Stavanger Bay Don't be afraid if there's no wind in my hair

Reverie had found a... a...
Something. A starfish, though she couldn't know it, washed up along the shoreline. At first she was only curious, circling the strange thing and leaving a ring of pawprints in the sand around it as she sniffed tentatively over it. Harmless enough, she thought — but then it started to move.
It came alive with fluid movements that somehow disturbed Reverie on a deep level. It started to — to crawl! She let out a little shriek and jumped back, ears pinning. No! she thought, channeling Blossom for a moment; at that thought her fear broke, and she giggled, reaching out with a paw to poke at the slow-moving creature. When that proved safe enough, she followed with her nose, and found herself delighted with the texture. She wondered next if she could eat it! But didn't dare try, lest she accidentally poison herself.

ah, moether sea gievs sou! exclaimed the bard, but his voice did not come from the shore.

( and neither did he mean reverie's curious find, which he couldn't yet see )

he came swimming from the deep waters, pushed by the roll of waves, tassels slicked back and away from his face, which displayed a grin.

It was Slavuj! Reverie could hardly contain her excitement. She forgot all about the strange creature, forgot her difficulties with speech and her sadness and — all of it, really. She ran to him, tail waving merrily behind her, and in a throwback to her domestic heritage danced in place for several moments before she thought to greet him.
Slavuj! You came to visit! It quickly occured to her that he would not understand. Her look turned apologetic, and she abruptly turned with a gesture for him to follow. If they couldn't talk, then she would just have to show him what she'd found. It was still moving as she led him back to it, but slowly. She didn't think it would be getting anywhere any time soon.

her joy delighted him, warmer than the sand he set paw on, pulling him to shore with more power than mother sea could lure him back to water.

his name - да! and words in a language he did not know, but for the familiarity it had. an excited falter in speech? his chest constricted - too cute! even his mirth had a singer's rumble, as his laugh rose and fell like a melody.

woerds, mai girl! thei haev failed yeau! but it was fine, his own weren't much more reliable.

curiosity had his head tilt, as she appeared to guide him to something. before following, he raised a paw, took a breath, and shook out his coat.

when enough water was gone from him, slavuj loped after reverie, cords now falling over his eyes.

it was a... морска звезда. 

the commontongue word eluded him. slavuj glanced sideways at reverie, the young woman cleary unfamiliar with the critter. 

he smirked. 

waetch this.

he howered a foreleg over the crawling starfish. the water seeping from soaked cords enlivened it, and the little aquatic wonder began to outright walk.



watching it scamper toward water, slavuj grinned. thei aere incheresting, but live in sea. it ies veeery lucky tchu see one on beech. 

he leaned into reverie. quik, maeke ae wish!

Her eyes were starlit as she watched him, quite infected by the sheer positivity of his presence. Even her changed speech didn't seem to faze him; Reverie smiled shyly at his comment, but found that for once she wasn't made to linger on it.
There were no words for this feeling. Her throat was tight with some mix of emotion, something like joy, or maybe grief? Both? He was smirking and she was just so — happy. She wished for a fierce moment that she could be this happy with her husband. Reverie swallowed the feeling, and watched with wide eyes as Slavuj brought the strange creature to life with a wave of his paw.
She sucked in a breath, took a stilted half-step backward, then forward again as she quickly realized it was not a threat. After a moment she reached out with one paw, pressing her toes thoughtlessly against it. It was cold! Then she came to her senses, and snatched her paw away, still holding it in the air when she looked at Slavuj with heart racing and stumbling over itself. Lucky? Reverie did not feel very lucky, but —
A wish. Any wish.
I want Lestan back, she thought, and abruptly the joy died from her. She was left only with the grief. It clouded her eyes, and she looked away, paw dropping back to the ground.

his smile fell.

reverie. he observed her, spared a brief look over her body, sans the usual thoughts of aesthetics and pleasure - although, in his concern, there was a tittering note of awkwardness.

he found no new marks, then wondered what deeper ones she might've sustained. 

speak tchu mi, girl. could his ears pin, they would've. his paw rose as if to comfort.

She shifted closer when he raised his paw, wanting to press against his side if he'd let her. Reverie tried not to think too much about it, but her heart was in her throat to be so close. It's Lestan, She said mournfully, her tight grip on her thoughts finally falling away. Even if Slavuj couldn't understand, at least he wanted to listen.
He's unwell, and it's my fault, and I can't even - talk to him! Frustrated with her own words, she reached for the common tongue, and choked a little on the effort, as if something was stuck in her throat. Reverie sighed. It was so much more than Lestan, really; it was... everything, her life, the world and the way it regarded her. But Lestan was what made all the rest of it tolerable, what she had told herself she would live for; it would always be, on some level, about him.
Reverie watched the crawling creature reach the water's edge, watched the coming wave swallow it. She wondered what that felt like.

the ocean's aroma engulfed him, engulfed her, too, when she leaned in, the tassels draping over to make a cooling shelter for her golden form.

lestan. the name touched the rim of his memory. her paramour? he focused.

...yet the words were no less foreign. an effort was made to piece together the story, but that blinded him to the way it was told. the emotion, the pitch and falter in each arrangement of sounds, the clear effort and inability to speak it in the common tongue...

slavuj let the gilded woman's sadness flow through him.

when reverie said her last, he let the silence lengthen. a rumble in his throat grew to a hum, until whispered words made of it a lullaby.

slavuj looked down at the sunshine woman, his smile sad, but sincere.

liek ae downpour, yeaur feelings. tchu great for words. ai unjerstand.

he parted from her, released her. slavuj set his paws on top of reverie's, looking her in the bright eyes. 

rev-ree, ai aem singer, nout speaker, bat ai can saey what's been chruth since di sun was new; all grief, all sadness, it gievs way tchu joy, thcu happiness. every rainschorm comes tchu aen end.

bat, until it paesses, dance in di rain. outcry di clouds, ief yeau must! jest know, ae time comes when sky ies blue again, agly clouds rechreat, aend di soil...

his grin. a memory of a sunspot offspring.

blah-sms.

But Reverie had spent her whole life dancing in the rain.
She wanted to dance in the light of the sun.
I am the sun,
She smiled gently at Slavuj, and stepped back when he did, into the water now. When she felt it shimmering around her ankles she stopped, and for a moment she only breathed in the scents of the ocean. She closed her eyes and felt it all around her, and when she opened them again, the sky seemed a little brighter. In a world where the only god she'd ever known was dead, and the rain fell endlessly, and her memories all crumbled away under the onslaught, Reverie knew, at least, how to dance. She knew how to be the fire that never died under the rains, the everlasting brightness that left only ashes in its wake.
and you will burn with me.
So she did.

he was rendered breathless, smile on his parted lips, gentle curl of cords framing an eye looking with a glimmer, the other catching glimpses.

his leashed heart pulled him to all four pawpads. slavuj rose and with him rose his voice, beginning with a long, doggish howl.

near baenbridge town, in th' county down,

ouen mornin' laest july!

he hopped, a man's dance, around reverie, grin on his face.

down ae boreen green, came a sweet couleen,

aend she smiled aes she passed mi by,

ouh she looked sou sweet fram her two bare feet,

to th' sheen ouf her gil-ded hair,

suech ae winsome elf, that ai pinched maiself,

foer tchu see ai was standin' dere!

and he thought to himself, see, how easy it is?

I'm so sorry for all the links idk what got into me

Reverie never felt more like herself than in these moments; a dancer, a girl in songs and daydreams, never quite real, never quite here.
Once, there was no room in her heart for fire; but that was before she knew what it truly was to burn, and burn, and burn —
And now there was nothing left at all, nothing but a flash of light and a sweet scent on the wind. Untethered as she'd always wanted, but it wasn't freedom; it was the ground fallen away beneath her feet and the clouds whirling dark and thick around her, it was the sea below and the stars above and nothing to hold, falling, falling forever and
and she stopped.
There was a gilded bird flitting in the air above.

the stop was abrupt, and he did not, at first, notice, himself turning in the waves, song exchanged for laughter.

and when he did see her, that old, ugly sadness reared its head within his chest, until the heart beat it away with a broom. назад! назад! foul beast! don't you see this woman needs no more misery?

he approached reverie, a repeat of what already happened. he nuzzled her ear in an attempt to offer comfort.

sadness had forgotten its coat. it wandered back in, took that tattered thing off the hook, and as it left remarked и кол'ко ћеш пута ово поновити?