MUSE / Sophie Hatter - Tumblr Posts
// I WAS LOOKING AT HOWLS MOVING CASTLE ART AND I REALIZED THAT HOWL AND SOPHIE BASICALLY SWAPPED HAIRCOLORS/LIGHT AND DARK MOTIFS BEGINNING VS ENDING. THAT'S SO FUN <3333333333 ( @tenebriism incase u've never noticed before i legally have to share )
@tenebriism // sophie & howl!
her nature, to care, to wait, had lived in her long before she stepped foot into this castle. But it was the stubborn, sincere will that guides her now, true-minded, developed like a skill. darning needle, embroidery thread in so unreasonable fabric, task turned over again and again until she knows the motions even when she doesn't : the roots of them, the little sparkling parts that really matter : which is to say — she'd know this bit by heart now.
at least, some broad and smooth part of her heart, now. written on it in shining ink. she's sure of it. she'd be proud to say how she wasn't gifted it, like her sisters had been in all the other ways she still underestimates and underwhelms herself over, but instead to say it was practiced, and learned, and sincere beyond sincere in those interwoven laces. What it takes to progress, what it takes to experience
She couldn't say she'd find herself caring about such things as beauty as she once had, no, not in a long time now. Unlike...
" Are you really still on about that? " the chime, not unkind but rather a sort of flat-footed tone she takes when she's unbothered or perhaps only feigning it to tease him, hails from close to his bedside, as she reaches up, up to some bottles hiding in the back of a shelf almost covered in his knickknacks and all those shining things; careful despite, the way she is undeterred even as her back protests, eyes glancing down to him only briefly ( a moments study, but she hears more in his voice alone. ) and her fingers find the neck of a vial as she speaks, " You know, I still think black is a nice look for you. Being blonde isn't as nice as you'd think it is! Though, if it's different with magic than naturally, I'm afraid... "
she sees the tremor in his throat, the hard rattle of his body tensing, the tendons of the neck & the shiver of his shoulders & his sharp breath pushed out, that moment just before his coughing fit, and she's down from her stool in one step backwards unto solid ground between the clutter and the plates resting 'pon the hardwood with nowhere else to put them, tea resting on his end-table — she's got a hand on him then, first pulling at his shoulder to shift him unto his flank, then sliding down, gingerly, to the side of his neck. her fingers covered by wefts of dark hair, rubbing soft soothing circles into the tender skin, gracing the nape of his neck...
she can't help but note the ash that sputters from him, tangled in saliva or out on the air in thin wisps, and something in her churns, nervous... a budding worry, to see an omen but not it's cause. no, no, not yet... but, the ash she'd seen, the marketplace... Come on Sophie, focus now, gentle...
" Shh... Easy, Howl... you know that's not true... " her answer is ever so softer than the one prior, aged fingertips still messaging as she speaks, his soft hair resting over her knuckles as she does. in her other hand, the vial, which she examines carefully... she could never truly hope to know everything in this place, what it did and could do, much less what was in it, but she'd gotten better of feeling out which to be which after the bath incident; something in the consistency, in the shimmer, in the swirl, in the hold of it... her attention never strays from him for long, even if all she has to spare is her voice, as croaking as she knows it to be now. ( she's half-certain Howl loves the sound of a voice, even if he doesn't answer to it. the noise of people's speaking. she doesn't find her own all that pleasant, but a distraction might be kind to him, now... )
" If I had it my way, I'd already have gotten Markl to try his hand at making something to at least soothe your chest! surely I doubt he'd be able to make that cough any worse. or, better yet, find something myself, but... " 'But I don't want to be apart from you. I don't want you to feel as alone as oftentimes, I think you do. I know it to be fleeting, even if you should know I'll come back. The worry, there. I don't want you to convince yourself that you are being proven right...'
— ... all she gives a vague little shrug, and her hand slides from the back & side of his neck to closer toward his shoulder, perhaps a means of holding him in place, as she sets the vial down, and one-handedly works at a gnarled bundle of old herbs ( ginger, mint, chamomile... ), plucking and pinching off the stubborn leaves and long-dried flowers in a hope, quietly, that they might help if she found the just right way to use them. More familiar than the vials and elixirs and concoctions surrounding her at every side... ( She's grateful they're not rotted, by how long they must have been here for... ) —— " Ah, well, maybe later. Can you be good and tell me what's wrong, then...? I hear the cough, but what about a fever? " she briefly considers the idea that she doesn't actually know if wizards can get fevers, at least as intensely as the unmagical, but she chooses to ignore such thoughts as she raises a hand and touches it to his forehead, seeking, attentive...
surely, were there any other injuries, she would find them... ( so rarely does the fire that cause such smog leave only it's ash as a keepsake to the injured... )