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He smells sand and sunshine. Lavender and honey. It is the familiar smell of his homeworld, and more. The planet he knew, the mother he had, the freedom he gained. Something he thought he hated; something he loved. It was a scent he found only in his dreams, one he wished to smell once more the instant he woke up from. And a nightmare he hoped to never have again.
No. It was something else.
Lily.
Smooth and pure like the lilac gardens on the planet Morkuska. Soft like the flowers she had plucked and skipped over to pull his hair back and place behind his ear. Sweet like the suckles they had shared, that remained as rich and sugary as the moment they had pulled it from its vine.
The lone sun beat down on them, glistening their skin until it turned red and sore to the touch. His skin could be blood red if it meant he could watch her hair shine like silk, a deep dark color he couldn't describe other than like the dim light he imagined in the furthest section of the Outer Rim. A pitch black that made her seem like a blank canvas, for the whole galaxy to reflect off of.
She was the universe, and her smile was the center point around which everything else created its axis.
Bronze skin a few shades darker than the tan of his clothes. The sun beat down, and every inch of her glows. Her hair, her skin, her smile. She is radiant, every breath of air she inhales. She glimmers, the sight of her tattooing his eyes.
Like the bright glint he meets in her eyes of whiskey.
In this light, she is her own. She is ethereal. It seems to him that the only reason the grass beneath her grew was so that she could lay on it at this very moment, across from him. That the air between them existed only to spite him the distance. That the sun in the sky rose only because it knew it would meet her dark eyes and turn them into shimmering spheres of gold.
She could command an army of all men, all united in admiration of her. She could lead millions.
If the galaxy could see her now, no one would call the Lyra angels.
She made Mercilé and her whole species pale in comparison.
The only one who could fit such a divine description would be her, and her image in this moment. If she spoke a word to him while she looked like that, he'd melt underneath that stare of gold.
They'd blame it on the sun, not ever knowing the sight he had seen at that moment. They do not see her beauty, like he does. They do not trust her, like he does. They do not know her, like he does.
They don't deserve her like he does.
"We could stay out here, you know?" she whispers across the field, wind and petals meeting his ears as her voice coaxes every ounce of doubt in his mind. "We could stay all day, without them ever knowing we were out here."
