Gale
this is going to break me clean in two --
this is going to bring me close to you
For most of his second life, Gale has avoided socialization in favor of observation. He prefers the latter, but there are times like these when he learns of things he cannot See, and they are worth the potential awkwardness of conversating.
Even with his guileless smile, the brindle stallion’s intense observation of others can be off-putting. Ciri though, has not reacted as poorly as she might have, and that alone has endeared her to Gale. The Stars and the Story alone might have done so, but he enjoys that he does not see apprehension or misgiving on her dark face when she looks at him. (Those had been two emotions he’s learned to read quickly, if only because of the frequency with which he saw them on the faces of others).
The story of a world that he does not know would have captivated Gale regardless of the teller, and to find one surrounded by stars is more than he might have dreamed of finding.
This combination of factors weighs so heavily in the scarred mare’s favor that Gale finds himself telling her a Tale of his own. It is a far different tale than Ciri’s, the story of how following his father into war had been his destruction, and how he’d climbed from his Loessian grave with nothing at all of his past remaining in his mind. He tells her of Ruinam, and the invitation to Islandres, and the slow recovery of his memories.
(That he leaves out the reunions with his family is intentional; he avoids a great deal of his family history)
He tells her of his time in the Alliance, when he’d made it to the final round but couldn’t stop thinking about an earlier opponent, and how she’d found him months later. Without including the story of the Curse, Gale finds that their story is mostly a tale of his romantic ineptitude, but he is still smiling as he speaks of Mazikeen, and ends with:
“So I’m going to live in Hyaline, now that I’ve put Islandres in the care of Fenwe and Islay.” His story has been a long one, and if she has wandered off during it, she will not be the first to have done so.
@[Ciri]
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