06-30-2017, 11:43 PM
Ellyse
I'm the only one who will walk across a fire for you.
it's only fear that makes you run, the demons that you're hiding from.
She cannot change his mind – he is as swift as the coursing river, and as unruly and temperamental. He is not unlike his father, a thought she decides then to tuck away somewhere within the deepest, darkest recesses of her own mind – the tension embedded deeply beneath the surface of his skin is already a telltale sign that he has had enough. The silence is shared but heavy, its burden settling between her shoulder blades – an ache is building, but she is loath to acknowledge it, quietly festering in the remnants of her own heartbreak. Uncertain. Uncertain.
Once, she might have scoffed at the word – bitter, biting, scathing reproach towards a word that had always meant frail, weak, unstable to her. Uncertainty meant indecisiveness, and in her youth, she had been anything but. Powerful, unyielding and a force to be reckoned with, she had built a name and reputation with a spiteful ruthlessness that not many could muster nor manage, and yet it had come easily to her, bitterness wrought into her every word, as poison festered in her every calculated action. Yet, as time went on, it had worn her down – it had not built upon her seemingly impermeable foundation, but rather, it had set a single, solitary crack – slowly growing, spreading, tearing apart what had once been strong and able.
She is not broken, no – the only piece broken is what she thought she was; who she thought she was. Companionship (her heart pined for Warrick in a way she knew it should not - he longed for another, his mind and heart elsewhere, but he was her closest friend), motherhood (her children were her lifeblood; her deepest reason for being), love (what she had thought to be love – but it hadn’t been; not truly) – it had all softened the hard, jagged edges of what she had been, of what she had been born to be. Yet, in the wake of the aftermath, she was uncertain.
Evolving, changing – but uncertain.
Even now, as her heartbeat quickens within the suddenly too-tight confinement of her chest, she is uncertain. Her lips softly caress the crease of his neck and his jawline, feeling his pulse against her mouth, pounding rhythmically beneath her tongue as her warm breath wafts over the surface of his dark, amber skin. Mere moments ago (or so it seemed – the sun had long since fallen, and in its place, the bright and blinding moon had risen), she had come across the shadow of a troubled stranger, and yet now, with him buried close to her breast, she is rife with emotion, with adrenaline and arousal and once more she is uncertain.
Two hearts, broken, by one.
It drew her to his pain (oh, foolish, she is), and he, drawn to her understanding and comfort.
His mouth is pressed against her shoulder, and his breathing is quickened, hot with a suppressed moan that nearly causes her heart to leap within her chest – it had been so long since she had felt anything stir beyond a physical need (she is a sexual creature – but this is somehow different). There is a shadow of familiarity in his touch, in the darkness settling over his strong, masculine features – he is handsome, in a way he can never see, can never understand; but she does not linger on the deep hollow of his cheek, nor the alluring shadow of his strong jawline. She cannot.
(He is not Magnus; he is Ledger – she is not a fool, nor foolish enough to think or pretend otherwise – but the tendrils of darkness seeping from his broken, damaged heart tether her to him, and his presence is enough to set her on fire.)
Soon, his mouth is traversing the length of her spine, teeth pressing into her withers, and she suppresses a soft gasp that becomes a quieted, strangled moan. There is a heat in his touch that had not been there before, and she is torn, her hazel eyes meeting with his own amber. Uncertain, but wanting – she hardly knew him, but somehow felt that she had always known him, having seen the broken, jagged pieces of him that remain from cruel hand dealt to him by life.
Ellyse, he murmurs, and she is shivering.
Stay, and I don’t want to be alone.
”You don’t have to be,” she whispers softly, pressing her pale lips beneath his ear, where his tangled tresses lay, trailing her mouth to the crease of his jaw where she can taste his pulse beneath his skin again. Gently, beside him, her feathered wing stirs and caresses the curve of his flank and along his underbelly, as the rounded curve of her hip presses against his own, seeking his warmth. Seeking something that leaves her feeling warm, lightheaded and anything but uncertain. ”and I am not going anywhere, Ledger – not if you don’t want me to.”
when all your promises are gone, I'm the only one.