[open] throw everything i own into the fire.

[Toska]

your bones hum my name the way gregorian monks sing of god. i wonder if they’ve always known me—if every cell in your body has just been waiting for me to come home.

As he did with the others nearby, he initially did not pay her much attention. It’s rude to stare and he’s not keen on surrendering even the smallest fragment of his morals. But her words reach him and he turns his head to give her his undivided attention, ears perked forward and a faint smile on his face. Toska takes an eager half step toward her but remains otherwise in place. If she’s timid, he doesn’t seem to notice in the slightest, or perhaps it is overshadowed by his extroversion.
 
He listens carefully to her name and offers a slight nod before testing her name on his tongue, or rather her nickname she offered up. “Vaka, it’s a pleasure to meet you,” he says with a voice like contented embers. “I’m Toska. Are you from near here? I’ve only just returned.” Only now does the boy realize how much he was hungering for conversation, for any sort of closeness that might shelter him from the isolation he had subjected himself to. It felt something like sinking into a warm bath after walking the streets in a terrible snow storm – almost too much and yet entirely pleasant. Coupled with the scent of far off rain and honeysuckle, he now feels at ease here in the forest.
 
“Why are you so frightened?” he asks, noticing the way she holds her head to hide her face. Toska takes another step near her and tilts his head curiously. Even as the shadows cross his face, his cheeks glimmer softly with their own light. He either doesn’t notice or doesn’t care, entirely focused on the curves of her face as he tries to read her expression. Had he violated some sort of social etiquette he is unaware of? A brief frown crosses his lips at the thought but he dismisses it as quickly as it had come about.

TOSKA
i tell them i am here now. i let my bones sing with your bones.
we are the kind of harmonies that make the moon rise, at night.
we are the reason the tide comes in.