EVIE
there ain't no doubt in no ones mind
Flowerbirth strips away the illusion of LongNight's comfort; long days inside their family home, the world beyond their door a vague notion that could be put on a shelf to gather dust for a while. She spends more time in the Infirmary than she has in seasons, hands shaking between sure and practiced motions when bodies fall under them. Doubt creeps in like sucking tendrils, threatening to drag her down into depths so murky and thick she can't see an escape even from the surface.These watery depths are not nearly so clouded, and the steam that rises is reminiscent to the springs they so recently lost. Still, here at least there is the frail illusion of safety once more. Their home, their family, her beloved at her side. Fragile though that feeling may be it is all that sustains her in these early days of spring.
Sitting perched on the edge of the tub while Deimos tests the waters, Evie's robe-covered arms tighten briefly around her own stomach in a spasm of what she can only call grief at hearing his quiet question. Rising, her bare feet cross the cool tiles to reach for his hand, still damp from the bathwater. Lifts it to her face and kisses the droplets off each knuckle as her blue eyes cast up to find his own through auburn lashes. "You have done more, now and always, than most people can claim to have even imagined doing for their people." Threading their fingers together, the Evergreen squeezes his hand and presses their joined knuckles into her freckled cheek, eyes closing and brows furrowing as she leans into their tangled hands. "It's why they came. Halo did too much, we threatened their spread too greatly. A poor man's reward, but a backhanded compliment all the same." Evie has tasted enough of them in her girlhood years to see it plain, even when cloaked in such violent shades.
that love's the finest thing around
