CROWNS HAVE THEIR COMPASS-LENGTH OF DAYS THEIR DATE-
TRIUMPHS THEIR TOMB-FELICITY, HER FATE-
Mauna had learned to expect nothing. Then he wouldn’t be disappointed, when memories failed or naught came from his search. Then he wouldn’t be disheartened, when the answers were clear and concise. Then he wouldn’t be surprised, when the ghosts only embedded and infused themselves in his aura, in his soul, and he was the only one that couldn’t let them go. It allowed the worlds to come and go, naught permanent, naught staying, naught to flicker in his wake, to instill an anchor, tie a tether; only bound to the skies, and the neverending sojourns for things he couldn’t, wouldn’t have again.
So he nearly stopped entirely when recognition seemed to pierce through Sera’s eyes, vaguely tilting his head to study, peruse, and try to understand what sparked the notions, the alterations, the semblance – until her words formed, lacquered, and stuck to his skull. His own gaze widened, and his heart lurched, stirred, wires crossing, membrane compiling for strangled, shocked synapses all at once. The surprise stayed rendered on him, until something else bolstered and heightened, tightened around his heart like a noose.
Hope.
Far more than he’d had anywhere else, where the shadows crawled and the unknown hovered, stayed, entranced and bewildered by every other precision. There was someone else out there, and he committed the words to memory, the Terrastella, land of the Dusk – and perhaps because he was young, because he’d spent so long searching, he was indifferent as to who might be immersed there, and only that they were. An existence much like his own once, beseeched and enthralled from a world he thought he’d only know, carry, and forge away when his time had ended.
For the first time in a long, long while, the boy smiled – a juvenile sort of charm dimpling along cheeks, staring at the ground at first as they continued through the sands, the fatigue varnished and garnished away for a few seconds as the possibilities cycled through his head. Something bright, instead of diminished and torn, serpentined its way through his gaze, lifting it back towards her with unmistakable gratitude. The grin remained. “Thank you. That’s…that’s all I need. It’s enough.” For now.
Because they were aspirations and ambitions, rather than dreams.
@tag | speaks
TRIUMPHS THEIR TOMB-FELICITY, HER FATE-
Mauna had learned to expect nothing. Then he wouldn’t be disappointed, when memories failed or naught came from his search. Then he wouldn’t be disheartened, when the answers were clear and concise. Then he wouldn’t be surprised, when the ghosts only embedded and infused themselves in his aura, in his soul, and he was the only one that couldn’t let them go. It allowed the worlds to come and go, naught permanent, naught staying, naught to flicker in his wake, to instill an anchor, tie a tether; only bound to the skies, and the neverending sojourns for things he couldn’t, wouldn’t have again.So he nearly stopped entirely when recognition seemed to pierce through Sera’s eyes, vaguely tilting his head to study, peruse, and try to understand what sparked the notions, the alterations, the semblance – until her words formed, lacquered, and stuck to his skull. His own gaze widened, and his heart lurched, stirred, wires crossing, membrane compiling for strangled, shocked synapses all at once. The surprise stayed rendered on him, until something else bolstered and heightened, tightened around his heart like a noose.
Hope.
Far more than he’d had anywhere else, where the shadows crawled and the unknown hovered, stayed, entranced and bewildered by every other precision. There was someone else out there, and he committed the words to memory, the Terrastella, land of the Dusk – and perhaps because he was young, because he’d spent so long searching, he was indifferent as to who might be immersed there, and only that they were. An existence much like his own once, beseeched and enthralled from a world he thought he’d only know, carry, and forge away when his time had ended.
For the first time in a long, long while, the boy smiled – a juvenile sort of charm dimpling along cheeks, staring at the ground at first as they continued through the sands, the fatigue varnished and garnished away for a few seconds as the possibilities cycled through his head. Something bright, instead of diminished and torn, serpentined its way through his gaze, lifting it back towards her with unmistakable gratitude. The grin remained. “Thank you. That’s…that’s all I need. It’s enough.” For now.
Because they were aspirations and ambitions, rather than dreams.
OF NOUGHT BUT EARTH CAN EARTH MAKE US PARTAKER,
BUT KNOWLEDGE MAKES A KING MOST LIKE HIS MAKER.
BUT KNOWLEDGE MAKES A KING MOST LIKE HIS MAKER.
