Verila's lips break onto Alexander's skin like a forest fire. It stings and warms and lights something inside of himself.
He feels something that he burried long ago, something he had to, his research was the main focus. It is the main focus, but having her close to him breaks him. It breaks his focus and all he can think about is her soft warm lips pressing into his.
Alexander feels the corners of his desk and he grips the edges with his fingers. The softened wooden edge feels sharp as he almost breaks his palms. He tries desperately to hold himself back.
Then he feels her pull her lips away. The soft place left on his neck contradicts the hard wooden desk under him. As she pulls away he can see her teasing smile quickly cover in shadows. She covered her dark grey lips but he can see them in his mind and feel them on his neck.
"V. What was-" Before Alexander could finish she sticks out her long delicate finger to silence him hovering it over his lips.
Verila's delicate hands that were once touching him reaches into her stomach. Her fingers bend the shadows that wrap around her and she reveals a note that she had been hiding. The paper is yellowed and Alexander can tell Verila recently wrote it. It is delicately folded and Alexander can image the moments before this.
In his mind Verila wrote this silently in a room he has never been. Somewhere where only she sleeps, maybe somewhere within the shadows themselves. He wonders if she smiled when she wrote this or if her laugh filled a room thinking about kissing his neck.
He grabs the note from her and reads over it. She waits silently as he does. He can see her still over the edges of the paper and he sees her even more in the words.
A promise.
'This kiss, etched in black, is my promise to you. I won't tell your father what you discovered. What we worked on together. There is so much I wish I could say, but for now this will have to do. If you need me. Truly need me. That kiss will lead me to you.'
Alexander touches where she kissed him. He can feel a heat well under his skin. Something he thought was just a budding feeling but now he realizes is a lot more.
A magic hides under this kiss.
Alexander pauses for a moment. The note tells him so much more than just the words say. He confirms something he felt when they worked together.
He can trust her.
"Thank you," he puts his hand on her shoulder. He wants to hug her. To kiss her. To express how much loneliness she rid from him. However he silences those thoughts. "You believing in me helps. Do you want to look at what ive finished?"
Verila puts her hand on his and nods her head. Alexander shivers feeling her on him even if her skin is hidden behind shadows. She moves to his side to look at the plates on his desk.
The runes she sees are unrecognizable. Verila can see the progress between each plate as Alexander makes them more complex and specific.
Alexander begins to explain his thought process behind each rune and the meaning. Alexander knows she understands this probably as well as he does but Verila doesn't have anything to add to them. She writes down 'Good Job.' and he smiles. He never felt like he had an equal until her.
Alexander tries to shake the feelings inside himself. He knows he's looking at her different. Fonder than before. She is looking over everything still while he looks at her. His brown eyes soften as he see the corner of her face.
Her long black hair cups her face and it looks as if it flows into the shadows that wrap her body. Her long grey ears stick out to the sides each around 7 inches from her face. Her nose has a short bridge and flows into a petite rounded hill. Her eyes are large and filled with a soft black glow from her magic. He is suprised that behind such a cool dark energy sits a woman full of life and beauty.
Alexander thinks of the Empress Aphrodite and the princesses. He thinks about how beneath the cold beauty he has seen his whole life in them only exists apathy and pain.
Alexander gets lost in her face and beauty. Until he shakes himself free. They have the final touches to be done and he isn't going to lose himself into feelings he isn't sure she shares.
He is better than that.
"One more night together should be enough to finish this. Would you like to test them out?" He grabs the first copper plate in the series. Spreading his strong arm across her face. Verila can't help but look.
Verila is as lonely as he is. Apart of that is why she attached herself to him so quickly. She sees herself in him and sees the isolation he has gone through.
Verila also can't help but see how attractive he is. Elves are forbidden from speaking to those not attuned to nature as they are, so she knows these feelings can't be expressed. Not completely. Unless she were to.. Verila thinks about the steps she needs to take to talk to him.
Verila follows Alexander to the apparatus as she thinks of a future where she might get to hear her voice intertwine with his.
'Let's just focus on these final tests,' They both think as they move forward.
The first plate they test are runes detailing efficiency, power and intent. Alexander had written these first runes with certain words although they were closer to ideas; smoothness, authority, absolute, void, darkness. Some were things specific to the type of mana she used, others were general ideas that bred ideas of control.
Each plate was an improvement on the last. Authority slowly became heavenly authority, smoothness became mana vein and flow and darkness became void at the end. The simple ideas gradually became more complex, until the final rune circle had only complex ideas.
"For each plate, think of something important to you. It has to be something you have a clear image of. I'll need you to do it for each plate. It will show how much the runes improve the expression." Alexander explains what she needs to do.
Verila doesn't nod and just begins injecting the mana into the crystal. She knows immediately what it would be. Something she has tried to make over and over again but never could. Something lost centuries ago.
Alexander watches her and the mana as it begins to pour. Although he should be focused on the plate; his eyes follow her every inch of her body to her face. He looks up her long toned legs until he gets to the curve of her butt. His eyes sit on it for a while. He can tell how it was a mixture of her natural form and her pure athleticism. It looks soft.
The nape of her back curves like a slope down a ramp from her butt and into her muscular shoulders. Her shoulders look small but strong all at the same time. She was taller than most, being an elf, but she was tiny compared to him. He imagines how the mixture of her softest parts and hardest parts of her would feel in his arms. He thinks of how her butt and chest would feel in his large hands. He knows they would spill from his grip like a firm cushion.
However her neck and ears, and her face intrigue him the most. They softness of her eyes as she thinks fondly of whatever she is conguring. The way her eyebrows turn down and her ears twitch as she focuses. He is enraptured into her, his soul is taken from his body with each breathe until he is left heaving.
He thinks of how Verila would sound panting under him, just like she makes him feel, and then they catch eyes. Her mask is no longer there and he can see her smile and how Verila's lips move towards her high soft cheek bones.
"Ehem," he coughs a little clearing his throat and hoping she missed his looks at her.
His eyes dart to the right where the end of the aparatus is. It shoots off away from his desk to the far wall, dangerously close to his bookshelves and then he sees it.
An ornate dagger made of shadows.
The blade is double sided and about ten inches long. The hilt looks to have some embellishments in it but because of the shadows the intricate details are muddled together. It is clear that the first plate gets close to what she is imagining but not exactly. The cross guard curves slightly over where the hand would be, similar to a rapier and Alexander can tell it might be ornamental.
Verila's smile tells him it is something important. Alexander assumes it's elven but he can't be sure, although it's beauty screams at him that it is.
"It's beautiful.. Elven, important, it will be perfect to test the rest of it V. How do you feel?" He looks over her form making sure it's just the mask that's faltering. Although he secretly wishes it is more.
She quickly writes down, 'I'm fine. Good even. Let's continue.' Her smile could light up a room right now and it does.
They are both lit up by the orange and pale white glow of candles and the few arcane lights that decorate certain corners of Alexander's room.
Alexander wonders what that dagger could mean to her. The smile on Verila's face tells him it could be a lot more important than just an ornamental dagger.
However those thoughts don't last long as her smile drags him in. All Alexander can think of is her dark grey lips and when he might get to feel them again.
If it wasn't soon. He'd find a way for it to be.