02-11-2017, 11:26 PM
He covers her skin in quiet kisses, drenching her in affection the way the stars drench her in silver. But these kisses aren’t welcome, and even though they are so gentle and so sweet the way he presses them against the white lace of sabino and roan, they still make her skin hurt and her chest ache and her stomach knot with worry. “Stop.” She tells him finally, pushing his nose away with hers and it is the first time she has voluntarily touched him. Lightly, so lightly, because worries about the bone plate in his face, worries about the blood that thickens around it, worries that she might hurt him if she isn’t gentle. “Stop.” Again, and she clings to this word, this simple word, wrapping her fingers around its hilt and brandishing it like a blade against him.
But he does not hear her or he does not care, because his lips are on her face again, a kiss as warm as the summer traced along the curve of her jaw and all she can do is try not to tremble. Home is later, love, he says so softly, I am now. But when the fear in her belly deepens, it changes, too, morphing to something that forces shadows from the fissuring pieces of her soul. Her brow furrows and her brown eyes are angry, bright and furious against that delicate face in the dark night. “I am not your love.” She reminds him, though it doesn’t help the way her skin is soft and tremulous and uncertain beneath his wandering lips, that it is kindness and not pain that he washes her in now. “And you are not my anything.” She sidesteps his next touch easily, disappearing from beneath his lips before they could force any more uncertainty into the already churning confusion of her thoughts.
Except then he is three, two, one step away and closing fast, and she has no time to move away before their chests are locked together and his face is buried so eagerly in the dark of a tangled, corn-silk mane. Come, love. Stay with me. She frowns and in a voice like captured starlight, reminds him, “I am not your love.” But she doesn’t pull away from him, doesn’t bury her teeth in his neck as he had done to her, because it takes only a handful of seconds to feel his heart beating against hers, only a handful of seconds for it to remind her that he is not entirely beast. She can feel his mouth against her mane, careful and sweet when he smooths her hair back into those dark, winding currents, can still, still, still, feel his heart beating a rhythm against her chest. It calms her somehow, despite the knots in her stomach, despite this wretched forced closeness, despite the ache in her neck and the blood that seeped from it in tears because it knew, even if she didn’t yet.
For a while, she is stiff in this embrace, stiff with his mouth against her neck, stiffer still when his nose drops to the wound and she feels suddenly like she is coming undone. But then she feels his tongue and his remorse, both pressed so gently to the tattered edges of an ugly wound, and finally, she does soften. Just a little. Just barely. I don’t know my own strength. You are so delicate. His words are so tender, but she is not entirely foolish, not entirely a slave to the way her body trembles beneath his lips, and, so slowly, she presses her nose to a place on his shoulder where flesh has been mangled by bone and made weary by the blood spread across it. She is gentle, so careful, and even now with rocks in her chest and a blade buried in her belly, she does not want to hurt him. “I think you’re lying.” She admits, and her words should be sharp and pointed, a well-aimed accusation, but she is Luster. She is starlight and fireflies and reflections caught in puddles. “I think you know your own strength,” a pause as she begins to clean the nearest wound, tracing the soft of her tongue across it until the blood flakes away and the skin is damp and sad and raw beneath, “and I think you know better than most how delicate skin is.” She shifts to clean the next wound of flesh and bone plate, to smooth her tongue across inflamed skin in such careful, gentle strokes.
His blood tastes awful in her mouth, like copper and maybe infection, but somehow it is easier to ignore the fear throbbing in her chest, knotting in her stomach, clawing at her bones, easier to ignore it when she can be focused on something else. But when he shifts to catch her eyes and she catches a glimpse of that playful little smile on his mouth, she is defeated. Her heart is through her chest, shattered through the fissures and laying in the dirt, and there is nothing she can do to rescue it. Come on, he says, and she rewards his efforts for her attention with those sad, luminous eyes, don’t you want to feel me too? She steps back and away from him, letting her gaze fall from his face and out to the water rippling beyond the sand they stood on. But instead of answering him, instead drawing close to appease him, to distract him, she simply says, “You’re going to hurt me again, aren’t you?” Her voice is a broken whisper, filled with glass and dust and so much debris, and when she lifts her eyes to place them carefully against his face, they are only sad and solemn and heavy with defeat. Then, even quieter, "at least stop calling me love, my name is Luster."
It matters, she thinks through the pain and the worry and dark burrowing in her chest, I am someone.
But he does not hear her or he does not care, because his lips are on her face again, a kiss as warm as the summer traced along the curve of her jaw and all she can do is try not to tremble. Home is later, love, he says so softly, I am now. But when the fear in her belly deepens, it changes, too, morphing to something that forces shadows from the fissuring pieces of her soul. Her brow furrows and her brown eyes are angry, bright and furious against that delicate face in the dark night. “I am not your love.” She reminds him, though it doesn’t help the way her skin is soft and tremulous and uncertain beneath his wandering lips, that it is kindness and not pain that he washes her in now. “And you are not my anything.” She sidesteps his next touch easily, disappearing from beneath his lips before they could force any more uncertainty into the already churning confusion of her thoughts.
Except then he is three, two, one step away and closing fast, and she has no time to move away before their chests are locked together and his face is buried so eagerly in the dark of a tangled, corn-silk mane. Come, love. Stay with me. She frowns and in a voice like captured starlight, reminds him, “I am not your love.” But she doesn’t pull away from him, doesn’t bury her teeth in his neck as he had done to her, because it takes only a handful of seconds to feel his heart beating against hers, only a handful of seconds for it to remind her that he is not entirely beast. She can feel his mouth against her mane, careful and sweet when he smooths her hair back into those dark, winding currents, can still, still, still, feel his heart beating a rhythm against her chest. It calms her somehow, despite the knots in her stomach, despite this wretched forced closeness, despite the ache in her neck and the blood that seeped from it in tears because it knew, even if she didn’t yet.
For a while, she is stiff in this embrace, stiff with his mouth against her neck, stiffer still when his nose drops to the wound and she feels suddenly like she is coming undone. But then she feels his tongue and his remorse, both pressed so gently to the tattered edges of an ugly wound, and finally, she does soften. Just a little. Just barely. I don’t know my own strength. You are so delicate. His words are so tender, but she is not entirely foolish, not entirely a slave to the way her body trembles beneath his lips, and, so slowly, she presses her nose to a place on his shoulder where flesh has been mangled by bone and made weary by the blood spread across it. She is gentle, so careful, and even now with rocks in her chest and a blade buried in her belly, she does not want to hurt him. “I think you’re lying.” She admits, and her words should be sharp and pointed, a well-aimed accusation, but she is Luster. She is starlight and fireflies and reflections caught in puddles. “I think you know your own strength,” a pause as she begins to clean the nearest wound, tracing the soft of her tongue across it until the blood flakes away and the skin is damp and sad and raw beneath, “and I think you know better than most how delicate skin is.” She shifts to clean the next wound of flesh and bone plate, to smooth her tongue across inflamed skin in such careful, gentle strokes.
His blood tastes awful in her mouth, like copper and maybe infection, but somehow it is easier to ignore the fear throbbing in her chest, knotting in her stomach, clawing at her bones, easier to ignore it when she can be focused on something else. But when he shifts to catch her eyes and she catches a glimpse of that playful little smile on his mouth, she is defeated. Her heart is through her chest, shattered through the fissures and laying in the dirt, and there is nothing she can do to rescue it. Come on, he says, and she rewards his efforts for her attention with those sad, luminous eyes, don’t you want to feel me too? She steps back and away from him, letting her gaze fall from his face and out to the water rippling beyond the sand they stood on. But instead of answering him, instead drawing close to appease him, to distract him, she simply says, “You’re going to hurt me again, aren’t you?” Her voice is a broken whisper, filled with glass and dust and so much debris, and when she lifts her eyes to place them carefully against his face, they are only sad and solemn and heavy with defeat. Then, even quieter, "at least stop calling me love, my name is Luster."
It matters, she thinks through the pain and the worry and dark burrowing in her chest, I am someone.