the salt is on the briar rose,
the fog is in the fir trees.
the fog is in the fir trees.
He thinks, as she settles herself in the grass beside him, that she is not so old as she had seemed in the marketplace. Then she had looked grizzled, weathered like a stone on the shoreline to smooth, tired, grey edges. Now, it seems that she is not terribly much older than him, only a few years. It’s a strange realization, but one that he lets go of easily, with the help of the wine.
Her eyes are very cold on him, but he is very drunk; instead of her, or the little salt-piles where there was grass a moment before, he is back to watching the stars. It seems to him he can see them turning, wheeling, dizzying-fast; he has to shut his eyes tight for a moment, and focus on the feeling of the grass tickling his back, and the wine-taste sweet on his tongue, and the drifting smell of smoke and leaves. All of this disguises the prickle of his stare on her, except as soon as she speaks he meets it again, just in time to see her close her eyes. There is something absurd about it, the way they’re taking turns to look and not-look, but he is not nearly sober enough to consider it this way.
“Never?!” he says, and lifts his head with a snort. Now he considers her fully, and nothing is spinning yet, though he can only pick out her pale hair and the markings tattooed on her and the fine-boned edges of her, limned in starlight. “That’s a little dramatic. Haven’t you ever seen a rainbow, or watched a whale breach, or, or, won a bit of money in a game of dice?” Caspian shakes his head, though he stops quickly when the wine threatens to overcome him. “Clearly you didn’t stomp any grapes today."
@Saphira
