the place where wishes come true

Kamaria

I would rather stay here
Where the moon, it glows

Today is a special day. Her first birthday has passed, and she's asked her father for something... special. Something she isn't even sure she's ready for.

And yet, there's a skip in her step as they walk through the Wilds. They've left the comfort of their home, moving past the meadow's reach. Her hands reach out to touch soft flower petals as they pass through the meadow, green weeds casting stains across the bottom of her dress. She tosses reassuring smiles back at her father as they go. Until tall grasses give way to an empty field.

Well, almost empty. Her bluish-green gaze shadows as she takes in the sight of the spiraling staircase. Its steps lead up and up and up... to what? Or where? She wonders.

She comes to a sudden halt in her steps, chest deflating as she turns to face her father. "Where do they go, Dad?" She asks, pointing to the staircase, an expectant edge in her tone {as she fully believes that he must know the answer}. She tries to catch her breath as she waits.

Soaring doves and falling crows
Laughter is the only sound here

i closed my eyes and saw my father's sins, they covered me like a second skin
i peeled them off, and sure i bled a bit, but now i'm free to sink my own damn ship

His daughter’s first birthday has passed and while a bit of it is daunting, she’s still managed to keep the same thoughts in her mind of what she wanted to become. Who was he to deny her? It’s been a year after all, and it’s also been a while since they’d gone to see her mother. It’s been a while since Sunjata’d seen her, too, back then he’d still had Haai and it was just after the fresh move to King’s End. Now? Things were peaceful for him to an extent, but still terrifying, more so now with Kamaria’s request and the idea of her growing up so fast.

It was his job to protect her, of course, and he’s easily swayed into letting her explore as they make their approach, pausing near the hovering steps to what seems like nowhere with their abrupt stop at the end. But he’s heard the rumors in passing, the lore behind these specific steps, so when she suddenly stops and asks, he realizes a couple of steps after, turning toward her with an avian tilt of his head. He follows her gesture toward the staircase, and he returns back to her side despite his gaze remaining on the stairs.

“That’s the Last Step, liefling.” He murmurs, before his attention flickers back to her completely and his smile widens a fraction. “I heard that when you reach the very top, your wishes can come true.” Though he’s never tested that theory. But then, he crouches before her, brows pinching together as if he’s thinking very hard about something. “What would your wish be?” He asks curiously, reaching for her hands to tug her in close to him.

i cut my branch down from my family tree to start a fire in the living room

SUNJATA

Kamaria

I would rather stay here
Where the moon, it glows

"The Last Step..." She echoes, and it sounds almost like a dream, something funny and strange. How could it be the last? If she reaches the top, she could simply turn around - and there would be more steps.

Her eyes return to him, tucking her chin up to better see the broad smile he gives her. She returns it with a reflexive twitch of her own lips, instinctively already reaching to grasp his hand.

"Just one wish?" She asks, and she almost says that she wishes she could be with her mother again - forever, this time. But her mouth clamps shut on the words because they feel wrong. She looks down and away, clearly ashamed of herself.

Peering back up with sorry eyes, she admits, "I was gonna say that I wish I could be with mama again."

"I never used to get sad, before..." she explains softly, looking out at the stone staircase, "I didn't have to worry about loving Nate even though he's..." well, yeah, "and no one died.. like Haai. That never happened before. Sometimes I get scared that you'll.." she looks him up and down for a moment, too afraid to speak something awful and unspeakable into fruition. Like the same thing happening to her dad - or Nate (or her new siblings). Or the others they love and care about.

Soaring doves and falling crows
Laughter is the only sound here

i closed my eyes and saw my father's sins, they covered me like a second skin
i peeled them off, and sure i bled a bit, but now i'm free to sink my own damn ship

He tugs his daughter closer to him, crouched before her as he is – scanning her face when all the bright and hopeful hues in her green gaze begin to shift to something uncertain, and Sunjata finds his gut churning, his smile faltering ever so slightly as concern starts to pour through him. She looks down and away and he reaches up to push her blonde hair back from her face, thumb brushing by her temple in a gentle, fatherly touch of consolation.

To be with Safrin again is something Sunjata can understand, even if it did make him sad a fraction. Life was hard and truthfully, he’d give a lot to be able to spend time with his mother again if he could. As it stood, though, his daughter continues. Talks of sadness and Nate and Haai and Sunjata nods in understanding, not needing her to finish what the train of thought is.

His hand slips around her, pulling her in for a hug where he can press a kiss to the crown of her head. “It’s hard, Ria. And it’s unfair.” He murmurs softly, keeping a nice tight hug around his daughter. “Haai loved you very much, but she’s in a better place now. She’s up there with Mort chasing all the ramphires she can find.” He tells her, though of course he doesn’t know. It’s more hope than anything else. But he pulls away a fraction to try and capture his daughter’s jade gaze. “I wish so badly that you didn’t have to deal with all of this. But you’ll always have your mother watching you from above in every star and at the shrines when you go to see her. And you’ll always have me, too, regardless of what happens. Do you know how I know?” He asks her, a well hidden fracturing steel gaze tries to scan her face, waiting to see what she might guess.

i cut my branch down from my family tree to start a fire in the living room

SUNJATA

Kamaria

I would rather stay here
Where the moon, it glows

For all the ways he makes the world a better place, doubts are like splinters in her mind. But everyone's fingers are too clumsy to pluck them out. The more they try, the worse it gets.

At first, she doesn't hear the words coming out of his mouth. Not until he pulls away, blue eyes searching hers, and he wishes things could be different.

"I know.." she says of that, of her mother, who would always be watching over her from the vast, starry heaven in which she comes from. Kamaria knows that as truth; a truth with such deep roots that it could never possibly be shaken.

Blinking, she furrows her brows with some concern. She shakes her head, in no spirit to playfully guess. But, in an effort to meet him halfway, she tries: "Because mama's watching over you, too." There's a resolved confidence behind the words that she wasn't expecting from herself. It steels her a bit. She is apart of her mother, apart of her father, and that's everything... because who would she be, without them both?

Her fingers squeeze around his much larger palm. "Dad?" She asks after a few moments, "I don't want that to be my wish. I want to stay here with you, and Nate, and my brothers. If I didn't get to be here, I wouldn't know what it's like... to.. live. Even if I get sad or scared sometimes. I wouldn't be able to swim in the ocean and make you worry until your hair turns gray--" her teacher had said something like that might happen, anyway "--or climb big trees just so I can fall out of them. I wouldn't get to eat berry pies with you, or grow a garden of white roses for your mommy. I wouldn't get to play with the twins... Or.. get tattoos! And I wouldn't be able to go on adventures with you when I grow up." Because that is the plan - he realizes that, right? She peers up at him and decides to leave it at this: "I want to be here."

Looking back out at the staircase, she frowns softly and says, "But I wish the world was nicer to everyone."

Soaring doves and falling crows
Laughter is the only sound here

i closed my eyes and saw my father's sins, they covered me like a second skin
i peeled them off, and sure i bled a bit, but now i'm free to sink my own damn ship

She tries to meet him halfway, his steel gaze scanning her face while that protective streak of his dragon shift starts to reach out within him, wanting nothing more than to protect her from the fear she faces, the fears she has and holds close to her chest. “She is.” Sunjata murmurs softly, making a small quick show of the starry tattoos to his arms, a thumb hooked toward the edge of the constellation tattoo that peaks up above where his shirt is unbuttoned the last few notches.

His head tilts while she squeezes his palm, watching her face like a hawk would for anything. “Yes, sweetheart?” He prompts her gently, waiting patiently until she’s done. And what she says isn’t at all what he expects. It warms something within him, something broken and empty and searching for any kind of balm. She grants him this in the future that she paints for them – a future that he hopes goes just as she describes.

He can’t help but to interject with a small boyish smile, perhaps one of the softest ones she’s seen on his rugged, scarred face. “I’m afraid I already have a few grey hairs, liefde.” He murmurs but settles so she can finish what she wants to say, a boost to his confidence of fatherhood, that maybe – just maybe – he isn’t too bad at this. She mentions his own mother and the flowers, the twins, the berry pies, and his gaze is a dance between shadowed from memories and bright with pride, because these are all things she wants to do. The things she looks forward to.

And truthfully, it means so much to him that he pulls her into another tight hug, a soft kiss pressed to the crown of her blonde head. “I wish the world was nicer to everyone, too.” He agrees softly, pulling away so that he can scan the staircase too – wondering if it was even a wish that could be accomplished. “We’re all a part of it though, Ria. And it’s up to us as well as the others to set examples.” He offers gently, gaze returning to his daughter. “If we’re nicer to someone, then perhaps they’ll be nicer to the next, and so on and so on. I know it doesn’t seem like much to do something that might seem like it’s so little… But overall?” He pauses, leaning in toward her to tell her a secret. “All it takes are a lot of little rain drops to make a flood.” There’s the edge of a smile that begins on the scarred side of his face, a dark brow raised beneath longer dark hair.

i cut my branch down from my family tree to start a fire in the living room

SUNJATA

Kamaria

I would rather stay here
Where the moon, it glows

"Uff," he pulls her into an embrace she should've expected, one she slowly melts into. She rests her cheek against his chest and continues to gaze out at the lonely staircase. As she listens, she fiddles with a piece of string that's started to unravel from the seams on his shirt. His voice is a soft rumble that stirs the hair on the top of her head. She can hear the smile in it at the end, when he mentions a flood, and it lifts her spirits.

"Then I'll make my own wish come true. I'll be a flood of little kindnesses!" A cheerful giggle lightens her face, reddens her pale cheeks. Glancing up, she reaches for her father's hand to tug him along, smiling gently, "Okay, I'm ready to go."

She has to marvel at what life will be like once they finish this journey, when they return home and she is changed. When she's bigger, stronger, and faster. There are things about being small that she knows she'll miss, but she yearns for more. To see more of the world, to hear more about it, to feel more of it. Maybe then she could understand it, and make it a better place.

---

fin!

Soaring doves and falling crows
Laughter is the only sound here