I was a poor boy; you were a bright light
I was a sinner and you were a snake
When he was a young boy, Brigade imagined that he would have all kinds of constants in his life.
He imagined that his family would always be there. That his father’s wolves would always run by his side and that he would never learn what it meant to grow apart from his twin. He imagined that he would have the constant example of his father to measure himself against—steely and strong but always kind. That his life would be set against the backdrop of Tephra and he would grow wild and free and unencumbered.
Instead, nothing is as he had once thought.
He has not seen his family in years—including his twin. He has not stepped foot in Tephra ever since he flew away from it. Each day, he feels himself grow further and further from his father’s example; more volatile, more selfish, more cowardly. And, perhaps worst of all, the howls that once comforted him so not leave him shaking and terrified. Yet another example of his childhood wrenched from his hands.
But Irisa.
Irisa in her own way has always been there. In his dreams, in these chance encounters, in her own head. She has been there with her inquisitive eyes and the way she seems to see through the steely exterior that others come up short by. She has been there when he was at his worst, and she didn’t leave.
So he breathes low and deep when she looks at him, not bothering to answer her question just yet but instead studying her, taking in his fill of her, letting it settle in his chest like a stone.
He feels warmer now, he thinks. Perhaps more whole.
Which is why he is finally able to answer when she asks him the same question in a different form.
“I have been dead.”
It sounds so strange to give life to the syllables.
shook like some old souls when our bones broke
swallowed the sickness, a fever, a flame
