Full beautiful—a faery’s child,
Her hair was long, her foot was light,
And her eyes were wild.
She does not notice him until he speaks.
Even then, it takes her a moment to find him. Did you know? and she’s turning her head from the fire and the dancers, light gleaming off the gold of her eyes, half in darkness. The night air is colder on that side of her face, and the shadows seem to shift and thicken. And there - silver eyes, four flowers the delicate in-between color of periwinkle. Somewhere in her memory is her father, showing her the same, growing higher than her head in a meadow: they’re asters. Like you. The word means star. His lips had shaped it reverently, like the way he talked about mother.
The girl named for a flower named for a star turns the rest of the way toward the stranger. Now she begins to see what is below the shadows, a different color black; his hair, falling in a sheath to his knees. A cuff, on one of his forelegs; her eyes find the hilt of the dagger before they lift again to his face.
The music behind them has softened, slowed. It sounds like an old woman climbing an endless staircase. It sounds like a man balancing the world on his shoulders. It sounds frail but is building, building -
“What did it do?” she asks, dubious, more interested in this man than what he tells her. Aster cares nothing for money; she does not know what it can do, what its use is. A handful of coins to her is less useful than a handful of acorns, or flowers, or wind.
But there must be something more to it, some magic, else he would not be telling her - is that not the way of stories? A note plucked on a fiddle wails, a tambourine shivers in eager ecstasy. Despite herself, because there is no one in her life to tell her not to, she takes a step nearer.
@Caine | you wait so long for THIS I am sorry
