WITH SWORD AND SALT -
I already miss you -
Easy as it is unfitting, the Commander smiles. She cannot know that in the low, gloaming light, the white of her teeth could be the same white of a shark’s. Or that the gray of her eyes, here, in the near-dark, are not smooth like water but cratered like the moon, dip-nosed, pockmarked.
And the smile, sheepish, both sad and celebratory, sticks to her lips like water to silk: Marisol blinks then, soft, sure, and feels the want of a response bubbling up in her like spring but does not quite have the courage to heed it. She bites her lip and bites down the urge. Anything she could think to say, she could think to somehow ruin. And the magic of the night - the heat in her veins, the sparkle of something strange in Isra’s eyes - is too strange and too occult to spoil with something so simple as words.
Overhead the lights shimmer and twist. Underneath their refractory gaze, Isra’s scales, and her dragon’s, seem to turn from sea to sky to blooming flower and back again in beautiful uncertainty. The rust of the chain snaked around her leg is gold, then copper, then blackness. Marisol lifts her head a degree. The dark sable of her open throat seems to say yes. Yes. I trust you.
So of course she says yes when Isra asks her to dance, though it is with some unkempt measure of embarrassment, followed by half a grin and a disclaimer: I don’t know how, she says, But yes. Of course. She ducks her head, and the sharp line of cut mane on her neck bristles a little, gold and dark in the light. And then, easy as anything, she brushes her lips against the soft slope of Isra’s shoulder and steps past her, closer to the milling of hundreds.
<3
Easy as it is unfitting, the Commander smiles. She cannot know that in the low, gloaming light, the white of her teeth could be the same white of a shark’s. Or that the gray of her eyes, here, in the near-dark, are not smooth like water but cratered like the moon, dip-nosed, pockmarked.
And the smile, sheepish, both sad and celebratory, sticks to her lips like water to silk: Marisol blinks then, soft, sure, and feels the want of a response bubbling up in her like spring but does not quite have the courage to heed it. She bites her lip and bites down the urge. Anything she could think to say, she could think to somehow ruin. And the magic of the night - the heat in her veins, the sparkle of something strange in Isra’s eyes - is too strange and too occult to spoil with something so simple as words.
Overhead the lights shimmer and twist. Underneath their refractory gaze, Isra’s scales, and her dragon’s, seem to turn from sea to sky to blooming flower and back again in beautiful uncertainty. The rust of the chain snaked around her leg is gold, then copper, then blackness. Marisol lifts her head a degree. The dark sable of her open throat seems to say yes. Yes. I trust you.
So of course she says yes when Isra asks her to dance, though it is with some unkempt measure of embarrassment, followed by half a grin and a disclaimer: I don’t know how, she says, But yes. Of course. She ducks her head, and the sharp line of cut mane on her neck bristles a little, gold and dark in the light. And then, easy as anything, she brushes her lips against the soft slope of Isra’s shoulder and steps past her, closer to the milling of hundreds.
<3
![[Image: ddg6quy-9d15dab5-339c-4b09-8b57-20a99fda...jvUop12efQ]](https://images-wixmp-ed30a86b8c4ca887773594c2.wixmp.com/f/c175b84a-409b-40aa-8b86-49ed65b989ee/ddg6quy-9d15dab5-339c-4b09-8b57-20a99fda550e.png?token=eyJ0eXAiOiJKV1QiLCJhbGciOiJIUzI1NiJ9.eyJzdWIiOiJ1cm46YXBwOjdlMGQxODg5ODIyNjQzNzNhNWYwZDQxNWVhMGQyNmUwIiwiaXNzIjoidXJuOmFwcDo3ZTBkMTg4OTgyMjY0MzczYTVmMGQ0MTVlYTBkMjZlMCIsIm9iaiI6W1t7InBhdGgiOiJcL2ZcL2MxNzViODRhLTQwOWItNDBhYS04Yjg2LTQ5ZWQ2NWI5ODllZVwvZGRnNnF1eS05ZDE1ZGFiNS0zMzljLTRiMDktOGI1Ny0yMGE5OWZkYTU1MGUucG5nIn1dXSwiYXVkIjpbInVybjpzZXJ2aWNlOmZpbGUuZG93bmxvYWQiXX0.j-t9RuUsmMyaVL-O1rvZqbyyPYdOvtjHLjvUop12efQ)
