please, let him be soft. i know you made him a warrior a soldier a hero. but even gunmetal can warp and even wolf's teeth can dull and i do not want to see him break the way old and overused things do. i do not want to see him go up in flames the way all heroes end up martyrs. i know that you will tell me the world needs him, the world needs his heart and his faith and his courage and his strength and his bones and his teeth and his blood and his voice and his. the world needs anything he will give them.
Beauty has a strange effect on him.
For most men, it is simply inspiring; it is resonant, impactful, the meaning of art, poetry, music. For most men, it means many things.
For him, it means everything.
It is an elixir; an ambrosia. He is drunk on it and half in love with a kingdom that is not his own. With the feeling comes a sordid guilt. He should not be here. But Terrastella already holds many things that call to him, like a half-remembered dream, one he spends his waking hours trying to rediscover…
There are the tall cliffs, the ocean crashing below. The secrecy, not so different from the feeling of quiet prayer. He feels like a boy here, as he ventures far from the other winter celebrations, deeper and deeper into the sacred territory. Orestes has never seen cypresses; and now they stretch overhead in a dark, suffocating canopy. The wind whispers through their ancient branches, and it is not so difficult to imagine them say, stay, stay, rest awhile. Orestes does not. He pushes further ahead, toward the Hospital and the vigil over the dead and lost. He sees the lights that commemorate them; the candles that flicker and some lanterns that rise; and he wonders how many he could light for a life he no longer lives.
(Orestes can’t help but think of a ship out at sea somewhere, beneath the waves. He cannot help but think of the sound of a song he cannot remember and wish the words would come to him. He cannot help but wonder how many are left with tattoos burned into their skins like ornate gold, beautiful and foreign—)
First, he hears her voice and then sees her.
Orestes remembers the first time he met his Emissary, then, in Denocte. He had been a newly crowned Sovereign then, fresh from the fire. She had just been a girl with eyes like polished jade, not lost royalty. There is a moment where he considers passing by; and then rejects the idea, going to her with the suppleness of a cat. Ariel beats him to it, slinking from the cypresses soft-footed to settle beside the Emissary.
Ariel does not favour many; because of that, Orestes is nearly embarrassed when the lion begins to purr, a rumbling sort of sound that threatens to shake him apart.
“Good evening, Lady Aghavni.” Orestes announces his presence. There is a shy huskiness to his voice; he fears he will disturb the atmosphere of the place if he speaks too loudly. "May I join you?"
DAMN THE WORLD AND DAMN YOU TOO, DAMN ANYONE THAT EVER ASKED ANYTHING OF HIM, DAMN ANYONE THAT EVER TOOK ANYTHING FROM HIM, DAMN ANYONE THAT EVER PRAYED TO HIS NAME. YOU KNOW THAT HE WILL GIVE THEM EVERYTHING UNTIL THERE IS NOTHING LEFT OF HIM BUT THE IMPRINT OF DUST WHERE HIS FEET ONCE TROD. DEAR GOD, YOU HAVE ALREADY MADE AN ATLAS, YOU HAVE ALREADY MADE AN ACHILLES AND AN ICARUS AND A HERCULES. YOU HAVE ALREADY MADE A SACRIFICIAL LAMB. SO PLEASE, I BEG YOU, LET HIM BE SOFT, AND LET HIM BE MINE.
