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Five years he searched for her.
Five years he looked up to the stars and beyond to find answers that would never come to him.
Five years in which his heart of ice grew colder and colder until he was sure there could never be fire warm enough to melt it.
It was the beginning of the sixth year, the snow still settling on the top of trees that could do nothing but wait for spring, when he finally found her.
Or rather - she found him.
~
The lonely man in the cloak had long given up actual hope of finding her. Hope was something for beating hearts, for long hugs or smiles in desperate situations - it had no place in lonely nights spent wandering or dark corners that never felt the sun. And yet, he never stopped looking. The prospect of getting to her sometime was the only thing that kept him moving through the days.
He only ever traveled after the sun had set. In the shadows of night he experienced a strange form of comfort as though the sky was to embrace him with its long, star-shaped arms. It was the second best sensation right after swimming in the sea’s blue depths - which colors only came from the reflection of the sky after all.
If people saw him from afar, he’d do everything to frighten them and later listen to the ways in which he was described. Most of them were scary like the ghost storys landpeople would tell each other around campfires. There were countless facets of humans he never understood but this one in particular. Why would they try to scare their loved ones, he always wondered.
Nowadays he didn't wonder about that anymore. He cherished the myths, longed to see them spread around, always picturing Thea hearing about it and breaking down.
In her agony he found relief, be it imagined or real.
Very real were the ships he lured away from safe waters only for them to crush on the sharp rocks he stood on. Their screams of death formed beautiful melodies, but haunted his sleep nonetheless. Maybe he was a monster for bringing death to all these innocent people - but what else could monsters be but creatures that forgot how to love?
It was never her on the ships though - he would know if it was. Hundreds of ships, thousands of humans piling on shores, dyeing the waves in the color of death, and yet the Crucis kept sailing upon oceans of bliss, skillfully avoiding the storms of harm.
He didn't see the Crucis, when she found him, he didn't even see the rest of her Crew - because they weren't there.
When Thea arrived, she was alone, just as the lonely man himself. And yet, her presence was full of friendship and being like his never would. It disgusted him, it appalled him, and yet it drew him closer so her aura of warmth might fill up the lack of his own.
Seeing her was unexpected. Years and years she ran from him - why would she now seek his company? How could her fear of him just vanish?
Not being frightening was what frightened him in return. If someone wasn’t afraid of him, they might actually look at him, see his heart of ice or even pity him. He shuddered at the thought.
“What are you doing here?” he asked in still familiar sign language, not sure if it was really her standing there in the moonlight or if he saw nothing more than a wish of what could be - it wouldn't be the first time.
The waves behind her crashed against the rocky shore, as if the water tried to grab her ankles but failed every time. The lonely man knew the feeling of failing too well. Seeing her felt like failing all over again.
“I was scared of you, you know,” she signed, but the sentence didn’t feel as rewarding as he’d imagined. “I was scared of what you'd do, of who you have become.”
“You shouldn't be here,” he signed in very careful motions, because if it actually was a dream he didn't want to destroy the illusion, “You know that I will kill you.”
“No.” She shouldn't look so confident, so different to the girl she used to be, so… mature. Suddenly the lonely man realized what he’d missed. He never saw her grow up, he never watched her leave the small girl behind to become the woman she clearly was now. There was no regret over it, but a certain emptiness where once he felt affection. “It took a long time, but in the end I realized that you won't actually hurt me. You couldn't.” she continued.
“Clearly, that’s where you’re wrong.“ Yet despite his exasperated words, he didn’t actually get closer to her, nor did he pull out his bow and arrows to shoot her from afar. And Thea shook her head, only to step closer to him herself. “No,” she signed again, still as confident yet nonchalant as before.
The lonely man didn’t answer, his heart of ice suddenly beating faster in fear of something he couldn’t quite name.
“Previously I was convinced that the curse you put on Orion destined you to kill me - and well, maybe it did. “ Again she took a step towards him. “But you never were someone to simply follow the path that was laid in front of you.” He couldn’t disagree with that, no matter how much he wanted to contradict her. Thea wasn’t finished though. “When I left my fathers and joined the Alpha Cru I finally felt how it was to be accepted, how it was for someone to have indefinite trust in you. And-” she stopped and looked at him, really looked at him, “I accept you, Cassaras. I trust you. And that is how I know you won’t kill me.”
The lonely man didn’t know how to react. Simply the fact of someone remembering his name almost made his stomach turn.
“I always saw you as a father figure, you know.” And with that step, she stood right in front of him. Something inside him tensed. She wasn’t supposed to say that. She was supposed to scream in fear and then let him kill her. Why wouldn’t she stick to the unwritten script?
“Well you’re not my daughter,” he signed sternly before Thea wrapped her arms around him, embracing him in a hug that felt like fire - dangerous but so temptingly warm.
“You’re not my daughter,” he whispered as the tenderness of her love managed to percolate the walls he didn’t know he built around himself, as her warm presence reached corners in him even the loneliness wasn’t able to touch.
You’re not my daughter, he thought as, in spite of everything he thought he knew, the shards of ice that were the edges of his heart began to melt.
You’re not my daughter, he finally realized, but it always felt like you were.