I paid the price and own the scars
why did we climb to fall so far ?

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 An amalgamation of fire and light, a scorch upon the lands with tinkling laughter that turns heads, eyes that brighten the world, and a smile (when unburdened, unhidden, bare for all to view) to stop the earth on its axis, Moira pushes herself across the cliffs with the utmost care. A sleepy smile wavers on the edges of her teeth, even as brows draw down when amber eyes flit about to gain her bearing once more. Asterion. That's right. The word whispers through her like a welcome breeze as she remembers how they'd talked through the setting sun, watched as the stars came to life to dance overhead and bring out the brilliance of the man. Moira has been here all night, she remembers with only mild shock shuffling around within - it would be a scandal amongst her family, but they are not here to scold and scorn and judge.


 Birdsong meets her on her trek downward, a return trip to Denocte and her beloved infirmary in progress, when a figure moves just below. Such stillness rests about him before until actions disrupt the natural flow of dark upon dark; gray and tan ground is nothing like the goliath that moves upon it in all of his shadowed glory. Flesh rolls as muscles undulate, dark and light clash in a beautiful display that her family would have loved. The Tonnerres are not a people built for exotic appearances such as her own - color does not permeate their home as fruits and fronds do in the summertime when all is warm and lavish parties are thrown. Every now and again, an odd child is welcomed into the fold from an outside marriage, but they are one of the few and oft do not make it high in the ranks after that. The purity, the cleanliness of the mundane and muted colorations must be kept. So Moira is an anomaly, but she adores the monochromatic colors that the world seems to overlook (that she would overlook could she not see properly as some did not.) If only shadows and light were what she knew, she thinks she would be happy with that, too.


 But it is a treat to watch him move, only for her to notice red upon the ground - red the drips from an unknown source upon the man, red the stains the dirt, the grass, the morning in lush colors and concern. All thoughts of monochrome beauty dissolve as gears chug faster and faster, grinding within even as she hurries down. Where a girl stood before, admiring all that was lovely in the world, a woman now stands, a healer coming upon a stranger who bleeds as red as everyone else.


 "You're bleeding," she says plainly, sternly, with all the neutrality upon her face as a mother would have when scolding their babe for dropping an open sandwich face down on the floor. Perhaps it wasn't his fault, but he should not leave himself to sully the grounds like that. "And frowning. Are you ill?" Perhaps elsewhere doctors were warm, brushing a reassuring hand over their patient's head, checking for fever, smiling like they weren't going to die even if they were too far gone to save. But she was raised in a house of frost and masks, stuck behind a glass to have her strings pulled like a marionette whenever the matron saw fit, paraded about like a prized peacock for the world to laugh and smile and dance about. She was not warmth and laughter like Estelle, Moira is cold efficiency and hidden gentility. The cool hand that brushes away fever but does not kiss you goodnight, the one that works hours just to help a single soul without ever asking for a shred of gratitude in return.


 Now, as she studies him her lips purse and at last she lowers her head with an introduction. "I am Moira Tonnerre." His name is not necessary and should not be forced, but if he freely gives it to her, she's sure it is not one she'll likely forget.

---

in this house of broken hearts
we made our love out of stacks of cards

@Thorvald hope it's alright we jump in here ! c:

I paid the price and own the scars
why did we climb to fall so far ?

---

---

Some part of her watches him as an artist does a painting, and although this one lives and breathes and moves as her art had never done, it is still just as captivating as colors on canvas so that her heart would speed up were she not in such a state as she is. Something akin to love and yearning would have been in those amber eyes were she not increasing her frown at his nonchalant tone, dismissive of something that was so obviously wrong with the bare minimum functioning of his very body.


your body is your temple, it was what she'd always been taught growing up. They were vessels to get you from one place to another, but so much more in that. Your body was a friend, a lover, the first thing to greet you in your creation and the last corporeal form you'd ever know. It was to be taken care of as you would your beloved if not more devotedly; like a song sung over and over, you should never have tired of your own care and well being.


Yet here the man stood without realizing what an affront it was for him to so carelessly let his lifeblood drip onto the ground, splashing abstract marks over green and tan and brown until it all seemed the same muddied mix of sludge. "A pleasure," Moira states purely out of politeness. 


Something about Thorvald was not calming, but perhaps tempered any further emotions she would have if he were in a state of hysterics. Be that as it may, the mildness with which he addressed her and his condition was concerning. With her mouth drawing tight about the edges that only one who knew her could see for the displeasure it is, Moira shakes her head and clucks her tongue lightly. "Lucky then, Mister Thorvald, that my herbs are away today. Are these...bleeds common?" It is not her place to pry, but she is a healer or whatever it was they call them in these lands. The wellbeing of all is her concern, even if her family would have confounded her to their own estates to serve until she was gray and shaking.


She could have gotten lost in those blue eyes - just a few shades paler and her family would be staring back. They, too, were living portraits built of fire and ice and otherliness that she was discovering had not quite reached the general populace. A certain disdain hung around the majority of the Tonnerre estate, reminiscent of those who are a part of your world, but don't necessarily include themselves such. Entirely a monster of their own creation, made of mechanisms and ideals outlandish and strange, yet functioning in the same manner as a well oiled machine.


Few were decent among the Tonnerres. Perhaps Moira was an exception, but that was yet to be seen. She shews her lip as she waits for an answer, something to ease the gnawing curiosity and desire to save the world, if you will.

---

in this house of broken hearts
we made our love out of stacks of cards

@Thorvald <3

I paid the price and own the scars
why did we climb to fall so far ?

---

---

"There is no better use for them than to help another," she says plainly, as though the mere thought of passing by is an offense to her very being. hands, meant to help and to heal, could twitch with the casualness he uses to disregard himself. it is a stinging cut, a laceration bathed in salt that burns and bleeds, something she cannot fathom. why should he feel so horribly toward himself that he would rather bleed than consider her help as just that - help. Moira knows better than to force herself and her opinions on others, but the demand in her to heal is too strong to deny.

pale brows fall heavily over amber eyes that spark as he continues, uninterrupted at last. in the seconds between his words, her chest heaves more with screams that will never see the light of day. You should be weary she longs to tell him, do not destroy yourself so wholly that all should be lost. No matter what she wishes - to use words as battering rams to be thrown and shoved and forced upon the walls of his castle, to thrust knowledge and advice as a storm left unchecked - she will not give in to these urges. Silence prevails, no sound uttered from sanguine lips.

He is walking poetry, a painting of black and white lit with chocolate and caramel. Crafted so beautifully that the artist in her could cry from the mere perfection of it all. His body sighs with every movement, the wind wails her laments when her touch does not affect him. Only the dripping of his blood brings her back to the questions at hand.

The question itself is rather interesting, for they are strangers. "Should one life matter less than another just because I do not know it?" she counters, both brows now raised. "A healer cares little for whom they treat, there is a song in our soul that need be answered. I cannot sing and dance and simply exist for myself. I am as much a slave to the demand to help as you are the blood in your veins. But," she pauses, chewing on her lip a moment. "Of the strangers I've met, those that have cuts or bleed, I think I worry over them… Yes. Is it a bother?"


Few were decent among the Tonnerres. Perhaps Moira was an exception, but that was yet to be seen. She shews her lip as she waits for an answer, something to ease the gnawing curiosity and desire to save the world, if you will.

---

in this house of broken hearts
we made our love out of stacks of cards

@Thorvald <3