“What are they?” he asked, watching as a brown one, lacking in rich colours, flapped around her hair. “I have seen these before, but never in the Veil. Only on the surface.”
And since he and Aleron were often distracted in their play with one another, they often didn’t notice the tiny fluttering creatures until they were fleeing.
He’d seen many of them today, but that was because he’d disturbed the grass they were hiding in. They were always trying to escape, never stopping to play around them.
“They’re called butterflies.” She lifted her hand out to one that flew just above them, like she wanted it to land on her reaching fingertips. “You have to be gentle and patient with them. Let them come to you.”
I do not want to wait for them to come to me. It would be easier if he were to capture one when it was least expecting it.
Yet, when Emerie placed one of her delicate and small hands into his calloused dark-grey palm, he decided to follow her lead. She was touching him, and he was at peace with this because of it.
She backed up to give his hand space, and he held it out with his claws pointing upward. When a butterfly flew near it, he went to follow it until she told him to stay still.
It landed on his face instead.
Ingram stared as it slowly opened and closed its wings on his beak. It was bright blue, with black around the edges. Now that he was looking at it properly, it did look rather small and fragile. Its wings were thin, with its body thinner than his claw tip.
“They say it’s good luck if a butterfly lands on you,” she said with a quiet giggle, drawing his attention to her.
His sight shifted to bright yellow at the many butterflies that were choosing to rest in her hair or on her shoulder. She didn’t seem to notice them there, and he wondered if they were attracted to the brightness of her.
Pretty female. His chest was tight with a strange emotion akin to adoration at the sight of her with multicoloured insects on her.
Like them, she appeared colourful, small, and fragile.
When another butterfly landed on him, this time on the shiny claw of his pointer finger, its orange colouring blended with her hair just behind it.
In all his life, Ingram didn’t think he’d ever experienced such a serene, tranquil moment. He’d never just existed quietly and still with the world, letting it come to him rather than him violently reaching out to inspect it.
Had it not been for Emerie here, he would have squished and killed every butterfly he could just to look at it. His patience had been rewarded.
He attempted to bring his new friend closer, and it fluttered off.
Ingram didn’t mind. Not when he had his own bigger, brighter, and better colourful butterfly. One who had lost all her own new friends as she crawled over to sit between his legs with her back pressing against the inside of his left knee.
It was like she’d known he preferred the comfort of touch, even if it was something as minor as this.
“Emerie, the butterfly has landed on me. Does this mean I shall forever have good luck?” He let out a chuckle, allowing her radiance and his enjoyment of it to seep through him.
Since he’d been hoping for a smile, or maybe for her cheeks to do that reddening thing they did, his head jerked when her brows twitched like she wanted to frown.
“Why do you appear… unsure? Is it bad to be compared to them?”
“Huh, what?” She gave a little laugh as she rubbed at the side of her neck. “No, it’s actually really sweet. It’s just… I’ve never heard you laugh before. I was beginning to think you didn’t know how.”
His sight returned to its normal purple, and he lifted his skull slightly so he could look up at the light-blue sky.
“I have laughed many times.” After watching a fluffy white cloud for a few seconds, trying to remember the last time he’d made such a sound, he eventually sighed. “But no. I have not done so for a long while.”
He darted his skull down when she moved, bringing her knees up so she could wrap her arms around them. She placed her cheek against her knees and, while facing him, asked, “Since your Aleron?”
Although sadness washed over him, his sight didn’t change when a rather big blue butterfly landed on the back of her head. Once more, she didn’t seem to know it was there.
“Yes, since him.”
“Did you guys have a home?”
“A place that I go to rest and be comfortable?” he asked, tilting his head in thought. She nodded, making her friend flap its wings, but it didn’t fly off. “He was my home.”
“No cave or house in a tree?”
“We had no need for this. We slept in whatever place we found ourselves at the beginning of dawn, no matter where it was.”
“Where did you go and visit?”
Ingram tilted his head. “Wherever Aleron wanted to go.”
Emerie rolled her eyes, and yet a smile twitched the corners of her lips. “Okay. Well, where did he want to go?”
He didn’t know why this conversation wasn’t hurting him. Perhaps it was this hill, or her, or their colourful friends. Maybe it was even the warmth on his back from the sun, or the crisp scent of the grass mingling with her pretty aroma.
Either it was something, or everything about this moment, but he felt… tranquil within, despite the cold lingering sadness.
“Wherever I wanted to go,” he answered. When she groaned and rolled her eyes again, he let out another chuckle. “I don’t know what you want me to say, little butterfly.”
“I’m trying to get to know you, dummy,” she grumbled with a pout. “Where you went, what you were doing before I met you, what your hopes and dreams were.”
“Where I went was anywhere that had Aleron. What I was doing was being with him while we played in this world. My dreams were of him, and my hopes were that we would continue to explore.”
She sighed, before burying her face against her knees.
“It’s like you’re saying your entire existence revolved around him. I can’t imagine what it’s like to lose someone that is so completely and utterly the centre of your world.” For a moment, his sight morphed to dark blue, but it only lasted until she turned her face towards him and shone those bright eyes, glinting with sunlight, at him. “What about your other brothers then? The other Duskwalkers?”
“We don’t know them well,” he admitted, his orbs their usual purple. “We always thought Merikh was… mean, but he also named us and let us rest at his home. Kitty was our favourite, as he often played with us. There are two other Mavka, but one did not like us in his territory.” Ingram scratched a claw at the side of his beak, suddenly feeling remarkably… guilty. “It may be because we destroyed part of his home.”
He could remember, very vividly, the day he and Aleron trampled over the impala-horned Mavka’s garden because they were curious about it. He had been lucky the charms around his human dwelling didn’t allow them inside it. So, they’d gone exploring through his garden and tore up plants to sniff and discover their scents, and plucked entire bushes from the ground.
The Mavka had become quite enraged at them, causing a fight involving all three of them – that saw the other one losing to him and his kindred. Then again, it had been an unfair fight. Not that they’d cared, though, since they’d been upset that they had to lick at their wounds.