I will not ask you where you came from
I will not ask, and neither should you
There is the roar of ages in his ears, the steady thrum of tired blood.
His bones creak like an ancient ship and still he walks, as if searching -- though for what, he cannot quite recall.
She makes him calm. He is beginning to realize that the ground does not pass underfoot so much as it rises up to meet him. It has the hum of ancients and its voice is much deeper and much older than his own. When she speaks, Michael lets out a breath he hadn't known he was holding.
As long as she had been free. Michael stares at her for a moment, then another, with some indefinite, searching expression, before the quiet clang of metal draws him downward. Interesting, he thinks but forgets to say. He sees it, now. A queen in chains.
He levels his eyes, blue as the summer sky, on her again. This pause becomes pregnant, heavy. And then, "Toward? Away from? I can't tell."
Michael wouldn't be able to tell her if she had asked. He doesn't know. He's never known. Sometimes the dark and freckled sky speaks his name and he has no choice but to go. Sometimes he falls asleep for days on end and wakes up somewhere else. Sometimes he falls asleep and wakes up in the same spot and those are the times that send him reeling.
Perhaps he is possessed by the spirit of wanderlust.
Perhaps he has not yet found the door behind which all those things he doesn't dare to consider are kept.
Perhaps both.
"Honestly, Isra," Michael laughs. It sounds like apple cider. "I'm not sure."
I mean, what is a home? Liridon was home. Ilir was home. Wherever Eleven happened to be was home. Eleven is probably dead now. He doesn't know. Michael clenches his teeth, tilts his head back, away, looking at literally anything else.
Somehow, it takes until now: Michael in all his infinite wisdom but very little awareness realizes three things at the exact same time. The first is that there are structures, here and there. Buildings. Roads. Michael doesn't know if he's seen buildings, except in dreams. The next pulls his attention back to the chain wrapped around her, and the feather that blooms in her wake.
Michael walks on, thoughtful. Whatever expression he has is lost to the mess of his mane because it does not touch his mouth. "Does everyone do magic?" Something takes root inside him, something small and timid and fragile. It trembles when he breathes. Michael lifts his head again, brows furrowed expectantly. The air hums with the music of things he doesn't understand.
@isra
His bones creak like an ancient ship and still he walks, as if searching -- though for what, he cannot quite recall.
She makes him calm. He is beginning to realize that the ground does not pass underfoot so much as it rises up to meet him. It has the hum of ancients and its voice is much deeper and much older than his own. When she speaks, Michael lets out a breath he hadn't known he was holding.
As long as she had been free. Michael stares at her for a moment, then another, with some indefinite, searching expression, before the quiet clang of metal draws him downward. Interesting, he thinks but forgets to say. He sees it, now. A queen in chains.
He levels his eyes, blue as the summer sky, on her again. This pause becomes pregnant, heavy. And then, "Toward? Away from? I can't tell."
Michael wouldn't be able to tell her if she had asked. He doesn't know. He's never known. Sometimes the dark and freckled sky speaks his name and he has no choice but to go. Sometimes he falls asleep for days on end and wakes up somewhere else. Sometimes he falls asleep and wakes up in the same spot and those are the times that send him reeling.
Perhaps he is possessed by the spirit of wanderlust.
Perhaps he has not yet found the door behind which all those things he doesn't dare to consider are kept.
Perhaps both.
"Honestly, Isra," Michael laughs. It sounds like apple cider. "I'm not sure."
I mean, what is a home? Liridon was home. Ilir was home. Wherever Eleven happened to be was home. Eleven is probably dead now. He doesn't know. Michael clenches his teeth, tilts his head back, away, looking at literally anything else.
Somehow, it takes until now: Michael in all his infinite wisdom but very little awareness realizes three things at the exact same time. The first is that there are structures, here and there. Buildings. Roads. Michael doesn't know if he's seen buildings, except in dreams. The next pulls his attention back to the chain wrapped around her, and the feather that blooms in her wake.
Michael walks on, thoughtful. Whatever expression he has is lost to the mess of his mane because it does not touch his mouth. "Does everyone do magic?" Something takes root inside him, something small and timid and fragile. It trembles when he breathes. Michael lifts his head again, brows furrowed expectantly. The air hums with the music of things he doesn't understand.
@isra
