"Against the odds, against the grain we lean, like gardens toward light.
We reach with all of our might for such a noble aim as love."
We reach with all of our might for such a noble aim as love."
Late into the festival week, Eulalie had disappeared back to the court carried only by the heavy drumming of her feet and the racing, thrumming of her heart. Fear was a wild, uncontrollable thing that she had not felt in more than a year’s time. Not since coming to Delumine, her escape, her second chance. But that fateful glance at the festival had changed everything.
She had been dancing her way through the lantern-lit crowd, laughter bubbling out of her chest and a sparkle in her dark eyes when an all too familiar voice had frozen her in place. Turning her head, she had been greeted by the face of someone she had thought she would never see again. The man her parents had sold her to as a youth—she loathed to even think his name—stood amongst the gathered bodies talking to a young woman dressed in fine silks with her hair pulled up in intricate wrappings. Inside, Eulalie could not help but wonder if she was another pet of his. Had he merely replaced her with someone else, to torture and to rob of freedom and of life? On the outside, she merely stared.
He had begun to turn in her direction and it was as though something feral was clawing its way into her. Eulalie turned and fled, pushing her way through the bodies. Had the crowd been this large the entire time? The bodies so close together? She couldn’t breathe. She couldn’t breathe and she couldn’t get through. And what if he noticed her? What then? It took her too long to reach the edges of the festival, to bolt out from beneath the cover of trees. Suddenly, the warm summer air had become stifling.
It took her the entire trip back to the court to realize that the emotion rising up inside her, choking her, was panic. It did not subside, even after minutes, hours. Days. The ivory and sunshine woman had hidden herself away, high within the walls of the citadel and fought against the tremors that zipped beneath her skin and the hummingbird vibrating of her pulse. She thought she had gotten the closure she needed, but then why, oh why, was she so afraid he would come bursting through the doors and drag her away and back to Solterra, to chain her up and to scar her again?
She did not sleep, did not eat. Every time she closed her eyes all she saw was his dark, dappled skin and his wicked, wicked smile warning her not to step out of line. She had been his prize, and even after all this time he still had a hold of her like a snake—wringing the life from her veins and the light from her eyes.
The woman did not know how many days had passed when a screeching came from outside the window She did not answer, could not gather the care to see what might be waiting for her beyond it. When the summons persisted, tap-tap-tapping, Eulalie forced herself to standing. All the way to the window her legs trembled, a sheen of sweat to her normally fine coat. There, upon the sill, waited a familiar owl. Alba’s presence spiked unease within her chest. Even more unsettling than that of seeing a demon from her past was the thought that something was wrong with Somnus.
Somnus.
Eulalie descended the tower as quickly as she could, and Alba waited for her, to lead her through the dark. She could never know what the barn owl was thinking, but could feel the urgency in the rush of her wings, the ruffle of her feathers. She followed Somnus’ bonded all along the Rapax, past where it branched off to flow south and became Amare Creek. How long had it taken Alba to come back to the court to find her? How long had Somnus been alone?
Oh and it took so long, ages it felt like, for the gilded man to come into sight standing so forlornly along the bank of the water. Her pace slowed until she had come to a stop behind him. In the dark hours of twilight, fireflies dancing all around them, it might be hard to see the darkness under her eyes, the echoes of exhaustion creeping along her skin. Despite everything her mind had put her body through, despite the lingering anxiety that drummed against her ribcage, she had come for him. She would always come for him.
Eulalie stepped forward slowly, coming closer to his side where she reached out her nose and brushed it gently along his flank. Her earth eyes inquired, searching for the verdant green she realized she so coveted, looking at the lines of burden in his face.
“Somnus.” I’m here.
@Somnus <3
