Commission: Snow Heart Eyes

I really enjoyed doing this commission for @Luna_3391 on Twitter. She makes beautiful art and I think you should go look at it.

*

Eirose's breath comes out in rich plumes. He shudders, partly because he's cold, and partly from distaste. Why the people of Skycrest chose to build this far north, why anyone would, he'll never understand. His boots clump messily through the snow, and the mugs of tea he's carrying slop their contents onto his mittens, ridiculously hot, then ridiculously chilly.

"You know, I hear you coming," says Rain.

"Pfft. That would concern me if I had meant to sneak up on you." Though how anyone could possibly sneak through the knee-deep white... stuff on the ground, he has no idea. He pushes a mug of tea at her over the tumbled stones. She's sitting on one of them. He can't begin to imagine how cold she must be. "You're not wearing your coat."

"I've got a jacket on," she snips--that's the only word for it, snip, her cross tone sharp as the cold. But she takes the mug and wraps her own mittens around it.

"I'm freezing my wings off and you're wearing a jacket."

"My blood's thick enough."

"Mm." He struggles over the stones of the fallen keep, slipping on snow and trying to keep the remaining tea inside his mug. "Don't suppose you could help me."

"It's more fun to watch you," she says, but she holds out her hand for his mug.

He puts a hand in it instead.

A little crease appears between her brows, but she doesn't take her hand away; she steadies him into the scattered ring of stones, mounded with snow, that used to be the keep. He tries not to watch her while he's making his way in, but he can't help it, and his foot slides out from under him.

"Ack!" he says, falling, and then "ouch!" when he lands on his butt, spilling every drop of the tea.

He can't be too upset, though his pride aches. She's laughing in that way she has, the way that makes her shine, and it's even more beautiful in the moonlight, in the starlight. Her hair looks bright white, and she glows.

"Go on, then," he says, trying not to sound like he worships her. "Laugh at the tropical bird man on his bottom in the snow."

She keeps laughing, longer than the joke is worth. It isn't an unkind laugh, not really. "I'm enjoying the sight of your feathers getting ruffled for once," she admits, chuckling, and stands. Offers both hands to him now, a graceful gesture of welcome.

He takes them both, and she helps him rise. He's coated from the waist down in snow. Once he's up, he flaps his feathers, dusts snow from his pants.

She steps in and brushes a little snow from his hair. Suddenly, his lungs don't work.

"Clumsy," she says, so gently, so wickedly.

He feels a terrible urge to defend himself. "I'm not used to this yet."

"I know. But look." She sweeps her arm out to the front, as if to display the landscape.

The keep is at the top of the highest hill for miles, and all around is whiteness as pure as he's ever seen, in rolling billows like waves, coating the pines and frosting the naked branches of other trees. The sky looks like a soft, deep-blue blanket over top, pierced with holes to let light through. And the moon is blazing above, casting silver beams that glance from the snow. A desolate owl cries out a sob that echoes strangely.

"Beautiful," he has to admit.

"Yes."

He looks over at her. She's watching him watch.

"What is it?" she asks.

"If I didn't know better," he says, ears twitching with chagrin and pleasure at once, "I'd think you meant me."

She punches him lightly on the arm, her face darkening. "Pfft."

"Who could blame you?" He turns, poses, preens, spreading his wings high and wide. "I am spectacular."

Her shoulders shake with laughter as she turns away from him. "Don't make me stuff snow down your shirt. I am so tempted right now."

His mouth drops open in horror. That sounds desperately cold and wet. "You wouldn't."

"Oh, I would."

He sniffs, affecting disdain. Has she noticed it's affected? Has she realized yet what he thinks of her? What he feels for her?  He wants her to know, but part of him wants her never to know. He's never sure where he stands with her, especially since his secret was revealed. She was so angry, and it doesn't seem like the right time to make himself so vulnerable to her.

Not that he isn't already. He feels naked around her, though she's never seen him unclothed. He feels raw around her.

She grabs his coat collar, and before he can pull away, what feels like ten pounds of snow slides down his back, between his wings. He squawks, undignified and involuntary, and thrashes.

It feels awful, but it's worth it to him. She's literally doubled over, hair hiding her face, laughing and laughing.

"You," he says, trying to sound sour and, by his own estimation, failing, "are milking this beyond all reason."

"It's hard not to," she gasps. "You're just so cute when you're complaining about the weather!"

Scowling, he scoops up a pile of snow and drops it onto her head so quickly he doesn't feel the cold through wet mittens. She lets out a squawk of her own, but keeps laughing even while she shakes white snow out of her white-moonglow hair.

"Now who's the cute one?" he demands, almost angry with her for being so... so beautiful. Who gave her the right?

She laughs herself to a gasping stop. "Still you," she says, and launches into a fit of the giggles.

"No, I'm the cold one."

"Fair enough. Ah..." She wipes tears from her eyes, sobering. "Eirose, I wish you'd told me the truth."

This again, is it? He feels a little ill. "I had my reasons."

"I'm starting to see that, but it hurt me. It still hurts me that you lied."

He turns away, tucking his wings around him--for warmth, he tells himself, but deep down he knows he would rather cut them off than hurt her. "I had my reasons," he repeats.

"You already--"

"But," he interrupts her, "I'm sorry for the pain I caused you. I am more sorry than I can say."

"What about Tobias and Ark, huh?"

"Of course, Tobias and Ark. I never meant to hurt anyone. Mostly you, though," he admits. It's a revelation to him; he knows it even as the words roll off his tongue, but before that, he didn't

really understand how precious she is to him. He turns to face her. "Mostly you, because I wanted most for you to trust me. To--to care for me."

She looks away from him, down.

He reaches for her hand, but she folds her arms.

"I wanted to trust you most, too," she says, very quietly. It's almost lost in the heaps of snow.

He reaches again, for her arms, but she steps back.

"It's more than that."

"Then what is it? I--"

"I wanted you to trust me most."

Anger boils in his guts, but he bites back his shout.

"I wanted to think you'd trust me with your life, but you didn't."

"I was meant to tell you, then? Expose my people? It wasn't always my secret to tell, Rain."

She pushes her hair back from her face, lifts her chin. Her look pins his wings out like a butterfly on a board. "If you trusted me, that wouldn't even be a consideration. I would never--"

"No, but you would have treated me differently."

"No! I wouldn't have!"

"Look at how you've treated me since you found out," he shoots back.

She fires a glare at him, so intense he swears he can feel snow melt around him. "That wasn't because of what you are! It's because you hid it from me!"

"Then there's no chance, is there?" He tries to shrug, but it probably looks more like a slump. It hurts more than he thought it would to say, "No chance for us."

"No, I--" She stops herself this time, shakes her head, though he doesn't know at what. "I didn't say that," she mumbles. Her cheeks are redder than they were a moment ago.

"So." He can't help smiling, even though a wind lifts past them from the back, slicing through his wet clothes. "There is a chance."

Her posture loosens, unwillingly, he thinks. Giving up, or relaxing? Her chest expands with a breath.

"There's a chance," she says. With her eyes closed, as if hiding from it.

"Are you sure?"

She shakes her head, slow, but she says, "I'm sure. I guess I understand why you hid it from everyone."

There's nothing he can say to make this better, and for once he doesn't say anything. Keeps his mouth shut, where before he would've said something like, 'Of course you understand. I was right.'

"I still don't think you should've lied to me," she says. "Especially once you knew me. I can understand. But Eirose?"

"Yes?"

"Never lie to me again," she says, and shoves him.

He takes the shove as his due, and falls on his bottom again, harder than he'd thought he would. He doesn't get up, but says, "I won't."

"All right then." She offers her hand to help him up.

Seized by a sudden wicked idea, he puts his hand in hers and tugs her down on top of him. She's heavy with muscle--but she laughs again, and her warmth penetrates her jacket. Her lips are soft and cold. Who made the first move toward kissing isn't important. Her lips are soft and cold, and the inside of her mouth is hot, and she tastes of tea.

When it's over, she rests her forehead against his. Their breaths plume together; he can see where the plumes begin, but when they mix, he can't see an end.

She kisses him again. They're there for a long time, until snow melts through the seat of his pants, until he's sitting on frigid stone.

"You must be cold," she says, touching him with a mittened hand. The aurora begins its spectacular show above, throwing green and violet light across her face. She looks haunted, almost frighteningly beautiful.

"I hadn't really considered," he says honestly, "but now that you mention it, yes, I'm half-frozen."

"Let's go in where it's warm. Well. Warmer." Her lips tilt up, full and soft, and her smile overflows with promise. She rises and offers her help again, and he takes it.

Dazzling light and color plays over them as they walk back, hand in hand. Later they'll remember the mugs--but only later.