Author's note: Charity fill for Myaru. And uhm, lots of vague Hatari guessing.
Like Flying
There was something wild, something nearly savage about the way Nailah moved when she was dancing. Perhaps it was in the way her bare toes swept across the stone of the courtyard in fast, measured circles, or the way her arms stretched to the sky as if to pull the stars down to touch her parted lips. It was unlike any dance Rafiel had ever seen, a strange, chaotic movement to the heavy rhythm of the drums and the flicker of the torchlight. It was mesmerizing, tantalizing, hypnotizing, but more than anything, terrifying.
She turned to face him and stretched her painted hands in his direction, beckoning him to come to her side and join the dance. He tried to imagine it – throwing his head back the way she did and letting the keening flutes and throbbing drumbeat, so unlike the twisting melody of a galdr, guide his hands and feet and useless wings. It would be a mockery, a farce, he decided, as he stepped away from the circle and shook his head. Even as a stranger, he could see that this was a dance of joy, of celebration. Rafiel had nothing left to celebrate.
Nailah's lips curled into a grin as she followed his lead, stepping closer and kicking up her heels. She always looked hungry when she smiled at him like that, sharp teeth bared and gaze fixed on his own. She reached out again, grabbing his hands and pulling him toward her with a force he couldn't even try to resist.
"Don't look so frightened," she cooed, her feral smile glinting white in the harsh moonlight as her fingers wrapped tight around his. "I don't bite."
She dragged him to the center, ignoring her kinsmen, and tried to move his fragile body in time with the music. He followed her weakly, arm pointing here, leg swinging there, but his efforts were jagged, hesitant, coarse. He had never felt clumsy before seeing her dance, and now as she urged him to let go, he couldn't help but wonder where that grace the herons were so known for had left him.
The thought slipped away as the throbbing of the drums grew louder in his ears and his feet finally began to understand the rhythm. He moved with none of the wildness that Nailah did, but she didn't seem to care. Her smile only flashed wider as his gentle motions took on the same cadence as her own, quick and almost fluid, despite his restraint, beneath the glow of the fires.
"There, see? It isn't so hard."
Rafiel couldn't find the words to answer her. He could only nod as her fingers ran through his hair and down his face, her hips still swinging in time to the music. She pulled him close again and threw herself into the motions, fast and frenzied and so utterly free that he couldn't help but let go himself, if only for just a moment. He couldn't say where his feet were going or why it felt so good to swing his head and reach up to the sky. Perhaps, after all, there was joy left in him yet, though not the wild, chaotic joy he heard in Nailah's unleashed cries. He couldn't quite understand why, but he wondered if it might be because dancing felt almost like flying again.