Impossible, I think, but I'd pick it out anywhere, remember it like I remember what it felt like to kiss her the first time.
My gaze lands on the coronet on her head. It gleams in the room, a gold brighter than even mine, matching the one atop the monster's head. I let my gaze drift lower. To a halo of unusually bright gold hair with a hue of summer red in them. And lower, to the small nose that might have been cute before, but was stronger now, noble, arrogant.
To those sensual lips curved into a small smirk.
"Is that..." Astrea utters breathlessly. "Valerian?" Her head snaps to me. "He is alive? He... is a woman."
But I can't move. Can't breathe. The hall collapses around me. The air turns thin. I can feel my pulse hammering behind my eyes, my own heartbeat screaming *no, no, no.*
Shit.
I would think I was hallucinating if she doesn't breeze past me, her shoulder brushing my chest slightly. Real. She is real.
