azrael
Azrael. His name is a song on her lips, his heart leaping at the sound of her honeyed voice purring over each syllable. There is a quiet comfort in her voice, edged with longing which mirrored his own – and Azrael is glad for it. He tucks her easily under his chin, letting the world fall away around them, letting the music hush and the scents fade, until there is only the moment of peace between them. And it is he who pulls away, reluctantly but eager all the same to embrace the memory-making in the festival they shared. It is he who leads her to the table, and he who begins to draw as she whittles away with a sly sort of secret.
He indulges her surprise, grinning boyishly as his gaze shifts from her to the others here – strangers, all of them. For Azrael was a solitary creature, the sun a strange sensation across his back – as foreign as the guests who laughed and crafted at their table. With every stroke, he captures their expressions, joyous and unburdened, with autumn wind toying in their manes. The drawings start as something crude, but as he turns the pencil on the page, they become more refined. And as Elena carves, he begins to draw her now – feminine curves and sunlight beaming from the gold of her coat. To the charcoal lines he adds a gilded bit of paint and rouge – paling in comparison to her beauty but capturing the essence of her sunkissed frame.
He draws her with flowers in her feet, and with a hunger in her eyes – as she had been in his dreams, watching him – wanting him. And when she tries to steal a peek, Azrael simply chuckles and nudges materials in front of his paper, blocking her view until he finishes and wraps the drawing in a tightly furled scroll, tying it with a bit of burlap twine.
“For you,” he offers, nudging the completed scroll toward her with a flush of self-consciousness. The stallion was far from an artist, though he’d dabbled with sketches from time to time. All of the shed-stars were taught the basics of artistic endeavors as children – for those who did not read the stars were destined to become entertainers and merchants, true vassals for Caligo’s ideals of passion and art. Curiosity grips him as he cranes his neck to get a better view of her carving with a smile.
“What secrets are you hiding there?” His innocent question was strangely ironic, for there was much the shed-star had still to learn about the Terestellan mare, beyond their own rendezvous beneath the stars. Azrael gives her a teasing smile, letting the mood of the festival wash over him as he offers to get them refreshments, stepping away to collect the spiced drinks with easiness about him.
“I’m told this is speciality of Delumine.” He places the cider upon their crafting table. “They tell me it is made from Oriens’ own apple orchard.” He sips the warm beverage gingerly, enjoying the way it soothes his throat in the briskness of autumn, and the bite of mulling spices against his tongue.
And he waits beneath the dusky sunly beside her, to see what she would offer to the harvest table, and what her hands had made for him to hold.
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