With every step he takes from Isra, love hardens to fear, to anger, to fury. By the time Eik reaches the mountain he is a different man than the one shaped by Novus. He is the last relic of a land the gods turned on, and his scars burn with memories of violence.
(a memory of a dream flutters in and out of focus: "whatever you do--)
The clearing is well-lit and merry, branching off into paths that suggest a world of possibilities. But beyond the glow of the lanterns and the fire, the forest is deep and too thick for even the moon to pierce. The dark trees watch him, and he stares back in search of a message.
(--your hands will always know the shape of violence.")
When he sees the sharp outline of Calliope he is too intent to believe in coincidence. Oh, how far they've come since the day they met with the sky falling down. This time, the storm rages in his eyes instead of the fields before them, and where there should be lightning there is only black, black, black. Still the silent wind howls her name like a call to arms, cal-li-ope!, and all the fallen leaves in his chest scatter at the sound.
"Calliope," he calls her name quietly but the sound cuts all the same. That first time they met, she had drawn a story from him that he didn't know needed to be told. It was the start of something-- an unfolding, or perhaps a crumbling. This time, though, he knows what it is he needs from the woman with a lion in her bones.
"How would you hunt a man who can change his face?"
*
@Calliope
(Although... I would not be opposed to anyone else wandering in, and I'm sure Nestle wouldn't either! Let's start a man hunt >:D)
