"There is never a temporary or fleeting fancy when it comes to the sun's fidelity to the moon." she splashed and he dodged, his head bending down and then pressing forward to give her a splash of his own. "But will the Moon understand that the sun's faithfulness is true and not that of a game to play?" he asked before watching her speak and bound into the waves, but deeper away from him. Would he dare to follow in? He watched a moment as he laughed, his eyes squinting against the sun as he shook his mane since it was stuck to places around his face.

"Yes because that is what the sun does to those it cherishes, It gives them the flames to reignite their soul again and again." he quirks his brow with a snarky grin. The sun beamed onto the tops of the white crests before they crashed against the beach behind him. His ears would momentarily turn to the sounds of the lulling beach waves before flopping back forward as he watched her. "Wrong.." he replies to her about the beauty comment. Beauty always finds a way to last in some way. "Beauty can be found preserved everywhere, in cave art - in the sky - in history that we leave behind. There's beauty everywhere," he tells her before deciding to dive further into a wave that was coming his way.

"And wrong again my lady, for if you should take a look at the stars at night, those stars burn the brightest each night, and yet they have died many many many thousands of years ago. But to us they look as though they are still there, watching us." he jumped again to float across the water in a graceful dance around her, though it was not deep yet here he tucked his legs closer to his bulk so he could swim around her. "And the Moon would not have to look forever as she waits, the Sun will always be right..." he swims closer to her but doesn't touch her "here..." he winks slowly as he kicks his upper body back and his back legs forward - jutting his body backward across the water. "..She'd not wait long at all..." his heart tickled in his chest, the warmth that spread across his face made the water feel cool against his skin as he waded in the water looking at her with a gentle expression.

@Jewel

She laughed, the cool touch of water a contrast to how warm her body felt. The lioness would let him swim around her, opting to remain where her feet could touch the sandy bottom. Jewel enjoyed swimming, but the idea of getting swept to sea was one that terrified her - in her own private thoughts. So, while she might dive into a pond, or a lake.. The ocean was a different beast. The cruel mistress of the sea would just as quickly sweep one out as it would to bring driftwood back to shore. Jewel had been enjoying their banter and the word play.. but she knew that her own witty repertoire of answers was dwindling. And, though the liones wished to continue their game of words and joy.. she didn't want to disappoint her golden knight either. "Then.. we should simply have to watch and let the chase between sun and moon play out, will we not?" Jewel flicked her tails at him, a smile of amusement on her face before she started back towards the shore. This lion, he made her want to leap and play - as she had as a child.. And while it excited, it also left her feeling nervous, a little fearful. Though, she wasn't sure why - the female thought perhaps it was the proximity to the drop off - how deeply she'd explored into the ocean that made her feel such unease. "Tell me, sir knight..Do you often engage in such banter with the females you cross paths with?" Her tone was joking, the glimmer of laughter in her eyes hiding the unease she felt. Jewel was no stranger to the words of the suave - and had to wonder.. was he one of them? Would he get what it was he sought from her and then wander away? @Vasilis

Table coding by Jolee

He courses through the waves, like a fish going over the ledge of a waterfall, it almost felt natural for him to do so, weird? Perhaps. Breathing in the salty air that was very much unfamiliar with since the woodlands only held freshwater within its arms, this was a welcomed change. A well deserved educational adventure might he add. When she spoke about letting them be Vasilis bopped his body near hers as he rounded to her right. "I must say, yes I would like to see what the moon allows the sun to do." he winked. When another wave came crashing near he ducked under - eyes closed tightly as the sting of salt was different than that of the freshwater he was so used to dealing with.

Moments later he came up for air and swam closer to the shore. His paw running his mane back away from his eyes so he could look at her again without straining through wet tendrils. When she asked about his behavior he would laugh a moment. How odd of a question, but he understood why it was asked. Shaking his head and releasing his paw back into the salty depths he coos to her from his distance away. "Actually..no not really. Just with you my Moon dancer." he was serious as he thought back about it. "I am quirky in my expressional playfulness with adults and or kids that need such behaviors to lighten their moods or brighten their days..but the way I am with you....no..not with others just...with you," he added in a whisper. She was the only one he had so far decided to go 'beyond' his limits and try...harder. Was that bad of him to do so? Treat her differently than the rest? But treat her delicately? Lovingly? He didn't think it was so bad to do. He rather liked giving her the attention that he believed she deserved to be showered within.

@Jewel

Jewel followed the lion up to the sands of the beach, the white and golden grains that surrounded her home. The lioness shook herself vigorously, spraying water in every which direction before she made moves to edge upwards, working towards more solid ground. His words had her smiling despite herself, lips twisting into an upward expression of amusement. Still... she worried. Somewhere deep within her soul - she worried that this was simply the golden males way of getting what it was that he wanted. But, what that 'want' was? She couldn't say. The lioness shifted so that she could attempt to bump her shoulder to his - mixing fur for the briefest of moments in golden dawn and ebony of night before she drew away. "One must be careful with such flowery words.. dear knight.." The female looked up at him, her cerulean eyes still sparkling with the mirth and the joy that he had helped to manifest. "The moon might begin to wonder if the sun is indeed courting her - rather than a simple chase through the night sky." While she might be too nervous to ask outright what it was that he had meant with his games and words.. Both of which she had thrown herself into more than readily.. Jewel would still ask whether or not the beast had intended those in a simple game of pretend, or if he had true intentions. Now those, she was interested to see - to find out. Jewel herself was uncertain what it was she wished to find in a mate - or even if this golden lion would be something of the sort to her. Certainly, she had come together in her heats with other males - that is what had given her the darlings that were her sun and her moon.. But something far more tangible and permanent? Well - that she wasn't sure what it was she searched for or even if she searched for something of the like. What the ebony lioness had so far? That worked just fine for her. @Vasilis

Table coding by Jolee

Vasilis would look at her, slumping so that his body crashed in the beach sands, his body would generously be swallowed by the surf as it came in from his back legs to half of his stomach. But he didn't care really that it splashed him as he laid ashore. Breathing in yet again that salty air from the ocean adrift his eyes looked out as he thought. He never really gave much thought to his actions unless it was something that could be hurtful. When she called his words flowery it was the first someone had told him that, was he being too sweet? was he being too enamored with himself? He looked upright to the sky and let his ears fold against his head before popping them back against his mane. "I guess I never thought about if I was being too kind to others. I just wanted them to smile and be happy.." he was saying more to himself aloud than meaning to tell her.

When she shifted on the beach not far from him, his eyes remained on the sun setting now far over the water's surface, the waves turned golden atop their dark blue unknown. When she touched him with her shoulder when she neared, he would lean into her as she spoke about if he was being sincere or not with his actions regarding herself. And well, he was being utterly truthful with anything that he did. It was true to what he said before, that he had not been this way with anyone other than the dark lioness that graced her presence to himself. He shifted a moment so that his legs and buttocks would get out of the reach of the cooling ocean waves. The sound lulling his ears and making him zone out for a moment before coming back to what he was doing. But the hush crashing of waves over the beach and the popping of sea bubbles as they landed on the sand beneath him soothed the light beast as he remained there. He decided this location was not half bad at all, it was ...rather....how to describe this emotion. It was...Remarkable? Breathtaking? Dreamy? There was no one word he could summon to describe this location or for her as a matter of fact.

He flickered his eyes, silent for a moment longer before taking a drawl of air into his mouth. His lips part as he loomed his honey eyes onto her oceanic ones. She had no idea how beautiful she was right then. The way that the sunset was kissing her dark pelt - the way that the air seemed lighter around her. There was a deep wave that crashed over his body that was not that of which belonged to the sea behind him either, it was a weird sensation to describe aloud other than it felt like a wave of tingles. Like the cooling air on your back during a hot summer day, or the way the hot springs felt in the middle of the woodlands during the peaks of Fall. The chill that ran up the spine that gave a spring in your step as you walked.

His father had always told him that the feeling was described as seeing the first spring releasing the newly budding flowers in bloom, or like how the fluttering of butterfly wings taking off in the early morning sunrise. These were both wrong to him. This emotion didn't compare to either of those moments in his life that he had witnessed so many times before. This was something else altogether. He felt as if time had stopped and the air in his lungs had frozen over. When he realized he was staring at her as if he had found the meaning of life by looking at her, he snapped out of his trance to reply back to Jewel. His features softened more as he eased up on his elbows. "I am....the sun....is not one to recklessly woo someone just to mess with their heads, my Moon." he felt that weird feeling takes over him again as he looked at her eyes - he was being one hundred percent real with her. "When I give myself to someone I do it with all intentions of making it last forever until I die. It's not just for that moment or that month or that year..it's forever." He rose up to his toes then. Vasilis would pace himself to come face to face with her. He looked down at her with a loose body posture as he was completely relaxed with her, his eyes seemed to dance alight like the sunset behind him.

@Jewel

"It's not that you are too kind, it's simply that some may take your kindness for an attempt to lull them into a false sense of security.." Jewel shifted as she watched the male land in the water, watched as the foam of the ocean washed over his hide leaving shining golden fur in its wake. She could understand his desire to want others to smile and be happy - was that not the reason she offered her own bit of council to him earlier? To remember his loved ones as they were and not as they ended up being? Jewel shifted, her tails flickering near her ankles as the ebony female watched him turn towards the glimmering expanse of ocean. The touch of his weight against her shoulder had her smiling, and shifting her own weight to support his before he pulled himself from the water. Jewel knew what the other lion was going through when he zoned out, staring at the water.. For she often felt that very same pull from the ocean in these lands. Shifting so that she could come slightly closer - so that her murmered words would be heard over the sound of the surge and pull of the ocean. "It's beautiful.. isn't it?" Her gaze turned towards the cresting waves out in the distance, the seagulls as they cawed overhead. Out in the far distance, she thought she could see a large fish leaping - the last of the sunlight glimmering off its scales. Jewel was unaware of the way the other lion looked at her, and perhaps if she could, she might wonder if he had lost his ever loving mind. She was no angel, nor was she some goddess decended from the heavens. The playful banter that they had lobbed back and forth was simply that - a banter that she had enjoyed.. Or so she had thought. Still, it seemed that the female harbored some sort of feelings for the golden lion, because when she turned to look at him, she saw perhaps something similar to what he saw in her. The ocean a backdrop for the golden dawn that stood outlined in the last dregs of sunlight, his mane dripping pieces of starshine as the droplets sparkled on their way back to the sands. Though she didn't know what it was she felt - her parents were pushed together because that was simply 'the way it was'. Females existed to breed and bear children. Males existed to simly...rise above. It was a life her mother had hated.. and a life Jewel had fought from the moment she could to rise out of. She watched him shift, waited with a breath she was holding because she couldn't otherwise without breaking the spell woven across the pair of them. His words caused a stutter to her heart, they caused a fear to bubble up in her breast and she shifted, almost, but not quite taking a step backwards. Instinct warred with reason - they were just words.. they held no power, yet here she stood ready to bolt, to run and to try her hardest to escape. "And what if I am some evil creature destined to rip the wings off flies?" She had dropped the sun and moon euphamisms in her desire to ensure that they were in fact talking of the same thing. "How is it that you can give yourself to me... when you... when you barely know me?" Ears fell, plastering against her skull. The truth of the matter - the fact she struggled to hide was that she had felt the same stirring of emotions that he had.. and while he embraced them whole heartedly, The ebony female shied away from them. Her life had been nothing but a constant battle, usually uphill.. She was a being born of blood and fang.. And he a beast running from that very thing. Fire had consumed his homeland.. battle had consumed hers. Both were equally destructive and bloody in their wake. "Diuris... I...I lead a dangerous life." She was a lioness, leading a pride - she was raising her children to be independent, to rely on each other and family - but to care for themselves. She knew that this world - this island was not for the faint of heart. "I..Don't know if I can offer you what it is you seek..I'm not one to run.. I won't hide.." Naturally - there were reasons to break those rules, but in the few conversations they had had together.. She wondered if her lifestyle would be one that he would truly be content in. "Can you truly be happy with that? With .. sharing this life with me? I started this pride by the strength of my fangs and the power of my claws.. I stained these lands with blood.." A step was taken, finally, and she took it backwards, her head lowering and her ears falling to the sides. "I fear you are giving yourself to the wrong female - to a lioness with a rage so deep that it can cut a swath in blood under the right circumstances.. A monster that you will someday see and run from." She wanted him to be okay with them - with her. But she also wanted.. No. She needed the lion to understand that the life she had chosen, the life she now led was not one of rainbows and kitten tails. It was not easy, and would likely in the coming months stain the sands red with blood over and over again. She knew in her heart that her hide would be torn asunder time and time again, that her own blood would be the nectar that fed flowers and grass alike across this realm. It was the life she had chosen - it was what she had undertaken so her children would live free. It was the path she had set herself on when she saw her mother used, and tossed aside. "I fear you will only end up hurt..or worse." Disgusted because he had chosen her. @Vasilis""

irish

Her words etched into his ears again and they stuck as always. He had not thought that perhaps they would make him give others a false sense of longing, and that was in no way what he wanted them to feel like he was doing with his actions and behavior. He thought on himself for a moment, perhaps he had to dwindle down on his kindness to others - maybe he should not be so open and foolish either, perhaps he should remind himself of his father's comings and goings. How stoic he was - how silent he remained - how ....authority range through his very core. But Vasilis couldn't be that way..he was more his mother than his father, and he knew that deep down that it would be hard for him to pretend to be so serious that he held no emotional lengths to anything or anyone. And that well, just wasn't him at all.

"I, ..Apologize then If I did that to you. I meant nothing to give such false security. I sincerely meant anything and everything I do with someone and with you." He never meant to harm anyone, ever. When he turned to stare off at the blankets of white shifting blobs of the seagulls in the air, Vasilis would hear her remark on how splendid this area was. "It..really is something else.." he replied to her. When he told her his mind and about his actions not being of folly, he watched her at first with worry when she seemed to stop and shy away. She reminded him of a Gazelle seeing a lion head first. To run? or to fake its death and hide in the tall grass. 'And what if I am some evil creature destined to rip the wings off flies?' the meaning snapped him from staring at her body as it inched away from his own. He stood still though, watching and waiting for her to finished. 'How is it that you can give yourself to me... when you... when you barely know me?' Was what would hit him.

He turned to look at their feet in the sand, his weight slowly making them sink below the tiny pits of gravel. "I'm..not sure how to explain it. With you, it's not just something that 'feels' right...it feels good, it feels.........destined. like the very words that hang from your lips leave my soul leaning on edge waiting to hear the rest..." he murmured before turning to face the waves. "it's like the ocean...you know you should fear the depths below the face of her waves but at the same time she is beautiful, graceful...and when you touch her...she feels wonderful against you...like its...meant to be...." he swallows. He paused a moment "And frankly...even if I knew you for ...days versus years...I am pretty sure my soul would remain with the same feelings it has right now..." Vasilis turned back to face her yet again as she received from him. Her ears back and her eyes looking down.

He steps two paces forward her, her words speaking full of fear and loss. Was he not enough? Did he seem weak to her because he had lost so many people in his past? Was it because he was homeless and she had the cove and her family? He gloats a moment, fighting himself to say the right thing and not the wrong that might set her off to really run away from him. "Even if your life was Dangerous or roses under the sunshine in the middle of an island surrounded by a still lake....it wouldn't change my course of actions...It wouldn't stop me from coming to see you...to talk to you...to learn about you and vice versa.." he whispered against the lull of the waves.

"And my life isn't so rainbow and butterflies either Jewel...I have lions who might be after me if they know I ran from the Woodlands...I had a life before this one..and I have been giving an Alias to keep my past from following me here to this land of beauty and promise." He stopped to take a breath. "But that doesn't mean I will hide from my past or the hateful actions of others, nor does it mean I will hide in a cave due to them. And I couldn't care less if you were an angel from the heavens or the top-ranked demon from hell. My eyes see only you and what my soul feels for you will never change...never cease....never falter even if you chased me away." he told her now looking directly at her as he swung his head up higher this time.

'Can you truly be happy with that? With .. sharing this life with me? I started this pride by the strength of my fangs and the power of my claws.. I stained these lands with blood..' he watched her step again back away from him and he stepped forward to match the space she tried to take away. He wasn't going to let her fear drive her away. He understood what she felt yes, he felt it too. But he wanted to work on this...whatever the feeling was that was taking ahold of him. It was new to him. All of it. "You started life with your strength Jewel. There is no one who should put you down for spilling blood and causing a few good scars on your opponent. They did the same to you and I doubt they are losing sleep over what they did. You needed to provide for your family, for others like you and your sons. And you did.... Jewel you did amazing..you are so strong in ways I believe you don't see with your own eyes..And so what if you spill more blood? I will be there to clean the blood from your lips and paws...I'll be there to clean any wounds you gain...And I'll always support you ...That's what should be done...am I wrong?" he asked.

"And to answer your question....Yes, I would share my life with you...even if you ended up eating roots from the baobab tree, or even started screaming at the stars to get back at the gods. There is nowhere else I'd rather be, But with you.." he was honestly being truthful to her. Yes, they knew one another for a short time. But from what he recalled of his parents, they had been together for many years, and yet they were still learning NEW things all the time about themselves. And that was what he felt was so beautiful - so raw and delicate about his parents. They never stopped loving each other when they learned something new that they liked or disliked of one another. They remained together. He would watch her again, his ears pressed forward into his honey-dewed mane with determination now. His toes sloshed out of the sands 'A monster that you will someday see and run from.' he shook his head to her words. "never.." he simply stated. "You are no monster. And Even IF you become with what you believe is to be a monster, you'd remain in my heart as you are now. Even if you change I'll remain the same to you. Age changes a lion, life gives and takes away plenty from everyone regardless of their status in life. And I grew up seeing that unfold with my parents. My mother raised me to accept all that life gives, and that sometimes it changes you and even if the change is bad or good, if that person remains truthful and loyal to you then you should give back tenfold." he stops a few paw steps from her as he leaned down slightly. He didn't want her to look down on herself or on anything anymore. She was a strong lioness, a beautiful soul, and a wonderful provider for her family.


I fear you will only end up hurt..or worse.' he shrugged softly to himself "If I get hurt it's because of my own stupidity in not knowing how to protect myself...if it is my time to go.....then so be it. But I will fight anything that comes my way as long as it means that I get to wake up seeing you there beside me. To hear your words of wisdom when my own fears plague my heart...to listen to your laugh when we sit here on this beach..." he trailed off feeling that pull again on his heart. "And don't say that about being the wrong female. I will decide that fate for myself, and what I feel right now...is like I grew wings I never knew I had. " he took a breath. "You make me feel free Jewel. Like morning dew on a spring flower..the first light of dawn as it rolls over the hillside..." he stepped closer. "I know what I want Jewel...." his face warms with a gentle smile, his brows sweeping on his face with his eyes melting to her own. "I choose you, always and a thousand times I do.......but that is my own heart...my own soul and my choosing. It is up to you what you decide this life take you on." he stopped, his eyes floating downcast to his toes as they were once again sunk under the sands. Biting his lips he turned his head to the side. Back legs stepping backward. He was not sure how she felt about HIM, but he knew that even though this feeling was new and by no means fleeting or 'a a dream'. He couldn't pressure her to feel the same way. He would pull himself to give her more space as he turned to watch the surf once more, his back to her as he let his mind wander.


Perhaps he said too much aloud. Maybe some of it should have remained a secret that he would..no should have died with...But..he wasn't going to live his life without saying something about how he felt to her. And he wanted to be sure that she understood that it wasn't a game to him, that he wasn't just leaning on her because she made him feel 'whole' again, or that she made him smile after a year of seclusion. No, he felt this way because he was damn sure about his emotional status. He knew there was a reason he felt this way, and for right now it was due to a multitude of things. Her laugh, the way the moon kissed her eyes at night, and how the sunset warmed her ebony coat. How she swayed with each pace of her limbs forward as she walked, the way she fumbled in her step when she was nervous. How she lights up when she talked about her children. He enjoyed seeing all of her in every aspect. And Vasilis wanted to see more of her, the dark sides, the sad, the gloomy, the excited, the childlike splendor that she held in her eyes during times of their endless banterings. ....He wanted more of her.

@Jewel

He apologized, and she felt bad that in her soul - she had caused him to think he had something to apologize for. "It's not...that you should apologize, Diuris.. It's.. that I've see what pretty words can do.. I've watched it destroy others.. when those words weren't meant." When he turned away, she felt an ache, and for a moment, Jewel wished to press herself against him - just to bring that gaze back to her. Don't shut me out.. Her jaws parted to ask him not to do exactly that, but snapped closed with a firm click. Yet, wasn't that exactly what she was doing to the golden lion before her? Stepping back, shutting down and struggling not to run away? When he turned back to look at her, she felt frozen, a deer in the headlights. Jewel was torn between darting away, and pushing forward, to embrace the feelings she felt roiling in her gut. But would she vomit? That was the question when her stomach pitched nervously. "Destined" was not a word she would use to describe them.. "And if this is an infatuation? A passing fancy of two lonely souls?" Had she not helped ease some of his burden earlier? Had she not given the male cause to laugh as he hadn't in some time? What happened when the emotions of that faded? Would he still say the same? He turned away from her once more and she shifted her weight, the sands shifting beneath her paws as she made to move forward, but remained still where she was. "Even the ocean can be dangerous.. Even the ocean can sweep you away without a second thought and you are merely along for the ride." Jewel froze when he stepped towards her, knowing now that the lion would pace her.. That he wouldn't let her escape. That alone sent her heart to pounding harder - the blood rushing through her veins in a roar that could rival the tides. His words rang between her ears, and she felt for the first time a terror - a legitimate fear. He wouldn't be staying - he had said it already, had he not? He would come and go with the seasons, with the tides. She swallowed, her mouth suddenly dry, her heart hammering for an entirely different reason. He spoke sweet nothings of romance, words that she had only ever heard said from the lips of a lion intent on taking a female beneath him. Words that were often empty and only intended to make them more compliant - more desperate. Yet, still she doubted this male would mean those words in that fashion, though a part of her brain rose up through the fog of emotion and pretty words to scream that it was a trap! She should turn and run.. To hide in her den until he left. Jewel knew that it wasn't going to end like that -she wasn't sure how she knew.. but she knew in her soul that she couldn't simply turn and walk away. She couldn't chase him away. "He also had a need to provide for his family, Diuris.. He fought just as I did to bring a home that they could live in and be proud of.." He spoke of cleaning her wounds, and she found the desire for someone to be there through the good and the bad.. for someone she didn't have to be strong for.. Her children were her everything. They were that around which her world revolved. Yet even so.. she couldn't show weakness. She couldn't let them see how tired she was - how exhausted and in pain she had been. To have someone to see such things and to know her innermost feelings? Would that be so bad? She shifted, eyes lifting to the lion when he posed his question, muscles in her legs quivering with the desire to back up yet again. To put space between them so she could just think clearly. She felt fogged - but knew instinctively it was stress and fear and.. something else. Something foreign and new and entirely unrelated to something she had any idea of what she felt. He said that even if she started to eat plants, or scream at the gods, he would still choose to be with her and she couldn't help but feel that things were becoming overwhelming.. Too much, too fast. Had he not just said that he would come and go - yet then in a second breath that he would be with her? Jewel had the presence of mind to wonder if he even knew what it was that HE wanted.. Because she certainly didn't know what it was that she wanted. While his life was rainbows - his family had been brought together by love, her own had been brought together by gender.. And the rules and laws that came with that. He said never, he stepped closer and even told her that she was no monster.. That she would remain in his heart as she was and the female found herself shaking her head, her eyes focused on the gentle ones of the knight standing before her. "You can't know that.. You can't know what the next few years.. even the next few hours will bring.. Don't...make a promise you can't keep, Diuris..Don't.. make promises based on a fleeting feeling of today when tomorrow it may not be the same." She looked up when he stepped even closer, moved to stand above her. The lioness shifted, moving to get out from beneath his shadow - or so that had been her plan.. But she found herself unable to move, remaining frozen where she stood. He spoke of getting hurt because he couldn't protect himself, he spoke of fighting if it meant that he could wake to see her beside him. He spoke more words that pleasantly fogged her brain, and made her want to lean into him. Made her want to take his word and accept the help and offered words. But still, she knew that if she did, she would let her guard down, she would hurt herself worse. Jewel knew that wasn't going to work - not when she had her family to worry about, her children to worry about. The lioness shifted when he moved, when the shadow that stood over her shifted, and his own concerns rose up to take root in him as her own had done. Jewel had a terror in her heart, a fear that she wondered whether it would ever relax its grip on her soul. She settled down, sat and curled her tails around her paws, carefully picking at one of the tufts in an attempt to ease her own anxiety. "I..can't.. promise you forever. I can't even promise you tomorrow in good conscience.. I can't even promise you a secure and safe life!" There was a bubble in her breast that was fighting to get out - something that she had held back as it reared its head. "I don't know whether what I feel is real.. whether it's a desire for more.. I don't know if it's anything that will last." Eyes shifted to his form and she felt a need - a desire to press herself into him to chase away the anxiety that she knew the golden lion was feeling. To see if his mane was as soft as it looked. To dig through the scents of his bath and see what the lion truly smelled like at his core. Without the smell of things like salt and seawater muddying it up. "I want things - you make me want things that I shouldn't. You make me wish that I had been born different - that I hadn't been born into a world of such gender disparity. I want to give you everything you want.. I want you to be happy.. but you've said yourself.." "You would need to come and go - I can't tie you down and I won't be able to. You want to be here.. but you also want to be out there.." She wasn't throwing his words in his face - simply trying to understand the difference in his reasons. "What changed between then and now? Why all of a sudden?" In speaking her question, she knew what it was that she wanted, at least for now. Lurching forward, the lioness sprayed sand behind her and sought to press her skull into his breast bone - to feel his mane against her hide - to find out whether it was as soft as it looked. "I don't...want you to leave. I don't want to wake one morning and find that you've gone and wonder where and when you'll be back." She heaved a breath - trying to filter through the scents of sand and surf to find what was truly Vasilis. "I can't keep you here if that is truly what you wish.. but .." She wouldn't be happy - knowing that he was coming and going. Jewel was.. nothing.. if not a dragon in disguise. "I.. am possessive though I don't look it.. What is mine is mine... and that includes others.." She would swallow, careful not to press any further against him or to advance if that wasn't his wish, his desire. "I don't know what my heart truly wants - but I know now? Here? In this moment? I want you.. I want you to spend time with me.. I want to be there for you.. to listen to you talk of your past and your life before now. I want to be able to talk of the future and not worry about what comes next." Though, she knew she would always worry - it was how she worked. Thinking ahead, working to make sure she was one step ahead of any trouble that might come for her. History had taught her a cruel lesson and it was one that she heeded without question. "I want.. all these things you spoke of, but I'm scared. I'm scared that one day I'll wake and you'll be gone." Jewel had to wonder if her 'possession' of trinkets and creatures had become a coping mechanism - perhaps.. And she had to wonder if he would find his way to someone else less.. clingy. For clingy she certainly was.. Not that she had ever expected herself to be such a creature. Always independant and quicker to bite than to hide. Jewel felt things she wanted, and they scared her. The idea of wanting so badly to be around another creature like this.. was a terrifying one and she worried that he would simply see the bad in her and walk away. He was a free spirit - as was she.. but she had things that often kept her chained to a place.. not that that was a bad thing, but would he truly be happy with that life? She shifted, swallowing loudly before inhaling his scent once more. Fear prevented her from tilting her chin up to look him in the face. Fear of what she might find in those honey hued eyes. "I want to spend my evenings watching the stars.. Talking long into the night. I want to know that when we sleep we will be surrounded by our children - for they would be yours as much as mine.. I would like to wake in the dawn and know that I wasn't alone..to know that no matter what there is someone behind me that I can count on ... That I know won't walk away.." Was he that someone? She would like to think he wanted to be - but would it truly be so? She did shift and pull away, finally, looking up at the golden knight standing before her. "I.. am not able to trust so blindly.. so easily..But with you - I want these things you speak of, but I'm afraid that we will lose this moment - that we'll grow tired of one another. I'm afraid that when you find someone better, you will walk away without looking back." Or she would. @Vasilis""

irish

The air was soft against his cheeks as he faced away. 'And if this is an infatuation? A passing fancy of two lonely souls?' he shook his head against his chest, his chin gently rubbing against the hairs there before he whispered. "To me, it's not just infatuation...I am not some horny teenager that has seen the first woman in the heat...to me what I feel is more than just infatuation..I want to see and know the good and bad parts of you, of us" he looked down. When she spoke about the ocean carrying one out adrift, he shook his head again. So what if the tides pulled him away? What he if WANTED that? What if he wanted that feeling of someone needing him? Wanting HIM for who HE was? And the same for him to want HER that way?

He shifted looking back over his shoulder but never met her eyes, at first, as he took a deep breath through his nose. "So? What if I want the tides to take me away? To submerge me within her arms? What if I want the coolness of its waters to envelope me like a blanket?" he paused to look at her a moment. "What if I want to be lost at sea?" he asked her before turning his head to look back at the waves. "I want...to feel needed by someone just as I want to need someone else. And I feel that with you...I feel like....my soul is pulling myself to you not out of need or necessity but because I truly feel that I want to become lost deeply about you." he meant it in a good way. Vasilis wanted that feeling of looking into someone's eyes and feel as though they were sucking him in and taking him on a paradisial drive through some sort of wild connection.

Vasilis could feel that she was slipping away, that she was becoming afraid of his words. And he didn't want that. So he faced away, moved away, and gave her the space she needed. His heart though didn't like that and suddenly felt so alive that it was jumping erratically around inside his chest. He felt the tingling of his skin growing goosebumps, the way his hair felt statically charged yet again along his nape and arms. He was doing his best to keep his breathing in check so he didn't seem weird, his eyes cast down into the water as his paw lifted up to grab some sand. She was quite behind him but he didn't have the heart to look at her yet. What if she was second-guessing himself? What if she was gone? Jewel spoke about how her opponent also had a family to protect and the same desire. "Yes, but isn't that often the role of one challenging to claim a home? Because they have a family or SOMEONE to protect and shelter? And you won, but there's no way we don't know that he didn't go someone else and tried again or simply found a vacancy somewhere else and joined them until he could find the best place for his family. What was done is done, you won you made a place for you and your family. He left and went to do the same elsewhere. You don't need to harp on your actions because what you did was right...it was okay...it was needed. And you won fair and square against them." he tells her with a nod. A look of saying 'you did well, you deserve every bit of work and title you gained.' which she DID deserve and all the more!!

His head drooped down farther on his chest, his chin rubbing against the thickest parts of his mane as he looked solemnly at the faded reflection of himself in the damp sand. He felt blindsided by his own heart and mind as he felt like he had done something wrong but he felt it was the right thing to do. When she was still remaining silent his ears drooped for a moment 'she must have gone...' she had to of, right? But then a subtle sloshing sound made his ears perked in reaction. The tiny thump of them turning to the back of his head to listen. Was that her or someone else to ask why he was alone on the beach? 'You can't know that... You can't know what the next few years... even the next few hours will bring... Don't...make a promise you can't keep, Diuris..Don't.. make promises based on a fleeting feeling of today when tomorrow it may not be the same.' He turned to look over his shoulder yet again, his cheek resting on his arm as he looked longly across the beach before looking at her from his seat facing the ocean tides. Vasilis swallowed, his nose sniffling a moment as he took the time to reply to her. "No one knows what the future holds..no one knows anything until it happens Jewel.." he tells her. "And I will promise what I feel is right. And by no means are they fleeting or momentary. They are as real as the burning sun on a hot summer day. As real as the shells stuck under the waves before our paws." She was silent again, moved away from him - again. His ears floated away from his mane and nearly hid deep inside the depths of his tendrils.

He looked at his shadows, his reflection in the passing waves that came so close yet so far from him. His eyes glanced so far into the distance that he felt as if he was zoned out. She was silent, she seemed to be debating everything. Debating what they had, or could be having. His brows pushed against his eyelids, making them feel heavy and yet again as if something would come spilling out from his heart. He knew she had her own things to worry about, she had the cove - her cubs and others now to protect. Was he even someone who would have space in her heart? Was he someone worthy of that space to begin with? He was no one, with no family, no rank no power. He was just.....here. Taking a shuttering deep breath he felt his body slump over himself again, the ache in his back starting to float and tingle down his spine as he waited in more silence yet again. She had to have left him by now right? Surely enough it was too silent. But he didn't dare to look back behind him. ' I can't even promise you a secure and safe life!' her words snapped him out of his echoing darkness. He looked back at her in a panic just for a moment, his eyes glassy as he took a breath that shook his chest. "no that is not true! Don't say that. You don't need to worry about giving me a secure life or a safe one for that matter. That is MY job to do. If I can't make my OWN life safe and secure then I don't deserve to be walking on this planet!" he tells her shaking his head quickly.

"And who needs forever? Like I said life throws everything at you, and like you said who knows what tomorrow or tonight shall bring? If I am here on this planet with you for years then that is what I will graciously take! If I am here for only two years with you I will take each day as if it was my last and enjoy what splendor I can with you. If I don't pass away until I am old and feeble then so be it. But regardless of my time here with you, I will take it as if it was the first moment my eyes saw you, I will cherish you the same way each and every day, I will go to sleep thinking of you each night with a smile on my face. Nothing could change that!" he tells her frantically to prove his meaning to her.


'I don't know whether what I feel is real... whether it's a desire for more.. I don't know if it's anything that will last.' yes that made him sad but at the same time, he was fine with that. He looked up with a smile, his forehead creasing a moment as he hummed. "no see that is okay. If you believe that what YOU feel is something that is making you desire to know more just for that moment in time - then I am okay with that. If even it becomes my silly one-sided affection and your momentary one, It won't change how I feel." he paused "Because when I am with you even if it's forever or just for now...I'll give you my everything Jewel.." Vasilis looked at her then. He felt as if the tears were falling against his cheeks when she spoke her next words 'You make me wish that I had been born different ' no, he didn't want her to be born differently or wish that she was. Even if she was born differently his heart would still pick her out of a thousand faces. "Even if that were to be true and you could go back in time and fix that part of your past. I would still find you in a crowded place and my heart would still feel the way it does. I would still seek you out, to learn about you and you about me. I would cherish you all the more.." he said nervously laughing.

'You would need to come and go - I can't tie you down and I won't be able to. You want to be here.. but you also want to be out there. What changed between then and now? Why all of a sudden?' that was a question he wanted to ask himself as well. What changed? Well, there was one major factor in it all, he turned to her with the serious of expressions. "Well" he started, his voice low drawing in a breath of air through his nose as he ushered it back out of his mouth slowly. "For one, I realized that I shouldn't be running from the possibility of a home just because I was afraid the attackers from my homeland would come searching for me," he answered. "I decided that instead of gushing my existence to a cave or in the shadows, I should try to live my life correctly like my parents wanted me to do, not survive alone but survive with someone who cherishes me as I do them. I also decided that like you ...I wanted to be near you, to see you more, to hear your laugh more - to see every aspect I could of you and not just watch from the distance of a rock or the shadows. To really become personal to you as you are starting to be with me."

He chuffed a sigh. "The reason I said I wanted to be able to come and go was that ORIGINALLY I didn't want my family's enemy to come searching here because they noticed my attachment. I didn't want YOU to suffer the same fate my parents and clan members did at the woodlands...But ...I told myself that was wrong of me. I should make a stand, fight them - live my life the way I want not the way they want me to live. I will not stay in fear." he tells her. "If they come so be it - I will rise to defend myself and the cove if I must. I will no longer hide my face and keep anything about myself a Secret. Why? Why is a good question, Why perhaps because the more I am with you the more I loath going back to the caves to sleep alone in the dark - to dream of your laugh, your smile the smell of sea salt on your coat that you leave behind on my body...I don't want to leave any more reasons to be regret not simply staying here with you." he tells her

'I don't...want you to leave. I don't want to wake one morning and find that you've gone and wondered where and when you'll be back.' he blushed at her words. She didn't want him to go? He felt the same way, he hated to see her go, to walk home, to go to a place he couldn't see and continue to enjoy her time with him. " Nor do I wanna leave either. And never I will never leave you to wake alone and cold in the morning light. I want to be the first thing you see when you open your eyes. and the last thing you see when you go to sleep, but I want you to be able to feel my body alongside yours as we sleep knowing I won't be going anywhere." he took a breath. Did he just say that aloud? His face would flush a thousandfold. His face smooshed into his mane, he tried to hide his coming rage of color against his golden face. How embarrassing for him to say that aloud, he was a lion who was an adult, and yet here he was flushing over a simple saying, a simple word - but yet those few words meant so much to him. "I am not going anywhere unless you tell me to go, Jewel.." he tells her then with a flushed face.

She tells him she is possessive. And he smiles. "Then be itI don't mind that aspect of you. If you want to be possessive then be possessive - if you want to swoon over me then swoon. If you want to worship the ground I walk on, that's fine too. Jewel.....there's nothing you could or couldn't do that would make me want you less than what I do already. Others might be put off by it, but that's what comes with being someone you want to have and to hold. " he lets his eyes cast to their feet. ' don't know what my heart truly wants - but I know now? Here? In this moment? I want you... I want you to spend time with me... I want to be there for you.. to listen to you talk of your past and your life before now. I want to be able to talk of the future and not worry about what comes next.' now his face had to be as red as an apple. If not as red as the setting sun behind them. He felt as though his words got locked into his chest, the air choking him for a moment. His heart stammered against its cage.

After a few moments of being silent to hear her, he finally had the courage to look at her - his face so flushed he knew his body temperature had to raise thirty degrees. Swallowing, again and again, to muster himself to say something he looked at her flustered. "I am glad you want me, and that I am not the only one sitting here as though my universe had just...exploded when I met you. And I too want to spend all the time in this world with you that I can get. Even if it's just watching you sleep as your cubs play. Even if it's just....watching you watch the sunset like this.....I want it all.." he whispered. He was afraid that if he spoke any higher that his voice would break. ' I want to know that when we sleep we will be surrounded by our children - for they would be yours as much as mine.' which made him stutter even more " I would very much love to be able to share that aspect of life with you, Jewel. I know that I could never BE their father but I hope to be something like that to them. To be there for them and for you when it's needed most and even when it seems I am not, that I am there rooting for you all in the background. And I would also be there for when you want to have more children with me as I would be very happy to achieve that with you if that happens to be so." he tells her shyly. He had never thought about having cubs. Nor had he met someone he wanted to do that with. But he was getting older and the more he thought back about his family, his parents, the cubs he shared in their clan when he helped raise them when their own parents were out hunting or doing events. He very much enjoyed that aspect of his life.

'but I'm afraid that we will lose this moment - that we'll grow tired of one another. I'm afraid that when you find someone better, you will walk away without looking back.' He shook himself off his seat, he rose and stepped to her, his face reaching out to hers as he rumbled a reply "no. I would never do that. There will never be someone more important than you to me other than perhaps your kids. No one could replace you in my heart. And if some unforeseen issue arises, that I run into someone else - they could never ever reach where you are inside my heart. You are my Moon Jewel. I've never been this close to anyone, ever. And I don't plan to find another person like that. So you need not worry about me 'walking away and finding someone else'. Because forever and ever it will always be you. Only you Jewel.". He bites his lips. "The smell of your pelt, your voice that whispers at night, the advice you give me as if it reaches right through my own darkness and brings me to the light. Every little thing that you do...you amaze me, Jewel...You make me forget to breathe...I feel....starstruck in more ways than one." he chortles a sweet sound from his lips.

"Jewel...." 'let me love you the way my heart wishes to do so' but he couldn't say that. He felt that was too soon to tell her that. But he knew that right then he was slowly starting to really fall in love with her. He leaned away from her face to look at her. His heart stammering loudly as he felt the sweat under his paws, even under the cool sands of the beach he felt hot. "Let me be yours, always as long as your heart permits me vacancy within it. You will not regret me or any of this.." he sat back down, his rump getting wet in the cold waters as it splashed over his tail and up against his back end. A shiver jitters across his body as he flinches into himself. It was starting to get cold. "And no...I will never, ever grow tired of you. And I hope that you'll never grow tired of me either. every day will feel brand new - like a breeze across a flower field in a spring afternoon. It'll be to the point you'll think of me and swoon in the middle of a meeting with your officials. Or recall something stupid I did while you're watching your kids and it'll make you laugh to yourself like a child...Jewel...every day will be so magical." he promised to himself then and now that was what he would do for her. He would make sure every day was something new. every day something different welcomed her eyes, that something would cause her to laugh till she cried and her chest hurt. That when night fell she'd be securely in his arms, and fall asleep without a worry in the world.

He would make sure of it. He was hers. Now and always no matter when, the time of the day, what was going on, if she was upset, angry, or happy. His presence would remain with her always, like a tune stuck in your head. But a good tune, a tune you'd hate to forget how to sing. "I'm not going anywhere. I will be here with you if you permit it so. I will hold you in my arms each night and tell you stories of my homeland. I will whisper gentle songs to you that will make your heart dance across the stars. And when we are old, I will remind you each day of one thing we did together, and when you forget about me - I'll find things to remind you. Your favorite flower, a song that touched your heart, I'll take you to a place that was our place and remind you of it all over again and again until you recall what we had and who I am....." his features was soft, he leaned down, his belly coasting over the beach as he curled himself around her on the ground. But would she feel the same way? Would she run away finally with what he opened up to her? Would she allow any of it? Or would she push his love aside? He hopelessly looked away - he prayed to himself, to the beach that they were on that there would be some sort of spark that would ignite inside her from his words. That she knew he really really meant everything he told her.


@Jewel

[OOC : Okay.. avoided this long enough because I just didn't know how to post match this ...lmao. So here we go!] She listened to the words that tumbled from his lips and felt warmth - a warmth that blossomed from deep within her breast, within her soul. There was a smile that echoed that warmth, but along with it came worry and fear. Jewel had known that pretty words and a pretty face could ensnare even the most vigilant of souls. She shifted, her expression softening when she searched the face of the golden knight, her sun. "Durius..." There was a soft pause before the ebony lioness sighed, lowering her eyes. "I ... I know what I feel. But I worry that it's not truth." The female returned to looking at the golden lion, shifting to rub her chin against his shoulder - press further into his maned chest. "I..I want very much for it to be truth, but I need to be able to think. I need... I want.. to make sure that we aren't simply falling into each others spell." Cerulean eyes shifted as she smiled, knowing that nothing could compare to how she felt right now - but still a warning claxon was screaming in the back of her skull. That sound was something she had always listened to, and the female forced herself to step back and shake, trying to shift her thoughts from how much she would like to spend the evening lounging with him beneath the stars. "You're dangerous for me, my golden dawn... You have the ability to make me forget myself and my duties.." And that scared her. Ears folded against her skull before she gave him a watery smile. "It's not... no. I just.. I need to think, Durius. I can't afford to be distracted right now - especially not right now. Not with things so new and raw. Will you stay? Stay here with me? With us? But... Let me come at my own pace?" She wanted to work out what she felt - she wanted to be able to know for sure what this was before she jumped into it. "Please don't think less of me, my sun... I just..." I'm scared. @Vasilis""

irish