I paid the price and own the scars why did we climb to fall so far ? An enigma upon the grounds, she seems to almost float with an air of dignity and solitude about her. There is no entourage to keep her company, no shadows following close to make sure that no harm comes to the Phoenix Woman, only the soft clattering of stone underfoot as each hoof falls on the pathway below. So few walk here, such resounding quietude was a reprieve from the whisper of feet outside corridor doors and the ever-constant babbling of who knows which people for the evening. Only the wind talks to her now, a welcoming caress against her ear, kissing her cheek and toying with her overly long tail until only tangles would remain to be sorted when night fell once more. Not yet, though, is it coming to claim the world as it did when all days came to their conclusion. Instead, the afternoon sun beats down upon her, setting fire to the already burning woman, painting her as a lighthouse in a storm, a flame given life, a torch gliding forward with nothing more than simple exploration on her mind.
No thoughts of Estelle haunt her today. Fresh from bed, put together so nicely that her aunts and uncles would have cried to see her so becoming and blossoming into a woman, and ready to take on the adventure and garner new knowledge, she is unruffled and at ease. For the first day in months she does not carry upon her shoulders a tension and sorrow that Atlas would have fallen under. There are few shadows beneath swirling amber eyes to draw away from the otherwise pretty visage that shows much more light and laughter than anything else.
Serenity.
The feeling pervades her senses, spreads throughout the area until she is forced to draw in a deep breath and let it out with a small smile at last coming to light. And it is as though the angels themselves are singing, that one simple act changing everything about the girl completely. Wings flutter upon her shoulders, all too heavy and strange even now that she is grown, having gone unused for the entirety of her life, but so lovely and flashy all the same. Chest rises and falls slowly, there is nothing to hinder her climb into the unknown along craggy peaks that are packed full of small shrubs and resilient flowers that line the edges of rocks and sprout through cracks to wave and say hello. Some distant part of her is reminded all too much of her family as she comes to a lower edge of a cliff. Not at the top, but perhaps here would be a resting spot.
There is a beauty in the harshness she longs to paint, to draw, to sketch. Even outlines are flung from her heart in the small amount of debris underfoot as she quickly lines the distant peaks. Their harsh angles and echoing silence was the most wonderful thing she's seen yet in all of Novus; it was very much like the Tonnerres with their savage barbs and icy demeanor to all but those they chose to keep. For a moment she remembers home and what it was like to sit beside a fire every night with her tea and books. Florence and Gael pulling at her hair while she studied long into the night, Eluoan beaming at her progression that had moved so quickly and all the promise she'd shown, and at last their matriarch. The glimmer that had been in her eye as Moira chose to follow Estelle into the unknown beyond their compound.
Outside of those walls was the first time she saw birds up close. There were doves in the menagerie, but that was not a place Moira was yet allowed entry into. More often than not, there were hounds for hunting trips and the occasional playmate when the boys were little, and then there were cats for the girls. Personally, she'd always enjoyed the little snow white kitten with blue eyes that had taken up residence in the Doctor's home around the time that Moira had. Often it would curl against her when it was younger, and soon it learned to bat at the twins when they'd come to bother her.
Such memories were as heart wrenching as they were welcomed, a welcome reminder that one day she would find a home - her home - again. Until then, she pauses to just watch as the clouds roll into hues of rose and tangerine, purple paints the horizon as the afternoon light fades to evening's wondrous glow and the sun begins to rest at last.
in this house of broken hearts we made our love out of stacks of cards
@Asterion <3
04-18-2018, 03:07 PM - This post was last modified: 05-26-2018, 01:12 PM by Moira
His dreams of late have been fractured things. Patterns of darkness and of light that wash over him like moonlight through the waves, keeping him tossing through the night. Each morning he wakes far before silver dawn, and though his days are full (a business that stretches him to his seams) he dreads each sundown, unwilling to return to the arms of sleep.
Maybe it is lucky that it is summer, and each night brief.
Always, always, he misses the sea. He knows it is close; when the breeze blows right, and the sun is hot, sometimes he lifts his head and tastes the salt on the air. Seagulls cry over the court, and Asterion imagines they beckon him home.
This evening, he listens.
For once Florentine has no tasks for him (or, perhaps more accurately, he can find none for himself – always he pushes harder than she asks, desperate to prove his worth) and he slips through the gate away from the city. For a moment the bay only stands, breathing deep of the summer evening, searching for the first fireflies of the season – and then he follows the breeze, tugging its fingers through his silver-threaded hair, leading him to the cliffs.
Up and up he winds, enjoying the burn of his muscles, the thinner air, the sunlight as it slants long and golden on the swaying wildflowers. It’s been too long since he was well and truly alone; Asterion feels like a stranger in his own head. He is afraid to search his own thoughts; he lets them stream by, driftwood on a river, unwilling to get caught up in their current. Below them, he knows, wait the pieces of his dreams.
So he is glad for the distraction, as the light shifts like a magician’s trick to rose and the horizon to violet. He can hear the water from here, crashing hungrily against the rocks, as familiar to him as breathing. Asterion glances toward the cliffside and sees the stranger. For a moment he hesitates, unwilling intrude in case she, too, was looking for solitude; when he does step toward her, it is out of a Regent’s duty as much as quiet curiosity.
“May I?” he says, glancing at her sidelong, unwilling to stare but caught by her striking appearance nonetheless. The sunset turned her even richer, crimson and gold more vivid than any horizon, and he can catch no familiar scent on her, disguised as they are by salt and sea-grass. “I’ve seen many sunsets from here, but never one in summer.”
I paid the price and own the scars why did we climb to fall so far ?
she lives, breathes, dies in the present, feels so fully that she could explode should she analyze the emotions, but it is her heart that is caught up in the past where light, laughter and family all shine. they smile at her with raven's eyes and wolf's teeth, watching every breath she takes under the fading sunlight, remembering how she used to shine like the night stars. and she watches them too. every tilted head and tall figure towering over her until she is that child once more, unwanted, a curse, something to be shunned and shamed at every opportunity. it is only the sound of a voice - his voice that pulls her from the reverie.
eluoan ? she wonders, eyes widening marginally as she turns, unaware of the bay she would meet. disappointment curls in the pit of her stomach, raking claws down her inside, but only a sliver of a smile (or a grimace?) and dipping of her head are given. it is then that she looks at asterion, truly looks at those chocolate eyes that melt by the fire, the silver flashes glimmering along the edges of his hair that catch fire in the setting sun, drawn ever further back to the darkness of his skin that is tainted only by the stroke of twilight and rose upon his stomach. he is tall, she notices next, taller than she and broader.
were they cups upon a shelf he would be a firm glass for brandy, and she a mere teacup sitting prettily at his side.
but they are not china nor crystal, to be placed and hung and strung about by those who should rule over them. she is fire and light and completely belonging to herself. an intelligence swirls in her amber eyes as at last she gives another nod. "there are so many firsts we will never see, but should I know who accompanies me for this first to-night?" brow arches inquisitively, a sidelong glance turns back to the light to let it rain down upon her once more as the last of the warmth from the rays filter away.
"I am Moira Tonnerre," she says plainly, no pompous titles, no grandiose gestures. A statement as simple as day, a loneliness echoing in the corridors of her voice. arrogance is not something she could wear even if she tried, instead the cloak of humility rests along her skin, a choker made from forlorn and forsaken droplets strung about her throat. how could she sway so heavily from thought to thought, allow the weight to settle once more when it had nearly vanished just a short while ago? something like disappointment almost tickles her tongue and tastes like ash on the wind. perhaps this stranger, though, could provide something that solitude had not.
perhaps he offers a distraction if only for now.
in this house of broken hearts we made our love out of stacks of cards
He searches her as she does him, with careful glances through dark lashes, subtly taking the measure of her as the light changes overhead and the sea rushes against the stone.
They are the two sides of twilight: she the sun burning its last moments on the sea, touching every cloud with fire, a brilliant sunset. Asterion is the moments after the sun has vanished; the slight silver of the first stars, the rich red gone to soft purple, a last sigh of blue.
Above them the world turns from one to the other. The bay stands steady beneath the deepening sky, but something in him eases at her second nod.
“I suppose you should,” he says, and a smile appears on his dark mouth, faint as those first stars. The bay steps forward, smoothly as a ripple on a lake, and dips his head at the gift of her name. Moira Tonnerre - it may sound like nothing much to her, but to Asterion it’s weighty with adventure, like a name he might find in one of the books back in Terrastella’s library. “A pleasure, Moira Tonnerre,” he says, unable to resist trying the fullness of her name out on his tongue; the syllables roll like bells. “I am Asterion, of the dusk court.” He says nothing of his own title; it doesn’t occur to him that it might be of interest. Regent is a word he wears uncomfortably, like an outsize coat.
It is much easier to only be a stranger, only a wandering boy. So he pretends he is, and glances sidelong at her bright amber eyes, and lets his smile grow more true as a breeze off the sea tugs at their hair. “What brings you to the cliffs tonight? The last time I was here, we threw wishes into the sea.” As if he might see them, he leans toward the edge, but only gulls dance above the waves. He wonders if any of those wishes came true.
I paid the price and own the scars why did we climb to fall so far ?
As the world begins to turn she finds herself admiring the way he shines even now, the way the darkness suits him moreso than the light, the way the stars glitter in his eyes to match the faint twinkling in the skies, the way that she relaxes ever so slightly at the hint of a smile on his face. It is a handsome one that comes about, something slow, something soft, and she mirrors it with a rewarding smile of her own. All feminine wiles as she looks to the ground, a glance given from beneath lashes much like his own, and then the grin grows ever so slightly. Moira would not say there is a physical attraction there, but something sweet and calming instead, as though his presence were a salve to a rash she never knew was itching just along her slender throat - hidden in plain sight. She wants to paint him, etch his likeness into murals, upon canvas, strewn through the heavens with him as a northern star; she wants to paint him, longs for it like a dying man their last cup of water. But Moira's notebook is gone, her paints left home, her pencils likely in the dust with Estelle's lack of care even if she never really means to lose what Moira finds most dear.
Muscles languidly ripple beneath chocolate, the rich mud that provides for their food coming to life as he bows with all the grace of one of her clan. Pleasant surprise flows over her features and a delighted gasp slips past sanguine lips, as her name dances from his tongue her head tilts: she's still waiting. Quickly her ears flick forward, catching the wind that brings his name to her in those rich tones that keep her rooted here. "Charmed, I'm sure," she manages at last, taking in the Dusk court. It's nothing like the calm waters she knows, or the sloping mountains who hold you in their vicelike grip unless you are clever or wise enough to escape, nor is it like the prairie with hills galore and people to gather and be merry upon. So far, this court is much more harsh with ragged peaks and rough waters that throw themselves upon the base of the cliffs, but the people, if Asterion is any indication, are just as charming as in the Night Court - and serene.
A quietude permeates the ever moving breeze once more wraps around the pair, pulling ebony locks from their braids and buns to fly and dance and tickle her neck just so. When she turns to readjust, the Phoenix woman catches the easing of his smile, the gentling of his stance until he is him and she is her. Walls crumble just so, walls she keeps so carefully in place. But when you are strangers it is so easy to pretend to be something you are not, or show something you are, for what are the chances she will see him again? Pursing her mouth even as she sucks on her cheek in thought, Moira glances to the tempestuous waves once more. "Did your wishes fall, Asterion, or did they fly?" Unanswered questions are cautiously left open as she mulls over her response still. However, emphasizing final words, her wings twitch, stretching towards the star-studded heavens in a glorious display of fire and light as she steps nearer the edges, face upturned in rapturous bliss, only to curl once more by her sides all too soon.
Her wings are useless.
"Adventure, silence" Moira breathes at last, a girlish smile now presents itself, lighting up their night just as his soothes her soul. "Although, your company is quite welcome." Rectifying any misunderstandings immediately, she turns to watch the birds play, seeing as they dive and cavort with one another above the water as he does. White streams into blue until it's all a blur so far below they could be ants - she could be flying. If she dwells on it, she knows she could be left breathless, and what an embarrassing display that would be. Measured steps bring her back to his side, away from the chances of falling, falling, falling and plummeting to her death.
in this house of broken hearts we made our love out of stacks of cards
@Asterion <3 (i really like these two. and i love your writing !!)
It is easy, standing here with her, and he wonders how much is the girl and how much the sea. The ocean is his oldest friend (save for golden Talia, has twin, although she is both more and less than a friend) and it doesn’t seem to matter if he stands beside the sandy beach of his birth or a hungry tide in Ravos or the cliffs they visit now. The sea is all new, and ever-changing, and yet for all of that it is as constant as his heartbeat, as the blood in his veins.
And it has helped him make friends of strangers before.
She is slight enough he thinks the wind might carry her to the stars, were she to only spread her wings – and perhaps she would belong there, bright as a comet.
At her question Asterion looks to her again, searching the eyes that shine so brightly in the bold carmine of her face, and there is something shamefully glad in him when he finds her watching the water and not him.
“Neither,” he answers, and his gaze, too, strays briefly to the sea. He pictures the wishes he’d witnessed, fluttering like ashes, spiraling slow toward the hungry waves beneath. “I did not make a wish. At the time, I felt I had everything I could want.” Asterion says nothing more, but that is enough; he is grateful for the change in course when she stretches her wings up toward the gathering dark.
When she stands like that, she reminds him a little of Florentine, of Aislinn: bold travelers, in love with the sky. The bay has never felt particularly jealous of their wings and the freedom they represented; he has ever been drawn to other things. But there is still something quietly wanting in him as the last of the light sets her pinion-feathers to flame.
He is a little sorry when she folds them again.
But his smile grows more bold when she speaks; never (he hopes) will he hear the word adventure and not feel a little trill go through him, a more vital want than the want of wings. He even laughs when she forgives him for his intrusion, though the sound is soft and brief enough to miss between the waves and the wind and the cries of the sea-birds.
Asterion could be breathless, too, watching her and the way she leans toward the edge, the wind tossing her hair, rifling through her feathers as though coaxing her to leap. He does not realize how tense his muscles are until she turns back; then he eases into a more casual stance, curving his muzzle toward hers. “Tell me if that changes,” he says with a grin, and can’t remember the last time he said anything teasing. For all of that, his next question is serious. “And what kind of adventure were you hoping for?”
@Moira you are too kind! your writing is lovely and makes replying easy (though this reply is later than I would have liked). they are great together, I think :)
04-25-2018, 12:05 PM
Played by
e-cho [PM] Posts: 243 — Threads: 27 Signos: 0
I paid the price and own the scars why did we climb to fall so far ? Neither and it is a breathy admission that has her eyes straying back to find the his own, a sea of their own making, endless and beautiful to match the voice that is content and yet not. There is unrest within him now, something that she can't quite put her finger on but she can feel in the vibrations of the world around them. Drawn from her own world, he pulls her into something more, something new that she has not tasted since she left her mother and father, travelling to study under the doctor. But even Eluoan took time to warm up to her whilst she was his charge. The smile on Asterion's face is foreign, but it is so beautiful she could have cried were she more emotional.
Moira knows what Estelle would do. She would saunter up and cozy herself next to the Regent, tucked under his arm like a doll on display. That was what she was trained to do, fall into the arms of strangers so easily as though she'd been there all their lives. The phoenix woman is nothing like her cousin - not even similar in the skin they wear. But they are cousins in the loosest of definitions, so she should not be surprised or judge her actions based upon Estelle's.
With that she sighs, drinking in every small fleck of emotion that the man feeds her. Something she's said pleases him, even the atmosphere is lighter, brighter. But she doesn't understand the look on his face. It's the one the silver boy gave her before, but something different moves within. Was it awe? Inspiration? Muse? Something less, or perhaps more? It is a mystery that has her hanging on the edge of her seat as he chuckles at last. The noise so soft it could have been the new mewling of a kitten, yet when she looks at him, at the curve of his cheek, the crinkling of eyes, she knows she wants to hear it again. And again. And again.
As sudden as it comes, the wind takes it away. It's the first time she wishes that even that wind that brought birdsong and joy would have been absent so she could hold the sound for even a moment longer. Although, much to her delight, joy is replaced by joy when he speaks: teasing, friendly. It's almost too much, but it sparks an answering mischievous grin and a fire in her heart. Is this what the artists of Denocte feel every day? It baffles her how they can live with such fire and not burn from its heat.
"I could find a million adventures in your laugh," Moira manages, completely honest, unhindered by facades kept on for the benefit of those she knows. "But I could start with a story, tell me the story of the day you didn't make a wish?" She whispers the request, eyes cast down shyly. It is bold of her to delve like this, to keep so much of herself whole and ask for him to bare himself to her. All it took was a leap of courage though, like a leap from these cliffs could carry her into the skies she has never known.
in this house of broken hearts we made our love out of stacks of cards
He does not know what to make of what she says next. Asterion would blush, if he were able; he would turn rose from cheeks to nose to rival the color of the sky, but instead he only dips his chin toward his chest. “Oh,” he says, and his gaze strays toward hers, only to find her looking down.
Somehow this emboldens him, her shyness smoothing away his own; perhaps that is why he answers her, though he hesitates for a long moment first. The wind and the waves and the soft cry of the gulls is the only sound between them, and then he says, “It is a long tale, not yet all told, and you may regret your asking.” The breeze carries his sigh out to sea the same way it had his laugh, and he begins.
“It was a night not long ago, as beautiful as this, but colder. Terrastella was hosting a festival, and all the courts came to drink, to dance, to greet one another in peace – to paint themselves in colors of their courts or their loves and to throw wishes to the sea.” He angles a little smile toward her, at the last. She is one of the only bright things left in the gathering dark; her presence is almost a comfort, a candle on the cliffside.
“I made no wishes, but I was painted in silver, in rose, in blue. With all the colors of twilight I pledged myself to Dusk, and then I walked the streets of my home, and drank, and danced.” Of Aislinn he makes no mention, and guilt lays a finger on his heart for the omission – but stronger is the guilt that he had been with her and not his queen in the first place. Oh, it is difficult to stand in the middle of the story and have no guesses for how it will end.
Now the color has washed from the sky, now the constellations are appearing, shapes he has finally come to name and to know. Hunter, healer, hero – all the stories they tell themselves on midwinter nights, on summer evenings. Perhaps he should have ended the telling there. But Asterion swallows, and his gaze searches for hers, though he must be difficult to find, now, in the dark.
“Meanwhile, my queen and sister, Florentine, was confronting her lover. She had discovered him with her regent, and while no one had transgressed, their secrecy – their intent – was cause enough for her to question. They separated that night, but her lover was angry. With some of his friends he attacked another member of our court, and left him beaten in the snow. After, the regent was removed from his position, freed at last to join his lover. And now everything feels fractured, uncertain.”
In the silence that follows, the waves thrash themselves against the rocks. Fool, fool, they accuse him, as they pull away again from stone, making way for the next assault. He wonders if he is one; he wonders if she has heard the tale already, and if she can hear the guilt in his voice, and if she would be so quick with her compliments now. He wonders many things, as they breathe together in the dark.
“It is a poor story, and I do not know how it ends,” he says at last, and there is a wry, sad smile on his dark mouth. “Maybe if I had made a wish, it would not have happened so.” Of course he knows differently, but he is still a dreamer at heart, and once his head was full of stardust and of folly.
@Moira lol poor girl had no idea what she was getting into with that question xD
04-30-2018, 01:46 PM
Played by
e-cho [PM] Posts: 243 — Threads: 27 Signos: 0
I paid the price and own the scars why did we climb to fall so far ?
His silence forces her own hesitation to take hold, grapple with her heart like a vice squeezing tighter, pulling her strings like a marionette so that she would look up, eyes darting to find his in the dark with an apology on red lips as panic flares in her own yellow eyes. But all that stops just as the time does when his words roll like thunder from his lips. Not in the sense that they were loud, or terribly frightening, rather that it encompasses her so completely that the rest of the world melts away. Pictures form before her eyes of the story he so kindly offers, those smiles finding her hanging on every syllable uttered. He should have been of Denocte, haunting the halls and library during the night with her, yet all she is given is this chance encounter.
She could have been left reeling.
Instead, she is steadied as he finds her staring at him, wide-eyed like a child, comforting like a friend, and reassuring as any who's known such confusion and conflict would (should) be. That he reaches for her in those moments plucks at her heart, causing something in her to unfurl and stretch like a cat, something that was slumbering and should have stayed in such repose. She feels it as it arches its back, slips talons down her spinal column, lodges them at the base of her neck until she is immobile, her breath a mere whisper of comfort as the stars begin to light up the sky.
Moira could find constellations in his eyes, too, but it's something doesn't say. Already he had paused from her previous comment, and perhaps had mistaken it for something it was not. Whatever the case, another painful squeeze of her heart follows the conclusion of his epilogue, a soft ending with regret lacing it together and tying a bow on top.
She couldn't have stopped if she tried, and carefully she extends her neck to brush along his shoulder. "You could not have known, Asterion. It is not your fault," she whispers it as though it's something she's said a thousand times before and will again. But those words are as much for herself as they are for him as she remembers Estelle then and how beautiful she would look under these stars, under this moon. How handsome she would be here, beside this man of twilight and dreams, rather than silly Moira and her skin set afire. "Do you want to know the ending?" Simple curiosity drives the question just as the previous one had been.
It is so easy to talk to him, almost as though she has found a friend again. But she withdraws at that thought, pulling away, pulling into herself. "It is not much, but I am glad you did not wish then, that night. You're a splendid companion, if I may be so bold. If you had, perhaps I would not have met you tonight, and I am very glad that we did meet." She smiles at him, a twinkle in her eyes that just might be like the stars above, like the pale white that paints her breast and wing - marking her as a Tonnerre as the flames never would.
"But I've asked so much, I apologize. You...uhm. Well, you can ask me questions too, I don't think I'll bite." Amicable as ever, sweeter than sunshine, Moira softens at last even as she tries not to panic. What has she opened herself up to?
in this house of broken hearts we made our love out of stacks of cards
@Asterion d'awww poor asterion ! she's not sorry though, even if a little sympathetic
Maybe that should trouble him, for the path from the cliffside is not without its treachery, but Asterion has always managed to find his way home in the dark. Instead it is almost a comfort, the night pressing in against them like they are the only two in the world. By the time he is finished with his long, fruitless tangle of words, even the gulls are quiet, all gone back to their rocky nests. The stars only watch, impassive as ever.
It is not your fault, she says in a voice as soft as seafoam, and oh! That might have been enough, but then there is her touch. It is a brief thing, but full of warmth, and if they were not so recently met the bay might have leaned into it. Instead he only bends toward her, touching his muzzle to her cheek for the space of a heartbeat. When she withdraws, he makes no move to close the distance between them again.
“I will know it whether I want it or not,” he says, and the whisk of his tail is almost a shrug. He knows that an ending will come; Asterion’s days of leaving the story halfway through are done.
He dips his head at her next words, his eyes on the darkness that had been the sea. Still the sounds of it rise around them, as much a comfort as his own heartbeat, or the sound of his companion’s breathing. It is easy for his gaze to find hers again, even if her words still make him feel like blushing.
“I am glad as well, Moira Tonnerre,” he answers, and cannot help the way using her full name makes his dark lips quirk in what is almost a smile. “But you are safe from my questions, at least for tonight. I should be getting back to the court.” There is almost regret in the way he turns from her, from the lullaby of the sea, from the stars overhead. It would be easier, he thinks, to stay here for the night, for the following day, for the summer.
It is a lucky thing he has no wings. Asterion would not trust himself not to use them.
As much as the comfort of the water, he finds he does not want to leave her. Moira has a piece of him, now (he almost feels lighter, as though the words had been a physical weight on his mind, his heart) – and after all she owes him answers now, too.
He tries to keep the hope from his voice when he looks back at her, white points like a beacon in the dark, but he is not wholly successful. “Unless you’d care to join me?”
Whatever her answer, and whether he leaves alone or with her, it will be a better walk back to the keep than it had been the way here.
@Moira <3 sorry, I feel like four days without posting and I've lost my groove
