oh, but sweetheart,
i am a goddess
i am a goddess
S
he walks like a ghost: head held high, wings tucked tight, body tense and ready for a fight. Exhaustion is written in every line of her body, every nook and cranny and crevice all the way from wilting hair, loose and flat in a darling disarray, down to the droop of her eyelids, the way her tail is not carried like a flag in the sky, but like a silk sheet dripping over the ground. This is the Moira that Tenebrae knew in his temple alongside his brethren. A girl eaten and spit out by the world, a girl destroyed, a girl crumbling, a girl who gave and gave and gave until she just gave out. Oh, her heart beats but she doesn't feel it beating fiercely. That fire, the indomitable Moira Tonnerre is shaken by how deeply she
If there was one thing she missed, whenever the man cloaked in shadows and dressed in brown asked, it was the sweets of the city.
Eventually, Moira returned from her retreat into the mountains and resumed her duties. It is here, now, how the monk will find her. Like a snake in the courts, she bustles smoothly through the halls; a Tonnerre never rushes, never seems to be in a hurry - no, they simply glide and float never appearing to touch the ground from room to room, meeting to meeting. Even though she has long been gone from her home for so many years now (three, four?) she still holds the stature of a Tonnerre in the straightness of her back, the squareness of her shoulders, the curve of her neck and coyness of her glance.
Although, unlike the days of girlhood that clung desperately to her skin for many, many years, Moira has a warmth in those once distant eyes. When she looks at another, she truly looks. They are not portraits or patients - still lives or creatures to heal - but people of her court, people visiting her court, simply...people.
The business of the day is coming to a halt and Moira feels the way it winds down. Tiredness that once plagued her, fatigue heavy on her brow, still escapes her just as it did at the temple. No matter how exhaustion loves to find her as easy prey, Moira cannot escape the call of insomnia that has her bidding others of the court goodnight as they retreat to their chambers. The halls of the keep empty and the stalls of the market grow quiet. It is here, now, in these hours of dawn, that the woman in red leaves her library and her study, leaves her warm rooms and the kitchen in the lower levels of the keep. Bright eyed, very much alive, she ventures onto the cobbled and sea-shell streets of Denocte to watch as her people find their way into the arms of lovers, parents, brothers; curl themselves tight in blankets and houses, shutting doors tight to keep out the heat of the day and autumnal breezes that are known to rush from their Oceanside trading ports.
Down she goes further and further along winding streets, meandering through alleys and beside small gardens still found within the city until, at last, she reaches a pier. The ocean beckons to her like Asterion does - her heart still thundering, still storming, still shattering but quieter at the thought of him - like Michael does - he who finds her with fresh fruit (strawberries and dragon fruit, sweet apple turnovers and more) to make sure she does not die (not yet) when he's only just learned to hold her tight. It is not the ocean she looks to though, instead golden eyes find safe passage on the edge of a ship slipping in and out of a distant line of rolling clouds just atop the water. Brows draw down, eyes narrow as her skinny nose goes up.
Perhaps they would dock and trade with her people. Perhaps they would be nothing but trouble.
The tides are too low to come in safely, and so for now the woman waits with a weathered eye on the horizon.
{ @Tenebrae "speaks" notes: I hope this is alright! }
