Nocturne Summit diamond heart

in the full heat of summersun, this place would be a welcome oasis from the harsh rays.
for now, as the woman moved in and out of the shadows, she was banded with the curious experience of changing temperatures, banded for a moment in the weak warmth of the spring morning, then in the cold breath of dark beneath a lingering chill.
presently she stopped to examine a branch hanging across her path, fragrant with little buds and the more intriguing scent of the deer who had stopped to nibble them.

She was a courier with a message that burned a hole through her pocket.

She had spent the last few days sleepless. The sour taste of fatigue filled her mouth, her eyes were dry and irritated. At times they would fill with tears and the world would become sprays of refracted light, stochastic color, fractal starbursts.

She could no longer explain the things which went on in her body.

Her head ached. She sought shelter in shade and she pressed her forehead against the cool bark of an old oak until the heat of her skull transferred onto the surface and it no longer brought her relief. She caught sight of a woman through the undergrowth, but did not have the energy to feel embarrassed.

Excuse me, she murmured, coughed, began again in a louder voice:

Excuse me miss, have you seen my brother? He is blond, with a big scar on his face.

And she thought about what she would do, or say, if the answer was no, and if the answer was yes; found both of them unimaginable.

the cough brought the raven's ears up, sharp.
an exhausted-seeming woman asked after a brother she had not seen. teya shook her head, but her eyes were fixed on how off the other appeared to be.
"alone here," she explained with a careful pair of steps forward. "how long you look for him?" time spent near bridget had taught teya to be alert for certain things, and this stranger was pulsing alarm bells for an illness.

She didn't understand the way the woman looked at her with such consternation. Shirin wanted to apologise, to proclaim that she meant no harm -- but why, and what for? Already, a disconnect. Frustration further inflamed her.

Since the last full moon. Even now, she grappled with the truth.

She closed her eyes. A memory was projected against the backdrop of her eyelids, dense as damask: a great fist of smoke in the sky, slowly uncurling.

Nearly inaudible, I have to find him. He's the only one left.

there was nothing she might say, teya thought, that could dissuade someone from a search for family. another step; the other's sorrow billowed toward her. "i know what it is to lose someone," she found herself saying in a quiet voice.
the coolwater eyes were softening, remembering. "i also know what it like to search alone." now she vied gently for the other's gaze, smiling if their eyes connected. "i teya, from brecheliant. when last time you rest or eat?"

when last time you rest or eat?

Since the last full moon, she repeated, and laughed hopelessly. I don't know. When she squinted, the tears that had filmed over her eyes finally welled over and slipped down her narrow face.

She felt like a little girl, wholly at the mercy of the grief which sat in her chest, a cold paperweight that slowly but relentlessly leeched the warmth from her. But what was she grieving for?

You're so kind, Teya, she murmured, the corners of her mouth catching her tears. It scares me, you know.

Shirin laughed again, the same empty noise.

"not be scared." but her eyes understood what it, too, what it was to be so laid so bare that you only wished to curl into ash.
"come back to brecheliant. cannot search if dead. have healer. rest. eat. go again." the stranger had not given her name, but in light of the situation, neither had teya asked for it.
closer, shoulders brushing, a gentle exhale as the raven realized her own need for the contact.

Sorry about her D: and thank you for the lovely thread, fading here!

Something in Shirin's gaze hardened at the offer of aid, as if someone had twisted the lens behind her eyes, the caustic network converging now onto a pin-point, smoldering.

I, she began. cannot take it.

Through a strained breath that did not seem to end: Anymore.

The side of her jaw darkened as a muscle twinged. Then a muffled squeak as her molars ground together. She poured into her voice what she could of her petty agonies, and fled before Teya could touch her.

The world shimmered before her tear-filled eyes, a rippling mesh of astigmatic light. Selfishly, she hoped she would trip and fall and become incapacitated, so that Teya could help her and Shirin herself could not protest, could not self-sabotage, that SHE would remember what it felt like to be gathered in someone's arms -- but her every step was true, and the distance between them grew.