“Meet me
where the end begins,
in echoes,
where your world is me,
and my world is you.”
where the end begins,
in echoes,
where your world is me,
and my world is you.”
They didn't have castles, when Michael was king. They didn't have cities or tall brick walls or cobblestone paths. There are times that Michael feels like a stranger and times when he feels like a con the only unwavering thing is the breathless awe that falls on him like the first snow. Sometimes he thinks he might have liked one: stained glass windows, blue carpet as plush as spring clover, banners that bore his family name.
Sometimes he thinks he deserved the wide grass plain, the field that slopes down toward the beach almost to gently to notice at all, the oak trees and the empty space where his pride should sit. Michael knows he wanted to be king of nothing. Michael knows that the crown was too heavy.
None of that matters, really. It didn't matter then, and it doesn't matter now-- all that matters is the breathless awe and the fist around Michael's heart as he follows the emissary through the main hall, up the stairs, through hallways lit by nothing but sparse torches and the star-freckled sky through the windows.
The sky that is turning purple, and pink, at the corners-- a sky that is blushing along with him, when Moira asks for pillows and blankets and the guards nod as discreetly as they can, averting their eyes.
It isn't until Moira opens the door to her room and starts throwing soft curtains over her art--he almost forgot she was a painter, somehow, and he wonders what it's like, to bring something tangible like that into the world, to create something from nothing, to do something consequential, anything consequential--that Michael realizes just how tired he is, baggy eyes and tangles hair and that ache in the back of his throat telling him to sleep.
But how can he?
How can he do anything? Michael looks around while she gathers and hangs fabric, at the smooth walls, at the shielded paintings, at the clink of the floor as she walk and the bed--
Moira stops. Moira stands up straight and leers down her nose at Michael, who has to try not wilt under her gaze. Michael places the plate on the table and scoots it closer to the center so it doesn't fall. He levels some ineffable gaze on her, pulling the scarf from his neck and folding it to keep busy.
Michael struggles-- for something to say, for something to do, for literally anything that breaks the silence. He finally settles on,"Where's Neerja?"
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