08-25-2021, 09:02 PM
ILLUM
She makes it so easy for him to turn back towards the dark, back to that thing inside his chest that he has been at war with for so long. She is gentle eyes and a gentle smile, she is a hand outstretched from the shadows that he does not want to venture back into - yet when he looks into that delicate face all soft with earnest wonder, something inside him turns to dust.
His sanity, his resolve, his goodness.
He watches the light across her soft skin dim until it is something even more faint than the most distant stars strewn across a twilight sky - and he knows he should tell her not to do that, not to care so much what he thinks and he feels, but this is power she gives to him and he is not immune to it like he had grown to believe. To pretend, even with himself. The faintness of her strangled light stirs something primal in his belly, not desire but perhaps satisfaction at her willingness to be perfect for him. To surrender herself into something he might like. He should recoil at this, should be better than the dark creeping behind his eyes, but he is a decade of brokenness and she looks at him like he is the light that let her live.
“Are you sure?” He asks of her quiet truth, of her faith in him, this belief that she did not have to be afraid of him. “Was it not the dark that bled you empty? Not the night that kept you shackled inside a dying body?” The words themselves are something sharp, like blades traced point-down over the constellation of glowing dapples across her delicate chest - but her gentleness is a light that keeps him at bay, an armor she does not realize she needs to wear.
Until it, until she goes dark for him.
It is submission, it is surrender, it is enough to rile the dark in him to a roar he cannot think over. The night sweeps in against her skin, a hazy starless dark that touches every silent metallic dapple on her glowless skin. He does not consider if this will hurt her because he cannot think beyond wondering how far this willingness extends. “Este.” He breathes, and when his eyes find hers again they are fully silver, completely molten, cold as any distant star and just as beautiful. “How can the night save you from the dark?” He wonders, not answering her question as he slips closer to her in the dark, close enough to feel the warmth of her soft skin. “How can I do anything except hurt you?”
The truth of his question unsteadies him for an instant, like a slap across the face to remind him of what he is and what he’s doing. He balks, and the night pulls away from her skin like a tide of shadow, pooling thickly around his body as he stares wordlessly at her. He traces her delicate face, tries not to notice the wonder in her gaze or acknowledge the way it seduces his dark closer again, the way her innocence is a beacon to his brokenness. “I tried.” He says quietly, watching stars settle like fireflies around her skin, floating in weightless, perpetual motion as they revolve around her quiet gravity.
“The better question, Este,” he says with such murmured quiet, his mouth waiting above the dapples of her delicate neck, “is who will save me from you.” Then, because he cannot stop it, his lips fall to the warmth of her dimmed skin, to the metallic pink shimmers he traces only for the sake of feeling her tremble beneath his touch. “Show me the light again, love.” And it is such an empty word, though he is sure she will not notice with the way it was whispered into the pulse at the curve of her throat.
His sanity, his resolve, his goodness.
He watches the light across her soft skin dim until it is something even more faint than the most distant stars strewn across a twilight sky - and he knows he should tell her not to do that, not to care so much what he thinks and he feels, but this is power she gives to him and he is not immune to it like he had grown to believe. To pretend, even with himself. The faintness of her strangled light stirs something primal in his belly, not desire but perhaps satisfaction at her willingness to be perfect for him. To surrender herself into something he might like. He should recoil at this, should be better than the dark creeping behind his eyes, but he is a decade of brokenness and she looks at him like he is the light that let her live.
“Are you sure?” He asks of her quiet truth, of her faith in him, this belief that she did not have to be afraid of him. “Was it not the dark that bled you empty? Not the night that kept you shackled inside a dying body?” The words themselves are something sharp, like blades traced point-down over the constellation of glowing dapples across her delicate chest - but her gentleness is a light that keeps him at bay, an armor she does not realize she needs to wear.
Until it, until she goes dark for him.
It is submission, it is surrender, it is enough to rile the dark in him to a roar he cannot think over. The night sweeps in against her skin, a hazy starless dark that touches every silent metallic dapple on her glowless skin. He does not consider if this will hurt her because he cannot think beyond wondering how far this willingness extends. “Este.” He breathes, and when his eyes find hers again they are fully silver, completely molten, cold as any distant star and just as beautiful. “How can the night save you from the dark?” He wonders, not answering her question as he slips closer to her in the dark, close enough to feel the warmth of her soft skin. “How can I do anything except hurt you?”
The truth of his question unsteadies him for an instant, like a slap across the face to remind him of what he is and what he’s doing. He balks, and the night pulls away from her skin like a tide of shadow, pooling thickly around his body as he stares wordlessly at her. He traces her delicate face, tries not to notice the wonder in her gaze or acknowledge the way it seduces his dark closer again, the way her innocence is a beacon to his brokenness. “I tried.” He says quietly, watching stars settle like fireflies around her skin, floating in weightless, perpetual motion as they revolve around her quiet gravity.
“The better question, Este,” he says with such murmured quiet, his mouth waiting above the dapples of her delicate neck, “is who will save me from you.” Then, because he cannot stop it, his lips fall to the warmth of her dimmed skin, to the metallic pink shimmers he traces only for the sake of feeling her tremble beneath his touch. “Show me the light again, love.” And it is such an empty word, though he is sure she will not notice with the way it was whispered into the pulse at the curve of her throat.
