A sudden yearning in my bones leaves me breathless. She is not looking at me, but how do I wish she was. I groan and her gaze shifts - lands on me. Far more than her eyes on me, I can feel her soul brushing against mine. I canāt remember how to breathe.
Those eyes are ageless, ancient, eyes. She is younger than me, but as River has proven to me before, the night lands leave a person changed. In the darkness everything changes, stretches, because there are no limitations between the stars.
I lean in to her fragrance - only to be rudely interrupted by a knock on the door. I freeze mid-movement. Neither her gaze nor her focus leaves mine, but my mind wandered the moment those knuckles landed on the door.
I know can send him away.
I know am in the position to send him away.
I have lost too many people to send away the few that might truly leave me when I do so. I would be deserving of it. Playing nice has never been my strong suit, and I repaid loyalty with dishonour one too many times.
I tell him he can come in. But not for a minute, not for a second, I do lean away away from that ravishing girl in front of me. I want him to see me - her. I want him to see - know - what he has interrupted.
I can feel the tension in his mind as he walks in. He is not enough in control of his emotions to prevent a single thought from slipping through: She is poison for you.
The right kind - I cut my telepathic retort short as all the emotions behind that statement catch up with me. All the things he is feeling, all the thoughts he doesnāt even bother to phrase inside his own mind. But most of all: so many memories of us.Ā So many things I never noticed. or bothered to remember.
All the arguments we had.
They shift and fall - one after another. In these memories about us I am not only there in our fights. I am there in front of our friends, and our enemies. In front of court. Next to my brother, Sky. Next to my once lover, Seth. Next to our king, River. Perhaps not as much as seen, he has always noticed me.
In the beginning there is indifference. Then, as we meet and get acquainted, dismay, sometimes lined with disgust and even hatred. There is a lot of fights during this period. But no matter how bad they get, no matter all his other feelings,Ā there is always, always,Ā admiration.
Together we fall through other memories. We fight less, talk more, plan battles and conquer wars together. Disgust is replaced by amusement, and a deep running sense of loyalty. Through all these moments the hatred fades, and is replaced with something else -
I cut off our connection so quickly it is painful.
I canāt face his feelings for me without recognising my own. And I am not ready to venture down there, nor am I sure I ever want to be.Ā I do have to recognise, however, thatĀ āshe is poison for you,ā is not a thought born out of dislike of her. It is born out of genuine concern for my well-being. I would even go as far as to say he might be right to assume he knows me better than I know myself. Not that I would ever recognise to his face.