The purr that had radiated from Mazikeen deepens as Gale’s attention follows the shiver down her spine, as he kisses his way across her scars. It never stops being pleasant, knowing her own desire is mirrored in him. Other thoughts empty from her mind as they always do under his attention, delight already chasing away the fire and bitterness. It is not enough to survive on, just this bliss, but it always feels like it might be in the moment. She can let herself believe that she will change her nature and run instead of fight so that they can continue on like this forever.
How could they possibly want anything else? There is no better match for each of them than the other.
As she always does, when Gale brushes some of her hair from her face afterwards she smiles back at him. It is the closest she gets now to that warm action she had once been capable of, when it was something closer to the sun than wildfire curling in the edges of her mouth, this reaction to this now-common punctuation as they linger close to each other. This may not be love, may not even really be happiness, but as always it feels close enough to count. She knows his magic weakens in moments like this and she wonders if that is why her restlessness fades as well. The shadows recede from them both and they can exist however they wish together.
Or maybe his contentment is just bleeding into her mind through their bond, enhancing what she feels and making it all a little more real.
Her muzzle moves idly across his skin, and she practices altering her scar tissue while she does it. The dead cells are difficult to manipulate, but unmistakably some of them begin to turn an iridescent blue as she answers his question. “You mean aside from your host?” Mazikeen says this with a grin as she tugs on his skin, letting go just before it breaks. She is quiet for a moment, considering, before replying. “I was far too fond of everyone before.” Even those that hurt her. Did she want to draw some kind of revenge out of Firion or that beast that had given her her first death? She has not felt like prey for a very long time so she does not begrudge that shadow any longer and whatever almost-feelings there may have once been for the golden magician have been eclipsed by the creature she is touching now as she speaks. “I have a grudge against myself, for giving up what was ours. And Wishbone, for keeping them.” It didn’t matter that it had been what she asked for at the time, Mazikeen now sees that decision as weak.
If their children hadn’t been capable of surviving their father, then they simply would have made better ones to replace them.
Mazikeen does not mourn for the child they would have had this past spring and neither is she particularly interested in becoming pregnant again - though it seems likely considering the pleasant ways they continue to spend their time. Perhaps she can roost them as eggs this time.
She thinks of Aela, of Reave and the expanding knowledge she’s gotten of Gale’s family and remarks. “Working our way through your family could keep us busy for a dozen years or more.”
@Gale