DEIMOS
Heave the silver hollow sliver
Amalia must have realized the fortifications were only down because of her; the comfort, the sanctity, the little intricacies and intimacies permitting walls and structures, carefully designated and designed armaments, to descend, reveal the boyish, youthful interludes beneath. He was still stalwart, still brazen, still emboldened, but with less iron, less detachment, less reticent, the reserve gone in her presence, the mischief alive and well and whole and there. She didn’t judge him for it. She didn’t dig into vulnerabilities. She didn’t choke or strangle him by his frailties, flaws, weaknesses, or ineptitude – acceptance, raw, real, and whole, so he did the same for her. He was quiet, but only to absorb and adore the passing moments, not yearning to forsake them in the bewitching horrors, trials, or tremors outside, not wishing to be haunted, devastated, marred, or ruined – them, together, hushed and unafraid.When he was finished with the grouse, he tossed the pieces into a pan, worked on invoking some fire to settle beneath the burners, then grabbed ahold of more of her vegetables, chopping and dicing them with his particular accuracy and meticulousness. The baker didn’t seem too partial to his idea, so he left it in the air as she shrugged, not stepping into the deciphering layers and codes. It would likely have to be something she noted and decided for herself; but she did have the bakery, with its warm smells and delightful foundations. “You do,” he nodded in agreement. As an after-thought, while placing some of his diced potatoes in another pan, he nodded. “It is one of my favorite places here,” a wink tossed in her direction too, before glancing over whatever else needed to be done.
Keeping his hands busy while his mind churned over her additions, he wasn’t truly surprised she’d ask about his home: but there’d been so many, that he couldn’t help but arch a brow. “Which one?” The depths of his smile lingered on her, and then it passed over the threshold of the kitchen, eyes surveying but flickering to the past too – the beats of a youth pressing his feet into the sand, sea air in his air, the world at his fingertips. “I was born near the ocean. We had a home on the coast. They called it the Moonlit Tides.” It had been everything – the breath of the wild, untamed outreaches, where he could howl at the moon and the stars and the kingdom would do the same back, where he thought he’d be something instead of nothing. Family was a precious thing too, gnawing and gone, except for those agonizing interludes that sometimes surfaced in his sleep, when he wished he could see them all again. They came back every now and then, in cauldrons of flames, in snippets of brooks. “My father was quite boisterous and had a penchant for fire. I always thought I would follow in his footsteps.” But maybe he couldn’t have been that bold, that audacious, that spectacular and spellbinding. “My mother was stern, calm, and could command water in her hands. She ensured I was educated, no matter how much I fussed.” And from there, she’d ensured he’d found a love of knowledge, no matter how severe and strict her commands. His smile softened; missing them terribly, in those stretches of time and lives intermingled, wires crossed, infernos fanned, dead and gone while he was gone, fighting wars and enabling crusades that had no business of being concocted or implemented.
Unite and spread the heart apart
