if all this falls apart, he will never know what you are
Theirs has been a circuitous route to finding one another, but he wouldn’t have it any other way.
He was a young man who was lost in every sense of the word when they first met. Starting out life as an orphan who was plucked from the Den and preened by a woman who could never be called mother was rather an auspicious beginning for someone as sensitive as he. He was spirited away to the Chamber, whose beating heart below the ground was more of a comfort to him than anything ever had been before. Walter grew up wild and stubborn and independent – and lonely.
The few friendships he made as a boy were the only tethers that kept him from disappearing entirely. First, with the beautiful black princess of the piney kingdom, Violette. She made him fly for the first time, made him feel accepted and wanted. Then, he found companionship in Aseret, whose voice and words curled around him alluringly like smoke. He grew to admire them in the way that boys do. But as they all grew older, the girls blossomed into mature women. The boy grew bigger, too, but he never was man enough to tell either how he felt about them.
Everybody found lives but Walter.
Until Djinni, that is.
She has been the only constant in his otherwise unremarkable life. She makes up for all of his many failures because – finally - they are doing right by each other. It doesn’t matter how long it has taken them to get to this exact point in time (her curled under his wing as they look out over the life they have created together). The destination and culmination is everything.
The briny breeze comes up again and tousles their hair. Walter presses his lips to her pink forelock, smoothing it down in the same motion. His muzzle lingers on this soft space of hers, like a bird settling into its nest. “Sylva?” “Yes?” He says, coloring his voice with as much confusion as her own. He’s mocking her, playing the part of the gnat he is. It’s hard to resist now that they’ve established his role.
But the next bit surprises him out of his taunting.
“Oh,” he says, “I see.” Though he sees nothing. The palomino is hardly interested in the kingdoms and their various and precarious relationships. Not anymore. Not since Hestia has gone from the grey shores of their home. “Well we’ll just have to sneak in, I guess. Undercover. Incognito.” He’s really enjoying this now. “We could even disguise ourselves, if you’re into it.”
and he will never know why the sun in my eyes burns like her
@[Djinni]