She is there, awash in his warmth, in the scent of jasmine that calls to his flower still lying upon her window ledge.
A young part of her waits for him to say something. It is the part of her that would watch a ship sail into the sunset yet still hope to see it turn back for her. But the ship disappears and Reichenbach’s words never come.
Her question, a tremulous thing between them, Are you no longer in love with me? has no answer. But in this silence, there is a reply, it is as loud as a clanging symbol and it is there in what he doesn’t say. It is in the silent unspooling of her heartstrings. Reichenbach leaves her so open she does not think this part of her will ever fully close.
Florentine feel her heart Dusk heart beat and wonders when she began to feel it again. At what point had he returned it to her and how she did never know of its return?
Stars fill Flora’s eyes and set her mind adrift with galaxies and memories. There is one and it is so filled with a moonlit night of shrines and failed prayers. It was then the Night King stole the Dusk girl’s heart, beneath the stars that crowned Verenor’s Peak; oh it seems so long ago now.
What song do those stars sing now where once they sang of Dusk and Night? Maybe one day the godless girl will be brave enough to return to Verenor and stand upon the mountain’s peak, before the altars of the gods and listen to those stars again.
Dusk had not meant to fall in love with Night that day and she does not mean to fall out of love now. But they had. They were apart, they were driftwood with so much water pouring between them. Universes had swelled and grown and pushed them further and further apart.
Her cheek presses to his and he becomes so deathly still. He is stone beneath her and she knows then that it is done.They are done; there is nothing more for them here. No matter the way their hearts still ache and want and crave each other. These hearts of theirs, oh these wayward instruments, just do not hold enough to keep them together.
Flora hurts for him, her gypsy boy of night and stars. But she does not fight for their love. She realizes it only now as she stands cocooned in jasmine and shadow. Had Reichenbach returned her heart or had she merely taken it back when neither were aware?
Florentine draws away from him, her heart within her chest, but never to be whole again. Might he hold that piece forever? Flora smiles, content with that.
Oh she might have gone to move and disappear back into the darkness of the festival, alone, alone, alone. But it will not come to pass, not when his voice becomes such a heavy, enchanting thing. It becomes a song Dusk yearns to hear and dance within forever.
She would dance right here if she could, beneath this sound, this melody of his that sinks into her bones. Oh he makes her light, light, light. Florentine is air and he is the hand that moves her here and there. The festival is gone, fallen away into nothingness. To her there is only him and his voice of magic and music asking for her truth.
Flora could dance to this music voice for an eternity. She begs for it, and he speaks again, to send such warm delirium reaching into her bones, her muscles, her skin. Don’t lie to me.
“Never.” She sighs through dance, through the hum of warmth that makes her tongue speak only truth. Golden lashes close over punch drunk eyes as music washes lies from her skin and sinks her into a river of truth where she will, most surely, drown.
Her tongue his heavy with truth, so full of words she longs to tell him. They rush forward, for what truth can deny this allure? This is a call she cannot escape. But she frowns, with her golden lashes pressed against her curve of her cheek for there is no easy truth to his question. Not even Flora knows the truth of her heart, except that: “He is an old friend.” This confirmation is sure and her eyes flutter open, brushed-eyes gleaming as she takes in her enchanter adorned in his shadow and sorrow.
“But,” The word breathes, expelled from confused lips, expelled by a heart that struggles through its ruins to make sense of fate and eternity and the truths they both secret away. “I knew him when I was a child and said that I might marry him when I grew up. Lysander laughed, saying he was not good marriage material, that there were better prospects…” Her voice is a song to match Reichenbach’s own, the one that still sings in her veins. “I did not see him again until he came to Novus in a new body I did not recognise. He was pleased I had found better prospects to marry here. I was upset, for I thought it meant he was pleased not to have to marry me. Again, he just attested that he would make a poor husband,” There is a pause, a breath were she sighs, where she feels the weight of truth press down upon her tongue, upon her heart. “That hurt me too but I told him about you and then asked him to stay with me. I didn’t want him to go, not when I had just found him again.”
Then the flower-queen is silent, her head cast low, her fringe of flowers falling across the delicate curves of her face. She wonders and wades in the foggy truths of fate lingering in her heart, in the essence of her. Florentine is a girl who lived before she was born; and she has been born so many times, and died so many more. “I have lived so many lives and in all of them we have found each other. We are fated, Lysander and me.”
Her tongue is light for the words are gone and the truth is heard. His magic melody seeps from her like water from her skin. Down from his spell’s delirium she falls; a bird with cut wings. Florentine lands in heavy limbs that feel gravity’s pull and oh it is so heavy, heavy, heavy.
Blinking eyes awake, the festival din creeping back in like a storm from the sea. She remembers the allure, she remembers the truth and the way she desired to give him all of it she could. There was no lie she could tell for she could not deny him anything… Her heart clatters in her breast and she looks around, suddenly alert, suddenly wild. “What did you do to me?” The words hiss fearful and ragged from her lips. The breath in her lungs is not enough and she gasps with a chest too tight.
Back she steps back as the truth creeps up from her open, ragged heart. Fate fate. Not even she was ready for the truth her timeless soul hid.
The Night King’s magic, his songs of truth bring an ugly dawn of realization and her wings flare wide. “What magic did you weave? What did you do to me?” Her voice cracks with his betrayal and she steps away from the Denocte boy. She needs the water rushing between them, she needs the universes that push and push and push them apart. She needs an eternity to be rid of his betrayal. “How could you do that to me? You are not the man I thought I loved.”
Her eyes fill, fill fill with anger and fear. Florentine is broken with love, “Do not come near me again.” And with that she scrambles away from him, the air calling her up into the night. She flees his shadows, she flees his magic and she flees their love, so terribly lost.
@Reichenbach - Fin the love of Reichentine -broken hearts and much sobbing-
★ She is clothed with strength and dignity,
and she laughs without fear of the future ★
