A sense of elation blossomed through her chest, beat just as tender, just as bold, just as dulcet as the soft tremors of her heart – light, airy, ethereal, melded, molded, and laced together with birdsong and stretches of rapture. Caught in a reverie she didn’t want to escape, her eyes glanced upwards at the threads of copper, at the crimson, golden waves of skin and sinew, polished like daylight, like a sanctuary, like a gilded heaven she dared to embrace. Portions of it must’ve been a dream, she thought, snared and woven with hallelujahs and sonnets, fashioned by her mind after a spell of endless evenings spent with nothing and no one; but she placed her lips against his shoulder and felt his corporeal form again, absolute and real. So instead of bending into the funnels of darkness, instead of whispering into the grains of tainted, tangled, remorseless annals, she smiled, radiant and light, petals facing the sun. Her essence, her entity, was a jubilant press of whimsy and dedication, a peace, a prose, forged in the bloom of compassion and devotion, springing up in golden dawns and hallowed pinnacles – she breathed and dove into a song, just barely brushing over her tongue, bounding and igniting, enlightening and beguiling, a hum, a hymn, a promise immersed between fronds and fir. Beneficence and joy lit up the foundation of her movements, slight and few, the miniscule caresses, the laughter, the fanciful flutters, the smile dipping into her cheeks and refusing to falter while he spoke. The fairy, the nymph, the seraph, didn’t allow a strike of disbelief to shudder against her spine or ripple through her mind – she embraced and rejoiced, she giggled and grinned, she lifted her head to swiftly glance up at the sky, then him, as if he’d always been the source of her bliss. She felt utterly divine, virtuous and free, liberated and delivered, a resonant piece of harmony and composure, warmth and eloquence, heartstrings painted and sketched by blue eyes and mellifluous convictions. She didn’t need to pretend to be happy, to be content, because the feeling stuck to her mind and reverberated in a graceful, ardent trill; no pretenses required when she couldn’t cease the tranquility, didn’t want the captivating, luring cadence to end (and where had those wondrous occasions been all her life?). Gone were those fragile moments tied up in knots, gone were those instances wrapped around her in chains, in thorns, in brambles, as he proffered things no one had ever said, uttered, or declared to her.
 
Lena was utterly invincible at the composition of his oeuvre – untouchable, only defined by the radiance of her elation. No fears pressed into her brow. No thoughts haunted her soul. No soulless ghouls relished in her anguish. She was alight and spirited, a piece, a portion, of the heavens left to shine beneath the wide-open sky; serenity and luminescence, valor and magnificence, honor, glory, vitality and tenderness. She was strength, endurance, and dedication, might and ardor under the affection of his gaze, snared from her warrens and mazes, directed into gleaming, glowing, resplendence. Loved, she was loved. She barely heard Imogen’s scoff along their connection, a careful, beautiful reminder that she’d always been; but too blinded by her own insecurities to see where gazes laid and hearts stirred, benevolence shifting into more than just bare convictions and glowing affability. The concept was foreign but wonderful, and she laughed once more to avoid crying (through euphoria, not sadness – she didn’t know if she could feel that rancorous edge of melancholy again), pressing her frame closer and closer into his until she was sure they were just intertwined hues of earth and repose. The fey wanted to dance, wanted to waltz, wanted to pour her presence into song and light, dazzling arias, but swallowed all of it for the comfort of his embrace, for the pull of reverie. “Come home with me?” She uttered instead, tilting her head so she could see the corner of his gaze, interpret what he craved, what he yearned, from the lining of the snow drifts and glacial expanse; heading back into eternal winter, where she thrived despite its desolation, its vicious past.