When the oil wells of Persia burned I did not weep
until I heard about the birds, the long-legged ones especially
which I imagined to be scarlet, with crests like egrets
and tails like peacocks, covered in tar
weighting the feathers they dragged through black shallows
at the rim of the marsh. But once
Zayir, when he looks at her, does not see feminine beauty or poise. He sees the scar kissing her throat, an indelicate and permanent necklace. Zayir thinks, I have dreamed that very thing but cannot place where the ornate, painted colour of the mare belongs in his memory.
Zayir stares at her harder than is polite. Zayir stares at her with the gaze of a falcon, or great and terrible cat. Predatory. Sharp. Endless.
The only water for miles, and you did not expect company? Her reply is not as barbed as it could have been, and Zayir’s lip twists into an almost-smile. “Ah, m’Lady, anyone native to Solterra knows the people here don’t need water. Only their pride.”
I’m not here for you.
Zayir nods as she dips her lips to the water. “Thank you, for your permission. You are kind, m'lady, for allowing me to stay." There is still a wry, almost-smile on his mouth.
He realises he is staring with such ferocity because, the longer he looks, the more familiar he finds her. Zayir stretches out his wings, testing the muscles for their soreness. He is quiet for a long moment, with only the sound of the water against him, before he asks in a quiet voice, “And what is your name? I am Zayir.”
Something is welling in his chest.
It is a hard knot; the feeling of nerves, tangled in so many different ways. This time, however, the knot is hard with a fragile hope; breakable, tentative, expectant.
Zayir looks, and remembers.
"Speaks" || @
I told this to a man who said I was inhuman, for giving animals my first lament. So now I guard my inhumanity like the jackal who appears behind the army base at dusk, come there for scraps with his head lowered in a posture that looks like appeasement, though it is not.
