Tandavi

I'll light a fire in your new shoes.

She finds him.

She finds him, as she always does: standing, staring, waiting for something (for her?) while the world coils around him, his body a porcelain picture of patience as hers has never been. She finds him as birds might find each other on migration, or fish on a reef. They enter each others orbits like heavenly bodies, stars and the sun caught for a moment in a dizzying, heady whirl, almost touching, almost close, and then gone, each veering into a slightly different path, each searching for a slightly different goal. The girl looks for herself while the boy looks for... what? Even now, she does not know, though part of her wonders if their pursuits are not the same.

She finds him standing, poised, a ghost in a scene of inky reds and green. Before him the blood-colored water falls and foams, as unnatural now as it had been that first time, when the girl stood among her peers and cast light upon a dark god. She does not like this place; she finds it eerie, stifling, and from his perch upon her haunches her silent brother agrees. Still she strides on legs of gold, avoiding roots and crushing brush, determined to find something here, some part of her she left behind in this wild wood. The pieces of her are scattered like so many parts of a tarnished puzzle, and she and her brother are treasure hunters, following a trail of memories, following a hazy map and waiting for the picture to become clear.

She recognizes him at once, his figure as familiar to her as any in this land. Her black eyes fill with him, and overflow; she can feel her body tremble as she steps into his orbit, leaving the woods behind her, casting shadows with fire and stone. She is not surprised to see him, not really; and yet at the same time there is nothing she expected less. Her ears pitch toward him, and before their proximity becomes hazardous, the girl's footsteps grow still, slate toes clinging to the edge of the red pool, not daring to touch the crimson tide. Her face is turned away from him, black eyes resting on the distant falls; her voice, though, calls out to him, dark and deep against the waves.

"A god died here," she tells her friend. "He fell through a hole into this world; and the world killed him." I remember. I was there.

At last she allows herself to bend, moonstruck face led by glittering eyes, swinging toward the boy. Her brother is already facing Caneo, his hopeful expression an echo of her own. Yet where the Fire Dancer's golden features are muted, Natraj's vulpine grin burns bright. He barks a welcome to their estranged friend, and the girl's lips curl in a sable smile; she is happy now, all at once, and it is a feeling she clings to as a stubborn tree might the edge of a cliff.

"I found you," Tandavi says; and there is teasing in her voice, a threat and a promise. Just like I always do. Just like I always will.

The girl begins to laugh.