[P] Our irreparable yesterdays

[Asterion]

Asterion in sunshine and in shadow*   He watches the emotions flicker like dim reflections on water across the red man’s face, and feels something like relief. At least Raymond felt at all. At least he was not so scarred as to be stone, as Asterion had been fearing. But then – Look, the warrior begins at once, and the king cannot keep an ear from twisting back as at a horsefly. The next words, and their dead tone, do nothing to placate his churn of feelings, but Asterion says nothing. His mouth remains a drawn line and he swallows his feelings down and down, drowning them in the little that remains of his magic. It is a comfort, that touch of sea within him – a piece of himself returned. Especially now, with the entirety of his world changed, to have back something he was born with – something useful, something strong -- Asterion breathes like the waves, and buries beneath them the impulses that are his alone and not those in the interest of the Court. Only after the question of peace is posed does he speak again, though he weighs each word carefully on his tongue. Gone is the coldness that had first met the red stallion, but Asterion does not look away from that level stare.   “Peace is all Terrastella has wanted with every court, no less so our neighbors to the east. I empathize with Isra, inheriting a kingdom when she did. We would be glad to provide Denocte support in any way we can, although we are in many ways…diminished.” He will not make the mistake of entangling his own thoughts of the red stallion with the politics of their kingdoms – though he wonders if Florentine had pledged the same to herself the last time an ex-Terrastellan had been swiftly named to the Night Court’s regime. Nor can he forget how derided she had been afterward, how criticized for inaction and action both. Better, he thinks, to have this business done quickly, and with as little more said as possible. @Raymond