She is sweet and flirtatious, but he views it as more mischievous than anything, her green eyes glinting out from beneath the thicket of her forelock. He laughs at her words, at the playfulness that runs beneath them and shakes his head. “Who knows? There have been characters with stranger desires before.” He purposefully drops his voice to husk, a seductive roll of velvet as he steps forward next to her. “Who knows just what…” his voice drops off as his eyes, smoldering and molten, find her own, “excites me.”
But the heat cools from his eyes as he laughs, the teasing returning to the handsome lines of his face.
As his laughter grows silent, he continues to follow her throughout the forest, tracking next to her, easily keeping pace. The woods themselves were beautiful—tinged with autumn color, brightness of the leaves fluttering around them, the ground crunching with each step. He could see the allure of calling this piece of land home—the beauty of it, the peace, the solitude. He could see why it would draw those like Djinni.
(Although he had a feeling that she herself did not hunger for peace and quiet.)
When they reached the waterfall, he tipped his head to consider it. It certainly did not match the majesty of the Falls in its splendor, but it was beautiful all the same and it brought a smile to his inky lips. “Your land is truly something to behold,” he shifted to face her fully. “I lived in the Falls for but a moment of time, but its residents were always kind. I am glad to know that there is a place that plays homage to it.”
The other lands were not so lucky. There were no deserts, no mountains, no valleys—nothing that could hold a candle to the peaceful tranquility of the Gates. Everything they had so long loved was gone.
out of the blue out into the loneliest place that you'll ever know
I carried the world just as far as I could but the damage had taken its toll
![[Image: gqYjsHr.png]](https://i.postimg.cc/KjqNDKxc/gqYjsHr.png)