[open] your best american girl

[magnus]

I wanna give you wild love, the kind that never slows down
I wanna take you high up let our hearts be the only sound

Like her, Magnus was not always as he seemed.

He supposes that’s what happens when you’ve been alive for as long as he has—or when you fought against your own nature for as long as he has. He had been born to two selfish, self-indulgent, powerful souls. They had ruled and raided and taught him the beauty of war. They had planted dark seeds in his belly of rage and cruelty and the desire to reach out and take what you wanted when you wanted it. If it hadn’t been for Joelle, and his stint living and serving in the Gates, he may never have learned to temper it. He may have lived as wild as he had grown up, forever indulging the worst parts him.

But, Joelle had happened. The Gates had happened. And he had learned that there were other ways to solve your problems. Better ways. While he had never quite taken that into the core of him—had never been the white knight that the Gates deserved—he had walked away changed. Gentler. More patient. More willing to listen before he attacked. It wasn’t always successful (and Lord knows he had the blood on his hands to prove it), but decades and centuries of trying meant he was better than he used to be.

Still, he doesn’t think of these things now. Doesn't trace the branching lines of his past.

Instead, his focus is placed entirely and wholly on the mare, charmed by her playful nature and intrigued by the hint of something more underneath—something sharper. He always did have a weakness for sharp-tongued women. He listens politely to Leilan before turning his attention back to her and giving her that lop-sided smile, crooked and warm. “I agree. I would recommend visiting the lands yourself to see which of them call to you.” He pauses. “Tephra is quiet right now. We are looking for leaders to step up and help guide her. It isn’t just handed to those, but there is opportunity for the ambitious and the willing.”

Kromium had taken the crown but not done much else, and Magnus’ worry was beginning to churn in his gut. They needed activity. They needed bodies. To leave the land covered in cobwebs and retreat in it with your own family was to bury your head in the sand—and Magnus wouldn’t allow it. They needed to inject new life into this home he helped build and if it came in the form of a lively mare with honey on her tongue and secrets in her eyes then he would be all the happier for his turn of fortune.

I wanna go where the lights burn low and you're only mine

@[peregrine jude] @[Leilan]