Full beautiful—a faery’s child,
Her hair was long, her foot was light,
And her eyes were wild.
Aster races the sunrise, and like always she is winning.
Oh, sometimes she wishes that she could see herself from below! The gilded glow of her wings lit by the sunlight a slip over the horizon - she thinks it must be like seeing a phoenix. As she passes by birds - gulls, cliff-side swallows with bright red at their throats - she reaches out with her magic only to see if she is quick enough to catch them. When she does, the bird’s wings beat so slowly that it begins to fall, only catching itself when it’s beyond her influence.
One day, she thinks as she lands, one day her magic will be strong enough to keep the sun at the horizon until she says rise.
But today she is still a child, a girl with wild eyes and tangled hair and golden horns only at their third tines. Teak is far away, still asleep - the cheetah could not keep up with her flying, and he does not care much for the sea.
She lands out where the tide has crept to, lets it wash her hooves shining-slick. Now the sun is at her back, and she lifts her wings wide and high to watch her shadow stretch before her, touching starfish and tangled kelp and perfect smooth stones speckled with white.
It is another flash of white that catches her eye, and she watches a slim pale shape race from the higher cliffside down to the shore. Aster’s own heart leaps as the unicorn does, waiting for the stumble, but the girl is as sure-footed as a hind. When she smiles, it’s at the memory of another unicorn on another beach, and it is not a soft expression.
Aster begins once more to walk, and the sun turns the shoreline gold. It paints the unicorn-girl warm as honey and clear as eyesight after tears, and she notes with interest the spots dark like blood, the cruel hook at the end of her tail. It makes her forget to play with her magic, and she stops before the stranger, the sea at her back, and bends her neck and tilts her wings in a little bow before folding them up to her sides.
“Good morning,” she says in a clear sweet voice like a brook. “You’re early.” Not you’re up early - it is not clear if she means this - but as though they have been planning to meet.
@Danae | <3
