[ Shockingly, he doesn't pull away from her embrace β rather, he eases into it, going from stillness to a tentative sort of answer, his arm looping gently around her shoulders.
It feels strange to be touched with genuine care, not just lust or desire, or even the threat of violence. He sinks into it the way one would into water, letting any tension leave his body, focusing just on the weight and warmth of her, closing the last fraction of distance between them, his cheek settling against her forehead. He blinks once, twice, in surprise, a little freer in letting uncertainty play out across his face given his would-be audience isn't in a position to see it. ]
You're leaving me rather a lot of room to sing my own praises, [ he hums, then affecting an impression of himself to say, ] 'Of course it's a gift, to have won the affection of the most devastatingly beautiful vampire to walk this earth.' Not that I don't think of myself as such, but ...
[ His fingertips travel from her shoulder to the nape of her neck, the movement slow and ponderous. Is is such a gift, he wonders. With all that they know now β about the Elder Brain, about the Emperor β there's an end in sight to his days in the sun. He can see that clearly, even if he has yet to breathe a word about it to anyone at camp. Perhaps, should he fulfill the ritualβ though he can't say he's exactly missed the general disapproval that notion has prompted. Of course he understands the whys of it, butβ
βbut that's a train of thought to follow some other time. (As for whether or not he'd choose to forget ... it's difficult to say. There's not a single memory of his life under Cazador's boot that brings him joy, but on that same token, he doesn't know who he'd be without it all.)
Instead, he focuses on what he can sense β the rise and fall of her chest, the sound of the water, the faint tickle of her breath, her hair. Tokens to hide away, to keep. When he speaks again, it's without pretense; plain, unadorned, quiet. Everything he chooses not to be, in the day-to-day. ]
Don't sell yourself too short. It isn't as though you haven't given me a gift, in return.
LMAOOOOOO delivered in that cadence exactly π
It feels strange to be touched with genuine care, not just lust or desire, or even the threat of violence. He sinks into it the way one would into water, letting any tension leave his body, focusing just on the weight and warmth of her, closing the last fraction of distance between them, his cheek settling against her forehead. He blinks once, twice, in surprise, a little freer in letting uncertainty play out across his face given his would-be audience isn't in a position to see it. ]
You're leaving me rather a lot of room to sing my own praises, [ he hums, then affecting an impression of himself to say, ] 'Of course it's a gift, to have won the affection of the most devastatingly beautiful vampire to walk this earth.' Not that I don't think of myself as such, but ...
[ His fingertips travel from her shoulder to the nape of her neck, the movement slow and ponderous. Is is such a gift, he wonders. With all that they know now β about the Elder Brain, about the Emperor β there's an end in sight to his days in the sun. He can see that clearly, even if he has yet to breathe a word about it to anyone at camp. Perhaps, should he fulfill the ritualβ though he can't say he's exactly missed the general disapproval that notion has prompted. Of course he understands the whys of it, butβ
βbut that's a train of thought to follow some other time. (As for whether or not he'd choose to forget ... it's difficult to say. There's not a single memory of his life under Cazador's boot that brings him joy, but on that same token, he doesn't know who he'd be without it all.)
Instead, he focuses on what he can sense β the rise and fall of her chest, the sound of the water, the faint tickle of her breath, her hair. Tokens to hide away, to keep. When he speaks again, it's without pretense; plain, unadorned, quiet. Everything he chooses not to be, in the day-to-day. ]
Don't sell yourself too short. It isn't as though you haven't given me a gift, in return.