So if Our Time Is Runnin’ Out

Sleep came faster than usual, a pattern of slipping consciousness that he had somehow perfected in the past couple of weeks. It was desperation that drove him by now, well aware of the pull his dreams now held over him. It was a secret he kept close to his chest, something even his siblings had not been made privy to, despite how he wished to share the experiences. Runar knew what he would sound like. They were the ramblings of a madman and a boy with his head in the clouds.

Out there were real problems with consequences that would fall squarely on his shoulders. In here, he could be free. Last night, he had seen her again, just out of reach and pulled away before his touch could reach. However, it gave him a newfound rush of hope, hope that she hadn't been pulled away from his grip forever.

That or the gods teased him in cruel ways.

Dark lids fluttered open to a now familiar moon nearly full in the sky, basking the mountain man in pale moonlight. She had been by the river before, and it was a wonder that Runar hadn't woken up devoured by the damn thing. His nose was mere inches away from the rolling current, though tonight the water lapped in peaceful rolls unlike the torrent that roared a night earlier.

Something pulled deep in his chest, a known desire that he needed to find her again before she slipped away completely. Raising his head, Runar would find his eyes lined up with the small dancing stars that floated around in a slow flicker once again. The last time he had seen them, she was there— each time they had been there greet him, and this time he turned to look expectantly, praying that this time his search would be easy. That he wouldn't awake with disappointment another night.

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Her lungs were no longer full with freshwater, but Kaede's chest felt heavy nevertheless.

In all of her traverses to this mysterious dreamscape, she had woken slowly, as if roused from sleep in a gentle lull. While gradual, it was peaceful. It gave her time to gather awareness and make sense of the landscape that cradled her.

For a moment, it had seemed like that would be the case again. A soft blurring around the edges of her vision as the scene came into sight — quiet ringing in her ears, the dampened, buzzing sensation of grass upon her ankles. But just as quickly as she recognized the transition happening, the world sprung into color and life.

She materialized in an instant — as though she only existed when he looked her way.

Runar's nose nearly bumped into her own. Kaede found herself meeting his very close, very strikingly yellow gaze with only inches between their faces.

A quick noise of surprise unleashed from her throat, neither voluntary or usual.

She knew who he was, so she did not move away. In truth, she had ached for this closeness, if only to prove to each other that they were both flesh and bone.

“You.” She says with some air of nostalgia. Not his name — not his brandished title — nor an accusation from her own tongue. Just .. him.

Her breath caught bitterly in her mouth, reminiscent of the taste of impatient ashes.

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His gaze met another sooner than he would have expected, close enough to feel her breath on his face. It wasn't unwelcome, but jarring all the same. Something that would make one double-take had they not feared their eyes betraying them the moment he looked back, so he did not. “You—” The word echoed back, and before Runar could process his own body, he found himself flinging limbs around her neck much like a grappling bear.

It would not hurt, though, not if she let him. He wasn't sure what he was doing; his brain lagged where desire did not. All he knew was that he wanted to see her again, to feel her against his body as he had when they tumbled into soft waves. To feel that for a moment, she might be real.

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Before she was allowed to process their reunion, Runar flung himself at her in a fashion particularly suited for mountain-like men. Blue collided with red, chest upon chest, and Kaede felt the instinct to snarl being pushed down as the reminder that this was a dream took precedence. Still, her body reacted to the sudden explosion of movement the same that it would with any attack from the front, and she tucked her chin to keep her throat safe from stray claw or fang.

It was a split-second decision to allow herself to fold under him. As he shoved her down into the grass, limbs tangled upon limbs, Kaede's bared teeth softened to a smile. A possible threat negated, she permitted him to hold her in whatever fashion he deemed necessary. Forearms reached out to drape across the back of his neck, hind legs parting to allow him to slot into her embrace rather than brute strength his place within.

As an added measure, she strained her neck to reach upward, aiming to catch the thin flesh of his cheek between her canines. There, she'd speak to him, hushed tones pressed against his face.

“Warm,” she whispers, a testament to both his very tangible existence and her own.

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He became a tangle of limbs, his weight collapsing against her own as she let them tumble over until she was pressed beneath him, chest to chest, and, as she had said, warm. A chuckle rumbled deep in his throat at the recognition of the oh too obvious point made out. “Yes, that is the point, Runar believes.” I believe. Kaede was not someone he needed to protect beneath the front of a fool, or gamble whatever this was that they had with a mask placed between them.

The mountain man does not find the words for some time before he brings himself to speak again, “I was beginning to think we would not meet again.” He had lost track of the days where he was given a chance to search. They hardly mattered. A perfumed world of lights and flowers seemed dull without her to stand amongst them. The one time he had caught glimpse of her since they had been torn apart by a wall of water, the usually calm current had grown to a torrent as if to tease his efforts.

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Her brow quirks slightly at his bird's eye view of himself, but she does not comment, as she never really minded it in the first place. It was a quirk she had grown to associate only with him. The usage of it to become more palatable for his company was smart, and Kaede did the same, only differently.

Her mask did not get raised much here, though. There was a peacefulness to this dream realm that did not provoke her usual habits. Without fear or threat, she supposed there was no reason to pretend. Yet, the face she had been wearing recently was one she thought she'd never uncover again.

Her trailing thoughts were disrupted by his following statement. Desperate attempts to meld their bodies into one aside, she felt the weight in his words through the slowing rise and fall of his ribcage.

She was not often a voice of comfort, nor was she motherly aside from the protective instinct she had fostered for Ravna. To comfort him, she might have to don that disguise again.

Her teeth along his face became hasty little nips, as a child might do in seek of attention. Physical was easy — it was assembling her words into assuring lyrics that she had to spend more time on.

“Fate would be cruel to have us meet only to tear one away forever,” she murmurs. Whether she believed in it or not was an entirely different matter. He only needed to hear gentle things now, and Kaede was not a gentle creature.

Her lips twist into a teasing line. “Is this—” her claws skimmed the length of his shoulders, suggestive in their tempo “—what you've wanted in my absence?”

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