[private] i bet on losing dogs

[larke]

She does not notice how far away he is until she is close and can watch his consciousness nearly snap back into place. It gives her pause and a slight twinge of regret for having disturbed him. He had looked so peaceful and she feels a slight burn of shame at having intruded. Still, it is too late to do anything about it and Larke has never been the kind to let herself sink into the negative emotions for too long.

Instead she is quiet and observant, her sage green eyes clear as she studies him.

“Midnight,” she repeats, her soft smile curling her lips as she savors the sound of it. “You have such a beautiful name,” she breathes, her voice a touch deeper than one might expect, but lovely all the same. She has always loved the evening; she loves the way that the world quiets and the way that it becomes so still so that she feels like she can practically hear the buzzing of stars like lightning bugs on the horizon.

When he asks for her name, she doesn’t hesitate, assuming that he must not have heard her. After all, she had been the one who had interrupted him. “Oh no,” her laughter is quiet and not unkind. “Although perhaps that would be more fitting.” She rolls her delicate, youthful shoulders. “My name is Larke.”

She is quiet for a second, looking past him to the inner, sloping pieces of Tephra.

When her eyes come back to him, they focus on his own. “My mother says that I was named for the songbirds that you can sometimes find here.” She grows a little shy but doesn’t retreat entirely. “Although I do not think I have a voice worthy of such a name. It is wonderful to imagine I someday might.”

—LARKE—

there is not in the wild world a valley so sweet
as the vale in whose bosom the bright waters meet