#i'm so weak for ray of sunshine/sad and tortured ship dynamics

[idealistsinc]

16 // crane

n.  any large wading bird of the family Gruidae, characterized by long legs, bill, and neck and an elevated hind toe wc: 717

"It’s a lovely evening, isn’t it?”

Summer had at last bloomed in Tailfeather—which was to say, the air still nipped like the first gasp of spring. Despite the chill, she wore a dress that bared her shoulders, hand-embroidered with a delicate pattern of small, yellow flowers. Khaizo kept his eyes firmly on the purple shadows cast by the caelumtrees and the peeking buds scattered among the stout, gnarled shrubbery, resisting the pull of a habitual, easy melancholy. “Mm.”

“What a refreshing breeze. I don’t blame you for escaping outside—I never imagined so many people would come.” A laugh. “It’s like a furnace in there. I haven’t felt so overwarm for years.”

The people of Tailfeather had little cause to celebrate before, pinned between the Dravanian horde and a inhospitable wall of Coerthan ice, struggling to scratch out something resembling a life beyond Ishgard’s oppressive aegis. But with the war ended, more Ishgardians had made the pilgrimage to the edge of Dravanian lands in the name of a peace as tentative as the season. The pessimist in Khaizo waited with bated breath for the collapse. After centuries of festering wounds and frothing blood feuds, that the war could truly be over seemed a stroke of fortune just short of a divine miracle. Too good to be true.

“They needed it,” said Khaizo.

“I think so, too.” Liloie stood quietly a moment in a silence so rare that he glanced her way in spite of himself. Her cheeks were flushed from the warmth in the hall, and a soft smile crinkled the lines by her eyes. “I know this isn’t your sort of event, dear. I appreciate that you came. If you don’t want to stay—”

“No, I’ll stay.” He cleared his throat, diligently ignoring the heat that threatened to rise into his face. “I’m...”

Her smile widened. “Khenbish, are you admitting to having fun? At a party? I may faint dead away.”

Fun was perhaps too strong of a word. But this hall was hers. He saw her care in every flourishing flower, in the energy of the musicians she’d rustled up from among the hunters’ ranks. Leaning against the wall, watching the frenetic swirl of celebrants, Liloie in their center like a polestar, he had felt nearly as he had a decade ago in that tiny cottage kitchen: something a little too close to hopeful.

He had wished her happiness before he left—had imagined its shape during his darkest moments in torturous detail. Perhaps a marriage repaired, ensconced again behind stone walls Khaizo would never cross (so he thought), again held aloft above the grassroots community her presence once nourished. But that had been a petty jealousy and a cruel disservice to the woman he knew. When she danced tonight in the hall, unburdened and unfettered, with wide, graceful sweeps of her arms like wings, he saw in her the joy he had dreamed of welling not from marriage, not from him, but from something she had built for herself and herself alone.

After everything, his own happiness was too much to hope for. Better that she found it far away from him. 

But he still...

“You organized this well.” Compliments never came easily to Khaizo; he stared stubbornly over her head, the words like rocks in his mouth. “And your dancing was...nice.”

He heard her amusement mingling with genuine pleasure in her voice. “Thank you. I used to dance when I was a girl—it’s been a long time. You know, I wonder if I can still...” Liloie took a deep breath, rocking on her heels, and then rose carefully on her toes: chin lifted, spine fluid, her neck long and elegant, as poised as a crane in the heartbeat before the flight. It was—impressive. Khaizo chose not to acknowledge any other thoughts he may have had. “Well! For forty-five, I’m not in such terrible shape as I thought—”

Her ankle buckled, and she tumbled forward, with spectacular providence, into Khaizo’s arms. 

No, the universe never relinquished anything for free. But as Liloie laughed away her fluster, brushing imaginary lint from his chest with a flurried touch (”Oh my goodness! I’m sorry, darling—I suppose I won’t be a prima ballerina any time soon.”), Khaizo felt that perhaps contentment, if not joy, was a dream within his reach.

uwu dragon man belongs to @mimiorzea