“AND DEEP IN OUR SECRET HEARTS
WE WORRIED THAT WE WERE AN ACCIDENT,”
WE WORRIED THAT WE WERE AN ACCIDENT,”
Even if she had know it was the sea waiting for them beyond the wall and the crowd pressing in around them like crows over a battlefield--
Even if she had known the walls would open up like a jaw and welcome her into the free roar of the tide with the constellations winking mysteries down at them--
Even if she had known-- it would still be only the sunset her eyes strain towards. That line of rose-gold, and dusty lilac, and a bruise black edge, would still be the only thing her gaze catches on. She strains towards it like a petal straining for the sunlight or like a star straining for the kiss of the moon. An ache settles in her bones, of hunger, of want, of everything her blood had run for in the dream she cannot grasp by anything more than wisps.
Warset knows she'll have to leave him soon, this stallion who makes her reach for unknowable things. She knows that soon it'll be the blood beneath his skin she'll want instead of the smile turning his lips into art she does not know how to make. The blood-red ruby moon bangs against her pulse like a reminder as the stallion pauses to tuck a flower into a child's mane.
Tap. A warning. Tap. The night is rising. Tap. A wildcat purrs.
She watches him anyway, straining towards the sight of this very mortal action of tucking flowers into hair. A memory flashes across her mind, like heat-lighting, and when she blinks it's to a negative of gold, and horses rising from the dirt like weeds. She presses her eyes closed to keep the image. It turns white, blindingly white, lighting white.
But she still does not open her eyes, not even when they start to ache. She thinks she might never open them again. What is there to see but daylight, and sunlight, and sunset? There are no stars for her.
There will never be any stars.
But when he touches her and tucks a copper and blood scented flower behind her hair Warset opens her eyes to look away from the sunset, and the gone white memory, and the blackness of her eyelids. She looks at him. And she is too lost in his gaze to see the reflection of his gift, the way it twists and turns like a crafted harp she once played. She only sees the mortality of his gaze, the terrible way he shines with a hundred things she does not know how to name or feel.
She only sees how he dies second by second. And it feels like a terrible thing, to smile back at him like another innocent overjoyed at the touch of another. It feels like an omen.
Still, because she cannot deny him, she smiles a look bright as she used to be, just as glorious. It's all moon-glow on a clear night, all wishes that live even after the fall. It's all hope. “I am Warset.” She whispers. Just Warset. Just a girl, not a star lost, not a chewed out and forgotten thing.
Not a lost thing.
She's a thing too timid to close the distance, a thing too almost-feral to brush a kiss of thanks across his cheek. But when she leans away and says, “What is this flower called, Dune?”, it's almost easy to see all the thing she wishes she was instead.
And it is easy to name all the things she knows she'll never become lingering in the way she says his name in the same notes that a star might use to sing of the earth.
@Dune
Even if she had known the walls would open up like a jaw and welcome her into the free roar of the tide with the constellations winking mysteries down at them--
Even if she had known-- it would still be only the sunset her eyes strain towards. That line of rose-gold, and dusty lilac, and a bruise black edge, would still be the only thing her gaze catches on. She strains towards it like a petal straining for the sunlight or like a star straining for the kiss of the moon. An ache settles in her bones, of hunger, of want, of everything her blood had run for in the dream she cannot grasp by anything more than wisps.
Warset knows she'll have to leave him soon, this stallion who makes her reach for unknowable things. She knows that soon it'll be the blood beneath his skin she'll want instead of the smile turning his lips into art she does not know how to make. The blood-red ruby moon bangs against her pulse like a reminder as the stallion pauses to tuck a flower into a child's mane.
Tap. A warning. Tap. The night is rising. Tap. A wildcat purrs.
She watches him anyway, straining towards the sight of this very mortal action of tucking flowers into hair. A memory flashes across her mind, like heat-lighting, and when she blinks it's to a negative of gold, and horses rising from the dirt like weeds. She presses her eyes closed to keep the image. It turns white, blindingly white, lighting white.
But she still does not open her eyes, not even when they start to ache. She thinks she might never open them again. What is there to see but daylight, and sunlight, and sunset? There are no stars for her.
There will never be any stars.
But when he touches her and tucks a copper and blood scented flower behind her hair Warset opens her eyes to look away from the sunset, and the gone white memory, and the blackness of her eyelids. She looks at him. And she is too lost in his gaze to see the reflection of his gift, the way it twists and turns like a crafted harp she once played. She only sees the mortality of his gaze, the terrible way he shines with a hundred things she does not know how to name or feel.
She only sees how he dies second by second. And it feels like a terrible thing, to smile back at him like another innocent overjoyed at the touch of another. It feels like an omen.
Still, because she cannot deny him, she smiles a look bright as she used to be, just as glorious. It's all moon-glow on a clear night, all wishes that live even after the fall. It's all hope. “I am Warset.” She whispers. Just Warset. Just a girl, not a star lost, not a chewed out and forgotten thing.
Not a lost thing.
She's a thing too timid to close the distance, a thing too almost-feral to brush a kiss of thanks across his cheek. But when she leans away and says, “What is this flower called, Dune?”, it's almost easy to see all the thing she wishes she was instead.
And it is easy to name all the things she knows she'll never become lingering in the way she says his name in the same notes that a star might use to sing of the earth.
@
