so we let our shadows fall away like dust
She slips easily through the perpetual autumn, flowing like water around the large grey stones and past tree trunks that look weathered and ancient, full of time and secrets and so many stories. But were they really? Or was it just magic made to look convincing, a seamless illusion of age and natural beauty. She had heard the stories of the way these lands used to be, she knew that the changes had been made in recent years – too recent for such an ancient forest. Yet here it was, arching and beautiful, perpetual autumn, perpetual fire.
Her mind is elsewhere is she wanders, content and musing, and there is a smile on her mouth that traces faintly across her lips and reappears again in the crinkle of the corners of those luminous brown eyes. There is no path she follows, no direction in the murky light that filters between the trees, and so travels as though caught in a current, directed willingly, easily, by the stones and boulder s and tangles of trees.
When sunlight splashes warm across her face she pauses, momentarily startled, and takes a moment to focus on which part of Sylva she had wandered into. While she has in the past wandered over the border, so lost in thought and in peace that she hadn’t noticed until snow crunched underfoot, once glance upwards at the burning orange leaves of the trees tell her this is not the case today.
Ahead of her there is a sound, a jingle, and the smile on her mouth deepens as she pushes back into that easy walk. There is a low hill, a hump of earth dressed in green and gold and knee-high grass, and when she climbs to the peak there is slender grey mare standing below on the other side. It takes a moment to recognize her – she wears new skin, after all. A soft grey with even softer dapples, mane that is dark like steel silk, dark like the bellies of storm clouds. But the bangles give her away, and even the slender shape of her ribs and the curve of her hips seems familiar.
“Djinni?” She asks softly, though even as she descends the hill and draws closer, she is certain. Beneath the new color is a face that is still same and beautiful, elegant in its wildness, and several loops of gleaming metal perch at the edge of a small ear. But she notices something else the closer she comes, something still early, still subtle enough to be hidden by distance, something that weaves an even deeper smile across the pale and pewter of those delicate lips.
She has seen it in her mother, too, that subtle shift of weight in her belly, the beautiful thickening of an underline, and she recognizes it instantly. So there is no reason to doubt herself when she comes along Djinni’s side and brushes such tender lips against skin that is beautiful and steel and smoother than storm clouds, when she presses that smile against the life that grows within that belly and says, “Djinni!” The exclamation is soft and sweet, those eyes luminous when she eases forward to touch her nose to the curve of a dappled jaw and the hollow beneath it. “You’re expecting,” a pause and she pulls away, settling in close beside her, companionably, “congratulations.”
There is soft in her expression, easy affection and careful light, and it is warm when her eyes settle against Djinni’s face. “My mother is pregnant, too.” A pause and she ducks her chin sweetly to the curve of that delicate blue chest, hiding a blush or a softness or the hint of an ache at the idea of family. Then, lifting her eyes again, ever soft, ever quiet, “you must be so happy.”
