Golden eyes watching our every move
Losing time without the sun or moon
He hadn't meant to come to her. Not like this (never like this), but there is no taking back what is done. Haunt couldn't have known they might cross paths with the only horse in all of Beqanna that could cause him such instant heartache. A pit is hollowed into his stomach as he watches them, that vise squeezing his chest until he fears his ribcage might shatter.
She is everything he remembers, and the way she so clearly cares for her son causes a pang in his heart, a wash of futile longing.
He had watched her from afar, but not since the birth of her child. It had been too painful. Heartwrenching, knowing it could never be his child at her heels. He'd never thought about being a father before then. Never known he'd wanted it until he had realized he couldn't have it with her. Then, suddenly, he had become a father, in a wildly different way than he had expected.
Once, he'd imagined they had been hers, but he had banished those thoughts just as quickly. His children deserve a father who loves them for who they are, not who they might have been.
And so he'd tried to forget. But it's impossible now, standing so helplessly here before he, their children meeting face to face quite by accident.
Haunt seems entirely unfazed by the tension that lingers so heavily between them, those golden eyes shifting from mare to colt. The shadow child stretches it's head forward, still grinning widely, before attempting to lick the other boys nose. With a wild giggle, Haunt scampers away. “Come play with us!” his child invites in a sing-song voice before coercing Harken to join. Haunt tries for Harbinger too, but his son, already wearied by this adventure, seems uninterested.
His throat had been working for several moments as he tried to find a way to respond to her. The children provide a welcome (if regrettably brief) distraction. Until Harbinger, with little encouragement, settles sleepily on the ground nearby.
It's tempting to feign distraction, but when he peers up at her once more, he knows it's impossible. Almost unconsciously he had drawn closer to her, a magnetic pull he finds himself unable to resist. Even if he is the only one who feels it.
“Briseis,” he finally manages, unable to resist tasting the syllables of her name on his tongue. His brief distraction seems to have loosened the knot in his throat. “I… um… thank you,” he begins uncertainly, stumbling uncomfortably over the words. “Misfit is, too. He's lucky to have you.” His gaze is earnest as he seeks out hers, not quite certain why he wishes her know how honestly he means that. After a moment he drops his eyes, brows furrowing before he flicks his gaze to his children. “Haunt is, um, the first one you met. And Harken… she has white hair. And,” he clears his throat, the one with gold is Harbinger.”
He falls silent then, not sure what the appropriate etiquette might be for someone who has just introduced a former lover to their children. Wondering if there is such a protocol, or if pain is simply supposed to keep them naturally apart. Finally his thoughts latch onto the first thing she had said, when he had still been trying to convince his throat to form words. He had avoided it, because he was not sure he wished to hear an explanation. Was not certain he could handle the pain of knowing why he hadn't been good enough without falling apart right in front of her. But another, more insistent part of him wonders if he would ever be able to let her go without knowing why she hadn't wanted him beyond that one night.
“What… did you need to explain?” he finally asks, pain and uncertainty and curiosity tangling heavily around those simple words even as he avoids meeting her gaze.
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