The Night Markets glittered beneath the moonlight like tears, like stars, like gemstones in a crooked crown welcoming Acton home.
 
For a long moment he only stood in the darkness, an autumn wind running fingers through his hair, carrying the scents of smoke and spice, perfume and incense. It was so achingly familiar that he closed his eyes, inhaled deeply, and berated himself as the worst kind of fool for ever thinking he could leave this behind. This was home. No king, no girl, no gods could change that. Each winding alleyway and crooked street (and grimy bar) was as familiar to him as the black spots freckling his skin. And Acton knew that –
 
Yank.
 
The buckskin’s eyes flew open, his ears already pinning, a hind leg readying to kick whoever had dared to pull hard on his tail. But when he glanced back, there was nothing there – until a bright streak darted between his legs and sat up in front of him like a cat, neat rows of teeth showing in a very satisfied grin.
 
It was not a cat. It was nothing that Acton had ever seen, except for one version that was much, much larger.
 
“The hell are you?” he said, but the magician couldn’t stay angry; already his ears were back forward, and he lowered his head to huff a breath at the miniature dragon, moonlight-blue and nearly glowing in the dim. In response it flicked its tongue at him, and then sneezed: a tiny plume of flame that singed a few of Acton’s whiskers. He drew back very swiftly, and with newfound appreciation. “Careful, buddy. You’re cute, which is lucky for you.”
 
The dragon only considered him, and he sat back a little on his heels, considering him back. It seemed not everyone had made themselves scarce after the Big Dragon had been set up as a guard. Slowly a little crooked grin bloomed on Acton’s mouth, and with a bit of concentration he conjured up another dragon, blue as a sapphire, which snapped its tiny jaws at the first.
 
The true dragon cocked his head and lashed his tail, then pounced at the imposter. But of course its claws closed on nothing, and it went rolling on the glittering pavement to the sound of Acton’s laughter. When it sprang up again, it was to stare at something just beyond the buckskin – and then it fled into the shadows beneath an empty stall.
 
Acton turned and his matchlight gaze fell on a mare the color of moonlight and shadow, with antlers a neat arch. He remembered her from that awful day – but he’d never known her name.
 
Still, he tilted his head toward her, a slanting sort of nod, and his grin did not waver. “’Lo,” he said. “Nice night, eh?”



@Jezanna hope this suits!

you're italic, I'm in bold

She belonged in the Night Court, he thought, from her colors to the curve of antlers to the sash that seemed to drift behind her like gauze, like moonlight. The mare looked at home here, beneath the glow of the full moon, and by some strange alchemy that was enough to smooth away what rough edges of his nerves remained.

He did not waver before the recognition in her gaze – instead he basked in it, though that was half an act. Acton couldn’t guess what she might think of him – certainly that meeting was far from the first time his mouth might have made him a fool – but there was a guilt in his belly, like a heavy, small stone, and the weight of it increased when she spoke.

All her words did was remind him that he’d run. Seraphina’s judgment echoed in his memory (what little he could remember of it, as drunk as he’d been) and a shadow passed over his laughing mouth.

To cover the falter he cast his glance aside, looking over the rows of stalls with their bright scarves and countless wares as if weighing her words. It wasn’t until he heard his name that he looked back, meeting the strange starlight of her eyes, and ducked his head in a showman’s bow. Forgotten behind him, the illusion-dragon flickered and vanished like smoke.

“None other,” he said (almost there was a bite behind the words), then narrowed the space between them, his gaze softening into curiosity. “I remember you, though I’m not sure I ever had your name.”

Ah, more questions than her name pressed against his teeth, weighed down his tongue - how was it, what happened, did they ever explain further? but not even he dared to speak them.

He wasn’t sure he really wanted to know, not on a night that was so fine.




@Jezanna <3 I'm still trying to find his groove again but I have faith in us

In his volatile world, Acton had never had much of a relationship with steady things. All of the Crows had been like him, in one way or the other – each teetering on some different edge, fuses that needed little encouragement to light.

He was unused to the kind of deep calm of someone like Jezanna, a weighty peace that he could feel tugging like gravity. The stallion was not wholly sure what to make of it – once, not so long ago, he might have scoffed at it. Now…

“Seems like a good time to change that,” he answered, indicating the markets around them with a flick of his ear. “Lots of new leaves turning over lately.” Of course there was the unspoken weight that pressed his words into something near sardonic – leaders missing, gods returned – but the movement of another of the little dragons caught his eye, and at the tail end of his words his lips crooked into a smile as he watched it.

They, at least, seemed to prefer the changes – and he liked them a helluva lot bigger than the overgrown cousin of theirs he’d met.

At her question he glanced at her again, startled anew by the paleness of her eyes, which glowed like marsh-lights, like moonlight on fog. There was the immediate temptation to answer her flippantly, and almost he let something snide or joking slip from the tip of his tongue – but then his mouth drew a thoughtful line.

“Home, I guess. To see what’s left of it.” He did not just mean the city around them, which was much unchanged –

but the Crows, and Reichenbach, who had been home almost as much as any place was. With them gone, where did he fit?

It felt strange to tell a truth to a stranger, especially one that made him feel so vulnerable, so boyishly foolish and borderline naïve. New leaves, he supposed.

“How about you? Looking for anything you can’t find from a vendor?” There was little her strange gaze gave away, but he searched her features anyway, and wondered what similarities two Denoctians so different could have between themselves.




@Jezanna