flora
Flora frowns slightly as Jack points out the many ways someone determined enough could force their way through the bonfire. Having never possessed true elemental magic herself, perhaps it isn’t surprising that she’d underestimated how creatively it could be used, but that doesn’t make the oversight feel any less irritating. If their relationship were anything other than the knife’s edge it has become, she might have laughed and pointed out that this was precisely why she needed him. Instead, she exhales and nods. "Fuck. Right."
As he begins to rise, a small, genuine laugh slips from her before she can stop it. "Well, like you said, anything else you want to know, you’ll probably be able to find out on your own." Somewhere in the Arclight of her thoughts, Vox in the shape of a horrible purple creature made almost entirely of spaghetti rises from the sea and begins flinging ships through the air, and the image pulls her smirk a little more crooked.
Her thoughts grow more complicated as she watches him, the gardens of her mind tangling around everything she doesn’t quite know how to say. That she appreciates him coming. That his advice matters. That, however naïvely, she still hopes there might be some way for her presence in his life, unavoidable given her position as queen, not to feel like an open wound every time. Once, she would have let the shape of those thoughts speak for her, trusting his telepathy to carry everything her mouth couldn’t. She’d learned far too late how much that silence had cost them both, though, and so Flora sighs and lets the rest blow away.
"Thanks, Jack." Her voice is quieter now, stripped of the earlier barbs, and if he wants to find fault with that, she's happy to let him. "If I learn anything else you won't have found out for yourself, I’ll send word." It is as close as she can come to promising she won’t abuse the small measure of patience he’s shown her, and she leaves it there.
As he begins to rise, a small, genuine laugh slips from her before she can stop it. "Well, like you said, anything else you want to know, you’ll probably be able to find out on your own." Somewhere in the Arclight of her thoughts, Vox in the shape of a horrible purple creature made almost entirely of spaghetti rises from the sea and begins flinging ships through the air, and the image pulls her smirk a little more crooked.
Her thoughts grow more complicated as she watches him, the gardens of her mind tangling around everything she doesn’t quite know how to say. That she appreciates him coming. That his advice matters. That, however naïvely, she still hopes there might be some way for her presence in his life, unavoidable given her position as queen, not to feel like an open wound every time. Once, she would have let the shape of those thoughts speak for her, trusting his telepathy to carry everything her mouth couldn’t. She’d learned far too late how much that silence had cost them both, though, and so Flora sighs and lets the rest blow away.
"Thanks, Jack." Her voice is quieter now, stripped of the earlier barbs, and if he wants to find fault with that, she's happy to let him. "If I learn anything else you won't have found out for yourself, I’ll send word." It is as close as she can come to promising she won’t abuse the small measure of patience he’s shown her, and she leaves it there.
How can a person know everything at 18 but nothing at 22?
Will you still want me when I'm nothing new?
Will you still want me when I'm nothing new?
