Moonspear blood [m]oon rising

Oh, there had never been a doubt in his mind that he was a creature worthy of her affections. He, who aimed high and rarely missed, sought ever to aim higher. If she were a prize then perhaps she were of the highest, ever just out of reach and close enough to taste. A holy grail of what he did not know, the path untaken in a heady, thick woodland—a worn, silvery thread in a tapestry laid bare begging to be pulled.

The inclination to follow her a step behind pulled at him as much as it stirred and coaxed at embers, but she had swung back around to face him before he could even so much as get body to follow head. Her words did not fall on deaf ears but hesitation bound his tongue; he covered this action deftly, reaching out once more to tease at the ear he worked at before she had pulled away. A note of consideration left him as he untangled from a tongue-tied situation. He had balked responsibility well where he could, as life had always been more about the survival of himself.

No, that didn't seem right. He wasn't necessarily the sort to balk at responsibility. No, this time it was a certain fear that rooted him and left him to fumble through a slowing sense of time. It was here on the cusp of maybe, finally about to have a taste of the fountain of youth, he was having a moment of clarity in spite of thirst. His lingering notes of consideration tapered lowly, almost to a growl. The water was inviting.

"That's quite a station you're wanting to promote me to," he answered huskily, feeling emboldened in the briefest of moments and struggling. "And where exactly do you intend to start your empire?" She may have been driven to rush now, coaxed into recklessness with the season but he knew better. Yet how tempting, how terribly tempting and offering that recklessness was—but he was not his father, unable to stand desire in spite of fire licking at his heels.