now and then there's a light in the darkness;
feel around 'til you find where your heart went.
The warmth of the sun is soothing, casting its bleak rays along the sharpened ridges of his broad frame, caressing the slope of his vertebrae along the length of his body with its pale light. The air is still frigid from the morning dew, weaving an icy thread through the finely preened feathers that line the hollowed bones of his wings, which lay tucked tightly against his rounded flank. His feathered appendages shield him from the prying grasp of winter, which still clutches at the frayed edge of morning where melting ice crystals become dew, clinging precariously to the blooming flora.
The tepid, blistering heat of summer has yet to touch the thicket of wiry, brittle vegetation, and it is not difficult to forget how the unforgiving scorch of the sun can be elsewhere. Alas, he cannot bathe beneath its glow much longer – his body flinches beneath its draping light, and soon the rolling muscles beneath his golden skin are moving and shifting, propelling him forward and away from the barren plateau. He is soon nestled along the border of the dense foliage, his feathers brushing against the dry, brittle bark as the water moves seamlessly next to him – powerful, unrelenting.
Further along, the water is less hostile, moving swiftly yet smoothly across tired old river stones, and there she is – a scent that he had not caught along the gentle breeze, but his eyes surely do not deceive him. She is vivid, bright and stark against the dark shadows of the roaring rapids, and a glimmer of curiosity lingers within the golden rim of his eyes. His own legs carry him into the frigid water, as it stains the pale gold of his skin into a darker bronze.
She is solemn, quiet, and tucked away within her own reverie, and gently (though not too much so – and as such, the whiskey-laced tone of his voice is not lost in the echo of the rushing river) he speaks.
”You like the water too, then?” he muses, a broad grin tugging at the corner of his mouth. ”I’m Canaan – and who are you?”
