she was powerful not because she wasn't scared,
but because she went on strongly despite her fear.
Under skies of pure midnight velvet, below stars so penetrating they drew the eyes heaven-bound, the sonnets of the shimmering night played softly in Maerys' mind. She dawned upon the court as an apparition that was no more than a malformation of light, a mare cut out of colors that were both foreign and nourishing. Where she moved the scene behind her bent and bowed as if looked at through fish-eye lenses. Season after season charged on like the ticking clocks and all she had left with each passing day were the impressions of hooves in the winter snow. As the light twinkled and the unheard music played, her steps fell lightly over the rutted path as they had evenings prior, leading her to the heart of her home.
The ground had whispered her here now, come home, little petal. It had murmured like lovers' lips, come and we'll paint the walls anew. And, oh, didn't she desire so strongly to do just that.
The future had not been something the girl fretted over. The reason - whether it was because of her young mind or lack of reason - was uncertain as the girl never gave thought to all the time that enclosed her life into only a small speck in a timeline that had stretched eons before her and would do so after. She had stood idly and watched time slip through the cracks in her world like grains of sand. The days she had spent watching seconds tick on the horizon like waves crashing against the shore had all been wasted. It was only now that she realized that for many, today could be their last tomorrow.
Aged, matured, and with a varied perspective than prior, the dragon came home.
We'll leave this empty room, into the air we'll climb
The night whispers to the ones keen enough to listen to the melody it whispers. The night coaxes wonder from the canvas of stars strewn across its ink-stained canvas. The stars dance and twinkle as though they were performing upon a stage where all the world to see. Aearanas dreams of breathing stars, of captivating the world the way the stars can. He has a long way to go before he can join them. Aeranas breathes no stars. The tales he spins are only dreams spun from the threads of his past. Aerie is a ghost, and all he has is a new place to haunt as he revels and writhes in his memories. The canvas of night assuages his worries of what the future will toss at his feet. Aeranas knows he will be the cartographer for his destiny. He silently warns fate that his dreams are so much bigger than himself. These dreams are didactic.
Aearanas drops his glance from the heavens to peer into the horizon. Movement within Delumine catches his eye. They breathe the dust of the sun. From their sun dusted hide are ribbons of cream, as though to soothe the smoldering ash upon her bodice. She is beautiful. Aerie wonders if she knows how she commands the attention of the stars. They glow brighter in her presence. They whisper to him the same melody of the night. When the stars whisper to him, they whisper about her. The ghost feels his limb stir to life before he even has a chance to protest. They carry him effortlessly across Delumine, he glides. His lanky limbs thrum in a steady rhythm as he moves. She is ethereal beneath the inked canvas of night. Aerie craves to know what her breath feels like upon his skin.
He wonders if she breathes the dust of the sun. Aerie's lithe frame falls into her orbit in just moments. He wonders if she will balk at his unusual approach. She is already a story in the making."Hello. I couldn't help but notice the way that the stars pause for you and your sundust kissed skin." Aerie breathes to her, and his excitement is palpable. A smile lights up the ghost's face."I'm Aerie." He introduces himself with the hopes that she will not turn him away.
she was powerful not because she wasn't scared,
but because she went on strongly despite her fear.
He had caught her eye as she had caught his.
Aeranas seemed to be molded from a different cast than the average among them as he had a look uncommon to most. He had been lacquered and enameled by the shine of glass in the thick sunlight, reflecting in elegant ivory only found in select few. Mottled with freckles and gleaming rose along with specific points of his body, he radiated pastel vitality and brio. The structure of his face was composed of rounded contours, sculpted and pared to perfection.
And that tongue of his, oh, it was lethal when he spoke.
Maerys stood frozen as she watched his lips form words she had never been told before. She saw nothing short of curiosity and wonder on his face; the face of otherworldly elegance and ethereality. The stars, he said, they suspended for her. It brought a smile to her features, a shy one. It was a reaction to a compliment that reached a caliber she'd never heard prior. She'd always been known to be skilled with words, but she would never string words together in a way that would elicit the same flattered giddiness in her heart as his did.
Her eyes searched for his, as bright and spellbinding as lodestars, as he introduced himself as Aerie. They were bewitching, shining like two eternity-rose baubles enwrought in snow. "Aerie," she whispered back to him as the luminous heavenly bodies continued to flirt down at them from the endless arch of void-black beyond the moon's corona. "Thy words art far too kind," she took a moment before continuing, "I thank thee."
The pair was heavenly finery laid on Delumine's thick ground as they spoke, their hearts pulsing like the flashing pinpricks of stardust overhead.
Aeranas had been the last thing she expected.
She hadn't known what she would be walking home to, but it had not been this. Things changed around Delumine at every second as positions rotated and switched and drama regurgitated itself into new situations. There'd been a great beauty that intertwined itself into Dawn Court, but also a feeling of great sorrow.
Aeranas was definitely a pleasant reprieve.
"I am Maerys," and she reached for him in greeting, her muzzle to his.
We'll leave this empty room, into the air we'll climb
This stardust maiden does not flinch nor flee from his abrupt approach. Her eyes remain fixed on each movement of his lithe, pastel form. He can feel her eyes trace every inch of his ivory bodice. Her eyes are pools of rose nestled in a garden of primrose flowers. A garden that is kissed by the stars, a garden that heaven is reluctant to release. Aerie sees the captivation in the expression upon her face, and he wonders exactly what has captivated her. Her hair, spilling like ivory seas atop her stardust skin, is like poetry to him. Every inch of her is beautiful, and he is determined to make sure she knows this. A smile creeps uncertainly across her gently sloping face. It is quiet. It is a smile that she is not completely conscious of. It is the kind of smile one reacts with upon receiving a gift they truly love. It is sweet. Genuine. Aerie feels his smile greet hers. The ghost does not have a smile that is so noticeable. It is when she whispers his name that he leans closer, as though she is offering a sweet embrace. Nothing is sweeter than poetry spilled between two strangers sharing space beneath the stars.
Aerie dives into her pools of rose just as she dives into his. His smile is a permanent one in her presence this night. Aerie twitches his auds forward so that he does not miss a single word she offers him. She breathes poetry in the way she speaks. The way she frames her sentences reminds him of the words written in books of old, long since forgotten by this world. Books he loves so dearly. She is his poet, and what a brilliant poet she is. "There is no need to thank someone for the truth. You are a precious, timeless treasure. I worry the stars may grow jealous of the story-teller and the treasure. They must not want to let you go." Aerie promises her with a gentle laugh. He wonders if she will find his manner of speaking too strange. He finds himself craving to hear her speak again, at length. He wants to hear her stories, and her dreams so that he might breathe them back to the stars. So that others will know of the mesmerizing star kissed maiden with ivory seas.
His poet introduces herself to him, in those same sweet tones as before. Maerys. "Maerys. What a beautiful name for a poet who speaks in gold as you do." He answers her with nothing but genuine words slipping from his lips. The warm glow from his scarf swells when he extends his muzzle to greet hers. Her maw too is as soft, and beautiful as she is. Maerys is real, and tangible unlike the stars in the sky. They may be real, but they are not tangible. One cannot hold a star in their lips in the same way one could hold the words of his poet in theirs. "Tell me, Maerys, are you a traveler? Is Delumine your home? I think that I am in love with Delumine already, for she has welcomed me home. I am new to Novus. An entertainer, a storyteller." Aerie speaks to her, excited to talk to someone new. "Would you like to hear my story about you?" He smiles so wide that his eyes crinkle into crescent moons. Perhaps the ghost will make a new friend yet. The ghost would be lucky to befriend such a captivating creature.
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