The Heartless Divine
Varsha Ravi
Top 10 Best Quotes
“Love is dangerous, blinding,’” he quoted, voice soft against her cheeks in an empty semblance of amusement. He pulled back slightly, just enough that she could see the gentleness, the raw warmth in his gaze. The clean lack of regret. “And yet, I see you so clearly.”
“What were love stories but dreams of worlds where the sun and moon could linger beside one another long enough to learn the language of the other’s heart?”
“I am not… I am not the kind of god that others worry for.” “I do.” The words fell from her lips like a confession, the only holy act she had ever performed. “I worry for you all the time.” He smiled, and it held his old warmth. “Then you will have to be the first.”
“Who do gods pray to?” she asked aloud, a dream with open eyes. The line of his mouth was sharp enough to draw blood. But when he spoke, his voice was snow soft, death soft. “This is not prayer, Suri. It is atonement.”
“When they had been young enough that they neither of them could reach the tops of bookshelves without stools and magic, he had told her that sometimes he felt like dreams split him from the inside out, dreams that bloomed into tales of faraway worlds. He had told her that he gave those stories to her in the hopes that one day they would grow into life, buds opening like blades and catching on the edges of reality. He had told her, quietly, so that their parents could not hear, of a world he had dreamed up—a kind world, where war was a thing of days past and life was not something they crushed in calloused hands.”
“I want to hear all of your stories,” she said, fierce as fire. “Every single one. I don’t care whether they have happy endings or not.”
“I believe in happy endings,” she agreed, “And I believe in the gods who grant them. But I don’t believe in their silence damning us. If the gods never answer, then we learn to make happy endings of our own.”
“Kiran was dying, but he could no longer tell whether it was from the blood staining the stone red; he could no longer tell whether this death had been pulled from his body long before the knife had ever met his skin. The anger had taken that knowledge from him, had blurred the lines between gold and red. His mouth tasted of blood and ash.”
“I’m not afraid of you,” she said, and the words came out surprisingly steady. His eyebrows arched, slightly, in a silent question. She hesitated, reaching for the words and continued, “I know you said I should be afraid of you. Because the gods aren’t kind.” She tilted her head, and her headband unsteadied in her hair. “Can’t you be the exception?” “You misunderstood me.” His voice was low, empty; mountains carved into shells. “I’m not unkind because the gods are unkind. It is true enough that they are not kind, not a single one of them, but you must understand that I am the worst of them all.”
“I have always wanted a brother. I have a sister, instead, and I love her very much, but I also wanted a brother. Have you ever felt like that?” At the other boy’s resounding, bemused silence, he continued, “Do you want to be brothers, then? We can be family.”
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Book Keywords:
dreams, life, suri, choice, kiran, love, venegeance, friendship, stories, death, imagination, viro, inspiration, anger, prayer, dying, happy-endings, heart, love-quotes, brotherhood, inspirational, gods, kindness, atonement
