[P] wonderland.

[Asterion]

Asterion in sunshine and in shadow* The summer insects chirp and hum, a symphony absent to any other time of year but so perfectly suited for summer, for this night. It only adds to the heady sense of dreaming, as the stars burn endless overhead and reflect on the lake, still save for the water that trembles around her legs. With every heartbeat he expects her to vanish; instead she lingers with each breath and grows more real. Too real – real enough to already begin to take root in his thoughts, in his heart. Such is the problem with the boy’s twilight dreaming; every glorious night is followed by pale dawn. But he is new and lost and lonely and sunrise is still so far off. Everything is new, most of all the way she looks at him, the blue of her eyes like a sky he’s not yet seen. The sky over El Dorado, or Shangri La. The sky he’s been chasing since he left the shore he was born on, the gulls all in mourning. When she closes her eyes he fears he’s been too bold, and his heart trembles like a night-bird against the cage of his ribs until she speaks.  Her words make him sigh the way the petals drift from her hair, a sweet, soft release. Maybe it won’t, he wants to say; for all he knows, this world is one endless night, the stars wheeling but lingering, each breeze a balm against the summer heat. But it is too hopeful, too foolish a thought for even Asterion to give voice to. Still, he can’t help but draw nearer yet, until he stands at the edge of the lake where the moonlight-colored water sighs against the shore an inch from his dark hooves. He watches her wing unfold and thinks of every fairy tale he knows. He thinks of heralds and angels, of phoenixes and fairies and Valkyries. And then she asks him to dance, and the twilight bay stops thinking altogether. They are near enough their breaths could mingle, if only they reached for one another. They are near enough he can inhale the scent of her, moonlight and woodsmoke, wildflowers and the intangible things of this new country the magic has put him in. It’s not close enough; Asterion does not think there could be a close enough, with this stranger. “Of course,” he breathes, as if it – all of them, all of this night – was a foregone conclusion. And then he smiles, shy and bold and dreaming, dreaming. “But only if you tell me your name.” @Aislinn -incoherent happy noises-