oh come forth
into the storm and rout
and be my love in the rain

They dropped from the ceiling of the gods like stones, pitiful in the wake of the storm they'd created, lashed against - a beast railing against its owner, its creator. But with what little draining strength the golden brute still had, he pursued the little cloud dancer, fighting just as furiously against the winds that buffeted him from his course. They had ascended together, breathed in a peace so calm it had burned their lungs. He had felt her heartbeat thud its way across his skin, and if they fell, it would be together.

Kaj felt filaments brush again his own, damp but struggling valiantly. She was a fighter till the end. Why was it that it was so intoxicating to him? With a little exertion, which he had to continue with what meager support he could give her in the vortex, they righted themselves. Even in her exhaustion she was radiant, as beautiful in her natural colors as when the storm played itself like ivory keys across her hide. He told himself that when they escaped this, he would tell her as much. Cirrus didn't seem the type for flowery words and extravagant gifts, but she could just deal with it, because sometimes she made him feel like his heart was so high in his throat it was painting his tongue with all the words he wanted to say to her. So far he'd been capable of choking them down, ignoring them, but something had shifted and clicked into place with this dance on death's door.

Her breath was a singular source of warmth in the freezing storm they'd created together, pinpoints of light and comfort where she lay her cheek roughly against his flank. The eye was calmer, and he led her down, towards whatever land met their hooves below. His patrols could wait, and the magnanimity of that statement resounded purposefully inside his soul. Terrifying, thrilling. Like how she made him feel, how flying with her inspired him. It was slow going, a vow he had intended to keep no matter the cost. One he'd blessedly managed to keep.

When they landed, it sang vibrato up his legs, tense and unsteady as he stumbled on the greenery. Overhead their storm was slowly, reluctantly dispersing, and though his wings ached with flight and the fight it had become, the Czar forced the one nearest to her up above her shorter frame to shelter her from the downpour that refused to cease. It did little, but to him, it was the gesture that held meaning. Barrel chest heaved in air, knees locked lest they give out on his massive bodice and send him crashing embarrassingly to the soggy earth at his hooves.

Amongst his breathless panting he caught the shift of her gems from the corner of his eye, and crown swung tiredly to regard her with an intensity no exhaustion could dim or dull. As her lips quirked into a grin, his own slowly sparked to life, a breathless rumbling chuckle forming pleasantly in his throat. That was one of the craziest things Kaj had ever done. And he'd do it again. "That was amazing," the beast laughed, eyes wild and grin lopsided with a manic edge that she'd helped craft. She held a magnetic pull on him, one that unleashed a primordial beast he was always hesitant to liberate from its cage. It was a dangerous, dark, sexy thing. Intoxicating, a drug that she spiked into his veins with a look, a single shiver of her wings, the slant of her eyes and the quirk of her smile. It scared him in a way, but something far deeper in his soul was roaring its joy and appreciation. She was transforming him, unchaining him. But he'd placed those chains on himself, and it was a daunting prospect to have them removed.

When her smile died his own sputtered out, extinguished as much by the rain as by her expression. Brow drew close over electric eyes, and Kaj stumbled closer to press his maw up against her cheek, breathe across the arches of her face and offer comfort and forcefully draw her attention back to him. "Hey," he rumbled, nudging her gently. "What's wrong? Are you hurt?" Tired as he was, bodice stirred at the question on his own lips, straightening and solidifying in preparation to aid her whether she liked it or not.

@[Cirrus]