As many words as I may ever learn to use, in every language I speak or write, I will never be able to capture what Kuras feels for them.
Because how do you explain to anyone the ache of thousands of years spent adoring life, only to fall—utterly, irrevocably—in love with death? How do you confess that you crave the fire that ruined you, the one that burns you still, metaphorically and otherwise, even as you fight not to condemn them with your touch?
How do you explain the way your ancient heart drums in your chest with a rhythm you've never known before? How you look at them like they're divine, even though you stopped believing in gods and their kindness eons ago?
How do you tell them that you worship them as both curse and cure, both your downfall and salvation? That you let go of reason just to be near them, drinking them in like a dying man at the edge of a sacred spring?
That you die and are reborn under them, in front of them, behind them—but never beside them, never truly theirs, never truly whole.
Because they are the one thing the universe gave you not to keep.
And yet, you love them still. Not despite the pain; because of it. Because they make you feel, and you have not felt in centuries, and they are the wound that reminds you you're still alive.
Because there’s that pressure in your chest, that itch on your tongue, that twitch of your trained fingers—the ones meant to wield heavenly magic and forgiveness—reminding you; your "love" is unholy, unfair, unimportant.
You came to heal, to protect. Not to be healed, not to be protected.
But your ego—oh, your monstrous, aching ego—has taken the best of you. It’s ripped out your wings, your voice, torn from the back of the back of your throat, where screams go to rot.
Because you’ve been waiting.
You’ve been praying.
You’ve been betrayed.
And gods, you are so done.
You don’t want to want anymore. But you do. You want them so much it howls inside you.
And now, all you can do is wait.
Wait like a coward.
Wait like a martyr.
Because if you don't—if you move wrong, if you breathe wrong—you'll pound onto them, drag them to you, claim them, and flee; up and away, skyward and damned. And the worst part is, you know it.
You know it and you want it anyway.