This keening soul;
A silver woman stands in the midst of the flowers. She is as still as a statue carved of stone. Her stone is marble, Leto thinks, marble of white and silver. Yet there is a part of her that is not like the rest: her cheek. It is as if the parts of her jaw are held together with the beauty of kintsugi. The gold of her catches the light. Only the slight tip and turn of her head as it follows the path of a child, is any indication that she is alive at all. Even where the kelpie stands, the stranger’s skin looks hard and cold. This woman, the priestess thinks, is as firm, unyielding as the cliffs that stand upon the edges of the sea. Leto moves toward her; a wave coming in from the sea.
Oh, the sea.
It is so far from her now. But her skin is still slick with salt, her body warm, warm, warm. There is no protection from her magic here and the stars watch her keenly. The laugh in their places and run their light like lances through the inky purple stain of the turning sky, They will set the meadow alight, if Leto would let them fall.
She does not.
Not here where children frolic in the grasses and flowers. Not here where lovers meet in the beauty of Terrastella. This is her home, her heritage. She moves through the flowers and they welcome her back with petal soft kisses across her knees. They lay perfume across the salt of her skin and try to rid from her the scents of the sea. The last time she was here, a man sat upon the throne. But he left, as he always does.
Leto moves toward the silver woman, stands beside her and watches the child play. The kelpie is the midnight to the silver of Seraphina’s starlight skin. The Terrastellan’s starfire magic is not lit enough to cut her body up with the glow of her blood - her vessels that map a firewhite map across her body. She simply stands black, black, black and lets the chimes of the bells and bones in her hair declare her arrival.
“Is she yours?” Leto asks after a moment and in the silence she has wondered what it would be to have a child.
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Anyone! | "speaks" | notes:
