Silverlight Terrace arts

@Melaneus <3

The sun was setting and the world was alive.

Callyope had crept away from Moonglow for a heartbeat. Remaining on the ridge of the spin had done nothing for the young girl. No sign of Mo seemed to be spotted from there.

She knew this was a way he must walk, but she waited with a selfishness.

She busied herself here, in the liminal space between the mountain and moonglow. The scent of others crossed through. The scent of beasts laced the lush spots of the land.

She plucked at a stray dandelion and remained blissfully unaware for a moment. Relishing the momentary peace of mind.

<3 !!

A radiant glow washed the grasses in vibrant light. What a difference, from the haunting mist of the Weald! He felt exposed here, beyond the protective interlacing of trees. Exposed, but not in a frightening way. He hid seamlessly within the Weald. What great practice hiding in this land would be!

Melaneus shifted his weight like Rodyn had shown him and felt the earth with his toes. He smelled a thousand things and heard a thousand more. And he crawled, like Rodyn had taught - and it was then he felt another's company through the beat of the dirt. Soft, light, a gentle tap against the ground, and emanating from the dip of a nearby hill.

Melaneus paused. Listened. Felt the ground for more, but nothing came. He had yet to master how to distinguish the footfalls of one creature from another. Didn't beasts prowl here? He had heard of them in stories - giant lions, three-headed dogs, bulls who walked like things called men. They made his stomach crawl - but he would show no fear, though he felt the tremor of his heart.

With caution in his boldness, Melaneus crawled to the crest of the hill and peeked over the tall grasses to spy the creature beneath, not knowing what to expect, and wholly not expecting the creature he saw.

Or wolf, rather.

A girl.

Draped in moonlight. Picking at flowers. Carrying the scent of Moonglow.

If he did not move, she would look up once the dandelion had been freed from the earth.

There was no reason for her to pluck it. This she knew. It would not come home with her and she had no desire to try eating it. So why? Why had she plucked it?

Heavy gaze landed on the silhouette of something. A head cresting over a hill and tall grass.

It watched her. A shiver down her spine.

She could not even see eyes on the head. Too dark and placed handsomely into its head. She did not know if it was fear or intrigue in her heart in those long, silent moments.

She saw him for a spirit. Not a boy.

Do no harm, spirit.

Her voice quivered with her mother's tongue.

She spoke, and he did not understand. Words of a language he had neither heard nor ever spoken - but her tremor, this was a thing he knew, and he understood this enough.

She feared him.

He did not know if she would understand any words he offered her. He did not know if silence would frighten her further. But silence was more than half of what he knew, and he did not wish for her to leave.

Melaneus tipped his ears forward as he did for baba or mama when he wanted them to know he was listening. And there, he waited before this moonlight girl with her dandelion eyes, while the grass around them shifted, and he watched to see what she might do through eyes even darker than the twilight sky they both stood beneath.

He did not speak.

This solidified her thoughts of the beast. A spirit come to hear her words. She had asked them to listen days ago, now she was given beating proof of it all before her.

Ears pressed towards her and suddenly she felt on a stage.

Her heart the drum in time with a rabbit's foot.

Show your face, spirit.

But her heart walked among many words between sunman and moonman. Her blood was not just the ice of her mother's but the heat and saltwater of her father's.

This could be a spirit of either.

Come.

Her voice quivered further without the veil of anaa's tongue.

She spoke again, in that same tongue he did not know. She was neither Greek nor of the common folk; her language held a mystery he found himself curious to unravel. To know, as he knew the Weald, and as he had begun to know the secrets of the shadows, the listening of the hunt.

His ears remained upward, tipped forward to hear her.

It was there he caught a word.

He blinked, surprised he had understood her - before he realized she had chosen their common tongue.

A strange disappointment filled him. This did not linger long. Melaneus had not scared her away. Rather, she bade him come.

She was bold, to command him as she did! Perhaps if he were a different boy he might have laughed at her or chided her, stuck out his tongue and refused. But he was Melaneus, his mother’s child, his father’s son, and he was not a different boy.

Melaneus considered her. And when he had done so enough, he rose until he crested the hill, revealing the full size of his heavy paws and ever lengthening legs.

He drifted downward to meet her.

One day she would be as large as her father, but as lean as her mother.

For now she gangly and awkward. Faced with a spirit that made her feel tiny as he crested the hill. The mass of him on display and all at once she had regrets.

She should not have dared to speak a language this spirit would hear.

What if he followed her back to Moonglow?

Here she could see the ruddy coat he bore and how he seemed like the dying embers of the sun. He was a handsome spirit. This too spoke of danger and curiosity.

A trap.

I give you the name of Dying Sun, spirit. This name will only be said here and heard by none others.

She exhaled heavy, unsteady.

She crept closer and closer to him.

Moongirl did not turn away.

Rather, she did not move.

Melaneus was careful in his advance. Slow, and patient. Treating her like he imagined he might treat a fawn, but without the intent of slaughter.

She spoke again that melody of language — commanding, and strong, though he did not forget the tremble that had accompanied her first voice. And then, she drew nearer.

He stopped when they were but a hair breadth apart. Here he could see the sun fire that touched her ears, her face. Here he decided her eyes were not dandelions, but sunfire too.

And what would she see in him? He’d only ever had his paws to look at, dark and ruddy, and he had never cared enough to ask his parents the colours of the rest of him. Were his eyes a cloudless sky, like he knew his mother’s to be? Or were his sunfire too?

He had never cared before, but now, he felt self-conscious, and he considered what he might say to her. But words were like names: once given, they could not be taken back. Melaneus did not know if he had any yet to give her, only knew he wanted to find one - even one! - so he waited, too, for his own language to come.

She could touch him, she thought.

That closeness could not be ignored, but if he was as spirit as he seemed? Then to touch him would bring grave things upon her. Upon Moonglow. The spirits of her home already seemed to thunder and churn.

Some part of her wondered — what's one more?

She sat herself down, in the small space between them, eyes fixed firmly to him still. Even close there was little shine to his eyes. Yet the ruddy rush of his fur excited her. He resembled something taboo, something for the way of hunters.

For now she remained silent, only existing before him in her barest form.

Still she toyed with the thought of what he would look like in Moonglow. Haunting the spine of it, creeping over the hills behind her shoulders.

He could touch her, he thought, as she sat herself down, in that small space between them.

They beheld each other in silence, the huntsman and the moongirl, and he did not reach out to touch her. She held him with her eyes. He wondered, still, to the thoughts beneath. They spoke of resolve, intelligence, though she spoke no further.

This time, she was silent.

And this time, he would speak.

You are of Moonglow, his hushed voice ran out, still boyish and ill-fitting of his frame, though growing into itself, as the rest of him had already begun to do.

She understood his words.

However most stark was the declaration of Moonglow. A shiver down her spine offered another, soft tremble of her lips. Unfortunately visible this close.

His voice was boyish, but she felt the intelligence of him beyond his years.

She would cave. Speak to him in a common tongue, but the accent of her mother's tongue remained thick upon her softening voice.

How do you know?

Melaneus saw the tremble, and his ears twitched ever closer.

She spoke in his tongue, though her voice carried the grace of the language she'd once chosen to share. This time, however, he was grateful she did not give him words he did not understand.

It is of my nature to know.

He had often scented Rodyn around the Weald, even after he had departed, carrying with him the scent of others. And he had heard the name Moonglow spoken before. It made sense that Rodyn would be of Moonglow, and that moongirl would be of their family, too, since she carried the scent of them both. Yet he would not speak the name of Rodyn, nor reveal his visits to their Weald, unless moongirl mentioned these herself.

His nature!

Her heart thumped wildly against her breastbone. She was convinced it might break free, that the contents of it might spill before the spirit like he wanted.

Her eyes grew half-lidded and heavy with her emotion.

Where has your spirit come from?

He was large. Healthy. Wherever he came from thrived, she imagined.

He knew of Moonglow.

She thought of him in the shade of Aumauttuk Grove.

A shift overcame her as she settled with his words. He could not read her, only guessed that what he had said held power in her mind.

He held Moonglow's name. He held Rodyn's, too. She held none of his, until the moment his voice parted again in his same hushed tones, Oi Kryfoí, his turn, now, for his soft voice to accentuate with the Greek of his mother's tongue, the hidden ones.

Melaneus wondered if she had heard their name before.

Wondered, if Rodyn might have spoken of him.

i could write these two forever <3

Oi Kryfoí.

If it had been whispered in Moonglow, it moved over the ears of Callyope. She lingered by her mother often but these days was hardly privy to the words of politics now.

Instead she busied herself with the hunting of spirits and the collection of stories and songs. She wondered how many this spirit had.

The hidden ones.

But you show yourself to me. Some loose sense of awe in her voice, conveyed further in the gentle sheen of her eyes.

<3 <3 <3 saaame!!! I love them so much!!

μόνο αυτό που επιλέγουμε, he tried to remain composed, but a smile broke the corner of his lips - mischievous, and small, and one that brushed his eyes. Fleeting - but her eyes were so fixed on him, he thought she must have seen it, even as he had seen her tremble, even as he saw new wonder fill her eyes.

Does owl show himself when he calls in the night, when you see his eyes in the dark of the woods? he had given her language, and a face to place with it. A voice, and pieces of thought. Showing face and form was one thing, showing name and heart, another.

Taataa spoke that tongue.

But Callyope did not know it enough to know clearly what was said.

Her heart found no break from its rampant beating. For a moment she wondered if she truly had crossed over into some spirit realm. As if she might open her eyes and be at mother's alter.

When he spoke common, he spoke like mother.

Like her.

When she quaked now it was with awe. Grand and great.

Your eyes would not be seen. She told him in this hushed, enchanted state. You are not like brother owl. But she found she did not mind these things. Not in the least.

He was large, ruddy but swarthy.

You are Dying Sun, His new-given name spoken in mother tongue. Like none other.