the song of tomorrow

[Raum]

 

The shadows of Denocte are behind him. He feels their creeping. They grope for him and cry out in the darkness. Occassionally he looks back, when Rhoswen and his daughter are not looking.
 
His mercury skin grows tight, drying beneath the sun. He knows what it is to live beneath the sun to be far from Caligo’s dark. Idly he wonders what his god might think, that he fell into bed with a girl who denounced her. That he loved a girl who Solis blessed and lured away. And, above all, he was the one to follow her out of the Night Court.
 
Already he considers what offering he might lay at her altar, what apologies he might make for the choices his heart, his soul had made.
 
To look back at that mountain pass is salvation and destruction. Smoke still billows, even now, days after the event. Denocte has become the cry of dragons and with cutting ire, the Crow wonders where the song of a gypsy had gone.
 
Did Reichenbach mean for his niece to see corpses leaving Denocte? She had seen things Raum never wished her eyes to witness. Not yet. She would have seen them all but not yet.
 
This child of his was Crow born. It was in her blood. To fight, to survive, to grow – it was all in her make up. It is why he taught her to fight, why he made her learn from Acton and she does. His daughter had grown nimble as a dancer and she would be deadly upon her long limbs if she ever chose to be. Sabine possesses her dam’s swan grace, her father’s cunning. She would make a wonderful assassin.
 
Sabine. Oh small, quiet, beautiful Sabine, her horns refract broken light across his torso. She lights him up in a way he let no other, not even her mother and she had fire enough for all of them. The Ghost keeps close to his daughter, those eyes watching, ears forever listening to the secrets of the world they passed.
 
Mountains turn to a flat plain, open and sparse. They had reached the Steppes. They step between ghosts of war, he feels a shiver rock through Sabine’s body and his lips smooth along the fine curve of her nape.
 
Old blood has stained grasses red and in silence he walks on as if they were not walking upon the bones of an ancient battle field. He does not give his daughter time to think until they are clear of the deep, ancient circle, set aside for duels. Then, and only then, his lips reach for her shoulder. A small gesture to catch his child’s attention, “I am going to join your mother for a while, stay with Acton.”
 
And he moves faster for Rhoswen is ahead, always. She leads the charge away from Denocte with fire licking every corner of her being. His girl is fierce and resplendent beneath the light. It is not such a wound to see her beneath the sun’s glow now – not when he sees how she shines. When he thinks he might enjoy the way it turns her bright as a flame. Solis has blessed her and Raum can never deny it.
 
Raum is Caligo’s curse upon Rhoswen like Rhoswen is Solis’ upon him. The gods play a wicked game, but his thoughts are far from them, for anger burns within his Solterran girl and it is aimed at him.
 
His shoulder brushes her hip as he moves himself close. Then his lips touch her shoulder. Even Raum is not sure if they were kisses, but what he knows is that they are a test. He is forever a spark to her gasoline and he wants to know how hot she will burn this day. Hot enough to burn him? Or just enough to stave off the cold that Denocte had left in their bones.
 
“Sabine will tire soon. Will you not slow down, Rose?”
 
Being this close, he can smell the jasmine that clings to her skin. It makes him ache, for the brother they both left behind, entombed within his own court. The Crows were split and Raum had chosen family. Yet even family, he knew, would not be an easy road to walk.
 
He waits for her to turn those eyes upon him and set his world alight.