the heaviness in my heart belongs to gravity; kensley

[larke]

carried by the current of the morning
miles below the surface of the dawn

Larke does not know much about loss.

She has not been schooled in all the ways that a life can fall apart and the loss that she has experienced has been dulled by the persistent, beating of the rivers of her optimism. She barely remembers what it was like to be born and watch her mother become something else entirely. To watch her mother walk away in a cloud of magic and confusion and to see the pain fracture her father’s face in the aftermath of it.

But such things fall apart in the new memories she has made with her family.

Such things become distant memories and her remains secure—remains sheltered, safe.

It is this sheltered heart that she protects as she walks through the meadow, leaving Ischia for the first time since she was given her leadership position. She feels that familiar melding of nerves and uncertainty that brew in her chest—that fear of the unknown that she is not quite able to discern. It drives her forward, walking the paths of the meadow until she nearly runs into the stallion the same color of a storm.

“Oh,” she exhales as she takes several steps back, widening the berth between them and shaking her fine head. “I am so sorry. I wasn’t paying attention.” She feels heat rise in her chest, and she exhales slowly as she tries to find some sense of stability. “My name is Larke,” she introduces herself almost out of habit, and then falls silent again, studying the strange lines of his face and the unspoken that lies beneath it.

this is not the place that I was born in
but it doesn't mean it's not the place where I belong

larke