Tandavi

I'll light a fire in your new shoes.

Warm surprise flashes across the curves and lines of her features; she remembers saying it, of course she does, but any expectation that he would recall, that he would hold on to her words with any sort of sincerity or commitment... it simply had not existed outside the beautiful bubble of that night. She looks upon the boy with confusion and wonder, momentarily distracted from her adamant desire to avoid his eyes. She imagines him looking for her, seeking her out among the desert sands, those blue eyes peering through starry skies in an attempt to capture fire. Had his thoughts followed the same path as hers- for she had never stopped looking for him, either. She looked for everyone she loved.

It's just that, over time, her looking had grown passive, cautious- copper child had given up on love looking back.

Something hot rises on her spine; it squeezes around her lungs, holding her in its vice-like grip until she exhales, "Oh."

Silence stretches between them once more, hot and unsteady, thin and fragile as crafted glass. Fire Dancer regards her friend, heart beating an unsteady melody against hollow ribs - prat-a-tat, prat-a-tat - black eyes regarding him with patient expectation, a child awaiting the newest revelation about the world. Even the kitsune is quiet, his distress quelled for the moment being, though he remains uncertain, on edge. He is deeply curious about the snake that coils around Caneo's horn- he has never met a companion who is also food; he wonders if she is afraid of them, the way she hangs back, a visual representation of the stallion's hesitancy.

The silence stretches just too long, and the girl fears it will never end- until it does, though the climax is lackluster, weary. Two-toned ears flip to catch Caneo's sigh; the girl is a statue locked in his mouth, afraid to move lest he crush her between his teeth. He frowns as he confesses, three words that make her heart skip, though there is irritation in the beat. I missed you he says, and she wants to answer why?, to demand a reason, a deeper glance into the guarded mysteries of the boy's soul. She sees a little of it, a little of him, peering out from between the frozen crystals that he has become; she yearns to reach out and tear the stone away, the weariness, the months and years- to reach within him and grab that boy who was so in love with the moon, and this time, never let him go.

Carefully, cautiously, the girl drifts forward, her narrow body that much closer to his. She could almost reach him, were she to strain and stretch; instead she lowers her neck and tilts her head, peering at the boy through hooded eyes. She is not fully convinced of his decision to stay, but she is hopeful. "I missed you, too- " and with this she does extend, taking a chance and searching with her lips for for his pale cheek, the soft curve of it, though she knows she cannot reach without his help.

"I'm glad you kept looking," the girl confesses, her voice smoke in the space between them, sincere with laughter and quiet relief. She cannot help it; she burns bright around him, a bonfire beneath his night of stars. "I didn't mean to be so hard to find."