The Heirs of Dark and Light

Chapter 46

I'd often been known to let go and free fall, like a cat with a life or two to spare, always landing on my feet. But free falling required a lack of plan, which was something I never went without. Each plunging chasm I threw myself into, I had already gone over every detail of my drop.

What would happen if I started to spin, how to right it.

Even if a big gust of wind came and blew me off course, I would suspend midair, reassessing, recalculating, until I was ready to continue falling.

Some would say it was luck, they would be blind. Blind to each cog whirring around in the overarching machine that was my plan.

Though, I hadn't a plan when I had jumped. Not even a slither of a strategic thought had entered my brain as I'd acted. All I saw was the last flash of emotion that had crossed his face before he had disappeared. He had seen me rip off the metal prison from around my neck and return back to myself, he had seen that and he had looked so blissfully unaware or everything happening to him. He had looked at me and smiled. It had been a small one, barley even a half curve of his mouth but it had been so earth shattering and beautiful that it had erased all traces of my careful instincts.

Now, as he flooded my senses with his scent and the feel of his leathers pushing into my skin, I cursed the idea of my rule book turning me to make any other choice than this one. Any other choice than him.
I felt his hands running through my hair and then down my body, almost like he was checking that this was real, I was real. My shudders must have confirmed it all.

I had jumped and found my way to him.

"Star." He whispered my nickname on a quick breath, it wasn't a question. The way he had said it made it sound like a wish one might make when blowing out candles.

I couldn't bring myself to speak. Any possible words were being lodged in my throat by all the emotions coursing through my body.

This was him. His scent, his voice, his skin. Everything about him screamed familiarity.

An intrusive thought passed through my mind, one that turned my shudders of relief into ones of fear. I thought it was him but I had thought that so many times before.

I looked up, feeling the panic rise.

"Please Elias, tell me this is real. I need to know this is real. I can't- if this isn't real I dont- I can't"

He startled quickly, eyes searching mine, looking for an answer as to why I would ask such a question, why I would believe it's anything but.
He calmed and smoothed a strand of hair from my face. "It's real star."

I searched him for any signs of the darkness, when I couldn't find any, I let my hands relearn the sharp angles and smooth lines of his face and my body relax. This was real, he was real.

And just to check, just to let myself be sure, I pressed my lips to his.

It felt like coming home. It felt like the stars reappearing after only seeing darkness. It felt like the world began to spin again after being stood still.

I noticed the desperation in his lips. The way they moved against mine with vigour, the way I found my own matching his tempo. It was frantic, messy, rushed. We were so close to losing each other and now I felt so close to losing myself in him. But I always felt like that with him, like I was dancing on the edge. I often wandered if I would fall - when.

He sat up, taking me with him whilst his hands ran up and down my body. I could tell by the slow delicate movements that he wasn't relearning the shape of my form, he was searching for injuries. I knew he would find nothing substantial on my exterior, when he only found scrapes and minor cuts he pulled back from the kiss and looked at me, his eyes full of well deserved worry. He looked at me like he was trying to figure it all out, trying to piece it all together.