05-25-2020, 04:11 PM
"Then perhaps you are disappointed," she amended wryly. She didn't sound offended, though she reflected that it did in fact bother her as much or more as his perceived anger had. Thalia never quite fit the mold, nor really tried, and she was used to the little bubbles of exasperation often left in her wake. Aylin, prime example. And her parents. Whatever it was he sought she wasn't likely worth the effort he had gone to, and nor did she suspect she was really who he had expected to find. Not that her own soul was worthless -- it wasn't, to her -- but she couldn't fathom being plucked from the obscurity of billions for this attention, and she shied from that spotlight like a fish caught in the shallows after the tide sucked out. She wasn't special. Nor did she want to be.
He didn't answer any of the outpour, not the questions or the desperate grasp for some kind of reassurance, like a drowning lunge for shore. At least not with words.
"Oh." It was not recognition that pulled the sound breathless from her lips, though as he handed her the twig it did lurch with a dizzying sense of deja vu. Enough that she rather thought for a moment she ought to sit down. The tumbling words of his explanation were debris, and she did not answer as she contemplated the gift. Like a touchstone, the churning waters of her thoughts calmed quite abruptly. For a moment longer she beheld the cup of her palm like she expected to find herself holding something else.
She had thought he came for prophecy, for abilities she had barely begun to acknowledge let alone understand. His words of declared saviour were too grand, but once the deluge of that great flood passed she discovered something infinitely more human left behind in the wreckage. Maybe, anyway. Because it didn't seem entirely possible that he had uprooted himself not for any great portents of the future, but because he had been worried about her. Or about Nimeda at least.
Thalia flexed her hand quietly, and thought about his words in the church.
Then her fingers ran over the stick, speckled with buds like the bulging vines feeding the caged heart on Eha's cottage wall. Really, what was with the pine cones? He gave the creature a name she had not known, and the words meant nothing but the tenuous feeling did, like tender shoots. Only the more she tried to concentrate on it the more nebulous it became. It seemed a refuge she could only look at side on. But it reminded her of something important: hope.
She pulled the hat back on her head, and stooped to retrieve the box. He was already walking away, back to their circular path.
When she padded up back beside him, the punnet of market cherries was in her grip, the box back in her bag, and the blossoming twig tucked carefully under her arm, whereupon its pink buds tangled with the loose curls of her hair. She peered up at him curiously under the brim of her hat, but left her thoughts to drift into unspoken depths. The tray was offered out, though she would be unphased if he declined. They were good though, as fruit usually was that fresh. “Pine cones are thought lucky in Sicily,” she told him. “I’m not really green-fingered, but it seems they come with a wealth of positive superstition. We even have a gland in our brains the same shape. Decartes says that’s where the soul lives.” Such disparate facts wove a tracery through her life, not that she found it that unique; you could convince yourself of anything if you tried hard enough. Or hide it from yourself too. “Would you believe me if I told you what was in the box?” She smiled, but it was only amusement for the strange currents buffeting her life of late. Her nose crinkled.
Then her mind turned to the question he asked.
"Maybe. I don’t know. Sometimes drawings just feel different. All I did was get on a train and carry on until I stopped. Almost like luck, or need. Nothing that could be called skill.” She tipped her shoulder, because it really had no more basis than that, and she had trusted it with the kind of careless abandon that probably gave her sister grey hairs. Even Nox cautioned her against the whimsy that sent her alone. She didn’t regret any of it, not even the brand on her palm, though it worried her too. Her gaze caught once more on the scenery, and she leaned to murmur, “You must be tired of walking in circles.”
He didn't answer any of the outpour, not the questions or the desperate grasp for some kind of reassurance, like a drowning lunge for shore. At least not with words.
"Oh." It was not recognition that pulled the sound breathless from her lips, though as he handed her the twig it did lurch with a dizzying sense of deja vu. Enough that she rather thought for a moment she ought to sit down. The tumbling words of his explanation were debris, and she did not answer as she contemplated the gift. Like a touchstone, the churning waters of her thoughts calmed quite abruptly. For a moment longer she beheld the cup of her palm like she expected to find herself holding something else.
She had thought he came for prophecy, for abilities she had barely begun to acknowledge let alone understand. His words of declared saviour were too grand, but once the deluge of that great flood passed she discovered something infinitely more human left behind in the wreckage. Maybe, anyway. Because it didn't seem entirely possible that he had uprooted himself not for any great portents of the future, but because he had been worried about her. Or about Nimeda at least.
Thalia flexed her hand quietly, and thought about his words in the church.
Then her fingers ran over the stick, speckled with buds like the bulging vines feeding the caged heart on Eha's cottage wall. Really, what was with the pine cones? He gave the creature a name she had not known, and the words meant nothing but the tenuous feeling did, like tender shoots. Only the more she tried to concentrate on it the more nebulous it became. It seemed a refuge she could only look at side on. But it reminded her of something important: hope.
She pulled the hat back on her head, and stooped to retrieve the box. He was already walking away, back to their circular path.
When she padded up back beside him, the punnet of market cherries was in her grip, the box back in her bag, and the blossoming twig tucked carefully under her arm, whereupon its pink buds tangled with the loose curls of her hair. She peered up at him curiously under the brim of her hat, but left her thoughts to drift into unspoken depths. The tray was offered out, though she would be unphased if he declined. They were good though, as fruit usually was that fresh. “Pine cones are thought lucky in Sicily,” she told him. “I’m not really green-fingered, but it seems they come with a wealth of positive superstition. We even have a gland in our brains the same shape. Decartes says that’s where the soul lives.” Such disparate facts wove a tracery through her life, not that she found it that unique; you could convince yourself of anything if you tried hard enough. Or hide it from yourself too. “Would you believe me if I told you what was in the box?” She smiled, but it was only amusement for the strange currents buffeting her life of late. Her nose crinkled.
Then her mind turned to the question he asked.
"Maybe. I don’t know. Sometimes drawings just feel different. All I did was get on a train and carry on until I stopped. Almost like luck, or need. Nothing that could be called skill.” She tipped her shoulder, because it really had no more basis than that, and she had trusted it with the kind of careless abandon that probably gave her sister grey hairs. Even Nox cautioned her against the whimsy that sent her alone. She didn’t regret any of it, not even the brand on her palm, though it worried her too. Her gaze caught once more on the scenery, and she leaned to murmur, “You must be tired of walking in circles.”