The dusk has long ago been consumed by the night and, adorned in shadow, she comes at last.
There is no hiding the Dusk Emissary, not with her petals that fall like the autumnal leaves to leave a trail in her wake. They twine in from the mountains, weaving their way around rocks and sparse shrub. They trace down through sentinel trees and over babbling brooks. On and on they lead towards the firelight glow and music of revelry.
There they find their flower girl host upon the edge of the merriment. She has not heeded the midnight call of the Night Court since his coronation. Now, here within this merriment, with laughter and dance lit by bonfire light, she knows why. A part of her belongs within this Court; a part of her yearns for it. It is the part that smothers the dusk in darkness and starlight and here it grows. To the sound of this carousing music and bohemian spirit it begins to thrive, to dance.
Yet the girl does not.
Not even when her feet beg her to remember how she danced bare foot through these crowds once before - when she first began to feel those alluring whispers of night upon her golden skin. But those alluring whispers were nothing to those of their king. He took the part of her that belongs here and cleaved the girl in two as he did. As Florentine stands, dusk light and starlight warring within her, she wonders if she will now only ever be whole when Reichenbach is near.
Above the din, above lilting music and a sea of laughter and voices, she hears his laugh. Through the flickering flame of his wild bonfire she sees him. Amethyst eyes trail the wild curls of his black, black hair, the tilt of his lips and the charm of the smile they make. Dusk watches as the Night enchants his courtiers. Florentine makes no move toward him, though his name plays upon her tongue, her lips, her heart.
His gypsy coins glitter, the twinkling of golden stars and she knows how they sound within a sacred temple, brought to life only by their shared breath. The twilight girl thinks of what their love has cost: a broken heart and tears, so many tears… She should leave! She should flee back to the safety of the dusk court but…
He told me he was in love with you.
And that is why Florentine is here: to berate him for loving her, to berate him for stealing her heart, but, most ashamedly of all, whilst Aislinn’s tears still dry upon the cliifside, she has come to fall into his starlight with no thought of ever returning.
The place where her heart once was, a place that should be so empty, instead feels full, full to bursting. The Night King is everywhere within it. There is no hidden corner that does not know him, and when at last his starlight gaze finds the amethyst of hers, there is only one question her eyes ask him through the crackle of flame between them, Have you kept my heart well?
@Reichenbach one bonfire thread, as requested -snug-
Today had been the day he received confirmation of Rosti's release - and his own. The concerns of ruling a Court had worn heavy on his wild haired head for too long, his wildfire had begun to burn too hot, too fast... for the King of Shadows had a fearsome temper, much like the deity he worshipped. The stress of Rostislav's capture had melted like hot butter at the first sight of his warden, seething and bloodthirsty, upon the mountain pass. There were political matters that would need to be discussed... preventative matters, concerns with inter-court relations, other threats he might have ignored... but those could wait. Denocte was a wild court, a free one - and tonight their King was unburdened and carefree.
He grinned at those surrounding him, drinking in the sight of his lively people as if it were the richest wine, he held a booming laugh at the tip of his tongue or behind his white teeth at all times, releasing it often and freely. Music thundered and whistled and flames crackled, Calligo and her shadows melting in every crooked grin and empty pocket with a charming smugness. Reichenbach shined underneath the stars, grasping them in the gleam of his midnight curls and the reflection of his argent eyes, catching them and keeping them as he grinned and teased, choosing to forget the worry and regret as he had done for much of his life.
She catches him, though. It's only a slight glimpse of violet in the corner of his eye that tells him it's her - he's memorised that shade and named it hers forever. Almost in slow motion he feels his great head turning to gaze at her, face pausing for a moment as he truly registers that the dusk girl is here, that his dusk girl was here. His face broke into a great grin, vibrant and full of a fragile light that lingered with the true, pure joy of his rapture for her. The flames danced about her, lifting the light, honey soaked hairs of her mane as if pulling her in, closer, closer. Stars above, she looked beautiful against the firelight.
He made his way through the crowd, gliding rather than walking, his vast chest clearing a path with ease. As he moved he memorised her, the planes of her delicate face, the fierce innocence that trembled upon the flawless lines of her frame, subtly smelled the air in the hope to get a whiff of her crushed petal scent.
He arrived.
All woodsmoke, jasmine and stars.
All wildfire and passion.
He answered her silent question with one of his own:
She knows the moment he sees her, the way that laughter falls to quiet. The silence left in its wake tiptoes up her spine. A shiver chases it and Flora’s eyes fall to the curve of the Night King’s black, black lips. It is a wonder she can see it through the shadows that leap and dance, through the glow of flames that ripple and flare.
Sparks burst from their fire, spiraling high, high up in the sky. They snag within the night boy’s argent eyes and they flare red, red, red. Was it a warning? Most likely. Does the Dusk girl heed it? No. Does she see the way her petals roll away, away from the bonfire and tumble homeward?
No. Dusk sees nothing but the approaching Night; the pitch of night here to consume the floundering dusk. The moon pours quicksilver light along the curls atop his head, his neck. The flames turn the red of his bay coat to molten lava as he pours to her, hot and dangerous.
This king is revelry. That first night, the first time she heard Dencote’s voice (a song, a dance, the crackle of fire) it trapped Dusk’s golden girl tight. But it was nothing compared to him. He steps to her and his court’s shackles turn tighter and tighter about her heart.
What little of it he left for her...
There are no words spoken between them – there is simply no space. Only the unspoken ones, questions about stolen hearts, squeeze between the scant space he has left between them. Here, in this moment of wildfire and starlight, she is the sun that long ago set, she is the bruised purple of the fading daylight. Night is here so close, so insistent she should take a step back, away from him, away from this allure. But his flower girl is drunk, she is drowning, already falling through stars.
Her neck extends, slender and elegant, lips reaching hesitantly for his shoulder. He is the dark of night, the space between stars – a place she is lost within and to touch him is to never return.
Florentine’s lips find the curve of his shoulder, warm and so full of wood smoke. His coins chime somewhere in the distance, they glitter in the firelight, casting gold fractals that dance upon her skin, his skin.
She traces sinuous muscle with the feather touch of her lips. Her caress is so tremulous and curious. “I met Aislinn.” Dusk begins, breathing the words across his shadowed skin.
The twilight girl keeps her gaze hidden, shy beneath her tangle of hair – all golden threads, and wild, wild flowers. She cannot say the words if she looks to his face (his eyes) and so, it is with soft whimsy and fearful wonder that she speaks them to his shoulder, “She told me you love me…” How can words be a reprimand and yet so filled with selfish joy? It is a mysetery but that is what they are.
Florentine is sad and sorry and delighted and lovestruck. Was love supposed to hurt like this? Was it always something that could lift her so high and sweep others so low with one felling swoop?
“What have we done?” Florentine asks of her Night King as her lips fall away from him and her amethyst eyes lift up to find his starlight gaze.
Her touch is like a release he hadn't known he was waiting for, that tremulous, careful caress filling him up, up, up. Until his eyes are shining and bright, bursting with life and energy. She is his, finally his - and he'd do anything to keep her. Reichenbach was about to say as much when another name is murmured against his mahogany skin - the name that still haunted him, through guilt or grief or honour he does not know.
Aislinn.
The very name brings forth the vision of her glacier cut eyes, the wildness of her storm blown skin. He waits, knowing that her next words will either fulfil him or condemn him. He knew about Bexley, too. Knew that his beautiful friend had captured Florentine's eager attentions once, that the bounce of her fat curls and the slender, stunning line of her body were not easy to dismiss. His eyes were intense on Florentine's face, willing her to meet his eyes, persuading her through the very force of his thunderous heartbeat.
"She told me you loved me."
It was a reprimand but also a quivering, tentative question. Reichenbach felt that familiar grin itch around his black lips, but the thought of her suffering and hurting heart kept it at bay. He watched her so closely, so lovingly, memorising every sweet line of her gentle face as if it might be the last time he saw it. He wanted to roar, to bellow to the starry skies that Florentine was his and no one else's.
"What have we done?"
Her eyes find the abyssal silver of his own, his long lashes lowering in something akin to fury, albeit gentler and cooler. Reichenbach bent his muscular neck, lowering his head so that they could be eye to eye as he said;
"I love you Florentine, and I'll never apologise for that."
He looked away suddenly, staring sightlessly toward the revelry as his mind whirred excitedly. There was no dampening the fire that had surged at the sight of Florentine, no controlling it. She strengthened and weakened him in a way he had not felt since Sparrow... all consuming, so much so that he could do nothing but follow what his heart desired. He looked back at his Dusk girl, plucking a flower from her hair gently;
"We have something beautiful, it can't be damned... not in that way. Aislinn... Aislinn and dear Bexley will understand that."
He grinned suddenly, tugging at the ends of her honeyed hair;
It was a mistake to look up to his argent eyes for they are a sea of stars and she finds herself climbing higher and higher into them. Oh to be surrounded there, to be a thing of starlight there, held together by moonlight magic and the dust of the night. Her soul is made of twilight and sleepy whispers and her heart of starlight and love’s confessions.
She is still lost in the silver heights of his eyes when he affirms his love. He lowers his gaze to hers but Florentine does not begin to fall, instead her breath tangles with his as he smothers her in jasmine and declarations she does not know how to handle.
He might kill her with this love of theirs, for her heart is just that wild, and yet it is with resolute gladness that she builds her pyre, higher, higher.
Reichenbach looks away and Florentine is tumbling down from where his gaze had held her. She stagger–steps closer to be caught by his shoulder and snag upon his heart.
He reaches to her neck and the tangle of flowers and hair, plucking from its nest a lavender flower. How many times had flowers been plucked from her mane? She does not think to count, for none so matter as much as this and the flower he has plucked.
Calligo weaves her magic into the laughter of voices and the dance of flames whose lights lick and flicker across their skin. The dusk girl and her night boy are swathed in smoke and incense, lost into the thrall of revelry. The bonfire is bewitching and Florentine closes her eyes to it, pressing her cheek into the crook of her lovers shoulder. She listens to the jingle of gypsy coins and not even they can drown out Bexley’s name.
It makes her a tangle of joy and sorrow. Relief is sweet for he is not angry and he knows. “Did she tell you?”
A glimpse of trade carts catch her gaze and slowly the flower girl peels herself from his side as curiosity sharpened her amethyst gaze. “I was a pick pocket once.” She breathes as she watches the crowds around each stall; a tangle of commerce. Florentine does not linger to consider whether she had ever told this boy of her former lives.
She casts him an impish smile as she falls into the crowds, weaving and pushing and dancing her way towards the lines of carts and wares. Sweet confectionary lays their fragrances upon her tongue, and her eyes glitter as they take in foreign gems set within lavish jewellery. “You have quite the eclectic market here, Your Majesty.” The Dusk girl notes with a playful smile upon her lips. She leads her night boy on through the crowds as she lets herself be won by charming salesmen and the bustle of the nighttime crowds.
@Reichenbach
★ She is clothed with strength and dignity,
and she laughs without fear of the future ★
11-12-2017, 10:29 AM - This post was last modified: 11-12-2017, 10:29 AM by Florentine
