The Sun's rays grew warmer and warmer. The man took off his cap and mopped his brow. At last he became so heated that he pulled off his cloak, and, to escape the blazing sunshine,
The “departing” chapter of a happenstance meeting always seems to come too swiftly and, when it does, it arrives like a judge’s sentence. He feels the encounter winding down; running its course; and he is a fool to try and grasp at the running time as if they are strings slipping from his grasp. So Orestes does not try.
“Please bring your sister,” Orestes tells Aspara, with a smile. “I would love to meet her.”
And then: the Once-King meets Orestes’s eyes and holds them, with a complicated expression; there is no way for the Sun King to read the intricacies of it, and so he does not try. There is merely a dryness in his mouth, and feeling of otherness as if Orestes stands at the precipice of another story staring in rather than living it.
Aspara is the saving grace of the conversation, and the encounter. Your city has always had my favorite festivals, Asterion says.
Then: I’m glad to have met you both. But I am going to continue on. Though if you are too… I’d be honoured to have your company, and your stories. Orestes appreciates the invitation, but there is an itching feeling that he is not meant to go, that he is meant to stay. Aspara is next, as she says suddenly:
Oh I’m sorry. There’s something I need to do. Goodbye uncle Asterion, it was so nice to meet you!
Yes, indeed. Perhaps he is caught on the fringes of another’s story, staring in. Orestes, with Aspara’s fond and thoughtless admission, feels… strangely sad, to not have that kind of history. There are very few people in the world waiting for him to come back. In fact, Orestes doubts anyone is. The revelation fills him with profound sadness, that he disguises as contemplation. The Sun King smiles at each of his companions. “The pleasure was mine. Thank you for a remarkable evening. I hope to meet again, Asterion, although I must decline your invitation tonight. And… Aspara… I will be waiting for a visit from you and your sister. Take care.”
With that, Orestes turns from them. Ariel is first; his magic pulsates, and then plunges into darkness. For all intents and appearances, the Sun Lion appears nondescript as they near the Eventide arch. Orestes, too, does his best to resemble a normal man visiting a celebration. It does not take long for him to disappear into the crowd as if it is a sea, craning his neck to observe the arch and the way even in darkness the stars reflect across the painted panes.
As he walks, Orestes realises the simple fact that has left him so dissatisfied with the encounter:
He doesn’t have roots.
As much of Solterra as he embraces, there is a part of him that feels so wholly like a foreigner. Orestes knows that, tonight, no one is waiting for him to come home.
He comes to rest on the fringes of the gathering, half in the trees. He watches, for a while. And then, rather than go to the city of Denocte, he turns and begins the long journey back toward Solterra.
“Speech” || @
he threw himself
in the welcome
shade of
a tree
by the
roadside
in the welcome
shade of
a tree
by the
roadside
