BEXLEY BRIAR
The sun is no candle flicker, it is a lighthouse, and Bexley leans toward it in this time of need - though it already sears her from where it is hung in the sky, a sharp-toothed burn across her skin. Eyes narrowed against the weight of it, she watches Eik carefully. How can they be so utterly different, so completely at odds, and yet from the outside look almost the same? Except for the nervous swish of that thin tail, the anxiety with which he looks upon her - an expression Bexley has never worn - they could be twins to the untrained eye. The strangeness of it would send a shudder up her spine if she weren’t as phlegmatic as she is.
His shift at the sway of her hip is unsubtle, but Bex says nothing about it, not surprised in the least. What a shy, skittish thing, what an unsatisfying existence, to be afraid of one scar, of the sight of a bone while still under skin. They should be allowed to starve… She smiles blankly, meets his eyes. Yes, says the blue gaze, frank. That is how we live. Nothing escapes the bone-white lips, but the cold honestly of her expression says it almost as well: it may be harsh, but this is the way of Solis, the way His desert operates. The thing Vadim says in a tone of voice that belies how ridiculous he thinks it is really is the basis of all life here. What a shock he’s going to have living here, adjusting to the bleakness of Solterra. Bexley has seen violence and poverty, and power wrenched from her hands, she has been the cruel ruler, she has been the bullwhip, and so the transition into this regime was not so difficult, coming from a life of the same bitterness and barbarity - but it seems Vadim has not, and for a moment she pities him, lamenting the life he will have to grow used to.
Because I do, she says simply, with a slow rolling of her narrow shoulders. True in the same way that we have four gods, and that rain falls less here than it does in Denocte. The frankness of her voice is something startling to behold, yet somehow it still rings with warmth, her feelings never having been faint enough to be hidden. Despite their differences, her pity is quickly turning to a slow admiration, not only of his innocence but of the audacity he has to show up here, a stranger in a strange land, and present his heart to the answers of so many difficult questions.
@vadim <3
