Arrival of the Horned Boy. [Complete]

[theboywithhorns]

Character(s): Ico, Yorda, ???
Content: Ico meets Yorda at the Joutenheim gate, and follows her to a hotel; one comatose slumber later, the two discuss their pasts and the world of Paixao
Setting: Joutenheim gate - later on, the hotel Actua Are
Time: Mid-afternoon, week 6
Warnings: N/A

Comments

[nonomoribird]

Yorda had been walking through the city, as usual, barefoot and clad in the only dress she owned. She liked going out and meeting new people occasionally - but today was different, somehow. Today, the girl felt like going to the gates and watching new people pour into the city. She was worried about Cora, who had yet to come for her (and the one who now possessed her journal, Elenra, hadn't been seen, either) - and she missed the boy, hoping he was safe and away from the sunken island and any more misfortune.

When she got to Joutenheim gate, having picked it out of the four, she gasped upon seeing a familiar sight. Who else was there but the boy himself, writing? Yorda stared for a few moments and padded closer, staring. How did he have his horns again? The last time the princess had seen him, they had been broken off. The girl knelt on the ground and reached out for the horns to touch them, not bothering to speak for the moment.

[theboywithhorns]

As engrossed as he was in the book, Ico had an ear turned to the world around him, for he was not truly at ease with his location. Perhaps it would be a long time before he would be, for his body was still alert to the movement of shadows, to danger all around him; a survival instinct that he found useful, at least for the moment. So when he felt a shadow pass over him, immediately he looked up, hand reaching quickly for the sword at his side, his eyes filled with intensity.

He was about to speak a harsh warning of some sort, when his eyes fell upon who it was that had chosen to stand before him. It was Yorda! But it could not be her. He had just seen her a moment before, petrified... perhaps this was not her, perhaps it was all a trick, but he could not be sure. As these thoughts raced through his mind, he stared at her openly with wide eyes, and sat rigid as she reached towards him.

"Yorda?" he whispered, the name uneasy on his tongue - it was the first time he'd ever spoken it. "Are you really here?"

[nonomoribird]

As soon as Ico moved towards it, Yorda's eyes were drawn to the sword. "How did you get that?" she asked, standing up and backing away, a little uneasy. She knew very well what the sword could do, and although she trusted the boy, it didn't stop her fear of the sword from showing. After all, it could kill her in her shadow form just as easily as it killed her mother.

But then she saw the shock on the boy's face and remembered who he was, that he would never do her any harm. She smiled at him, laughing joyfully, and reached for his face to see if he were real. When she knew he was, Yorda laughed again, her smile growing brighter than before. "It is you!"

[theboywithhorns]

He couldn't speak, could not formulate an answer to her question. The tears that had threatened to pour down his cheeks before now tried to do so again, and as much as he tried to resist them, he could feel them welling up near his eyes... more so after she touched his face.

He could feel her, he could see her, he could hear her speak... wait. She could speak?! The boy from the journal had told him that everyone spoke the same language... could it be that it was the same for Yorda and he? That was as good an indication of her existence as anything... but a part of him was still bewildered at the thought.

As he slowly took her hand in his, the tears began to fall down his cheeks. "I thought that I had failed you," he whispered quietly. "I thought that the Queen had done something to you. Are you really here?"

[nonomoribird]

Yorda watched his eyes curiously. What were those? Yorda had never cried herself - and her mother certainly hadn't - and she had never seen anything like it. What was wrong with the boy? She tilted her head curiously at him, stroking his face and horns, still trying to fathom whether or not he was a mere illusion. It took a few moments, during which Yorda gently brushed at Ico's tears and wondered silently at them, but at last she believed, and she laughed again as he took her hand.

"You did not fail," she told him. "You saved me." The glowing princess felt an unfamiliar feeling in her own eyes, not realizing they were happy tears, and laughed again, the sound almost like a quiet sob because of the unfamiliar thickness of her own voice. "And now we are here together."