in sunshine and in shadow
His laughter is soft, breathed into her dark hair, when she plays along and introduces herself. Playfully he nips at her neck, a gentle admonishment for her cheekiness, but he says nothing until her whisper follows.
“No,” he replies, low, and wonders why it feels like the first lie he’s told. Perhaps because he feels the same way - that the joy in him now, sweeter than birdsong, is as wrong as she says. After all, nothing has changed; they are both still bound by their kingdoms, and Raum is still somewhere with a shadow stretching long and dark as old blood, and the gods are inscrutable.
Oh, but his heart says, so fiercely, that none of it matters. That it is not a sin, to allow himself this happiness.
Somewhere, Cirrus falters in her flying, turns to look toward the deep green of the island, a question forming. And Asterion lets the veil of thought between himself and his bonded fall closed. All is well.
“It would be impossible,” he says, still unwilling to step away from her, to open up the smallest slant of daylight between them. There is too much time to make up for (no, says his mind, we have forever) and some part of him still feels hazy with dreaming, sure that if he steps away she will disappear. Better to let his skin bloom with the warmth of hers, better to murmur in her ear so that not even the leaves can listen. “Except that this is the perfect place, the only place, where all those things fall away.”
He can almost imagine it is true. He can almost believe it, that the island is for them, that all his secret desire to stay is not cowardice or weakness. That it doesn’t matter what he said only minutes ago about duty, how he has become so much more than himself (he can hardly remember that first dreaming boy, his head full of cloud-stuff and starlight, his shoulders unburdened and unbent). Pretending is different from lying.
“As you wish,” he answers her, and the grin that pulls at his dark mouth then is just a little wicked. “If you think we can find a way to fill forever.” This time, when he kisses her, he does not brace himself for the shatter of china. If there is a part of him still waiting for a crash, it is nothing but habit.
Asterion tells himself, as he closes his eyes, that some endings are allowed to be happy.
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