Snippets of Writing

20.

They sat on the cliff with the customary two inches of empty space between them. Small enough to be comfortable, yet large enough to be a yawning chasm between the two of them.

"You shouldn't do this," she whispered. "It's dangerous."

"Love always is," he replied.

She sighed. "You know what I mean."

"I really don't." His hand settled lightly on her knee, light as a butterfly ready to fly away at a moment's notice.

"I don't deserve you." Out of the corner of her eye, she eyed the distance between them. She could walk through fire and steel, so why couldn't she find the courage to move two inches closer? She was nearly fifty, gods damn it, not some flighty teenager. "You are a king."

"And what does that have to do with anything?"

She shrugged. "You are a king. You should marry a princess."

He laughed softly. "All of the princesses I'm currently aware of are either half my age or hate us. Besides, your father didn't marry a princess. He was one of the greatest kings we've known." He paused for a moment, then added, "You're a princess too."

"Not anymore. Not since you took the crown." Was the bitterness too pronounced in her voice? She'd told herself that she'd gotten over it, that she'd understood. But it wasn't easy to forget that the man sitting beside her, with his soft words and easy smiles, had killed her brother. "Besides, I never was really... a princess."

"Your father was the king." His hand settled more firmly on her knee as he tried not to lean closer, a sunflower towards the sun. "I'm reasonably sure that makes you a princess."

Her shoulder lifted slightly in a shrug that she tried so hard to look nonchalant, but she cared too much. She always cared too much. "My mother was a commoner. You know I'm illegitimate."

"Your father didn't marry a princess," he said again. "And he was a better king than he'll ever be."

"She was a nobleman. One with power and high standing." She closed her eyes, trying not to let it bother her so much. It was hard, hard to let go and move on. She'd lived for half a century: wasn't that enough to learn to get over death? Yet no matter how many people she lost, she couldn't make herself cold to the pain. She always cared too much.

"And you are the Steel Lord." His soft smile turned into a grin, his red eyes sparkling in the dim twilight. "You can't get higher than that."

Another sigh, her chin sinking towards her chest. "I am a soldier. You deserve... a lady." She made herself do it, shift over the two inches between the two of them so her shoulder brushed against his arm. "A real lady, not a poor excuse for a woman like me."

She gestured towards herself, and even in the dimness of the dark evening he could make out her blond hair cropped close around her ears, the silvery-blue scales that surrounded her eye, the scar tissue covering her cheek and tracing down into the collar of her shirt.

He wanted to kiss her and tell her that she was perfectly beautiful just the way she was.

"Besides," she continued, turning to look at him, "you should marry someone... younger. You're a king; you need heirs. I... don't think I can do that for you."

His hand moved from her knee to her shoulder, holding her close against him. "I won't be king for much longer. Once Brightspark is of age... I want her to have the crown. This was all a mistake, Firewielder. I guess there's a reason the Shajz have stayed in power for so long, huh?"

Well, that's news to me. For how long had he wanted to give it all back to her niece? She deserved it, at least, having her father taken away so early, so violently.

"Do you love me, Firewielder?"

"What?"

"Do you love me?"

She was silent for a moment, her head leaning against her shoulder. He was warm, or was she just cold?

"I don't know," she finally said. "The whole deal with Misted... I loved him. I think he was the one for me," she admitted. "I... I'm sorry. I know it hurts... but I, I don't want to lie to you. That would hurt more, I think."

"Yes," he said softly. "It would." Was he sweating, or was she just cold?

"I'm sorry," she repeated. "I'm so sorry. That was... that was years ago. I should be over him."

"It was love," he replied simply. "Love doesn't make sense, I suppose."

"Yes... I suppose it doesn't." She shook her head. "You really want to do this?"

He was silent, looking out over the land laid out in front of them, at the fires burning far to the west. "This is war," he said. "And you are at the heart of it. I don't know how much longer we have."

"Long enough. Long enough to win."

"I certainly hope so." The last light of the sunset, a final scream of a dying sun, spread out over the horizon. "You don't have to stay a soldier. I'll make you my queen... for however longer I'm king, at least. We can leave. Fly far to the East, to the Star Meadows..."

She laughed, settling against him. "You always were a coward, Stormfire. No, we must stand and fight. And I won't leave them alone in this fight. I'm their leader, I deserve to be out there."

"On the front lines, Firewielder? You aren't as young as you used to be, and... even traditionally, the Steel Lord has never actually engaged in combat. There's no dishonor in planning strategy."

"And I want to be better than them." She lifted her chin, looking out at the emerging stars. "I will not command from the safety of a tent. If I fall, then I fall. Life must end at some point."

"I don't want yours to end."

"Now that's not your choice, is it?" She turned, giving him a fading, flickering grin.

"You scare me," he admitted. "Every time you fly away, every time you go out there, I worry that you won't come back. And every time you return to my office, battered and bloody, I worry that I'll lose you."

"You worry too much."

"Perhaps. But it has kept me alive for this long, hasn't it?"

"And I don't worry at all, and I am still alive, aren't I?"

"Barely." He grinned, adjusting his hand on her shoulder. He could feel the scales on her face against his shoulder and they were cool and smooth, nothing like the sharp, rough things he had imagined them to be.

Firewielder sighed, still looking at the purple and deep red streaked across the sky. "I suppose we should go back. They will be wondering where their king went."

"And their absolutely amazing Steel Lord," he added, letting his hand slip from her shoulder as he stood and dusted his heavily embroidered trousers off. "Come."

She eyed the hand that he held out to her, finally taking it and letting him help her to her feet. They stood awfully close to each other, and the sunset reflected violet and red on the angles of his nose and eyebrows. The years go by so fast... "There is white in your hair," she said, summoning the courage to brush it out of his eyes. "You're getting old, my friend."

He laughed. "Not as much as you. The blonde does wonders to hide the grey, but I see it."

"It's a two year difference," she said, rolling her eyes.

"It still counts." His hand paused at the base of her jaw, where she wore a thin, simple silver necklace with a single sapphire pendant. "May- may I kiss you?"

"You are forty-seven, Stormfire, not nineteen. Get on with it."

Her hair was soft between his fingers, her lips cool against his, and the sunset silhouetted them against the mountain. "I love you," he murmured, trying to savor every moment he could before she went away in the morning.

"I know," she said, her hands at his collar. "I know."

And when they walked back into the banquet hall, her fingers were loosely tangled in his.

a dragon's fall (WOFAF era 3)