MESSALINA
It was odd — she couldn’t explain why, wouldn’t even have noticed if she was the same as she’d been just a month ago. But she’d changed since then. Utterly, and completely. The lightness that filled Messalina’s heart, the soft glow of happiness that fluttered within her like a jewel-winged hummingbird, was spreading like warm cider to the tips of her hooves.
To others, an evening spent admiring paintings with Dawn’s Emissary and Night’s Sovereign (a rather peculiar trio, in retrospect) would have been but a trifling affair. Pleasant, yes, but quickly forgotten in a rush of fancy galas and champagne spun dinners. Yet to the ivory-haired dancer, it was a novel situation entirely. The fact that her presence was welcomed, not as a silk-swathed performer or sweet-cheeked escort, but as simply herself, was a wonder all its own.
“Denocte is truly magnificent, Your Grace. So much so, that I was rather reluctant to leave,” she admitted with an airy chuckle. Through a fan of white lashes, she glanced wryly towards Po’s hovering presence. “That is, until I happened to come across Ipomoea — what are the chances? Dawn draws me back again. Back home.” The end of her finely woven sentence drifted out so softly, Messalina doubted either of them had heard. But it didn’t make it any less true. Home — Delumine was home.
She sensed the Emissary’s inquisitive gaze linger upon her like a fluttering butterfly. When Reichenbach strode away to fetch another painting from a gilded corner, the King’s sudden absence made the room seem so much smaller than she remembered. And Po, so much closer than she remembered. Suddenly, Messalina could see nothing but garnet eyes and painted skin.
".. he was also an avid painter of the Dawn."
Thank heavens the lights were dim indeed, for the Emissary’s featherlight touch as he brushed past her to examine the painting elicited the rosiest of flushes to blossom like watercolor across Messalina’s fair skin.
Hastily, cerulean eyes blinked once, twice, as she forced a heated breath from her lips. How unbecoming! And in the presence of the Night King, no less. Silently agonizing, the slender dancer nonetheless treaded hesitantly across the plush carpeting to where the showing now continued. I... I will talk to him later. I am far too worked up for it now.
She dared not look towards Ipomoea again — not yet, her heart had not steadied just yet — and so she stayed closer this time to the King’s side, gazing intently at the swirls and strokes of Delumine’s glittering, gilded sunrise he held aloft with a tender smile.
“The strokes and colors, the masterful chiascuro — not one of Algernon’s best artists could ever replicate Ixion's work fully.
“Yet… there is always a certain sense of — melancholy, in his work, I think. To evoke such profound emotion, I wonder what an artist has to suffer,” she murmured, looking fleetingly towards Reichenbach’s eyes of dancing argent before lowering her gaze again to the swirling oils.
To others, an evening spent admiring paintings with Dawn’s Emissary and Night’s Sovereign (a rather peculiar trio, in retrospect) would have been but a trifling affair. Pleasant, yes, but quickly forgotten in a rush of fancy galas and champagne spun dinners. Yet to the ivory-haired dancer, it was a novel situation entirely. The fact that her presence was welcomed, not as a silk-swathed performer or sweet-cheeked escort, but as simply herself, was a wonder all its own.
She sensed the Emissary’s inquisitive gaze linger upon her like a fluttering butterfly. When Reichenbach strode away to fetch another painting from a gilded corner, the King’s sudden absence made the room seem so much smaller than she remembered. And Po, so much closer than she remembered. Suddenly, Messalina could see nothing but garnet eyes and painted skin.
".. he was also an avid painter of the Dawn."
Thank heavens the lights were dim indeed, for the Emissary’s featherlight touch as he brushed past her to examine the painting elicited the rosiest of flushes to blossom like watercolor across Messalina’s fair skin.
Hastily, cerulean eyes blinked once, twice, as she forced a heated breath from her lips. How unbecoming! And in the presence of the Night King, no less. Silently agonizing, the slender dancer nonetheless treaded hesitantly across the plush carpeting to where the showing now continued. I... I will talk to him later. I am far too worked up for it now.
She dared not look towards Ipomoea again — not yet, her heart had not steadied just yet — and so she stayed closer this time to the King’s side, gazing intently at the swirls and strokes of Delumine’s glittering, gilded sunrise he held aloft with a tender smile.
“Yet… there is always a certain sense of — melancholy, in his work, I think. To evoke such profound emotion, I wonder what an artist has to suffer,”
eyes so blue,
I drown.
I drown.
@Ipomoea @Reichenbach
this thread is such a nice change of pace!
this thread is such a nice change of pace!
