Harp's Song

Part III

"You're improving, I see."

Harp looked down at the sound of the voice. "Still avoiding the rain too." Sitar was smiling, hands on his hips over his plain white robe.

Harp returned his smile and shrugged slightly. "Yeah. That won't change, I expect."

Sitar rolled his eyes a bit, his own instrument appearing between his open hands on cue. "If I can't expect you to come down here, may I join you up there?"

Harp nodded. "Of course." Scooting to one side of the cloud ledge, he made room for Sitar, who spared no second opening his own expansive wings behind him. Three strong beats of his feathered appendages and Sitar was finding a comfortable position, crossing his legs near the edge's drop off.

"You found it then, your muse," he commented. "That much is obvious from what I just heard."

Harp nodded, his expression turning pensive. "I think so, yes."

"Good," Sitar returned. "You're starting to grow on me. It'd have been a shame if Conductor got you expelled."

"Yeah…" Harp trailed off, biting his lip a little in thought. Between his own legs, the harp he was playing began to flicker as he lost focus on it. Sitar's was completely solid, on the other hand. The older angel's fingers were flexing over it experimentally, as though considering a choice of chords.

"Sitar," Harp said, his voice upturned in a question. "Is…is your muse Zexion sad very often?"

Sitar looked up, an eyebrow raised. "Not particularly, to my knowledge," he said. "I'd say he's more academic than anything." There was a pause, as he chuckled a little, reaching to run his fingers through his dirty blond hair.

"He's a pretty boring human, actually."

That didn't explain why he was important enough to be Sitar's muse, but the younger angel wasn't thinking along those lines at the moment. Instead, Harp's wings drooped a little. "Oh."

"Why?" The navy winged angel's eyebrow rose again like a wave against his forehead.

Instrument now completely gone, Harp re-situated himself onto his back, propped up by his elbows. "The human I encountered is very sad," Harp said simply, unsure how to elaborate. "His eyes watered and I could feel it in my chest."

"Tears," Sitar corrected almost automatically. "He must've been crying."

"Tears," Harp echoed.

"Humans cry for many reasons. A lot of times they're sad, but they can do it when they're really happy too."

"That's confusing," Harp said, his expression utterly bewildered. "How do they tell the difference when they don't feel one another like we can?"

Sitar shrugged a little. "Context, usually. If they've just had their arm cut off, for example, they're probably sad or some equivalent closer to it than happiness. There's also this delightful habit they have, called cursing. It can be quite comical."

"Sounds hilarious," Harp returned, allowing himself to drop fully into the cloud's cushioning floor.

"Oh ho! Who's learning sarcasm? I'm a good teacher." Sitar grinned and began to strum his instrument in upbeat tones.

Harp didn't respond immediately. His thoughts were elsewhere, on red hair and green eyes. For a time, he simply listened to Sitar's song, allowing the contented melody to wash over him.

He wanted to see the human again, but what was strange was he also wanted to talk to him. Maybe. At the very least, he wanted to look at more of those images of him and the blond-haired blue-eyed lookalike.