Bramblepoint old wounds

Aneira held his gaze, a winter hush settling between them; still, weighty, unbroken. His words rand clear, hewn from the same cold stone beneath paws, and she let them linger as the wind threading through frost-laden boughs.
„Endurance is not a choice,” a murmur, soft, edged with something distant, something worn, „It is what remains when all else is lost.” Her breath curled in the frigid air, vanishing as quickly as it came. The horizon stretched, endless, silence echoing the quiet ache carved into her ribs. To endure; yes, she knew the shape of it, the taste of it. But to belong?
Could he vow that the ground beneath her would hold? That what they built would not splinter as ice under the weight of time? Could he swear that this haven, if she dared to call it home, would not fall as the Grove had, swallowed by the earth, lost to ruin? Aneira turned away, though not in retreat. Her body, a sculpture of stillness, betrayed nothing. In the fleeting shadow across her gaze did doubt stir; silent, lingering at the edges of certainty. To belong;
She did not answer at once; instead, she let the hush stretch, measuring weight and meaning. Then, a whisper against stone, her face still turned away from Solharr; belong!
„Perhaps,” she neither embraced nor dismissed his offer as the flicker of doubt creeped on her more. If she steps forward, it will not be at another’s beckoning, nor in search of a place to rest her weary bones; it will be because her will has settled. And Aneira does not settle lightly.