Reaching For the Sun (⚣)

Prologue

Icarus is flying too close to the sun
Icarus's life, it has only just begun
-Icarus, Bastille

Watching dust motes filter through the soft rays of sunlight is one of my favourite pastimes. Inside these stone walls, time is in abundance.

I lay on the floor, the uneven ground carving its presence into my vertebrae as the sun burns red behind my eyelids.

"Icarus, come help me."

I crack open an eye to peer at my father, scenery desaturated from lounging in the light.

Rising from the ground, I wince as my spine makes noises of protest. I pad over to him, buried beneath vulture and warbler feathers. I kneel down before him, dragging a finger through the small river of wax that has formed at his feet.

He wordlessly hands me my harness, one half of a wing already finished. I stroke a hand over the long feathers, feeling the silken fibers beneath my calloused fingers.

We sit in silence, bathed in the dying light of the sun,  adorning our wings with feathers and wax until the floor grows cold and bones grow old from stillness.

Father's eyes start to slip shut in the middle of the night, feathers falling through his fingers and candlelight burning out.

I make my way to the window on quiet feet, laying my arms on the ledge to rest my head beneath the glow of the moon. I gaze upon her beauty with lidded eyes, a sigh making its way through my lips. She sighs back, sensing my longing. I watch her slow descent into the Aegean Sea, a promise for the return of her twin.