mountain come to me
It is not often that the Wolflord of the andain chooses to spend his sleeping hours in Milliways, a crossroads between worlds. But occasionally prudence demands it, particularly when several crossings between dimensions have cause to happen in too short a space.
Which is why the fall of night finds him asleep, grey eyes (or are they red?) veiled and unseeing, the paths of dreams spiraling out before him. He is no seer, and no visionary save for the predictions a keen and incisive mind grants him.
Yet this evening, cold and star-spangled, one star is far brighter than the others, flickering and guttering as if it were a light about to go out.
A white owl darts soundless and swift out of the sky. Perhaps that was the source of the flickering, guttering light. Or perhaps it was the fall of a blade, lying blood-speckled on the soft dusting of white snow under Galadan's paws.
Or --
But no, that flickering light is eclipsed and overcome by a far brighter light, and one that Galadan has known before -- too well, and not well enough.
From the water she comes, lake turned to sea, the salt spray rising behind her like a curtain, like a veil.
Like the fall of her hair, sea-damp and salt-crusted, yet even so she shines more brightly than a heaven full of stars. So bright, and he had almost forgotten.
"Wolflord," she says, voice quiet and still as the forest on a winter's night, a depth of silence that masks the stirring of life within.
"Lisen," is Galadan's only reply, his own voice softer and more gentle than any has heard it in years.
In centuries.
She does not smile, this fiercest and most beautiful of all deiena, she who was created to bring the Forest's vengeance on all who trespassed against it, or against the Mother. He does not expect her to. They were alike in that, once, all cold smiles and artifice, pleasantries used as a mask to shield the vicious truth within.
And yet, did he meet her now, and for the first time, with all the history behind them save for their meeting (and, perhaps, their parting) --
What would be similar about them now?
"Does your Amairgen remain lost to you still?"
A caught breath, shock or pain he cannot tell, they have been apart too long for him to say, if he ever could have known.
"Never lost," she says, and there is the smile, small and true and speaking of her heart's secrets as loudly as does the light in her eyes and at her brow. "Save for those moments between my knowing and my choice."
"Always your choice, Lady," the Wolflord replies, inclining his head at long last, one hand held lightly (oh so lightly) over his heart.
"Of course." The water rises around her feet, licking at her ankles, at the toes of his boots. In the distance, breaking the stillness, comes the sound of oars cutting deeply into the water. They are drawing closer. "It would not have been my life, else."
"No," Galadan says, with a faint, fading smile of his own, thumb running across the worn edge of a bracelet, green and grey with palest pink at its heart.
Mistress Mary, quite contrary, how does your garden grow?
"No," he repeats, a little more strongly, and this time the curve of his smile does not fade, affection layered over the last vestiges of old, old pain. "No, indeed, it would not have been."
A faint huff of breath from her, from him -- regardless, the salt-sea air carries it away. Not, perhaps, before he has cause to see her smile brighten, even as she steps backward toward the water.
"This, too, was my choice," Lisen says. "And yours."
Out of the shadows on the water comes a boat, a small craft but finely-made. In the prow, white staff in hand, stands Amairgen Whitebranch, first among men to learn the arts of the skylore. Lisen, wood spirit, Source, and wife, turns to him, smile lit to incandescence, brighter by far than the light bound at her brow.
Was it always so?
Galadan's heart, he finds, is too full -- of joy, of sorrow, of peace, and the last lingering embers of rage -- for speech, and yet --
"I am sorry." It is sincere and earnestly meant, here and now, followed though it is by self-aware dryness. "Late as I am come to the sentiment."
Lisen laughs, then, and Amairgen, too, even as he helps her into the boat, the last trailing hem of her gown soaked and dripping water, dripping light.
"You'll be sorrier yet before this cast is done." Amairgen, laughter or no, has no pity in him. And why should he?
Lisen, somber now, with her hand resting on her husband's elbow, light as seafoam, adds, "And sorrier still at the end of it. But perhaps you'll take heed of your lessons this time, if no other." And here is her sharpness, that quick viciousness for which the Wood made her. "Weaver at the Loom, but I hope so."
Perhaps she fades, perhaps the mist rises to obscure her face and form at the last, or perhaps all the stars wink out, one by one.
It matters little.
Galadan will never see it.
He is already awake.
Which is why the fall of night finds him asleep, grey eyes (or are they red?) veiled and unseeing, the paths of dreams spiraling out before him. He is no seer, and no visionary save for the predictions a keen and incisive mind grants him.
Yet this evening, cold and star-spangled, one star is far brighter than the others, flickering and guttering as if it were a light about to go out.
A white owl darts soundless and swift out of the sky. Perhaps that was the source of the flickering, guttering light. Or perhaps it was the fall of a blade, lying blood-speckled on the soft dusting of white snow under Galadan's paws.
Or --
But no, that flickering light is eclipsed and overcome by a far brighter light, and one that Galadan has known before -- too well, and not well enough.
From the water she comes, lake turned to sea, the salt spray rising behind her like a curtain, like a veil.
Like the fall of her hair, sea-damp and salt-crusted, yet even so she shines more brightly than a heaven full of stars. So bright, and he had almost forgotten.
"Wolflord," she says, voice quiet and still as the forest on a winter's night, a depth of silence that masks the stirring of life within.
"Lisen," is Galadan's only reply, his own voice softer and more gentle than any has heard it in years.
In centuries.
She does not smile, this fiercest and most beautiful of all deiena, she who was created to bring the Forest's vengeance on all who trespassed against it, or against the Mother. He does not expect her to. They were alike in that, once, all cold smiles and artifice, pleasantries used as a mask to shield the vicious truth within.
And yet, did he meet her now, and for the first time, with all the history behind them save for their meeting (and, perhaps, their parting) --
What would be similar about them now?
"Does your Amairgen remain lost to you still?"
A caught breath, shock or pain he cannot tell, they have been apart too long for him to say, if he ever could have known.
"Never lost," she says, and there is the smile, small and true and speaking of her heart's secrets as loudly as does the light in her eyes and at her brow. "Save for those moments between my knowing and my choice."
"Always your choice, Lady," the Wolflord replies, inclining his head at long last, one hand held lightly (oh so lightly) over his heart.
"Of course." The water rises around her feet, licking at her ankles, at the toes of his boots. In the distance, breaking the stillness, comes the sound of oars cutting deeply into the water. They are drawing closer. "It would not have been my life, else."
"No," Galadan says, with a faint, fading smile of his own, thumb running across the worn edge of a bracelet, green and grey with palest pink at its heart.
Mistress Mary, quite contrary, how does your garden grow?
"No," he repeats, a little more strongly, and this time the curve of his smile does not fade, affection layered over the last vestiges of old, old pain. "No, indeed, it would not have been."
A faint huff of breath from her, from him -- regardless, the salt-sea air carries it away. Not, perhaps, before he has cause to see her smile brighten, even as she steps backward toward the water.
"This, too, was my choice," Lisen says. "And yours."
Out of the shadows on the water comes a boat, a small craft but finely-made. In the prow, white staff in hand, stands Amairgen Whitebranch, first among men to learn the arts of the skylore. Lisen, wood spirit, Source, and wife, turns to him, smile lit to incandescence, brighter by far than the light bound at her brow.
Was it always so?
Galadan's heart, he finds, is too full -- of joy, of sorrow, of peace, and the last lingering embers of rage -- for speech, and yet --
"I am sorry." It is sincere and earnestly meant, here and now, followed though it is by self-aware dryness. "Late as I am come to the sentiment."
Lisen laughs, then, and Amairgen, too, even as he helps her into the boat, the last trailing hem of her gown soaked and dripping water, dripping light.
"You'll be sorrier yet before this cast is done." Amairgen, laughter or no, has no pity in him. And why should he?
Lisen, somber now, with her hand resting on her husband's elbow, light as seafoam, adds, "And sorrier still at the end of it. But perhaps you'll take heed of your lessons this time, if no other." And here is her sharpness, that quick viciousness for which the Wood made her. "Weaver at the Loom, but I hope so."
Perhaps she fades, perhaps the mist rises to obscure her face and form at the last, or perhaps all the stars wink out, one by one.
It matters little.
Galadan will never see it.
He is already awake.