She does not know how much time passed, or if any passed at all aside from the night of the festival, after a corn maze, after the shrines, and after she entered a forest of fogs and screams. The phoenix braved the woods as she did her memories, cutting away ghosts like stalks of grain come harvest time, burying herself in the act of saving another, of helping another, of healing another rather than giving in to fits of despair and self loathing and pain. It is within that a tempest rages, that was only momentarily soothed as she thought of the future that Alyndra begged she think of, of the world as she wishes to make it.
'Think a happy though, Moira Tonnerre,' her mother would say to her when she'd come home and cry as a girl.

A happier thought lies within when there are no more cries to keep her awake in the dark. Part of the phoenix is still that little girl locked in a dark room with chains about her chest and silent screams rattling in her throat. There is a chance, perhaps, that part of her always will be.

The Emissary moves out of the woods much in the manner of everyone else: by the hands of a ghost, on the breath of the wind, and is left gently outside as the mists disappear. It is dark still, yet seems lighter than when she'd first entered. Brow furrows for but a moment, and then she dismisses the lost sense of time until she might investigate it further. No souls gather round as she might have expected, and the Tonnerre girl thinks all the better for it. She does not wish for them to see the crystal she's tucked within the strands of her mane; she does not want them to see herself pulled apart at the seams and sewing herself together again. Like a scarecrow that stuffs itself with hay over and over as it falls apart, she, too, must replenish all that she lost along the path.

Steady footfalls guide her back toward the markets where Morrighan patrols with a frown and her fire. Frost kisses her breath and tickles her nose, and she lets a wisp of lamplight bob along a snowflake as it floats so that magnificent colors dance and toy with the imagery about her. Denocte has always taken her breath away; it is a world fit for an artist. Color splashes the rooves, even those that still recover from so many storms they've weathered are bright and merry. Autumnal colors kiss doorways and wreaths are hung high. Festive lights are strung over walkways still, but even Moira can tell that the crowds have thinned considerably. It is with a pensive frown that Michael finds her, brows drawn together and quickly parting as he calls her near.

Turning with a smile, the Emissary speeds her walk to something quicker until she is at his side. Michael is not one she knows well enough yet to embrace, and so she does not. An unexpected delight sparks in her eyes as Neerja's fur brushes against her hind legs; the deep, pleasurable purr of her beloved tiger accompanies the surprise and she turns a warm look to Neerja as well. "Was I gone long?" she asks, turning back.
Can he tell how much lighter she seems after those dams were opened?

"I... It was someone who was lost long ago. Let us go in where we shan't catch out deaths, then I'll weave you a tale unlike those Isra tells us to keep our hearts light." With a nod, she implores her golden companion to lead the way, noting how eyes followed him through the bar. When the woman behind the counter stares too long, Moira clears her throat and offers a pretty smile, but it does not reach those honeyed eyes. Now, should Michael look, they seem quite frigid, ice creeping along the edges, lights dying inside, gobbled by some unknown monster. "A hot cider for me, if you'd please, and a bit of decency" she calls in those smoky tones, raising a brow. Soon, the drink is before her and she offers a much warmer look toward the entertainer.

"Come to a table over there, it seems quieter with fewer...wandering eyes." A sympathetic look passes between them, and the phoenix is off, letting Neerja clear the pathway as she moves them into a shadier spot, a quieter din despite the jubilation and drunken revelry of the other patrons. "How are you? I lost you in the fog - others were lifted up, but I did not know what happened to them."

---

 

     

   That sun-fire smile is turned over the orange of her back, an imploring glance thrown to Michael as he watches her move into the tavern. When he follows her back to the bar, and then to the table, she cannot help but wonder why he shows such friendship, such loyalty. What has she - a girl of humble and cruel origins, of still life portraits and voodoo doll people, of half emotions and plentiful anger - has done to inspire such a gentle and true companion? If she seems softer for his presence or more pensive, who is to tell?

Aside from Isra and Eik and Asterion, who has she let bleed into her heart and been around enough to know the subtle changes in her breathing or the length it takes to blink and blink again?
No one, something whispers cold and true.

She does not ask these questions, now, instead she hums for a moment, lost in thought. Where to begin? What to do? Gold and black turns to the blue of Neerja's gaze, the tiger waiting expectantly. Pushed so long from the phoenix' mind, Neerja is crass and upset, but a faithful companion beside her strange winged cub nonetheless. They stare for what seems an eternity, emotions flickering back and forth, until at last the tiger's paw swipes the cider off the table, sending it flying over the floor and feet of the many who pass by. There seems to be a satisfied huff from the tiger who only flicks her tail with bared teeth before sitting haughtily beside their table.

The Tonnerre girl frowns, delicate mouth curving down with a sour look and an annoyed sigh. "I suppose I deserved that," reaching out with her hind leg, she pushes the tiger away but a an inch or two before clucking her tongue with a shake of her head. "Only alright?" she asks gently.

Lips purse and she nods at last. "I followed you in, I meant to stay by your side I suppose, but the fogs grew too thick. They descended like a pack of cackling hyenas, hunger wrapped in the mist as it ate away my vision and everything but the sounds." Here, she pauses, eyes as foggy as the woods that night, remembering the way the girl cowered when the creatures of white came to devour her, too. "When a girl screamed I reacted. Not because I wished to save her, but because I could not let her die of terror. What a sad way to go," and perhaps Cal had reminded Moira of a sad thing she'd been once. Even for a second. So she'd charged in without consideration of herself as she'd always done. "When the light struck, the girl was plucked up and they changed. I saw an old friend."

Eluoan. A mentor, her muse and guardian when even her parents had not kept her safe.

"They led me to a clearing that is no longer there. Katniss and I stood before a girl who was no longer a girl and were asked a question. Somehow, I was found worthy, and she spoke with me at length. When she disappeared, she shed no more tears and left me on the edges of the woods. It is from there which I have come, and now here we are." The phoenix stops, looks up to ask for something stronger than the cider Neerja spilled, before turning back. A small shrug is accompanied by "I suppose it wasn't much of a tale after all." Beside them, a server stops - clear of Neerja and her glowering eyes, her extended claws - and hands the Emissary a drink, quick to scuttle away from sharp words and condescending tones should any linger unwanted too long. Sipping it, she looks at him from beneath dark lashes, unsure what to say or do next, but letting him take charge of the meeting however he wished.

---

 

His heart hums a tune hers is just beginning to learn, and together they are a pair of wistful and wizened and sorrowful things. Two birds whose voices were taken and scattered on the winds, only plucking at the lyre strings of their hearts in hopes that someone might hear. When no answers come, when there is only silence in the corridors, when laughter fades and light fades and smiles fade, what more is left but their thoughts, their memories, and a crushing wall of darkness?

It is a demon there to swallow her whole.

The shattered glass fades, the babbling voices fad, everything but that inner wall climbing higher and higher. Coldness creeps along her spine, somewhere, she feels herself shiver. Slowly, it ebbs out from her spine, it settles into her bones as a winter frost. Dark are those honeyed eyes, dark and shuttered like the ice at the edges of the window they sit nearest. Red light plays along red skin, crowning her in a halo of blood and gold.

Does he see a monster when he looks at the girl who is still figuring out how to stitch herself together again?
Somewhere along the way, she's stopped seeing a monster in every mirror that stares back at her.

"I think you'd be much lovelier if you smiled, Michael," she confides. With a creased brow, the Tonnerre girl scrutinizes him with the eyes of an artist. From the flaxen sheen of his coat to the silver and white strands of his hair, dancing over the scarf always about his throat (although the color changes so beautifully), to those blue, soulful eyes. She sees a man wanting. She sees a man trying.

Something in that dark wall cracks. A sliver of light wants to reach through so badly and hold him.
Moira has hardly ever wanted to hold another.

Ghostly hands trail along his brow, his spine. She spins small braids into the length of his hair under the table and threads a tendril of light into their midst. Within the hour it will die, burning out like she does over and over. But for now, candlelight flickers as a strand beneath them, a river of time reflected and shown along its short length.

At last, lips purse and then flatten, a breath drawn from her lungs on a sigh. Is he always meant to make her think so deeply? "One day, upon your golden brow I will put a wreath of starlight to match the light I'll find in your eyes." It is an intimate whisper, one she leans forward to give to him, a promise and a tentative smile. There is a blossom in her heart, and even Neerja cannot be annoyed enough to scratch at the barmaid's feet when she replaces the broken glass with something new, something stronger than before. Somewhere, she's found a trickling fountain of hope within her cub, and she will cling to that until their minds are as their hearts are: one once more.

"Mmm," the emissary hums at last, mulling over his recent questions. "If you are a rabbit, then even the slightest fright will send your heart beating too quick. So quickly that it will burst and you would die. Being that I do not believe you to be a rabbit," she muses, "I do not think you would die of terror. Seeing an old friend... It..." words halt, thoughts swirl, eddying in the churning dark waters. "It was," Moira Tonnerre says at last, something of a serene smile tipping her dark lips up, crinkling the corners of her eyes until even the gold is molten and warm. "I've missed him," she says, although she does not say who.

Patrons who are near would likely think that their Emissary thinks of the late Dusk King. A man of starlight who held her and made ephemeral promises in a forest that was always meant to be destroyed.

If only they knew of the twinkling heart miles and miles away. Of a northern light that taught her more than how to heal, that taught her how to survive and rise above. Eluoan, her heart whispers in thanks. One day, his soul would guide her just as the ghost in the woods had. There is a crystal in her hair that reminds her of this, that makes her smile a little broader with just the thought.

She is so caught up in the past that she almost doesn't hear the present. The silence that comes crashing down before soft words that fall like snowflakes. "Well, I think you're worthy."

And she wants to implore of what. Some part that is still fighting for recognition yearns to beg him to open his heart (his mouth) and pour honey down her throat until she knows what golden light he sees. Of course, neither of these things are done. Moira merely hides her eyes behind dark lashes, suddenly all too interested in the drinks and determined to ignore the blush she can feel creep over her cheeks, over her throat. The room is too warm and she is too full of questions.

Forward she presses her glass, offering a small nod of encouragement. "Try it first and tell me if it's good? Would you believe me if I told you I have very little experience in the art of alcohols?" Their eyes still do not meet, she looks instead to his lips, to his pink nose, to the way his throat bobs with every swallow. Anywhere but those honest, sweet blue eyes.

---

From her eyes flows her hair, gently tucked back into the dark fringe that sets her brows in a deep shade, and those wide doe-eyes in an even darker one. Black within black within black. Perhaps she is a demon with those dark eyes and honeyed smile. Perhaps she is an angel with her wings lit by the sun and golden light upon her dark locks. Perhaps she is just a girl who only knows that this was the boy there by her side when she walked and walked time and again.

He follows her every step.

For a moment, she smiles at the table, down into the reflection of her glass, and sees someone contemplative and serene. "It could be both, if you'd like" she murmurs with a flick of her eyes. Chuckling, the Emissary's head is up once more, darning and brave and bold.

Only after he swallows down the smallest of sips and grimaces does Moira press the glass to her lips. It lifts higher and higher, liquid pouring down, liquid warming her belly, liquid giving her courage when she's most reckless and afraid. As she pulls away and the gentle clink of the glass atop the table is the only thing left between them, there is a small grimace and wrinkling of her brow. A small cough, puffed cheeks, and a shake of her head before that little grin that dares even Death to face her is back.

"I'd prefer it be the second option, I'm so terrible with threats. But the truth, Michael, I will illuminate it all." Pressing her point, the soft lights bathing them flicker and strings are pulled. Strands of each twine together into a multi-hued tapestry that glistens before them. She pulls the dark light and paints the sea. She pulls that which is bright to weave a comet. She pulls the purest lights and puts in a pale cloud between it all; soft and dreamy and so easily changed, yet beloved nonetheless. Her tapestry is small and it is beautiful as it shines.

Somewhere, someone drops their glass when they look upon it, and Moira forgets how little she's used her Weaving skills in the public's eye.

There is something too warm in her belly to let her feel embarrassed or repulsed or ashamed.
But she knows -
oh, she knows -
if she were a true Tonnerre, it would be lightning or ice sluicing from her skin, not this feeble attempt at beauty and dreams.

They ask for nothing and take what they want. They are conquerors, it's simply in their DNA from the day they rose from the sea. All Moira Tonnerre ever conquered was their disdain for her wings with the delight they took in the magic of her mind. Their little angel, their prodigy girl who would never rise further than Doctor - Head Physician one day, perhaps - and never be allowed a family to lay claim to the Tonnerre name for fear of passing on her hated qualities.

Moira is too much and too little a Tonnerre and it bugs her.

But he does not bug her. Michael is a beacon, a lighthouse, a low-hanging cumulonimbus cloud that blocks her from so many of her regrets and heartache. "Do I?" She purrs, moving around the edge of the table so they are closer and closer yet. "Make you weak, that is?" And she wants to know, craves the knowledge of what she does to others - no, Michael - of what she does to Michael just as she wishes to know anything she does right and wrong to anyone she cares for. That makes her pause, tilting dark face inquisitively. Does she care for him? And if so, how?

Pursed lips, thoughtful, she hums low and sweet. "Perhaps there are too may surprises in me that are too horrifying to ever show or tell. I'd be much sorrier of a person if I lost you," too she thinks sadly after.

---