“Use your words.” (Drabble prompt)
Ithandrahyl shut his mouth reflexively, stemming the wash of half-stuttered syllables flowing from his mouth. He was grateful for the helmet obscuring his face. Had it not been, he was sure the bewildered look beneath it would have only given him cause for further shame. “Apologies,” he said, coughing into his hand to center himself. “It has.... been some time since anyone was so forward with me.”
Kieranel put her hand on a cocked a hip. Her face was likewise obscured as his, though hers lay beneath the screaming visage of her banshee helm. Despite it, Ithandrahyl could hear the amused laughter in her words. “Then we are of similar mind, for it has been some time since I have encountered someone worth being so forward with.”
Kieranel raised her hands to her helmet. The seal around her neck broke with a his and she pulled it free. The banshee shook her head as she tucked the helmet under her arm and clipped it to her belt, blonde locks falling free of their confines to frame her face. Fierce blue eyes pierced right through Ithandrahyl’s featureless visor and found his as she stepped closer to him.
“Ithan,” Kieranel said, her voice dropping to a tender whisper. “Ithan, how long have we known each other?”
“Almost two centuries,” Ithandrahyl replied. His breath caught in his throat as he watched Kieranel raise her hands and place them on the sides of his helmet. Her thumbs found the seal and she flicked them open. Ithandrahyl’s vision blurred momentarily as his HUD disappeared and Kieranel lifted his helmet from his head.
“Two centuries,” Kieranel repeated, her voice a soft whisper. She took Ithandrahyl’s helmet and placed it on the ground beside them. Her gaze never left his, and Ithandrahyl was acutely aware of the adoration it held. “And do you know for how many of those two hundred years I have pined for you, Spiritseer? How many nights I resided in my bed forcing myself to swallow my emotions and think of something, anything, other than you?”
Ithandrahyl shook his head. Kieranel’s hands rose to cup his face, her thumbs sweeping gently back and forth across his cheeks.
“Too many,” she whispered. “Too many wasted without the warmth of your embrace to send me to sleep. Ithan...” Kieranel bit her lip. “I can’t do this anymore. I can’t pretend. Can’t pretend like I don’t love you. Because I do. I love you, Ithandrahyl Thyndralian. I have loved you for more cycles than I care to admit.”
The Spiritseer found himself unable to speak. Words buzzed through his head like angry hornets, yet none would cooperate to cross his lips and allow him to admit his own subdued feelings. He opened his mouth to try, but only succeeded in floundering like a fish out of water. Kieranel smiled, though it was tinged with a hurt sadness.
“It’s okay,” she said. He hands dropped from his cheeks to rest on his shoulders. “You don’t have to love me back. I just had to tell you, to get it off my chest and-”
“But I do.” The Spiritseer seemed to stun himself as much as he did Kieranel with his sudden outburst. His jaw flapped open and closed as he willed himself to keep speaking, to build the momentum and meet her. “I do... Kiera...” Ithandrahyl swallowed thickly. “Kiera, I have been enamored with you the moment I first saw your eyes, and the confidence of your smile. And I have loved you since-”
Ithandrahyl did not get to finish his sentence. Kieranel had heard enough. Hands cupping his face again, the banshee pulled the Spiritseer down to her level and kissed him with all the ferocity her aspect was known for.
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