"But the dream, the echo, slips from him as quickly as he had found it and as consciousness comes to him (a slap and not the gentle waves of oceanic tides), it dissolves entirely. His muscles relax as the cold claims him again, as the numbness sets in, and when his grey eyes open, there’s nothing but the faint after burn of a dream often trod and never remembered." --Brigade, written by Laura
It is the mid-end of summer and there is no escaping the heat. Even beneath the trees it is still hot, humidity seeping in and around the trunks as though the shade meant nothing. There is sweat on the shoulders of those she passes, sweat on their necks and in the hollows of their hips, it dulls their eyes and their smiles when they move wordlessly past her. She feels some small amount of guilt because, while she is not impervious to the heat, sensation is certainly dulled by the glossy teal surface of her strange body. It is what made it so easy to sleep nestled in the curve of Ruan’s body, the lack of cold creeping into her from the winter of his skin. She could still feel it, but in a vague, distant way, a soft creeping that made it easy to ignore. This heat was no different.
Still, she wandered from the trees to the small irregular pond she had found buried in the Taiga, wading in up to her ankles and then halting. Her eyes fell as they often did to the surface of the water, waiting until the ripples had faded and her reflection was whole again to trace the strangeness of her body. She had grown since coming here - longer legs, leaner body, a delicately sharp edge to a face that had been so soft in youth. Even her mane had grown in, a strange mix of coarse and silky, translucent purple as though the color had been watered down when those strange strands began to grow. It wasn’t beautiful like the hair she had seen on other girls, soft silk in gentle tangles, but it was still softer than the glass of her cracked skin and so she loved it dearly. It made her feel more normal, more acceptable.
She turns and the water ripples out from her again, distorting her reflection until the waves came further apart and then stopped altogether. It was easy to make out the line of ice-gems embedded in the curve of her spine, glittering jewels set in place to help remind her where she belonged and with whom she belonged when doubt started to creep in. He didn’t like when she felt that way, smaller than she was, somehow less because she was so different. But it was hard sometimes, harder since she had never seen anyone like her, since she had been abandoned because of her strangeness.
She wades in deeper, stopping again when the water rose to just above her chest and the sun refracted a dozen teal rainbows around her. Her lips find the surface, drawing a wide arc around her so that the rainbows shudder and dance, and her reflection dissolves into slivers of gleaming teal and fragments of a quiet face staring back up at her from so many different places. With a quiet sigh she lifts her chin to the sky, closing those pale amber eyes and letting the sun warm her face until it gleamed like molten teal in the summer heat.
though i never needed any proof to trust the heart that beats inside of you
06-17-2017, 05:08 PM (This post was last modified: 06-17-2017, 05:11 PM by Ruan.)
Another season was passing, and still he felt so carved out and hollow at times. Just as dangerously fragile as the girl of glass in the water. His winter was no longer wild and chaotic, involuntarily billowing around him. No startling gusts of cold and random flurries of snow answering after his torrential emotions. He wasn't sure when it had changed, hadn't even really noticed when it became only a glimmer of frost across his skin. Not a blizzard of inner turmoil and crashing sleet. Calm now, settled just outside his coat, a soft blanket of glittering powder. So empty inside, the emotions dulled. Almost fragile, like her.
But he was strong for her.
For all of them.
She stared down at her reflection, and he observed her from where he stood a distance off. His eyes stared bright and blue from a dark face, expressionless and watchful from the depths of shadows beneath their trees. She looked as dejected as he usually felt, usually tried to hide from her, and it hurt his heart. Had he made her this way? Had his deep depression bled into her? He tried to keep it all to himself. To be steady and strong for them as always. She always seemed to know, or sense, his true feelings though.
Maybe he'd failed her. All of them.
She turned to study herself from the side, her ice crystals catching the light just as the glass of her teal body did. He knew she liked them, his reminder that she was precious, and beautiful, and unique. And his. But today she wasn't pleased, wasn’t admiring them with that soft glow in her warm eyes. Today she was too different.
The need to comfort her, to reassure her, tugged and pulled at the doting father in him, and it was hard to ignore. Perhaps she needed to work this out on her own though, and he waited, watching over her as her smooth nose dipped to the water. She stroked a broad arch and the ripples shattered the sunlight, throwing fractured rays of her teal and rainbows all around. Couldn’t she see how beautiful she was? There was no other creature like her. Not a single one.
He detached from the shadows. If they were both going to be quieted today, they may as well do it together. The frost on his skin melted in the summer heat, immediately reforming again and leaving damp trails of arctic water slipping down his sides and legs. His eyes never left her small figure, glassy and gleaming in the baking sun, as he came forward. Thick redwoods were left behind, then a small expanse of meadow grasses and little pink flowers, until his feet were gently sinking into the soft bank of the little pond.
He slipped in, wading quietly to her with a watery whisper. His advance disturbed her reflections of color again and sent the water lapping softly at her sides. As he passed from her hip to shoulder, he drew his muzzle slowly across the diamonds of her spine, not quite touching. His breath was cooler than her sun-bathed glass and it cleared a haze of heat from her surface. The new, polished shine beneath lit something in his eyes. Something sharp, something alert. His nose drifted along her neck, across her fall of watery hair and to the crook of her little jaw.
”Polaris,” he said, a quiet, murmuring rumble. His cold breath chased the heat away and he lingered there, his lips barely against the cool glass of her skin as he slowly shifted his hips around so that he faced her. He nuzzled into the hollow between her cheek and mouth with a soft sigh, wishing he could make everything right for her, give her whatever it was that would make her truly happy. In the end, he said nothing more. He never really needed to with her. He only closed his sad eyes and pressed his forehead gently to hers, breathing slow and deep through an ache in his heart.
She feels his eyes before she sees him, would know that intensity anywhere, the way it traces her skin like gentle fingers. It makes her soft, quiets the unease in her heart to know that he is close by, always near. That he would always chase away the shadows before they crept close enough to dampen her light. She turns to look for him, those faded amber eyes slipping open to pick him out from his trek across a small meadow, his dark and purple so beautiful like snowcapped mountains etched through with frost.
It is clear that he is coming to join her so she does not leave the water, but her feet take a few small steps toward him, tugged close by his gravity. A soft squelch of mud marks his passing as it sucks at his hooves, and then the quiet splash of water rippling outwards from his body. The small waves lapped up higher at her sides, and she swayed and smiled up at him with the quiet quirk of such glowing teal lips. “Ruan.” She says in that whisper-voice, like the rustle of wings and leaves and rain through trees. But she is cut off by his breath against her spine, cool like winter to war with the summer heat, and she is at once breathless and wide-eyed and pushing her nose to the crook of his shoulder when he stops beside her.
Polaris, he greets her in that murmurous hum, swinging wide to face her in the water. It is strange when for a moment she finds she cannot lift her eyes to his, when his full focus makes her disappear a little within herself, a soft furrow in the impossibly smooth of her brow. A strange tug in her belly. But then he noses the hollow beneath her cheek and it lifts her chin to him again, lifts those soft amber eyes until they are warm against the hollows of his dark face.
Ruan.
He drops his forehead to hers and closes his eyes, and she follows him like an echo, inching forward until they are pressed together and quiet. For a long while she is content with this, to bask in his closeness and the evenness of his breath, to feel him soften at her touch. But the silence has a weight to it, a weight she knows well because it is the heaviness he chases from her heart with those quiet touches and murmurous words, with a light he wields without meaning to. She pulls back hesitantly, those eyes open now and searching, and then ducks beneath his chin and against a chest she had finally grown into.
She is wordless at first, a soft nuzzle to his shoulder, lips in a worried frown and nibbling gently at his neck. She might’ve smiled if she knew the truth, that he had worried at the dark in her expression, the quiet draped across that strange gleaming skin as she watched her own reflection in the water. That she thought she saw the same in him now and meant to erase it in any way he’d let her. Maybe she had learned this from him. This urgent need to fix, to soothe.
She slips out from under him, turning to grab a lock of his mane between her teeth and tug them deeper into the water until it lapped halfway up her neck, making the water immediately around her glow with her teal. “I don’t know how to swim.” She says in a voice like violet flowers, shy and fragile and beautiful in a wild way. “Teach me.” There is a smile on her lips now, a lightness she feels whenever he is near, and she reaches for him again, presses her mouth to his cool neck, presses a smile that he will feel by the curve of her lips. Then she takes another step back, watching him with eyes that are curious and bright, so much softer now.
though i never needed any proof to trust the heart that beats inside of you
The sound of his name spoken so softly, so lovingly, sent a shiver rippling down his spine. Her nose pressed to his shoulder as his breath slowly passed over her gems of ice. His hunter eyes brightened on her, but it wasn't until after his cool breath cleared the heat from her skin, until he placed a light kiss beside her jaw and settled there, that he greeted her back with a murmur of her name.
For a moment, he worried. She didn't seem to want to look at him, and he nuzzled into her, gently tilting her chin a little higher. When those warm honey eyes lifted, he shuttered his over the fierce light in the blue of his stare. He could feel it, didn't understand it. Something was changing in him, but he fought it down.
He dipped his head to hers, and she inched forward until they touched. Then they were both quiet, both still. Breathing evenly and soaking in each other's presence. She had a way of soothing him without even speaking. She'd never needed to speak with him. He was always aware of body language like the wolves of his once-home and it was a language she spoke so naturally. Primal communication, raw and real and instinctive.
After a time, she pulled back carefully. He watched her from behind half-lidded eyes until she ducked beneath his head and to his chest. He tucked his chin against her, holding her gently to him. He hated that they both seemed so troubled today. Wished he could make everything better for her and struggling to know how to. More than just her health and protection, her happiness was his to care for too.
She nuzzled into his shoulder and he almost hummed at the electricity shooting up his withers, almost caught his breath when her mouth nibbled at his neck. Nearly had to bite back a groan. His muscles tensed and he grit his teeth, eyes opening to stare straight ahead and ignore the quickening in his pulse. These were not changes in him he wanted. Definitely not now, not here. He would leave if it got worse. He would fight it til then.
She slipped away and tugged at his mane. His eyes followed her, a little too sharp, and his body followed too, a smooth prowl through the water. "I don't know how to swim," a voice of quiet dew drops on wild flowers, delicate and clear. He stepped further, deeper, blue eyes in the amber of hers. A warning inside him, but he was fighting it down. It would be okay. This was Polaris. "Teach me."
He didn't say anything, but he nodded, eyes on hers. She stepped in again and he could feel the smile of her lips against his neck. With a slow, deep breath in, he buried his nose in her hair, breathing in that scent he'd become so familiar with, had fallen asleep to it ever since he'd first found her. His mouth teased at her strands until he could feel her neck beneath his lips, and he kissed her softly.
Maybe he should leave, after all.
Soon. Not yet. He could handle this.
He glided forward, deeper, treading water easily as he passed her and turned. Come on, then, he gestured with a small jerk of his chin and a smile in his lips. Instinct would force her to kick, and he was ready with his magic if she needed it. All she had to do was come to him.
He does not understand her breathlessness, does not understand when her eyes fall like amber stars from a face she suddenly cannot look at. But maybe she does not understand either, cannot name the reason her heart is suddenly heading for her throat and beating so fast. A million butterflies trapped in her chest. He nuzzles her gently and lifts her chin higher, guides her eyes back to his face where they settle warm and shy and soft against a color like damp steel. Not his eyes though, not yet. A breath and she steadies a little, lifts her eyes a little higher until they are lost in a blue the sky should be so envious of.
Oh.
She is glad when their foreheads press together, when he stops watching the truths swimming like fish back and forth between eyes the color of crushed gold. It gives her a chance to steady herself, to let that nervous hum in her chest quiet so that he will not notice when she moves closer again to tuck herself against his chest. She does and he pulls her close in that reflexive way, tucks his chin across such delicate teal withers in an embrace she has memorized. Her skin fogs beneath his breath, the teal fading with every exhalation into something softer, something less translucent and strange.
She touches his shoulder, nuzzles close and needing because all this uncertainty makes her feel so fragile. Makes her wonder and doubt and fight a quiet in her chest that she does not want to submit to. She finds his neck next, traces the long hollowed line of muscle beneath the pale and purple. When the muscle tenses beneath her touch she is uncertain at first, pauses just above his skin so only the tepid heat of her sweet breath gathers there. Her weight shifts and she turns her face to find his, to find those eyes she loves - but they are staring straight ahead and focused, they don’t drop to her at all. She winces inwardly, traces the tension in his clenched jaw with eyes that are soft and uncertain. Had she done something wrong? He’d never minded her closeness before.
So she steps back and away, a hint of apology in the delicate hollows of that twinkling teal face. Instead she takes a lock of his mane between her lips, tugs softly and backs away, but she cannot seem to pry her eyes from him. He follows so easily, so willingly, silent despite the way the water slaps and splashes against her strange, glowing skin. They continue to wade deeper, her stepping backward into the watery unknown, him following in a prowl, and she cannot help the way her eyes submit softly to the intensity of his gaze locked on hers. It feels electric, all goosebumps and shivers and she is glad he only seems focused on her face right now.
Teach me.
He nods without breaking eye contact, has no idea how the weight of his gravity is crushing her, turning glass to dust until the teal spills from her and into the water. She steps close again (it’s his fault, his doing) and touches a smile to his neck, coaxes him closer even as she pulls away into deeper water. But he reaches out, too, buries his nose in her mane, teases the pale purple strands until he is at her neck beneath it. He kisses her.
He’s kissed her a hundred times, it’s nothing new, nothing different. Except maybe her heart disagrees because it’s thrumming and wild and suddenly she’s heaving and staring up at him from beneath a shining, furrowed brow. Do it again, those amber eyes say, touch me again.
No - wait. She takes a step back, still heaving, still watching him so closely, but the motion pulls him out to her and he glides past easily, his legs churning beneath him. As he passes and before he can get too far, she reaches out to press teeth to his hip, a nudge to the skin just behind it with eyes that flash like wet gold. Not too far, not without me. Those eyes say, belying her worry just a little. He turns and nods at her, coaxes her further and she hesitates for only a heartbeat before paddling forward. It feels strange to be so weightless, and that delicate, glistening body seems to sigh at her in relief. It takes her a second to find a rhythm, to keep her legs from snapping together and her chin from dipping below the surface. She bobs haphazardly a few times, but Ruan won’t let her sink too far, doesn’t let her exhaust herself.
She paddles for him now, kicking her legs until she is next to him and sliding up from his hip to his shoulder, nosing at his back and his neck and the familiar curve of his cheek with eyes that are lit with pleasure and maybe just a little adrenaline. Just enough to make her foolish. She swims around to his head, coughs when she bobs again and water splashes in through her mouth and down a throat that isn’t ready. Reaching for him, she touches her nose to the corner of his mouth, traces a line along his jaw and then turns away with a splash, swimming for deeper water. When she turns in a half-circle, bobbing so that the water splashes up over her gleaming face again, there is a new wild in her expression, a playfulness revealed now that her earlier melancholy had been chased away.
Come and get me. Those eyes say when they settle against his face, trap that impossible blue in the warm amber of her own.
though i never needed any proof to trust the heart that beats inside of you
