped in with both feet. That she’d confessed, then kissed an open flame of a girl in a rainstorm.

rolling with the LGBT