and where you invest your love, you invest your life
The Tundra was vast and white, but it does not protect him like it does her.
He was an outsider, and he knew it. He had come under his father’s rule but had never taken the oath. He had never taken up the mantle or joined the ranks or done anything to make his father proud. Instead he had done what he had since learned that he did best: he secluded himself. He had eluded his father’s questions and faded into the distance, living on the scarce outskirts of the kingdom as a vagabond. More often than not, he flirted with the border—never quite entering but never really leaving to go anywhere else either.
It made him an intruder, but he didn’t mind.
Today, he was further in than he normally allowed. His pace was slow, his pale Roman nose dragging along the ground as he languidly hunted for the grass. The only thing left was the nearly-dead blades that were tough enough to even survive the Tundra winter. They tasted like air and dirt, but they were enough to sustain him. He himself was only a ghost of a stallion anyway. He was lean, muscles roping over his slender frame, the only real bulk coming from the feathery angel wings that he kept pulled in tight on his sides. He had discovered it was harder to note the difference in size, the uselessness, in that position.
Not that he was particularly vain.
It was just...easier to keep conversation shallow and light when he did not have to worry about questions about the disfigurement. (Can you still fly? What happened? Are you injured?) Tobiah disliked the conversations even more when the questions were swallowed; he could see them dancing unspoken in their eyes, the strained focus on his face. It exhausted him to pretend to not notice their pretending; it exhausted him to stay polite. Recently, the desire to give into his frustration had ballooned under the surface.
It made him all the more likely to skirt around life whenever he saw it.
Thankfully, his wings were disfigured and not his other (in his opinion, more useful) traits.
Invisibility had become a crutch for him. When he was younger, he had only been able to hold onto it for minutes at a time, but as he had grown older, it had become a muscle that he had flexed and built. Now, he could remain unseen for days at a time before it slipped from his grasp. It afforded him an anonymity that he found invaluable—and it was likely the only reason he had been able to live as a vagabond and stranger in the kingdom for so long. Unfortunately, today, he was not so lucky.
As he walked, nose drifting through the piles of snow, he did not see her. In fact, he did not see her until his shoulder had bumped into her. Startled, he snorted and leapt backward, dropping the invisibility before he realized what he was doing. He was dismayed to see the delicate wildflower in front of him; after all, it was most likely only the second female he had never come across. His expression fell to one of stone for a second, his light gray eyes becoming sleet as he took her in. Finally, after too many seconds had passed, he finally managed two words: “I apologize.” His voice was gravel and rust in his throat. He shook his head. “I didn’t see you there.” He attempted a smile, but even he knew it probably looked more like a grimace.