Falls

He came up beside her in the serene silence that only the moment just before dawn could bring, the sun beginning to spill over the horizon as the light creeps over their no so different forms. From the corner of his eye he can see the soft smile that plays across her lips at his comment and it warms his heart more than the suns rays. It seemed a long time since he had made a woman smile, but the effects were not diminished at all. He let the quiet fall back around them as long as she wanted, waiting until he sees her turn towards him to slide his emerald gaze in her direction. Her features are not dissimilar to his own, though hers have that distinctive feminine caress which softens them while he is all blockiness and hard edges. Her words still him, the world seeming to take in a breath at that moment as nothing but the drum of his heartbeat echoed in his chest. He felt her words as much as he heard them as she directed her attention back towards the sun though he lingered for a moment to study her further.

As she continues on he extricates himself from the trance and follows her eyes towards the gradually lightening horizon. His heavy head nods in agreement with her sentiment though, often finding that in the light of morning so many of his sins seemed lessened if only for a moment or two. He bore so many of them across his strapping back. He is unable to keep his eyes from her as she almost seems to flourish under the light as it washes across the burnt umber of her body down to the deep ebony of the feathers at her feet. She was radiant. Pulling his attention back to her face as she introduces herself, he smiles gently as his dark tail swipes gently as his hocks. “My name is Bondurant, a pleasure to meet you miss.” His heavy voice drawls deeply in response, inclining his spotted head in the gentlemanly fashion he had become so accustomed to.

The question she posed made him pause, it seemed so fortuitous that he would meet her on this morning after his daughter had returned to him, after he had decided that slowly fading into oblivion in the final years of his life perhaps was not the best path for him. “Strange new possibilities it seems,” he murmurs with obvious disbelief and surprise at the words. “New experiences are far and few between at my age, an’ yet here we stand.” His eyes crinkle at the words, no one more expecting all of this less than he as he gradually came to terms with restarting his life with his best years behind him. “And you?” He can’t help but ask what the mysterious woman found here, what enigmas she might be hunting. “You seem in your element.” The observation came unbidden to his lips, his splotched ears flicking towards her as he shifts his hefty weight habitually. There seemed like so much more just bubbling under the surface.