longing
Caleb found Irial in the garden. The king looked unlike himself, stripped of the usual regal clothes in favor of a light white shirt and black pants, his posture undone as he slumped gracefully over a chair. His eyes were closed and he seemed to be somewhere between asleep and awake. Caleb cleared his throat, trying his best to make his presence known without startling the other man.
“Oh,” Irial said softly, his eyes fluttering open slowly. “Did I fall asleep?”
Caleb nodded, standing quietly enough to look like a statue. Irial stared at him for a second before tearing his eyes away to look at the sky above.
“It’s getting warm, Your Highness, you should go inside,” Caleb stated, and his voice was a raspy, quiet tear through the silent garden. The king, however, did not make any motion that he was listening to him, merely humming quietly in response.
Finally, after a long moment, Irial sighed. “I can feel her now, as the wind blows through my skin,” he said, lowering his voice to a whisper. “Can you feel her, Caleb? Our queen?”
The question hurt Caleb more than he cared to admit. No, he could not feel her. He could feel the dull ache in his heart, and the lacking strength of his powers. He could feel the oncoming summer knocking out his breath much quicker than usual, and he could feel the emptiness that irradiated from the tattoo at his chest to the rest of him like a disease.
Irial, on the other hand, felt longing. He was a dying man in the desert that had just been fed a droplet of water and sought out for more desperately. Everyone saw it in his eyes, the heartbreak that cut through the usual menace hidden behind the blue irises. His need fed his obsession, and in turn he had become both irritable and depressed all at once.
“I cannot, my King,” Caleb finally answered, after what felt like too long a pause.
Irial closed his eyes again.
“I would very much like to hold her hand”