Igor blinked, the movement slow and deliberate, almost owlish, as he regarded the twilight-haired beauty before him. Her soft laugh—a sweet tone that danced on the air—was a balm to his weary ears. The knowledge that he could elicit such a reaction, such genuine delight, was… gratifying. He felt a familiar, yet long-forgotten, stirring within him — the clumsy, exhilarating flush of a youth discovering a crush for the first time. An odd sensation, to be sure, and an even odder notion to have. That his sleeping mind would conjure a woman of eventide, a vision so radiant and seemingly unattainable, let alone one he could dare to dream of meeting in the real world. Perhaps, he realized with a subtle tightening of his jaw, he was far more lonely than he allowed himself to initially believe. He had spent half of his life bound to a wife, surrounded by the boisterous energy of a gaggle of children. But that life was behind him now—a closed chapter, and he, a cudzinec — outlander, believed in looking toward the unwavering future instead of the past.
He hummed a low, noncommittal sound, a barest acknowledgement of her words. This place, this setting, was most certainly paradise. A place where every creature comfort he could desire was readily provided. If he didn’t maintain such ironclad control over his own minute facial tics, he would have blushed at her kind words, a reaction he could ill afford. He was too old, his fur too reminiscent of the timelessness of snow and mountain peaks, nothing as grand or as captivating as she implied. He was certainly no burning star; he was just an old, tired man.
His gaze flickered away, a moment of self-deprecating weariness in his steel colored eyes. “Nie,” — no he murmured, his voice a low rumble as he shook his head. “Just a lost man.” He added, the words hanging in the air like a bad aftertaste.
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