Maea
Stars, hide your fires
Night had fallen, starless, godless, full to bursting with memory and old fear. Heavy curtains had been pulled over every window in the Treehouse to keep the darkness at bay, and candles blazed on every table, lamps burning without fuel, fed by one Ancient's refusal to allow any shadow across her threshold. She had a book splayed open across her lap, a steaming mug of tea nestled between whitening fingers and a heaping plate of pastries on the coffee table before her. Yet those pale eyes were staring unblinking into the roaring fire, unseeing. If the room was a bit too hot even for the deepest of winters, if some of the wax candles had started to bend in exhaustion, losing structure in the sweltering heat, it did not register. Unseen things were striding across the fields of memory, nameless and shapeless, that left behind a bitter aftertaste of old dread.
Shii had endured its companions slow spiralling with some patience. It happened every year at this point, and usually passed on its own. But when beeswax began to drip, drip drip onto a polished wood counter, pooled and began to trickle over the edge to the floor, it'd had enough. Zooming around the room, it first tried to catch the attention of the woman it adored, and when that failed, it darted off in search of the Tall one. That one had hands, and voice, and could shake the girl out of her waking nightmares. Shii would make him. It would make them both wake up, so that the silence and long glances cast between them could end. Upon finding the Tall one, the wisp began a whisping dance before his face, pulsing and whispering in the ways of the tricksters until Liam would have no choice but to follow.
Shii had endured its companions slow spiralling with some patience. It happened every year at this point, and usually passed on its own. But when beeswax began to drip, drip drip onto a polished wood counter, pooled and began to trickle over the edge to the floor, it'd had enough. Zooming around the room, it first tried to catch the attention of the woman it adored, and when that failed, it darted off in search of the Tall one. That one had hands, and voice, and could shake the girl out of her waking nightmares. Shii would make him. It would make them both wake up, so that the silence and long glances cast between them could end. Upon finding the Tall one, the wisp began a whisping dance before his face, pulsing and whispering in the ways of the tricksters until Liam would have no choice but to follow.
Let not light see my black and deep desires
