The sound of the door opening behind the only-moments-arrived arcanist prompted her to turn around. Her eyes were greeted with the sight of a handsome, high-cheekboned and familiar face, framed by dark hair, looking back at her from the doorway to the room... But this face did not belong to the one she most often saw wearing it.
"You," Aranya acknowledged the shadow priest expressionlessly, and turned away from him to finish laying aside some of her belongings at the foot of the chair that stood close to the quiet, dark fireplace.
"Me," he returned, with a spread of his hands; not at all sorry if she was disappointed to see him, and he strode into the room. "You were expecting someone else." He had said it as a statement, not a question.
"I was expecting no one," rejoined Aranya calmly, not looking at him. Truth. She had thought that she would likely have the better part of an hour to sit with her thoughts, review the contents of one of the notebooks in her satchel, have some solitude before having the pleasure of the company of the person that she wanted to see.
She didn't mind waiting an hour or two for him. Heaven knew that she had left greater time and distance for him to wait upon.
"But you hoped, nonetheless," was Lutero's reply.
Now Aranya slanted a look at him, quirking a brow. "Getting into my head now?"
She couldn't tell if his response was more scoff or sneer. "As if I even need to," he answered, pacing by her general direction. "Every time that you and my brother are in a room together, your eyes light up like nothing else in the world, for him alone." Standing in that familiar characteristic pose, with both hands behind him, he smirkingly asked after about half a minute, "Have you come to break his heart with how long you'll be gone from him this time?"
Aranya's tainted eyes flashed, but she allowed herself no other outward reaction to his words. She would not give him that. "Quite the contrary, I assure you," she replied coolly, assuming a languid posture as she took a seat to lounge across the large, comfortable chair. A flex of her slender fingers brought fire to life in her hand and a flick of her wrist sent it spiraling into the fireplace, where it caught wood and kindling that had already been set, illuminating the room with it's warm, lively glow.
Unbeknownst to the shadow lord, Aranya had more reason than mere wanting to stay rather than go, this time. She had no current obligations to any apprentices, other than Valéria's lessons in enchanting, and no current contracts as yet with any new benefactors. Her collaborations with Shad'ara Felsun were her priority as far as her craft was concerned, barring any official crisis that she might be needed for, and Shad'ara was expecting the birth of her daughter at any day within the month. The summoner and former priestess wasn't going anywhere for the time being, and so - for that matter - neither was Aranya.
"Perhaps it is well that you are here," Lutero's voice rippled through the quiet that yet filled the room. "After all, he's done with far less agreeable distraction than you to fill his time."
Apparently, cutting insults - whether blatant or thinly veiled - were a thing that came as a natural talent to the shadow priest. No matter, the arcanist had patience enough to ignore him. Aranya took a deep breath and let it go, letting her head fall to one side and rest on her hands, draped upon the arm of the chair.
A delicate, caressing sensation trailed down the edge of her pointed ear and along the side of her neck, making her breath catch and her spine stiffen. A glance back over her shoulder showed Lutero to be standing nowhere near her, so he could not have touched her. Yet, the way that he stood, the casual pose of his arms, hands, and fingers - as if he had just made some idle rhetoric - didn't seem right. She followed the slant of his eyes and saw that he was looking at the wall, where the firelight had cast their shadows.
Their shadows... Their shadows had touched...
Lutero flicked his gaze over towards Aranya, the faintest hint of a smirk playing at the edges of his mouth.
Aranya disappeared from her place across the chair, and reappeared in an instant, standing face to face with the younger of the Thorne twins. Her eyes burned like the fel pits that surrounded the volcanic Hand of Gul'dan, but her voice and the expression on her face were deceptively collected, calm, and even giving the impression of being mildly curious as she asked, "Did you have a reason for coming to this room, Lutero?"
A slight tilt of his head was the only reply that she got, at first.
She had referred to him by name.
Few were the times that that ever happened. When speaking with Rhovin, Lutero was typically referred to as "your brother." In the company of his father, he was mentioned as "your other son." Scarcely was his name ever given utterance by her. As if he only had relevance when spoken of in relation to the other two.
As if the relevance of his very existence was... only a shadow.
And even now, she was asking him if that was all that he amounted to. Did he have a purpose for being here? Or was he only there to darken her steps?
A smile crept over Lutero's face, but it was as hard as nails and by no means a real smile. He held the arcanist's gaze, stare for burning stare, and when at last he spoke, his voice was mesmerizingly cold and soft. "I do wonder..." he said, looking briefly behind her, at the flames in the hearth. "Does the fire ever ask the shadows why they choose to appear?" He looked back at her. "Or does it simply know that this is the nature of things? That no matter how brightly it burns, ever-darker the shadows will be that follow it."
Something difficult to place flickered across her eyes at that. Fear? Dismay? Dread? Whatever it was, it was gone again as quickly as it had come, her resolve wavering for no longer than that one fleeting moment, and Lutero was left with only the small victory of knowing that he had somehow touched a nerve.
The 'fire' came back to singe at him, however.
"What are you a shadow of, Lutero?" Aranya queried, her voice every bit as soft and quiet as his had been. "Your father?" Her eyes were fel-sparks in the firelit room. Her words were caustic, despite the softness of her tone. "Your brother...?"
She couldn't stand to look at him anymore. His face was far too similar to Rhovin's, but there was no playfulness, no love in how he looked at her. She couldn't help but wonder if he was even really seeing her, or if all the bitter spite that she saw in him was meant for his twin, but aimed at her. "I don't have to wonder, sometimes, why he pities you."
It was the last thing that she said to him before turning to go.
Aranya was hardly even out the door when she nearly collided with another elf. His face was a near-perfect reflection of the one that she had just turned her back on, but this face was one that lifted her heart into the sky every time that she saw it.
Rhovin.
Overcome with gladness to see him, Aranya rushed forward the last half-pace that was between them, and dissolved into his arms, realizing for the first time just how cold she had felt but a few moments ago, despite the fire that she had lit. As cold as shadows on a moonless night.
Author's note - Originally written Oct 24, 2014. Picks up within a day of Informed Opinions. Shad'ara Felsun belongs to Spicy-Porcupine and Rhovin and Lutero Thorne belong to their writer, and this was also written a few years before the brothers were retconned from being twins to being just an older and younger brother.