In this fell clutch of circumstance
There is nothing as the boy calls out. Nothing stirs, even the smallest inch. The island is as silent as it has ever been and it is not even that the boy expects anything to stir for this is their world – a place of stillness. He cannot imagine it any other way. But he does look for the gold of his mother, the evergreen of his father, for the stars of his uncle… but there is nothing in the loveliness of this island. There is nothing but daylight and shadow-light mysteries that go on and on as far as his gilded eyes can see.
Hush. Aster tells him, her voice more grown, more still than he has ever heard it. The boy rushes to her and presses his lips into the groove of her shoulder, their touch the only thing that will stop him crying out again. He does not trust himself, the words are there, they carry desperation with them and they beg to be cried out into the silence, no matter how in vain it might be.
He takes a breath, long and deep and all of it tastes of Aster and time and magic. He drinks in that taste again and again until he feels it unwinding the binds of him like fingers working upon knotted thread. He unspools and listens to his sister. Hush, Leonidas she tells him again and he releases a shuddering breath, his name is a balm upon her lips soothing the wounds of his parents’ sudden departure.
Our blood is made to travel Time. He listens but does not comprehend. He does not think for a moment that his twin does not either – so assured are her words. She is his keeper of mysteries, she is the one who asked their mother so many questions whilst he strove to fight and play and run. She already knows so much more than he and so, is it any wonder that he heeds her words and never seeks to doubt her.
They are not lost and we… we are not alone. A cub at his feet, his cub, presses and rubs its cheek against his knee. It mewls small into the air and reaches up his limb with its forefeet to bat at the golden ends of his tangled mane. It reaches and reaches and tumbles backward into the grass, its balance lost as it strove too much, too soon. Slowly the boy draws his face from his sister and looks down at the twin cubs.
Though he looks at the cubs, they are no consolation for the absence of his parents. "Will they come back?” The boy asks his sister, hopeful that she might know, that her quiet calm is because she knew of a plan or at least of a solution. "Is it just us now?” His voice is tremulous, small and fearful of her answer. He looks down to the cubs - just us now.
His breath is tight, but he drags the air in deep and steels his body. "Mama once has a tiger to protect her didn’t she?” Leonidas muses softly as he strokes each cat. “Maybe that is why Papa gave them to us? Did they know they were going to leave us, Aster?”
He asks and already knows that any answer she gives him will hurt, so very much.
@Aster
