06-27-2021, 09:05 PM
I knew her for a little ghost
That in my garden walked;
The wall is high—higher than most—
And the green gate was locked.
That in my garden walked;
The wall is high—higher than most—
And the green gate was locked.
She loves his laughter, loves how the placid surface of his personality ripples for just a moment in unbridled joy. She loves the way the sides of his mouth crinkle just so, making him look beautiful and comical all at once. She loves the crown of flowers on his head and the wings on his feet. He is so wonderful that she can barely contain her own laughter, so excited is she to bear witness to the man she deemed the king of spring. Elli, surreal Elli, she loves her godfather with all that she has and a little more, but more than anything she loves that he wants to spend time with her. So she snuggles into his side and breathes a deep, contemplative sigh, wondering just where they will go and what they will do when they get there. He feels like spring mornings, like a cool breeze and comfortable shadow, and for a moment she wants to know just what its like to be him, to have all of nature to talk to.
It would also be nice, she believes, to have a thousand lives to remember instead of just this one.
“I think that it’s probably green, like early spring. Have you seen a spring yet?” Septimus had asked her. What would he think now, seeing spring, in another land, with another stranger she has met beside a river in a forest.
But that girl, she was a stranger to Elliana now too. And she’s thankful for it. That is the key difference between Elli and her mother. She is grateful that she has changed, has molded. Sometimes, you had to kill the person you were born to be, in order to become the person you wanted to be.
She walks stride for stride beside him. If she had been an empath like her mother, she might have noticed the recklessness in him, might have felt the adventure swimming beneath his skin. But Elliana is not Elena, and she does not crave secrets like her mother so does. Elli is a daughter of the shadows—it is only natural she should love the mystery of the world.
And not fear it like her mother so does.
“I think I will leave it for myself to decide that,” she says and narrows blue eyes with promise. “Do you have a favorite flower?” She asks him before shaking her head. “No, no, wait, show it to me, don’t tell me,” she changes her mind. If he told her now, the fun of wondering would be over.
Blue eyes drift downwards as she watches his feet set out in front of him with the comfortable familiar that she could recognize in herself, when she had walked through the streets of Terrastella or Denocte, or even Dawn at the end of it. Does he have roots? Do they grown long as they sink and grow beneath the ground? Elliana has no roots—only leaves from the tallest and thinnest of branches, weak against the wind.
“Ask me again another time,” she declares an answer to his question after a few moments of pondering it. His next words, she ponders again, considering. “Then I wont be,” she determines. Even if he were still a stranger to her. She doesn't mind it—not be a stranger to him. There is comfort in that thought.
“Are we close?” She asks before learning her shoulder slightly against his, matching his step and closing her eyes. “I don’t want to see the last of the path, just the finale.”
Picture colored by star
@Reave