This place was her home, and now, it was his too – but it still felt a foreign and strange place. He longed for his stars, for Caligo’s reassurance on his mind, but when he scried in this place, Azrael saw only a strange and shadowed veil upon the stars. It would pass, he knew… it always did… but confusion weighed heavily on the shed-star even as he looked out to the balcony where Elena paced and gathered her wits about her.
He could tell she was nervous, feeling the energy rolling off of her in waves, but still he does not go to her. For Azrael knows that the burden of a queen is something she must bear alone, or at least something she must reason with in her own psyche. Azrael knows the moment she reaches for him though, and his light meets hers, his embrace warm and affectionate as he wraps her into the curve of his shoulder and caresses her ivory mane with a loving touch. As they stand together in the silence of the sunset, the sound of waves gently washing ashore is the only noise to break through their quiet moment of peace.
“ “I am proud of you,” he whispers at last, his voice low and warm. As she stills and begins to move through the castle toward her people, his chest swells with pride. And though he walks several steps behind, his light reaches toward her, casting a soft glow as a halo behind her, even as she steps onto the castle steps and begins to speak.
Azrael finds his way to the crowd, standing among them instead of beside her, while he nods in a silent vow to Elena that he would uphold the honor and standing of her people. Their people, he corrects… for as much as his heart yearned for Denocte, it is Terrestella which calls him now. It is her. And it was enough.
The stars began to twinkle through the dusky sky, and his face turns skyward, her words falling to a quiet murmur as thoughts and memories play within the astromancer’s mind. As the world grows dark with night, he finds something familiar, some rooting to remind him of home. For as far as he had gone, the stars still found him. Their patterns were still familiar here, their shine still bright. He named them one by one, smiling softly at the reminder that life still held some semblance of the familiar.
Cygnus. Ophiuchus. Sagittarius.
And Azrael knew, all would be right with the world once more.
@
