[P] closed doors and open windows [marisol]

[Marisol]

"Good sense comes the hard way.
And the grace of the gods
(I'm pretty sure)
is a grace that comes by violence."

Of all the things Marisol must deal with, this is, surprisingly, one of the most tiring.

She has always been introverted, turned off, even, from the idea of making friends (or anything more); to be the face of her city.and wear a smile, pretend to be friendly, offer a tour, to every stranger that passes through, is draining. Even worse, it often makes her think of Asterion. He probably would not have found it such a chore. And he certainly wouldn’t be caught dead whining about it, not even in his head. Mari knows she is Dusk more than she is anything else—more than a woman, more than a warrior, more than a person—but she knows, too, that she is not Dusk in the way people expect or think is right, and that has always stricken her with a kind of fear. Bone-deep imposter syndrome.

 Do her people not miss the king that was Vespera’s own image? What a disappointment she would be next to them.

Mari’s eyes half-shut against the bitter wind. In the unsheltered courtyard, the air is rough with microscopic prickles of snow that settle in her short hair and ice it stiffly into place. Her muscles—already sore from training early this morning—protest even more harshly against the cold, but the Commander stands her ground, face impassive, careful not to wear the expression of anything but a pleasantly unworried interest.

The girl (girl, Marisol thinks, though they must be nearly the same age) is the summer-sun-gold of so many Solterran nobles. Even in the oncoming sunset her eyes shine a bright desert-sky blue, and her brow is marked with a perfect heart of white hair. Perhaps that’s where the need to call her girl comes from—the shy look on her face, the smile that looks like it’s about to ask for something—it reminds Marisol of the way the cadets act around her on their first days in the barracks, half awed and half afraid. 

I’m Elena, she says. Mari nods as she steps back to open the door, following the stranger into the foyer without responding just yet; a thick wind of warm air envelops the two of them as they step inside. 

The entrance room is beautiful but modest, a circular stone room with a spiral staircase, iron wall sconces and a few awkwardly thrown clay vases filled with fresh-cut flowers. “Commander Marisol,” the sovereign introduces, stopping in the middle of the room to shake a crust of frost from her hair. “Nice to meet you. Are you visiting?"

“Speaking.”

credits