Morningside Cuesta unbound

Astier watched her crest the ledge with the silent inevitability of water reclaiming a shore. She moved with a fluidity that made a mockery of the treacherous drop, a woman woven from the shadows of the cliffside. He did not step back to give her room, nor did he step forward to greet her. He simply stood his ground, a pale statue anchoring the wind-whipped edge, allowing her to close the distance he had so carefully maintained in the valley below.

Her scent washed over him again, driftwood and salt, a sharp, stinging reminder of a coast that felt a lifetime away. When she landed, silent and weighted, his silver gaze tracked the movement, dissecting the changes in her since the taiga. She was the same, and yet, sharper.

„Strangers are afforded the luxury of being ignored,” Astier corrected, his voice a low, dry rasp that cut through the wind. He tilted his head slightly toward the valley floor, where the faint echo of the Norseman likely still lingered. „If I had greeted you, you would be sharing this ledge with a loud giant who thinks he is a wolf. I assumed you preferred the silence over an audience.”

It was a tactical admission. He had made her a stranger to keep her safe from the noise. He met her olive gaze, holding it with a steady, unblinking intensity. Her comment on his displacement drew a faint, almost imperceptible shift in his stance; a relaxing of the shoulders, the only sign of comfort he would offer.

„The ice stands still,” he murmured, looking past her for a fleeting second to the drop she had just conquered. „I found I could not. And you, Siofra…” He let her name settle between them, heavy and familiar. „…Are a long way from the tide.”