freedom hangs like heaven; etro

[etro]

etro --

in the hushing dusk, under a swollen silver moon,
I came walking with the wind to watch the cactus bloom

There is too many sicknesses in Etro for her to count—too many diseases both natural born and earned that crawl up her throat and clog her mouth. They are cotton on her tongue and sludge in her veins, and yet she finds that she does not mind. She makes her home amongst the murderers of the world and calls them love; she picks up the shattered pieces of glass and holds them to her chest even as her fingers bleed. So she does not shy at his confession, does not even move from the spot where she leaned into him. Instead, she simply made a noise of affirmation in her throat, the sound rumbling and quiet.

She did not fear him, did not fear the black cloak of magic that could pull the strings of stallion and mare alike. Her mind was not privy to such darkness; it was both shield and prison, protecting her from the same wonders that it forbid her from seeing. Both gift and curse. It is a few moments before she pulls away from his warmth, her mud brown eyes wide and calm as she looked at him with gentleness.

“You didn’t mean to.”

She repeats his words back at him, underlining them with soft emphasis. He didn’t need to convince her of his innocence, but perhaps she needed to do the favor for him. She knew in her heart of hearts that he was no viper—and, if he was, that his poison was not his to control. She could not blame the snake for sinking his fangs into a heel that stepped on his tail. Whatever control his mind wielded over those nearby was not his to direct. It was nature. Just as she did not blame Kingslay for the way he smelled of stolen life.

“Are you alright?” she asks in the silence, her voice of silver bells muted, the tension of the conversation dampening it slightly so that it is but a whisper. “That’s what is important to me.”

-- vanquish and yael's forgotten trait-negating princess --