#swordlost

  hey girls…do you know that uuh….I love hawke?

do u kno that um I love hawke

As a general rule, T’ruth tries to avoid taking her meal when the mess hall is busiest. It’s not that she particularly minds the company of her crew mates, in fact she quite enjoys it at times. However meals are usually when people talk the most about their home planets and the past, something which T’ruth now has two reasons to try and avoid. Not only does she want to avoid slipping up and say something she shouldn’t, but it has only been a few months since the destruction of Vulcan. Either people don’t know what to say to her, and thus avoid her or makie things akward, or they are overly concerned about her. A day after the incident she’d confined herself to her room for five days, on the basis that if anyone else said I grieve with thee to her in that stupid human tone, she was going to nerve pinch them so hard their grandmothers fell unconscious. So yes, as a rule she likes to take her meals either in her room, or later on when there are only other more introverted people like herself. 

TELL HIM HIS SWEDISH AUNTY LOVES HIM

The spell has gone wrong. She knows it’s gone wrong because instead of an eldritch horror kind of deal standing in the middle of her living room there’s, what? A librarian? A geography teacher? Something like that, anyway. Never mind asking for power or any of that shit, she’s more tempted to offer him a cup of tea and ask for his opinion on The Canterbury Tails. Question is, really, how did this happen? She squints at the grimoire resting open on her lap and then at the sigil and candles in front of her. Ah, right, okay then, there it is. Fucking dyslexia, maybe she aught to get grimoire with blue pages or something, or tinted glasses. 

If heaven exists and Watson is, by some miracle, able to get there, then this is surely what it must look like. More than anything he wants to explore the bookshop; to run his hands over each title, to find out what ancient and wonderful texts Azira has stored here. Oh, he had a library as a boy of course, or at least his father’s house did, but this is different. Here there is no looming drunken presence ready to hit him for being too loud or moving the wrong book. Nor is there a portrait of his dead mother, lovely though it was, to remind him of everything he’s been robbed of. How many hours could he spend here? How many days? There is an itch deep in his soul that makes him want to take as many books as he can and read until his eyes go blind with the effort of it, but he doesn’t. 

Watson is no fool, and he’s already observed how particular Azira is about his books. This may be a bookshop, but nothing here is meant to be moved or bought. Instead Watson forces himself to be content with simply craning his neck around and memorising as many titles as possible so that he might enquire about them later. He even sees a small pamphlet on Calvinism and chuckles to himself ruefully. 

As beautiful as the books lining the walls (and the floor, and just about every other space) are, they are nothing compared to their owner. As soon as Az hops into the seat across from him, Watson feels his breath catch in a way that has nothing to do with the unpleasant rattling in his chest. Lord. Lord, what did he do to deserve this? How can he possibly deserve to be this lucky? Even with Azira’s mock seriousness, Watson cannot help a gentle laugh falling from his own lips, though he attempts to quell the coughing that threatens to follow it. 

Apollo, that is of course the obvious comparison to draw. Certainly he has the beautiful gold ringlets and stunning blue eyes that one associates with that God. Watson scribbles the name into his poem only to scratch it out a moment later. It doesn’t feel right, God of light as Apollo may have been, the image still doesn’t do justice to the breath taking beauty of Watson’s muse. If an angel appeared to him this very moment, it’s beauty would have be insignificant compared to that of Az. Oh, now that isn’t an entirely terrible sentiment; he scribbles it down before turning his attention once again to Greek gods. 

Perhaps he is going about this all wrong, and he ought to draw his comparisons elsewhere. Aphrodite is the name that keeps springing to the forefront of his mind. What better way to express Az’s beauty than to compare him to the very Goddess of love and beauty herself? The only issue is the rather notable fact of Aphrodite being a woman. While he doubts Az would be offended by the comparison, Watson still finds his pen hovering uncertainly above the page. Can he do this, or is a line that he is never intended to cross? Then again, the very fact that he is writing this poem is an offence in the eyes of the law, and most others no doubt. In for a penny, in for a pound, or so they say. He writes the name.

It is then that he hears a light footfall behind him and glances quickly over his shoulder. As always, his breath catches in his throat and his heart just about stops for a few seconds. Az, making his way over, towards him of all people. Watson isn’t really one to believe in divine blessings, but if there was ever an occasion...