Duskfire Glacier lluvia

backdated to march 20!

@Faust proved to be a generous host. while silvertongue did not press her presence upon the other members of darukaal, she welcomed the kaan's overture of peace and friendliness. an early morning soaked by grey rein found her at the stone ramparts, swathed in one of the furs and watching the land glitter far beyond the glacier. it was not akashingo, but it was not unelegant. faust had chosen well for his people.

it's beautiful this time of year. faust said, voice quiet beneath the veil of morning.
he stood a pace behind her, not looming, but present—always present. the snow cracked faintly underfoot as he shifted to look where she looked, out across the jagged teeth of the glacier. pale light spilled through the clouds, painting frost and stone in shades of silver and steel.
cold don’t dull its beauty, he murmured.
a beat. breath rising in mist. his eyes slid to her, the curve of her posture wrapped in furs, her gaze far-off and contemplative. she looked nothing like the wolves of darukaal. and yet, she didn’t look out of place either.
not many come here just to look, he added, something half-curious in his tone. waiting for akavir?

an exhale hid how faust had startled silvertongue, an intake of breath which gave her reason for raised shoulders. silver muzzle turned over the line of one shoulder to regard him, but otherwise she did not move. "he is resting," she answered, resisting the natural press of a man who found her worthwhile to look at. "i have been many places. not yet here to a land like this," she explained in a velvet voice, shifting gaze away and back to the sight of icefall and wild forests. "it is like a frozen gemstone," she decided after some moments, her smile for faust now, her focus returned to the leader of darukaal.

you've been travelling long? faust asked, eyes drawn to the curve of her spine, the grace still etched into her despite the missing leg. it did not make her lesser—only more tempered, like a blade hammered thin and strong.
his voice was low, tempered, touched with something close to curiosity.
he came to stand beside her at the ledge, shoulder near but never brushing. his gaze followed hers across the frozen sprawl of darukaal’s domain.
gemstone, eh? a faint smirk ghosted across his muzzle, then faded like steam. cold place to be polishing a jewel.
a beat passed. snow gusted.
but it keeps what’s ours safe. ‘specially from men who think they can take without earning.
he paused then, glancing sideways—just briefly.
you move well, even with it gone. no pity in his tone. only fact. only the acknowledgment of a survivor. how'd you lose it?

"you ask many questions, kaan," silvertongue purred, her smile still gently wondering at faust's interest. he sought information for darukaal, surely; their travel and her injury would draw attention. "would you believe me if i told you i did not remember?" silvertongue asked, her eyes now unmoving from his muscled form. she was thankful for that lack of pity, wishing almost that she could tell him the story of how it had happened. "i am grateful to rest. but there is more travel ahead," she murmured, her eyes upon the horizon once more. beside him silvertongue felt small and rather weak, sentiments she did not enjoy in the least.

maybe it's better that way, faust murmured, gaze flicking toward the glint of glacier light off the far ridges. not remembering.
his voice was quieter now, stripped of its usual iron, edged in something like understanding.
keeps a good attitude, he added after a pause, a brow ticking up slightly in dry amusement, though he didn’t smile.
his eyes slid back to her—sharp, green, and heavy with thought.
is it far to the creek?
the blunt weight of a northern man who had seen many run, and many more return.
he looked at her missing limb only once.
and then never again.

silvertongue's mouth curved. "i am not a leader in swiftcurrent." her tone did not change, but the words held a new message. anything faust sought would not have its root in her. she played a role, and she played it even more strongly away from that which she knew. a tactic of survival, had she the words to say it. "i do not wish to speak of journeys any longer. tell me, faust," meeting his eye with a boldness she should not possess in his camp, "is darukaal religious at all? i am familiar with the worship of many gods. but you do not appear to have any."

faust’s ears twitched as she spoke, and the shift in her tone did not go unnoticed. the kaan, so often silent in the wake of other voices, allowed hers to linger in the space between them. when she met his gaze, bold and burning, he did not look away.
i was wrong, he said simply, not one for poetic regret. “i thought you were mated to akavir. a pause. you are not.
his gaze dropped to the earth for a breath, then lifted again—harder, older. darukaal is haunted, he admitted. the nordic gods, the old ones. they breathe in the cracks of the glacier. they ride the winds through the trees. you feel them when it’s quiet.
he looked past her, to the sharp edge of the horizon. but they do not speak to me. perhaps i do not want to listen.
a beat.
gods did not help me when i needed them. when the south came with fire, when my mother burned. the weight of those words sank like stones. i learned not to wait for their mercy. i built darukaal with my own hands, not with prayer.
his eyes met hers again, searching. but you speak like someone who has heard them. do they still answer you, silvertongue?

a direct blow. a snap back to darukaal's haunting. a warrior; yes. yes. silvertongue felt herself with rising contusion, and he had not struck, nor hardly moved. to catch her breath, she smiled, drawing frozen air through stung nostrils. she wished to tell faust that she and akavir had a strong history, but did not speak. to do so would admit that a mark had been found; furthermore, defense did not deny truth. they were not married. faust had his own wickedness pursuant; a tale of fire and mothers who no longer drew breath. a man embittered by his own ghosts. "they do not, faust," she said, matching his familiarity. "once, in dreams. no longer." tonguetip held between teeth; she considered. "there are ways to purge a land, but not of its gods," she added, casting him a wry look.

his eyes stayed on her too long. not out of curiosity. not even suspicion. it was something else—something deeper. something older than the war-scarred land beneath their feet.
she smiled, but it didn’t reach him.
faust didn’t smile back.
instead, he stepped closer. not enough to touch—but enough to feel. his voice, when it came, was quiet. heavy.
dreams have weight, he said. doesn’t matter if they die in sleep. they still rot in the ribs.
the wind cut between them like a knife. she didn’t flinch. neither did he.
his gaze dropped for half a breath—to the corner of her mouth, the sharp curve of her jaw, the lingering color on her cheek where the cold had kissed her too hard. or maybe it was him. maybe he had left a mark without meaning to.
you can burn a land bare, faust went on, voice rougher now. you can salt the bones, strip the trees. kill the name of every god.
his eyes found hers again. a harder look now, colder, but alive with something she had stirred.
but if they still whisper, it’s not the land.
he leaned in—just slightly. a breath’s width between them.
it’s you.

who was this brazen creature who lifted fur at its root and set silvertongue on tenterhooks? faust was dangerous, yes; he was a man with power and those to follow, and that made any such man dangerous. but more than that, he was cunning, intense, with a grasp of language that intensified the natural masculine brutality into something more. faust was a sword, and she had little doubt that its cold bite was deep. "do you mean to say that you are haunted? tu alma?" her eyes were measuring. "what happened to invoke the ghosts for you?" shifting, in hope, the high focus of his eyes, his breath, his pressed knowing, from her features.

the word was almost foreign to him, but it landed with a strange weight. a recognition of sorts, though not one he would claim aloud.
haunted, he repeated, voice low, rough. it wasn’t something he said often. it wasn’t something he needed to say. but she had asked, and her eyes had peeled back something he didn’t often show.
perhaps, he admitted, finally, but the admission was a fracture, brief and evasive. his breath hitched, not in sorrow, but in something darker, something older.
he took a slow step back, as if creating distance would lessen the weight of the question. ghosts don’t follow you unless you’ve invited them, he muttered, more to himself than her. and even then, you don’t get to choose which ones.
his eyes flicked to her, hardened again, a jagged edge to his words.
but i’m not here to talk about ghosts, silvertongue. i’m here to live with them.

faust showed himself also to be a man of passions not long let out to breathe. in her presence, she wanted to believe he had found some lack of repression, some acceptance. it had always been natural for a girl once called belen; the woman named silvertongue had only taken that existing trait and jeweled it. and now at its bosom faust found solace, another man finally allowed to breathe. that was what she would accept as truth, anyway. "when is the last time you slept well, kaan?" she asked, his title reverent as all titles should be in the mouth of those who had engrained themselves inferior.

don't know if i ever have. faust muttered, his voice low, laced with a certain edge. his gaze lingered for a moment, looking not at her but beyond, as though searching for something just out of reach. he didn’t make a move, didn’t offer anything more than the quiet truth of his words.
he was used to unrest, to the gnawing discomfort that came with never fully letting go. still, there was something about silvertongue—something that eased the weight for a moment, made him forget how tightly he was wound. maybe tonight, he added, the slightest hint of a smirk tugging at his lips, though it was quick to fade.

"tonight," silvertongue repeated, her voice an encouraging whisper of silk. "you should. find pleasure in your body, exhaust yourself. you will sleep, faust," the former courtesan said with encouragement. each day in darukaal limned the once-fellahin in shadowcloaks of what she had been. this moment was no different. "i once lived in a palace. there we had such a dark drink as to put the mind to sleep for a long while." her eyes were elaborate, but her words offered nothing more. such images were only that for her now; imaginings. recollections.

faust smirks, his eyes gleaming with a mixture of amusement and something darker, something dangerous. he leans in just slightly, voice low, purposeful. you think sleep will cure me? he asks, the question lingering like smoke in the air between them. i don't need to sleep, silvertongue. not when i can find other ways to... exhaust myself. his grin sharpens, and for a moment, he looks more like a predator than a man. a palace, huh? must've been quite the hold. he doesn’t wait for her to respond, the silent challenge between them as palpable as the night air.

"that is what i mean, mi dulce," silvertongue offered in the honeyed voice which had once so appeased pharaoh. his words too on her tongue, an oft-repeated sentiment for queen satsu. "you have many men here. i did not sense many women. so go out. find someone to entertain you. devote yourself to that. sleep cannot evade the exhausted." she was teasing now, and openly; she enjoyed the repartee and the rapport. "it was a beautiful place. my time there is ended." and so was her time here on this stone terrace, though silvertongue did not yet move to leave faust there in the cold green scent.

his ear flicked, amused. flattered.
the foreign word roll from her tongue like silk. i’ve been called a lot of things. but i don't know that one.
he took a step closer, enough that his warmth could be felt in the evening chill. his gaze lingered—slow, knowing. appreciative. darukaal had its stone and steel, but very little softness. and this woman? she was made of velvet and sharp teeth, and faust wasn't fool enough not to enjoy that.
you assume i haven’t found someone, he rumbled low, almost conspiratorial. a smile ghosted at his mouth. maybe i’m already entertained.
he tilted his head. you're here takin’ up all the dreams.
a tease—but not without heat.
he didn't move to stop her from leaving. but neither did he move aside.

"i know you have no woman because you are here. no female scent is upon you, faust," silvertongue murmured, calling to bear all the information her eyes had given. "you remain with me, and you allow me to wear furs as if i am one of darukaal." the glassblue gaze was searching in gentle challenge of her own. "if she was here, we already would have spoken." yes; she had learned much in the charge of jawahir and ramesses. silvertongue pulled away, not translating; her mien had not changed to one unpleasant, but her face was guarded by a cool smile when she glanced back upon the kaan. "you should entertain yourself. find her, ice man." unless he stopped her, silvertongue meant to pad away, headed vaguely to find akavir, vaguely to be alone in the stone halls of darukaal, if only for a time.

faust did not stop her—not yet.
the quiet smirk that played at the edge of his mouth was neither amused nor wounded, but somewhere in between. she had a sharp tongue, and he didn’t mind the sting—it was almost welcome. her words held truth. no wife, no woman’s scent on him, no warm shadow trailing after his steps. darukaal knew him as their kaan, but not as a husband. not as a man who belonged to anyone.
you’re right, he admitted, low and level as her paws turned to leave. i have no wife.
his voice followed her, calm as a frozen lake, but beneath the surface… something stirred.
but don’t mistake that for absence.
he let the words hang, like breath in cold air, then added, i do not allow you anything, silvertongue. you wear those furs because you choose to. same way you choose to speak like that. a beat passed. i don't mind it.
and then—gently, almost teasingly—he added, ice melts, eventually.
he did not stop her.
but his eyes followed, sharp and thoughtful, until the stone swallowed her path.