through the darkness to the dawn
He knows that he is still young, Lumineer, even if he feels older than he’s ever felt before. But there is much for him to learn yet. And this is why he wanders further and further away from his home. Because it’s a great big world, he knows, much bigger than the circle of earth where he lives with his family. His mother and father and Aero, too.
So he takes to the skies because it is the most efficient mode of travel. Because the world looks brilliant from above. The water glinting in the sunlight, the forests deep and dark. And they all look so small -- every one of them, milling about, and he likes to imagine them happy. All of them, delighted just to be alive. Like he is. Happy just to know that their hearts are beating.
But he cannot fly forever, as much as he would like to. Because he is young still and the wings quickly tire. He makes it only as far as the meadow before he has to return to the earth (his landing punctuated by a loud thud because he has not quite learned much about grace yet). Still, he grins and feels his heart swell with some new elation. He has never been here before, has not explored the great swaths of knee-high grass, has not lolled in the shade of these great trees.
He knows that places like these are best explored in a much nimbler form. But he also knows that he must rest before he tries to shift, so he ambles through the grass (wearing a beaming grin all the way) and parks himself in the shade of one of those great trees.
Perhaps he falls asleep and perhaps he does not. Either way, he is startled to alertness by a soft commotion in the limbs overhead. He blinks himself back to consciousness and tips back his head, peering up into the tree’s canopy.
She is not hard to spot, the way she’s grinning down at him. And he grins back, just as bright, delighted by the prospect of company. “Hi, Aureline!” he calls back to her, “I’m Lumineer! What are you doing up there?”
@[aureline]