A/N: Done for the fe_fest community challenge at LJ. Prompt: Lehran/Sanaki - "I cannot touch thy lips, they are not mine." This came out completely different than I intended, though that's quite possibly because I don't even know what I was intending in the first place. Oh, well.

Words: 1342
Characters: Lehran, Sanaki
Time: Post-Radiant Dawn
Genre: General/Angst

Disclaimer: Everything you recognize belongs to Nintendo, not me.

Incense and candles burned like so many fluttering moths amongst the grand hallways of Mainal Cathedral. They cast an eerie, somber aura over the place, made none the cheerier by the shadows that danced ghost-like across the floors and walls, surrounding the robed figure as he walked with purpose but not with grace.

The torch brackets on the walls were conspicuously empty. Bereft of their usual flaming illumination, the doors and corridors would have been difficult to discern had he not treaded this path so often that it was ingrained in him more powerfully than a memory. It was by instinct, now, that he walked this path.

If all had been as it should have been, he would have passed guards, possibly those two incurably obstinate ladies, Sigrun and Tanith. As it was, however, the halls were clear. No doubt the Empress had sent them away. Ever since she had been old enough to think, to comprehend, and to give commands, she had done so ever so soundly on this night, leaving herself alone in her imagined memories. It was for this reason that he chose tonight to return to her. There was no one there to stop him.

As he grew closer to her quarters, his steps grew lighter; his wings unconsciously, gently, lifted each of his steps into a brushing glide. She heard nothing until he entered the room. In her wide antechamber, there was one west-facing window, and it was in that sill that she sat, curled with her hands around her bent knees, her cheek touching the cold glass. A full moon glimmered above her head. Patchy clouds dappled her in starlight.

"I commanded you to leave me tonight," she said in a voice as cold as distant as the moon itself.

"You gave me no such command, my empress," said Lehran.

Even from a distance, he saw her body stiffen. Her demeanor, previously one of forlorn repose, was now one of unwarranted severity, her back forced straight and her fingernails digging in to her knees. It was a wonder, she thought, that after months of his absence, his complete removal from all parts of life her life save for her dreams, that he should be here speaking to her as coolly and as calmly as if nothing had changed.

"I am not your empress any longer," Sanaki said. "I do not keep company with liars."

"Has Bengion lost all its senators, then? Quite a drastic but admirable move, Empress."

"You'll remember I killed all the dishonest ones," she hissed.

By now, he was much closer to her; she could feel it in the heat emanating from his body and the gentle, musky scent of his feathers. She heard the rustle of robes as he knelt, so their faces were nearly level. Still she did not look at him. Her gaze remained fixed on the distant trees.

"Are you going to kill me, Sanaki?" Lehran whispered in her ear.

She spoke through lips that barely moved. "It is – as of yet – indeterminate. A possibility. Do not irk me, Lehran. Your mere presence here is a violation of the terms I set for your banishment."

But her shoulders quavered now, and she could not keep up the pretense for much longer, she knew. She longed to look at him again, to see those tranquil features that had given her hope and joy and comfort through her youth, to see them unmarred by the madness that had overtaken him in the Tower of Guidance. She remembered every detail of his face, every glitter in his eye… She had not, however, seen his wings very often. She had never felt his feathers. Curiosity burned through her as surely as her memories.

"I could not resist, Sanaki. I knew, on this night, you would be alone."

"And perhaps more malleable to your wishes, then, if I am free of others' bothersome advice?"

"Oh, no. I just thought that I would be less likely to be killed on the way here. I had no wish in coming here other than to see you."

"Then you have seen me. You are free to leave."

"To see your face," amended Lehran. "Your eyes, Sanaki…"

Finally she turned to face him. She felt the tears burning under her gaze, but she did not try to impede them; it was a hopeless task. He looked exactly as he always did if she did not focus on the feathered black wings curved elegantly behind his head. Exactly the same, she realized, as he had looked for eight hundred years. Of its own accord, her hand reached out to his shadowed face, to make sure he was not a moonlit wraith conjured by her mind. He was indeed flesh before her. His cheek was warm, and her touch elicited a familiar, indulgent smile from him.

"Why have you come back here tonight?" she said, and her fingers curled into a fist. "Why, Sephi – no, Lehran. Why?"

"Because I knew, on this night, you would be alone," he repeated. "You have always done so. To punish yourself, to repent, to ask for forgiveness from the goddess… But now, you have suffered enough. You have offered all your apologies. You have been forgiven, not by the goddess, but by the herons themselves. And you have gone above and beyond even that by returning their home, replenishing its natural bounty… You have nothing more for which to atone. And yet, I knew you would still be here."

A long silence fell between them.

"It is a habit," she whispered at last, rather harshly. "A habit I cannot seem to break. Similar to the habit I have of trusting you. It doesn't go away, despite my better judgment."

"Ritual is a difficult trap to avoid."

Slowly, it seemed, so as not to spook her, Lehran raised his own hand and clasped it over hers still lingering on his cheek, then slid her fingertips down to his lips, where he kissed them gently. "Sanaki, do you remember what we used to do these nights?"

It was a pointless question, and Sanaki did not justify it with an answer that they both already knew. In her determination to forget about him, she had recalled every detail of their time together, then let the knowledge of his treachery taint and poison even the most innocent of memories. She wanted them so stained so deeply that they would be too dark to remember, that they would simply disappear… It had not worked.

"I would read to you in the ancient tongue," he continued. "From old books of mine, or from memory… I would sometimes recite spells, sometimes stories. If I was reading, I would read only by moonlight, or by candles if there was no moon. You refused to allow torches to burn out of remorse for the harm they inflicted upon the forest. You never knew the language I spoke was real. You thought I was inventing it. When you were little, it made you laugh. When you grew older, it made you calm. Sometimes, you would murmur along with me, Sanaki…"

But though he began to whisper, to chant in beautiful rhythm, Sanaki's lips did not move. She allowed herself to close her eyes, to listen, to lean into his touch; but she not attempt to join him as she had done in years past. Her lips, never his to command, were no longer his to even sway or influence, as unconsciously or artlessly as he might have done so. He could not draw those words of forgiveness from her lips, like fragrant honey, his weakness and his desire.

She remained still and silent until morning. Lehran's voice never grew tired. But when daybreak finally came, he fell quiet with good grace. In the frozen, dullish light of dawn, Sanaki stared once more at the distant, disgraced forest, then spoke in her most imperious of voices.

"It is cold, Lehran. Assist the others in returning the torches to their brackets."

"As you wish… my empress."