and i was thrashing on the line
She doesn't entirely understand what a port is, or how something could fly that isn’t a bird, but she files the words away—skyships—and follows him. His ease with the world is strange, like everything he names just is. She watches him walk ahead, light-footed and unbothered, and wonders what it’s like to move through the world like that. Certain. Unafraid. She trails behind not just in steps but in understanding, like a shadow still learning how to belong to the shape that casts it.
He calls her sister, and something quiet shifts in her chest. Not heavy. Not painful. But present. A thing she thinks she might have wanted, even before she knew what it was.
Zairah blinks toward the horizon, molten rock stretching like cracked bone under the sun. She looks once more at the cave mouth behind them, then back to Danta, already in motion, tail flicking, sunlight flashing against his horns. She follows, her feet sure despite the uneven stone.
“I don’t think I’ll miss this place,” she says, meaning the Climb, the cave, the dust of whatever she used to be. “But I might want to come back someday. Just to see if I remember it different.”
Her tone is mild, thoughtful. She doesn’t expect an answer. Then, after a pause:
“Show me the way, brother.”
He calls her sister, and something quiet shifts in her chest. Not heavy. Not painful. But present. A thing she thinks she might have wanted, even before she knew what it was.
Zairah blinks toward the horizon, molten rock stretching like cracked bone under the sun. She looks once more at the cave mouth behind them, then back to Danta, already in motion, tail flicking, sunlight flashing against his horns. She follows, her feet sure despite the uneven stone.
“I don’t think I’ll miss this place,” she says, meaning the Climb, the cave, the dust of whatever she used to be. “But I might want to come back someday. Just to see if I remember it different.”
Her tone is mild, thoughtful. She doesn’t expect an answer. Then, after a pause:
“Show me the way, brother.”
somewhere between desperate and divine
Zairah
