❝ the coast was beautiful there, ❞ says blake, as if stars fell and made a home in its waves there. the fur on her ears gently flutter in the autumn wind. it's gradually restored to a healthier texture now that she has no need to hide among her friends. ❝ and i used to linger near the fishermen, hoping they'd give me a chore to do in exchange for their catches. ❞ she gives ren a small smile. ❝ did you have the sea by your home in mistral? it feels like we could've met, once upon a time... ❞
@rebellas.
ren hadn’t referred to mistral as their home in a very long time. home was made of people and ren only left behind ghosts, phantoms which haunted them even now that they were leaving the capital. she had a quiet adoration in her voice, soft and bright like moonflowers, and they wished they could see past all the bad this land had put them through to understand it like blake did with hers. they would, in time. the bad memories were still fresh in their mind, brought to the surface after an age of manifesting fury, determination, and guilt. but when it hadn’t been that ? ren was homesick. always, all the time. they felt it now, digging into the marrow of their bones until it melded with their soul. they missed mistral as much as they hated it, longed to return the same way they’d rather be anywhere else. there was too much history in the sad, creaking bones of those misty valleys. they needed to wait to be okay with setting foot upon the haunted soil once more, patience would allow uprooted funeral flowers to grow in peace.
‘ maybe we did, in another life. ’ they entertained the thought of fantasmal whimsey, ebon lashes falling into a soft expression of content. this was a topic both easy and difficult, one that ren had been simultaneously avoiding and wanting to talk about at the same time. “ home ” had become such an obscure construct for them, that they wondered if they’d rather remain lost on this plane than to keep searching for that which might be destroyed again, and again, and again. could they recall a charming memory similar to blake’s without some part of it hurting ? maybe some day, but probably not now. not so soon. ‘ that would have been extraordinary wouldn’t it ? ’ amaranthine eyes opened and rose to meet their friend’s amber gaze, slight mischief in their smile. they considered undetermined reunions something akin to magic, that the accumulation of choices two individuals made would eventually tangle their red thread once more and lead them to each other. it was nothing short of miraculous. it could have happened, in another time, another place. ‘ no, i grew up in the mountains and it wasn’t home for long. ’
‘ — but i spent so much time by the sea that i know these shorelines just as well. ’
