His new companion is difficult to read, but Val is a patient creature, even with death snapping at his tired heels. He releases her from his gaze to peer up at the sky as she indicates the coming dawn. Yes, he agrees, relief evident in his voice. I resented the sun for many years before learning to appreciate how it tempered and strengthened me, in the wasteland where I grew up, he says, with the slightest pause before ‘grew up’. He had been about to say ‘reigned’, but that’s a detail he isn’t yet ready to share. I’m embarrassed to learn the ways in which my home has, in fact, weakened me. Val chuckles, making light of his withered frame, bones rattling beneath sooty paper skin with every shiver. I was hardened by the sun, so much so that I’ve come to depend on its abuse.
It’s dramatic, but Val has no concept of a gentle sun. He’s only ever experienced blistering heat beneath its eye, and he cannot comprehend a daytime that is warm instead of baking hot.
When Zira repeats his nickname, Valefar notes the deliberate way she holds it on her tongue. What my friends would call me, he had said, and he hears the way she has neatly packaged up his words and tied his name around them like twine before handing them back. He nods, reciprocating her intent and exerting effort not to let his racking shivers upset the delicate tilt of the gesture. As much as Val likes to talk, this doesn’t need to be said out loud. Friends they are.
She tells him of another island as the sun inches into the sky and the sharpest edges of cold begin to recede. There are still a few hours left until Val can bask in the daylight like an overgrown snake, but he’s hopeful. He cringes slightly at the idea of another swim so soon, though.
I am newly discovering my wanderlust, after spending my entire life in one place, he says, his eyes trailing from the fading stars above them to appraise his golden companion. He wonders if she will still be here when the sun comes up, or if he will have to wait until he is fit to make the swim East. He wants to know what she looks like in the daylight. I am curious about this island. When I am slightly more… lively, and presentable, I would join you there. Val knows authority, and though Zira seems very new to her position, the way she invites him to Luthien leaves the dappled stallion with little doubt that she belongs to a territory rather than a stallion.
His throat is parched, and he bends down to scoop up another mouthful of snow. He had encountered snow before, from a great distance where it capped the guardian peaks of his home, but he had never gotten close enough to it to touch while it was still in its powdery, crystalline form. He had been lucky if he could lick a few drops of the snowmelt while it was still cold as it dribbled down the hostile stones, but even then, he had to climb for such a treat. Otherwise, he could make do with the mountain’s backwash of tepid, bitter water at the bottom of the slopes. Val cherishes every frigid, heavenly bite of this fresh snow, even as he paces himself and reigns in his maddening thirst. Freezing from the inside out simply would not do.