and let me crawl inside your veins. I'll build a wall, give you a ball and chain.

It feels like ages since it had been just the two of them. Even though she wouldn’t trade their wealth of children for anything, there are of course days where she misses just being with him. Even if things had not always been easy at the beginning, it still has always been their love story to tell, and sometimes, when she is feeling especially nostalgic, she misses the beginning. If only because there are parts that she wishes she could change; wishes she could have been less cold and more open, wishes she could have avoided so much of the heartache and turmoil.

But when his heart stirs inside of her chest, when she feels its steady beating and reassuring rhythm, she thinks maybe everything turned out exactly the way it should have.

With their youngest children off with their eldest, Starsin was free to patrol the perimeter of Sylva one last time. It was a simple task, since she was not often interrupted by any real threats. This was more for show anyway, since Ophanim seemed to have some sort of plan in store, and this seemed like a good excuse as any to give him a chance to prepare.

Feeling as though she had given him adequate time she begins to meander back to where they had promised to meet, slipping between pale-barked trees and under fire-colored leaves. A smile immediately blooms across her lips when he turns to greet her, looking behind him at the array of flowers and apples and mushrooms. But when he speaks the smile turns to one of confusion, and then without meaning to, she laughs. “Thtarthin?”

She presses her lips to the corner of his mouth, still laughing when she says, “That’s very chivalrous that you tested the food to see if it was poisonous so that I didn’t have to suffer.” She pulls away just enough to again look at everything he had laid out, and her usually intense expression softens considerably when she looks back at him and says quietly, “You didn’t have to do all of this, you know.”

starsin

it’s not like me to be so mean. you’re all I wanted.
( just let me hold you Like a hostage. )

and let me crawl inside your veins. I'll build a wall, give you a ball and chain.

Her heart flutters inside of his chest at the feel of his lips against her jaw, and for a moment her dark blue eyes drift closed. Even after all these years he still had a way of settling her, of quieting the relentless surging in her veins and that seemingly constant feeling of needing to be doing something.

Even after all these years, her angel boy was the only one that could calm that raging storm inside of her chest, could turn a thunderstorm into a simple spring shower. With his nose near her ear she leans into him, her skin tingling where his breath dances across it, and everything else in the entire world falls away. She does not think of Loess and Lepis and Castile, she does not think of the fact that somewhere in her own forest Lie and Lilt have decided to play out their romance, and she does not think of her strange encounter with Wolfbane.

There is only Ophanim, with his wings settled across her back, and his beautiful blue eyes looking only at her.

“You’re the other half of the perfect family, though. It wouldn’t exist if it weren’t for you. And I’m pretty sure you’re the favorite parent,” she adds the last part with a laugh, tugging playfully at his mane. There was a kindness in Starsin reserved only for her children, but it still was not a secret that she was the stricter parent with not nearly the same sense of humor as Ophanim.

She dips her head, grasping one of the pale flowers with her lips, and then nestles it gently into his pale mane, followed by her mouth once more pressing to his throat, and then trailing down his neck. Her nose comes to rest at the scar across his chest, the one that matches hers, and after her lips have traced the familiar path of it she says quietly to him, “Thank you for being mine. Even though I still don’t deserve you.”

starsin

it’s not like me to be so mean. you’re all I wanted.
( just let me hold you Like a hostage. )

and let me crawl inside your veins. I'll build a wall, give you a ball and chain.

He has always been the softness to all of her sharp edges, the water to smother her fiery rage instead of fanning it into an inferno. Starsin did not believe in many things; she did not believe in fairy tales, or that everything would work out in the end. But what she did believe, to the very depths of her soul, was that Ophanim had been made for her. That by some divine intervention, she had been gifted someone that loved her despite all of her flaws and temper.

There were others out there far more deserving of love, she knows. Others would not have squandered what she had been given, that would have cherished him from the beginning. She had to lose him, had to nearly destroy everything before she came to her senses.

Her eyes close when he speaks, focusing on the soft feel of his lips against her jaw. She fights the urge to argue with him, to remind him of all the things she did, all the reasons she does not deserve him. Instead, she drinks in his words, savors them like wine, and lets herself believe him.

"I need you too," she confesses with her neck curved so that her nose could still touch him even as he gently bites her shoulder. Her lips caress the glowing band around his neck, before gently resting her forehead against him. "Remember when you asked me to be your girlfriend, and I told you no?" She asks him with a smile in her voice, and a kiss that drags against his throat. "I'm glad that didn't scare you away."

starsin

it’s not like me to be so mean. you’re all I wanted.
( just let me hold you Like a hostage. )