and they've been changing the sound of my name;

[Asterion]

Asterion in sunshine and in shadow*   “Not at all,” he agrees, and lifts his gaze upwards. “I would love to see that view, someday.” But for now, there are only small patches of blue sky, timidly hiding beyond the leaves of the canopy. The forest is bending over them, here, branches meeting like arms overhead, fingers spread and waving. It is like him, he thinks (and wonders if it is like Po, too) to be hungry for new worlds even as they explore one that’s not yet known. Asterion’s heart is such a needful creature, always wanting more. Together they pass through the smoke of the doe’s passing, trailing thin as incense, and deeper into the story. He, too, notices the way the trees make way for them, and the way they close the path once they have passed; like his companion, he does not remark on it. Still, he can’t help but wonder (though he tries to make it idle, a passing piece of flotsam and not an anchor) if the forest is granting them safe passage, or coaxing them deeper for some other purpose. Asterion would think nothing but the former, save for the memory of the soil and stone rising up to hem them in two summers ago. For now, he continues his stubborn belief that this place is born of magic beyond that of Novus’s gods. That it is ambivalent, and not openly hostile - as curious about the horses who have come as they are in turn. They walk in silence, for a time, but nothing about it feels oppressive. Their hush is soft awe, not fear. Occasionally the bay thinks he sees a flicker of tawny fur, or the glint of stray sunlight off gemstone antlers; but when he looks harder, there are only waving leaves. When Po speaks the king is almost startled by the break in the easy quiet; he meets the other man’s glance with a slight and sheepish smile. “I feel the same,” he says, his voice as soft. “Though I’ve learned better than to guess what it might be. Perhaps she can tell us,” he says, and tilts his nose ahead to where the path vanishes in the undergrowth, “if only she allows us to find her.” But Asterion already has the feeling that they won’t - though what surprises him is how little he minds. @Ipomoea crap post D: but I feel so blessed to be writing with po!