If he were to be honest, he only felt shock course through his veins.
she stands, with the back of a soldier that has learned to shoulder the weight of a world that hasn't felt the kiss of a silver blade, with the shaking fingertips of a woman that has been burned by morning light and she holds her head as though nothing lies in her heart. she is an enigma, and stars seem to float across broken words when she speaks. "you know, i always believed you would amount to something far greater than a watery death, child."
the mortals call her warm, gentle and loving - but eyes shrouded with pain, the color of molten rock, spell a different verse as her fingers mold climates and her breath is heated with ashen verbs.
"who - what are you?"
"i am a man's daughter, guardian."
he shakes his head, his thoughts are a tumble and whirlwind of mistaken words as she seems to shine and shimmer with a light that seems to rip his skin into burnt ribbons, as her hands flex and her eyes are tired from years of cruelty. she is a broken woman, held together by twigs and spiders webs. "that wasn't what i asked."
when she laughs, it is not a chorus of bells or birds harmonies. it is a mixture of bleeding stars and weeping eyes, where she is found in the mix. supernova's course through flame-ridden veins, and a wolfish need for a challenge is proof in wide eyes. "still, you do not need to know what i am, or what i am made of."
knuckles turn white around a twisted staff, and he finds all but confusion wash across his skin. he does not know this woman - but yet, she seems to familiar in his gaze. her words whisper a different tale, one he does not know, yet knows all at once.
"well - do you at least have a name?"
"no, i am not one for names, regretfully," she answers, and her gaze tilts away in a hidden veil of longing, as if such a concept is something she is not allowed, and her smile pockets sorrow in small curves. he wonders, whether she is truly sad, or maybe a statue that shines broken eyes. she turns, with the grace of a swan in flightless fingers, and she is back to the soldier she arrived as. "but, if it is a name you wish for, many mortals and spirits alike, know me as the sun."
ice blinks in his eyes, and his mouth curls in shock. the sun. he was not aware that such a being, so alike the man in the moon, even existed. that someone, that melted away his snow, that brought everyone such joy, could seem so sad, despite the warmth she exuded.
"the...the sun? what..."
"there are more of us elder beings, jack," his name is whispered soft in broken chords, and he decides that it is a melody he wants to hear again, "and we have watched from afar, in heavens that many mortals could not dare to reach, and i wanted to pass on a message to a dear friend of mine."
he is not stupid, and his gaze flickers upwards to the bloated orb that hangs in the sky. his brow crumbles, much like how troy was destroyed, once upon a time. in fire. in chaos. does such a scene play out on iced features? "the man in the moon, he doesn't talk to me. you'd do better with north."
mischief clouds her eyes and she walks, when he finally notices. her body is not strong, not held with the bricks he thought it was. her throat is bruised and her fingers are numb from the cold, but then again, she is used to a much warmer climate. her grace is merely a front, as she is a girl held deeply in a woman's skin. "perhaps, but i know he holds a favoritism for you. also, he believes that there is much more than meets the eye when it comes to you, little guardian."
little? he feels anger tear at his throat, feels shock claw at his empty stomach. still, he has not reveled in the fact that such a being is talking to him, much more than the riddles that the man in the moon whispers on shattered winds. much more personal, and he wonders why.
"is that the only reason?" despite the power that flows from warm skin; forget how her smile is a knitted image that spiders weave, he challenges her words. "because if the man in the moon really favored me, over every other spirit, he wouldn't have left me. he'd have at least said something."
but her smile dashes at his desperation, as the boy he fought to hide for years shows a muddied face, as the sun seems to coax every lie and insecurity from his hands until he is merely a shell.
"but he did - did he not?"
"a name isn't much."
"but it is something," she is soft between gnarled trees and broken branches, yet she shies away from him, as if he is something unbidden, something that is banned to her. "and yet he see's something in you. there is more jack, so much more."
he turns his back on the sun, his ears filter away her pleas. the sun was not meant to be a spirit, to not be like the deity that created him. she is a star, a ball of burning flames that once, in a far off Grecian tale, a man flew too close and got burned. she is not gentle, she is cruel and no one believes the painful truth of it.
"no!" the pain is evident in his anger as he twists, a violent cyclone of hate and bewilderment, because not only is she here, the sun, she should not be. she should not be telling him there is more to him when he does not know it. "no, there...there isn't anything! there can't be."
"there is, and i'm so sorry that you must learn it this way."
"but why now, why could he not tell me himself?"
"the moon is merely a teacher, a guider, for when times run dark," she answers, and he can practically feel the pulse of her blood in the curves of his fingers, in the intricate labyrinth of his body. there is a beat, and she speaks. "when men cannot see the darkness during the day, he is to guide them through it when it is night. but you do not see night like others, you laugh at it like a child. but then again, you are only a child."
he blinks at her reasoning, at how a woman that holds power beyond what he can believe, stands and tries to reason with a boy that only knows fun. but she is wrong, wrong, wrong. because if he were truly a favorite of the moon, then why let a child die when he gloats he rescues children from nightmares and men under beds?
she continues. "but still, i see what he see's. please, do not damn this existence. she was never yours -"
"don't talk about my sister!" his voice is loud, the pain heavy on his enunciated words and the rain has nothing against the water that chokes him, against the fire that burns his skin from the inside. she is the sun, but she is not warm.
the sun sighs, a mournful chord, but jack is not hit by it. he is merely ice to her fire, merely anger to her understanding. she knows of lost love, of never being able to touch them again.
"i apologize. it was not my place, but...i can see, what he see's," she murmurs thoughtfully, her eyes cast no shadows of anger across his frame, which has now twisted into folded arms and heavy breaths. this is not how he usually acts, and he does not care. she pulls her words together with all the force of an army in her throat. "i see him in you."
"is that the message? is that all?"
she laughs at the accusatory tone that pierces his words. but her eyes are old when she turns to him and they reflect every life she's ever watches, perched in the heavens. "no, that is not the message i wanted to convey. i can see i've angered you."
his own laugh is humorless, it's absence of light and fun makes it hollow. he watches her flinch and wonders why on earth she did so. he doesn't answer, but the silence is all she needs.
she's soft when she sighs, and suddenly, she is only arm's length away. she looks inviting and warm, but he knows better than the pull at honeysuckle hands. "jack...may i tell you a story?"
the curiosity peels off of cold skin, and freezes icicles in the air between them. she swallows a smile gracefully, and when her fingers scrape along the muted scars of his arms beneath fabric, he feels warm for the first time in centuries. he doesn't know whether he likes it.
"years before human's lived, there was a race, called incha. much larger and fulfilling than the race of humans. we lived in a world of magic and childlike love, where hearts could capture wings between each beat," her smile is fond, and jack feels the world press onto his chest when he see's the untapped loneliness that splits through her teeth. "but, this was long ago, and i often find myself dipping into memories that cause more pain than happiness. do you ever do this yourself?"
her curiosity is new. "yes."
her smile is wide. "i thought so, and this particular story is one of those memories. in another life, before this existence, i was a girl. i don't remember my name or my mother's face, but i'd like to believe that i was kind and understanding, though, telling by this night's events, i may have lost some of that," judging by jack's amused smile, she has not failed in her tribulations. "but, there is one thing i remember. a boy, much like myself, with eyes that i recall myself calling 'heaven's stars' more often than enough."
suddenly, he's listening, more so than he has done this entire evening. when she laughs, a smile cracks along his cheeks, and her eyes are bright than the flames that lick at her fingertips. a world of wonder drips from her lips.
"he was, as many humans say, my best friend. we grew up together. but...as a woman, i was not allowed the one simple pleasure of the man i love, he was beyond me in status and maturity. yet, he loved me, as i did him," suddenly, she's turning and jack rears back from her eyes as her breath ghosts along his lips. he did not mean to be pulled into her like gravity. but she is far, far away, in the eyes of a boy from millennium before. "but love does not heal wounds."
"i don't understand - how did...?"
are there tears in her eyes? he doesn't know as molten pupils hide them so well in crevices and caves that stretch along her skin. "but, throughout everything, i bore the light and love that, apparently, the sun grew envious of, that though my heart was broken, i still remained so bright in the face of such pain. so, as i grew older, and died, the sun gave me a new birth, a new life. it gave me it's power, embraced me inside of it's core. the love i held for that boy was what made me what i am now, jack. i was meant for more than a human being, and so was he."
the confusion settles in once more, blinds and binds his heart in constricting knots and locks. she is strong and weak, and powerful and powerless, wrapped in one ethereal shell that cracks when the light is too bright inside of her soul. when she is too gentle, too tough, much to anything to be real. he finds a girl, wreathed in flames.
"what do you mean?"
she is calm and collected when she speaks, and he finds the heat of the sun floods back into her after being so close to the personification of winter. ice prickles his heart. "my message, it is for the boy that i lost so many years ago."
his heart thuds against the clockwork of ribs, pumps the blood faster and makes his head dizzy. the world is hard on his chest now, and he struggles to find breath in creaking lungs.
her gaze turns upwards momentarily, and the orb that hangs precariously on shifting clouds and star light breath seems to throb as her eyes skim the surface. she turns back to him, and there is fire in her eyes once more with her love. "i die every night, to let him breath, as he does for me. through you, he see's the message. you are my message, jack, and i thank you for listening."
then, suddenly, she is a whistle on the fingers of the wind, she is ghost lost beneath sheets of white. the cold is back, and for once, he does not feel invited into it's numbing embrace. arms wind around a slim body, and she is gone from his grasp, on the other side of the world, another orb that expels warmth whilst the moon expels guidance.
he understands, now, what it is like to loved and lost. because, in two separate heavens, two lovers are lost, separated by breath and death. he understands now. for the sun loved the moon so much, she died to let him breath.