Post by max on Apr 21, 2013 6:53:37 GMT 10
Title: Cutting In
Rating: PG-13
Word Count: 804
Pairing: Crane/Lark/Rosethorn
Round/Fight: 1/B
Summary: In the beginning, there had been two. Lark's pov. (There's like a makeout session, sort of).
Notes: I apologise in advance to the referees if this is ruled to be ridiculous by them and disqualified on the basis of its being ridiculous.
You follow her through the door. Summersea sunlight is a silken golden liquid thing in the evenings of Rose Moon, snagging on the edges of bookshelves and tables and gilding her madder-rich hair in a million glittering strands. She wears it tied most of the time, but at day’s end – aware, perhaps, of how beautiful it is – allows it to fall in waves down to her shoulders. You had met her at the baths your first night in the temple city; it had been the first thing you had noticed – had stared at – and her cool brown eyes had met yours with a spark and a question inside of them.
Those early days after the Mire, you had forgotten that such beautiful things could exist. You had wanted to tell her but at that moment standing where the path forked between the baths, he had surged past you to her side – not ignoring everyone else, so much as simply not seeing them at all – and, wrapping his arm around her shoulders, towed her away.
You had not forgotten her eyes, though. She turns to you now, habit billowing with the skein of wind released by the open door, and they are the same curious colour they have been every time she has looked at you since (all of which you have remembered, irreconcilable to the reputation you have learnt her to possess. You had first thought the juxtaposition alone intrigued you – and by the time you realised otherwise, it had been too late).
‘So what was it you wanted to see me about?’
You have prepared your words almost as carefully as you prepared the bundle in your hands, but when she asks this, they fail you. You offer her the parcel, able to add, belatedly, ‘I heard it was your birthday,’ only after she has taken it from you.
Her fingers struggle on the knot. You ask their fibres to loosen and the strings untie from the cloth you had made with prayers woven into its selvedge which you could not articulate in words and explain, ‘It’s muslin,’ as she holds the cloth up against the light – examining it, you expect, for the magic you did not know two years ago you possessed. ‘To keep the aphids off your tomatoes.’
She looks at you again. Your age, but self-possessed in a way that no one you know is. Maybe because she has always known her power – both ambient and otherwise. The man you have seen her with so often loves her (you know it in the way he looks at her and as if you are looking into a mirror; as you have no right to know it): you yourself were dazzled even before you knew of the way flowers bloom for her just because she is happy.
She steps towards you hugging the fabric to her chest. Says, ‘My true birthday is on Longnight.’
Closes the door and the room dims with the loss of the sun, dusk suddenly resplendent, and velvet heavy. ‘Which means we’re still the same age a half-year yet.’
She is closer to you in this moment than she has ever been. You say, ‘How do you know –’
And she kisses you, very softly.
It is an answer that resonates through all of yourself, and makes everything else insignificant.
‘You didn’t just come here to give me this.’ Not a question; a statement of fact, and you think, the trouble with a girl like this, who has heard the call of the green world all her life, is that by now you cannot argue with her.
Still.
‘That Air dedicate –’
‘Crane is my oldest friend,’ she dismisses. Selfish in desire. ‘I’m allowed to make new ones.’
You try to say that this is unfair – you, knowing better than anyone what this will mean to him, the man called Crane. Her oldest friend, who has needed her more than he has been needed in return – but her hands come around you, spelled muslin between your bodies tumbling to the floor and when she says, ‘This is what you wanted,’ you cannot deny it.
Your back against the cold wooden door; the longing that has been building like a tidal wave drawing in more and more of the sea since before there ever was a Crane on a spiral pathway trying to lead her away from the string of moments that have led you here, inevitably. It is irrelevant to her, and the worst thing you could do to someone you have matched yourself against.
You touch her lovely hair, as, for the moment, you have a right to, and close your eyes as the wave inside you breaks and breaks, and the only thing you say to her is ‘Yes.’
This has been all you have wanted.
Rating: PG-13
Word Count: 804
Pairing: Crane/Lark/Rosethorn
Round/Fight: 1/B
Summary: In the beginning, there had been two. Lark's pov. (There's like a makeout session, sort of).
Notes: I apologise in advance to the referees if this is ruled to be ridiculous by them and disqualified on the basis of its being ridiculous.
You follow her through the door. Summersea sunlight is a silken golden liquid thing in the evenings of Rose Moon, snagging on the edges of bookshelves and tables and gilding her madder-rich hair in a million glittering strands. She wears it tied most of the time, but at day’s end – aware, perhaps, of how beautiful it is – allows it to fall in waves down to her shoulders. You had met her at the baths your first night in the temple city; it had been the first thing you had noticed – had stared at – and her cool brown eyes had met yours with a spark and a question inside of them.
Those early days after the Mire, you had forgotten that such beautiful things could exist. You had wanted to tell her but at that moment standing where the path forked between the baths, he had surged past you to her side – not ignoring everyone else, so much as simply not seeing them at all – and, wrapping his arm around her shoulders, towed her away.
You had not forgotten her eyes, though. She turns to you now, habit billowing with the skein of wind released by the open door, and they are the same curious colour they have been every time she has looked at you since (all of which you have remembered, irreconcilable to the reputation you have learnt her to possess. You had first thought the juxtaposition alone intrigued you – and by the time you realised otherwise, it had been too late).
‘So what was it you wanted to see me about?’
You have prepared your words almost as carefully as you prepared the bundle in your hands, but when she asks this, they fail you. You offer her the parcel, able to add, belatedly, ‘I heard it was your birthday,’ only after she has taken it from you.
Her fingers struggle on the knot. You ask their fibres to loosen and the strings untie from the cloth you had made with prayers woven into its selvedge which you could not articulate in words and explain, ‘It’s muslin,’ as she holds the cloth up against the light – examining it, you expect, for the magic you did not know two years ago you possessed. ‘To keep the aphids off your tomatoes.’
She looks at you again. Your age, but self-possessed in a way that no one you know is. Maybe because she has always known her power – both ambient and otherwise. The man you have seen her with so often loves her (you know it in the way he looks at her and as if you are looking into a mirror; as you have no right to know it): you yourself were dazzled even before you knew of the way flowers bloom for her just because she is happy.
She steps towards you hugging the fabric to her chest. Says, ‘My true birthday is on Longnight.’
Closes the door and the room dims with the loss of the sun, dusk suddenly resplendent, and velvet heavy. ‘Which means we’re still the same age a half-year yet.’
She is closer to you in this moment than she has ever been. You say, ‘How do you know –’
And she kisses you, very softly.
It is an answer that resonates through all of yourself, and makes everything else insignificant.
‘You didn’t just come here to give me this.’ Not a question; a statement of fact, and you think, the trouble with a girl like this, who has heard the call of the green world all her life, is that by now you cannot argue with her.
Still.
‘That Air dedicate –’
‘Crane is my oldest friend,’ she dismisses. Selfish in desire. ‘I’m allowed to make new ones.’
You try to say that this is unfair – you, knowing better than anyone what this will mean to him, the man called Crane. Her oldest friend, who has needed her more than he has been needed in return – but her hands come around you, spelled muslin between your bodies tumbling to the floor and when she says, ‘This is what you wanted,’ you cannot deny it.
Your back against the cold wooden door; the longing that has been building like a tidal wave drawing in more and more of the sea since before there ever was a Crane on a spiral pathway trying to lead her away from the string of moments that have led you here, inevitably. It is irrelevant to her, and the worst thing you could do to someone you have matched yourself against.
You touch her lovely hair, as, for the moment, you have a right to, and close your eyes as the wave inside you breaks and breaks, and the only thing you say to her is ‘Yes.’
This has been all you have wanted.