we are slaves to the sirens of the salty sea
She is unsure about how to deal with this desire to touch a shadow, to find the formal boundaries of it. She wonders if she would pass right through him. If she would be able to actually press up against him or if it would feel no different than when a shadow passes over her, when the sun shifts its position. The thought simmers in her veins until it reaches nearly a rolling boil, until she can practically feel herself vibrate.
Still, she gives no hint of this internal tension—of these thoughts.
Instead, she gives him a small, coy smile and an incline of her delicate head. “Perhaps not.” She does not know much about the magic that created her. Does not know anything beyond the fact that she was made from a woman of winter and a man of blood magic, that she was formed as much as she was birthed.
But she knows that there is more to her than just a simple mare.
As there is more to him than anything simple.
She wonders at his explanation. Wonders if he is just a shadow. Just a dream. Wonders if she would be able to keep him with her as her own shadow when, if, she returned to Ischia to live alongside Ivar’s brood. Would the others see him or would she be able to keep him as her own secret?
Where would he go when she slipped into the ocean?
When she severed herself from such a shadow?
“I have never wanted to touch my shadow,” another admission.
“But I find I want to know more of you.”
