Maybe it’s the fireflies landing light as teardrops against his skin, or the sound of the river whispering come away, come away in the background. Maybe it all reminds him of another night in another part of the river, where the reeds grew tangled and thick and red foam took the place of lilies. Ipomoea can feel his body beginning to move like a dance again, like the first blades of grass spearing their way through the snow (it’s fitting, that he should be blooming when the rest of the world is wilting again, the trees burrowing their roots to avoid the freeze that would come by morning.)
It’s almost easy to forsake the shadows tonight, to pretend he is someone who revels in the twilight like the rest of his court.
“Corrdelia,” he says again, and touches his shoulder to her’s in a greeting that is as warm as the circle of lantern-light that presses them together. “How have you been?”
It feels so long ago, that last-winter. It feels like when the ground finally thawed it sucked up all the blood-soaked snow like water, choked it down like it had never happened. Or maybe that’s just what he tells himself, when he feels the wind growing colder and knows winter was only a breath away. But tonight he doesn’t want to think about the incoming winter (in the morning, perhaps) or the previous one (when he could remember more than just the red of the snow, hopefully). Tonight he wants to remember what it is like to smile, to feel as light as an autumn leaf on the breeze.
It just feels so far away.
But when he pulls just far enough away from her to laugh and say “it must be something in the water, if both us and the fireflies are drawn to it,” it starts to feel a little closer. And his heart starts to beat to the tune of the music, drawing him closer and closer to the water, to the dancing, to the game he doesn’t quite know how to play. “Should we go and see for ourselves?”
And he’s already pulling her towards the water with another smile and a laugh, and it sounds something like music playing over the waves. The water is still calling him, begging to be made into a garden, and from the moment his hooves touch it mosaic flowers and irises begin to spread across the shallows.
He plucks a yellow blossom as soon as it opens and tucks it — water still dripping down its petals — behind one of her ears. A bit of gold to match the fireflies. "Are your dreams usually this bright?" he asks. But what he does not say is, I hope they are — because mine never are.
It’s almost easy to forsake the shadows tonight, to pretend he is someone who revels in the twilight like the rest of his court.
“Corrdelia,” he says again, and touches his shoulder to her’s in a greeting that is as warm as the circle of lantern-light that presses them together. “How have you been?”
It feels so long ago, that last-winter. It feels like when the ground finally thawed it sucked up all the blood-soaked snow like water, choked it down like it had never happened. Or maybe that’s just what he tells himself, when he feels the wind growing colder and knows winter was only a breath away. But tonight he doesn’t want to think about the incoming winter (in the morning, perhaps) or the previous one (when he could remember more than just the red of the snow, hopefully). Tonight he wants to remember what it is like to smile, to feel as light as an autumn leaf on the breeze.
It just feels so far away.
But when he pulls just far enough away from her to laugh and say “it must be something in the water, if both us and the fireflies are drawn to it,” it starts to feel a little closer. And his heart starts to beat to the tune of the music, drawing him closer and closer to the water, to the dancing, to the game he doesn’t quite know how to play. “Should we go and see for ourselves?”
And he’s already pulling her towards the water with another smile and a laugh, and it sounds something like music playing over the waves. The water is still calling him, begging to be made into a garden, and from the moment his hooves touch it mosaic flowers and irises begin to spread across the shallows.
He plucks a yellow blossom as soon as it opens and tucks it — water still dripping down its petals — behind one of her ears. A bit of gold to match the fireflies. "Are your dreams usually this bright?" he asks. But what he does not say is, I hope they are — because mine never are.
@corrdelia ! notes
”here am i!“
