lysander
Lysander does not drink and dance with kings and their consorts at this festival; it is the commoners he walks among, laughs with, listening to stories and music and letting the day ease away into softer, darker things.
Always Florentine is on his mind, but the once-god is untroubled here in Dawn. It reminds him so of home, the flowers and the paint, rich campfire smoke and rarer, sweeter smoke from things more difficult to find. He does not worry about jealous men and shattered knives; he does not worry at all.
She is right – he watches, and so he sees her, the way the crowd parts for her, the storm that sparks in her eyes. Ah, he has been expecting this, and not even her timing surprises him.
He says nothing when she pauses with a space between them that seems to tremble, seems to sigh. Instead he arches his neck, dipping his dark muzzle toward his chest in deference. Lysander does nothing to disguise the smile he wears, though it is far more difficult to read than her troubled features.
“For many things,” he agrees, and the dark green of his eyes does not leave hers.
Why did you come to Novus?
Mortal, now, he might be, and his heart a vital, beating thing – but still it cannot understand what Florentine’s does. Lysander has never been tangled tight with love for family, can’t empathize with the way she thinks of Gabriel and Karou.
Strains of music drift between them; Novus is so much further from the riftlands than a small cut between worlds.
“The same reason I came to the Rift, or to Ravos before that. I was curious. I have always been terribly curious.” His voice is not cool, not even cold, but it is a little careless – Lysander would never lie to her, but something in him wonders if she wants a different truth. It is a strange, new part of him that wishes he could give it to her.
It is not for nothing he has cautioned her against love; to hope or expect someone to act counter to their nature served only to invite disappointment.
