Moonlight Sonata

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The night is exceptionally dark, the stars and moon appearing very far away. Coniferous tree tops of the Feythorn rush by underneath the shimmering forms of the winged unicorn and her rider. There is no urgency, but anticipation has the fae-woman clutching at the delicate vines in her hands.

Ahead of them, easy enough to spot from the inviting glow that comes from the crossing into her home plane, Merla feels her heart quicken as Astra descends into the Feyverge Valley. When her partner’s hooves touch down she takes a deep breath in and feels something in her stir, awakening from slumber. She lets out a euphoric sigh and the imperial topaz gem in her circlet glows brighter.

Astra kneels down, allowing her mistress to dismount gracefully while looking around. The trees are tall, their bark glistening with silver and blue veins, branches full of maroon coloured leaves. The flowers are not as plentiful as they would be in the warmer months but are still an array of various colours, all bright and alluring.

“We are a bit early,” Merla remarks as she does not see anyone or anything else around.

“This person, Kruxeral, he is important to you,” Astra states, coming over to look at her mistress. She gently bumps her muzzle against Merla’s shoulder, a playful gesture to get her to relax a little and it seems to do the trick. Merla lets out the breath she had not known she was holding in.

“Yes… Yes he is.”

Astra sees flashes of a conversation flit across Merla’s mind before she pulls up her guard. She does not comment on it, but a sliver of mistrust comes to the winged unicorn’s mind. Astra does not share this thought with her mistress however.

“I’m going to play some music to pass the time until he arrives,” Merla declares, moving over to a patch of grass under the boughs of a silver and blue vined apple tree. It’s branches are weighted down with ripe golden fruit, many within easy reach. Merla ignores these low hanging temptations. Unlimbering her harp from her side she leans against the thick trunk and softly starts to play a lilting waltz.

The quiet notes from the harp are muffled further by the dense leaves above, and as each harmonic layer is added in the clearing Merla sat in it became its own private concert hall. It was an old song, simple in each individual line, but as both hands worked together the beat was almost lost as each voice seemed to tell its own, slightly melancholy version of the melody. As the piece came to a soft end, a voice spoke out, even more gently.

“Every time. Every song, more beautiful than the last,” Kruxeral said, standing leaning against the same tree just a few feet away. He was speaking quietly and for once the tone – and the face as she saw him – was neither mischievous or angry, but sad and calm. He dropped to a knee beside her, taking in Merla’s face and form.

Was that wonder in his eyes?

“It has been… some time.”

“One might say… a lifetime,” Merla admits, an alluring light sparkling in her eyes as she tilts her head to look at him. She carefully puts her harp aside as her eyes roam over his face, taking him in.

Merla had not realised how much she missed Kruxeral until this moment. She looks down to his hands, a desire to reach out to him pulling her forward. But she feels how her fingers tremble by her side. She does not wish to touch him with uncertainty.

“I’m glad you came,” she says softly, a knot detangling itself in her heart. “There are so many things I wish to tell you. And perhaps… there are a few things you may wish to tell me…”

Her hand has moved towards Kruxeral of its own accord. Merla sees this and a soft, half smile touches her lips as a flush appears on her cheeks. But before she can decide what to do or say next, Astra comes forward standing close behind her, looking down at the satyr.

“Ah yes, before… that.” Merla gestures with the hand that had been reaching towards Kruxeral. “This is Astra, my partner and companion. She is Lord Eachthighern’s kin. Astra,” she looks up to her, “this is Kruxeral, my…”

“Incredibly attractive mentor,” he said, a devious grin spreading over his face as he turns to Astra and bows deeply. “It is an honour to meet the one who has been keeping Merla safe all this time, Astra. You two must make quite the sight in the Material Plane. I’m glad you can bring a little more light to their poor mundane lives.”

It was the first smile he flashed since appearing.

Astra returns the bow but a little more reservedly, her spiralling horn beginning to glow.

“We bring light and music wherever we go, Lady Merla and I. It is nice to finally meet you, Kruxeral,” Astra spoke aloud, her tone distant.

Without looking at her mistress she says across their telepathic link, “I will give you some privacy, but will remain close.”

Merla sends her thanks but is curious at this odd behaviour that bordered on rudeness. Astra proudly walks off, moving over to a cluster of bushes that have some rather vibrant magenta berries on them. Merla turns back to Kruxeral and gives him an apologetic smile.

As he stands up again, he takes Merla in just as she had been doing, his expression softening again.

“You’ve changed, little one. Every day you’ve spent away from the Fey seems to transform you more and more into one of them.” His chuckle is a laugh quickly gone. “I wonder if you’ll grow some fur on those legs next. You are… undeniable.”

Was that a flash of fear in his eyes?

He moves over to sit on a tree root, a few feet away, still gazing at her like he is taking in every detail. “Catch me up, Merla. Who are you now, because you’re certainly not the halfling who left me moons ago?”

A flicker of piqued hurt causes her brows to draw down and her lips to press together. She takes a measured breath in and the sweet smell of the forest around her allows Merla’s expression to clear.

“You’re right, I am not the same,” Merla begins, her arms slowly starting to move in a balletic way. “I am si Penaal* who went into the Nine Hells to face the hordes of Avernus in order to stop Zariel from spreading the Blood War to the Material Plane.” Her hands weave through the air. “For a time, I became the Herald of the Raven Queen,” she imparts, looking at him carefully as her feet start to swirl in a subtle dance. “That is until my friends freed me from a cloak that held me entrapped in its talons.”

She spins around, arms reaching up, the iridescent split cape lifting to reveal the dark scars on her back. Merla stops, facing Kruxeral dead on. Slowly, her arms float down to her sides as the swirling fabric of her cape and slit skirts come to a rest. She has gone very still, an intensity to her gaze that charges the space between them with heat.

“I have been an unwitting thief, an unintentional murderer. I have called to the souls of those gone, beckoning for them to return to Life, whilst being exiled from my own home, barred from seeing those I love.”

Sadness and longing flit across her face as Merla looks at Kruxeral.

“I have been a light in the darkness and a song to comfort those who need it most.”

Merla takes a small step towards him. Then another.

“I may have been gone, but I never left you, Kruxeral,” Merla says quietly, her words filled with emotion as her expression flickers between yearning, sadness, confusion and hurt. “It was you who left me, avoiding me all of those times I returned to the Summer Court.”

She stands right in front of him, close enough to touch. Looking deep into his verdant green eyes, Merla wants to know the truth, she wants to mend things, but wonders if it’s even possible. Hoping to the stars above, watching them, that it is.

“Why?”

He instinctively swung back behind the root he was sitting on, the fur on his legs bristling as he breathed out sharply.

“I…,” he hesitated, and that was surely a sign that something was different in this conversation. Kruxeral always had a tale to spin in his defence – especially in his defence. Out of the corner of her eye, Merla catches his hand twitching slightly towards her, as her own had been before.

“I- I was afraid.

“You accumulate titles faster than you accumulate years. The universe spins, and somehow you’re standing in the middle. You were a delight in the Summer Court before, but now you enter it as a warrior, a champion if not for the current circumstances. Merla, you have grown so much and I… have grown so little.” He sags, deflated.

“You ride on Eachingthern’s kin into battle against titans. I plan parties – incredible ones, mind you, but next to the Herald of the Raven Queen… you are glorious, Merla.” He holds his arms out towards her, turned open as if to present her for all the forest to see. “Worthy of and surrounded in glory. I am vainglorious, and every day you burn brighter while I wonder how I could ever deserve you after all that I have done, or not done.”

“You worry about being worthy of me,” Merla begins, seeing the honesty in Kruxeral’s eyes and his insecurity. “Yet I, the Student, want to be your equal, to be able to stand beside you without being a burden.”

This time when she reaches for him, her fingers are steady. The years of music making can be felt in the touch of her skin as Merla takes Kruxeral’s hand.

“You protected me, guided me,” Merla says, tracing a pattern on the palm of his hand as she looks up at him, “watched over me. You taught me music, the greatest gift anyone has ever given me. The joy of Creation.” Her eyes glisten as she brings his hand up to her lips and kisses his palm. “I feel you in every song I sing, every note I play.” She rests her face in his hand, closing her eyes as she breathes in.

It is soft, a familiar melody she has not heard in many moons. But it is different, changed, a variation on a theme with something hidden in the notes. Merla opens her eyes and lifts her left hand up to his face, tracing the familiar lines of his features, entreating him to believe in her.

“You can be more, I know you can. We can grow together, Krux.”

He laughed, first softly and then louder as he looked up at the night sky above them and then back down to her face in his hands.

“And as with all things, those we teach grow up to surpass us, and then inspire us to be better than we were. I’ve told you enough stories that you’d think I would have seen this coming years ago.”

Kruxeral kneels down in front of her, bringing his face close to hers.

“Fine. Fine! You win. We can grow together, as long as we don’t grow old together!” He shudders. “Eternal youth will suit just fine. We can talk about what we have been up to and the great and terrible things we’ve done another time. One day I will apologise to you properly. But!” And at last there was his face again, the knowing grin and sparkling eyes that spoke of all manner of fun. Merla’s heart quickens. “I must be back in the morning. Revelries don’t plan themselves – and so we must make of this night everything we can!”

And he kisses her.

The melody swells around them and Merla feels something akin to a bolt of lightning coursing through her veins. Her softly golden glowing skin suddenly gets brighter as she presses herself close, fingers winding their way into soft brown hair as she melts into Kruxeral’s arms.

One of his strong hands tilts her head back, whilst the other falls to the buckles of her armour. He showers her in kisses as he deftly removes the beautifully crafted, studded leather protecting her body. At the same time, more knots detangle themselves from within her heart, the worry and uncertainty of the past several moons falling away like the pieces of armour and clothing they shed from one another until there’s nothing left but bare skin.

Then Kruxeral stands up, holding Merla in his arms and she lets out a surprised laugh of delight. He looks at her in wonder, taking in her aura of summer radiance, the light from the gem in her circlet casting a hypnotic glow between them. Her hands come up to his face once more, tracing the line of his brow to his horns then down his jaw as she looks into his verdant green eyes, hearing music all around them.

The forest sighs in ecstatic pleasure as the two lay down under the apple tree, the golden fruits pulsing with a new, awakened energy. As their reunited Songs join together to make a symphony, the Feyverge Valley glows a little brighter around them, pushing back the darkness under the cool, watchful gaze of the stars and moon.

---

“When will we meet again?”

The question pushes past her lips, unbidden and hurriedly. Merla does not want to let Kruxeral go, not now that they have finally made amends. And the love making – Oh Great Summer! She has never sung so sweetly before. He knew her wants just as she knew his.

“I’m not sure, given uncertain times,” Kruxeral says. His eyes linger on her, saying more than his words do, though Merla does not see it. She does pause in the act of putting her chemise back on, knowing what it is he is referring to.

Her banishment.

She glances over her shoulder to see desire lighting his features as his eyes drink in the sight of her. The corners of his mouth curve into a smile as he looks back into her eyes.

“But I will try again soon.”

Merla’s smile only goes halfway as she nods, letting the sheer fabric fall down to cover her. Kruxeral keeps stealing glances at her, as she does to him, as the two get dressed. He is faster than her, having less to put on. Merla feels the chill of Winter’s approach trying to push towards them. It makes her movements slower, feeding into her desire to linger in this moment a little longer.

Kruxeral comes up behind her, brushing her gold and pink hair aside to kiss her neck. Merla leans into him, her head resting against his chest over his heart. His hand turns her face up towards his, and Kruxeral looks into her eyes for a long moment before he kisses her deeply, longingly.

The boughs of the apple tree creek with a weighted sigh.

He helps her back into her armour, lingering touches from his calloused hands leaving imprints of warmth on her tanned skin as he fastens each clasp. The moon has set and the stars have begun to wink out, faster and faster with each passing minute. Merla feels time slipping away from them and she wishes she could stop it.

“If anything happens or changes, anything at all, tell me,” she commands, reaching out to pull the satyr towards her. Kruxeral raises an eyebrow at her tone and she softens her voice. “I may be banished, but that won’t stop me from helping in any way I can.”

Kruxeral grins as he brings her hands up to his lips, brushing a kiss over her knuckles.

“Why, in my experience, there’s nothing in this multiverse that can stop you, Merla,” he said. His eyes stay locked with hers as he walks backwards and away, disappearing behind a tree and out of the Material.


*Elvish for “small battlepoet”