Night's lantern glowed full over the hidden glen they called Moonshadow Hollow, a place rum-rumored to soften even the fiercest worries. Lady Moonbeam slipped past trunks furred with moss until she reached the pool at the glen's core—a dark mirror, thick and lustrous, exhaling a hush like velvet. Fireflies skimmed its surface, and the water's faint earthy scent mixed with the cool perfume of star-blooming lilies.
She had left her regalia behind, choosing instead a simple ensemble: a lilac-lace bralette and matching hip-hugging shorts, the fabric light as moon-silk against her skin. A single white blossom adorned her hair, a quiet nod to the flowers crowding the banks. She paused at the waterline, toes pressing into loam, and drew a deep breath. "I come willing, seeking rest," she murmured, voice barely above the reeds' rustle.
Warm mud lapped her ankles—surprisingly gentle, like a welcome. It tugged with playful weight as she eased one foot, then the other, farther in. Small ripples fanned outward, catching stray moonbeams so each ring shimmered silver-green. Knees, then thighs disappeared beneath the glossy surface. The pool thickened around her, a soothing cool that quickly warmed to her body's heat, holding her much the way strong arms might cradle a weary friend.
A blush crept across her cheeks. Each inch of descent coaxed a soft gasp—half delight, half wonder—at how the mud both resisted and yielded, molding perfectly to the curve of calf and thigh. When it claimed her waist, tension she hadn't known she was carrying drained away. She closed her eyes, feeling the pool's steady, rhythmic pulse merge with her own.
A slender vine draped from a low limb overhead, its green tendril brushing her shoulder. Smiling, she wrapped her fingers around the cool stem—not from fear, but to savor the living connection between earth above and earth below. "Guide my courage," she whispered. The vine answered with a faint rustle, and in that whisper she felt permission to sink deeper.
The mud climbed over her ribs, its surface mirroring the moon in broken fragments. Her breathing slowed; her shoulders settled. She tilted her head back, hair fanning across the viscous sheen like midnight silk. Soft sighs slipped past her lips—sounds of pure release as every worry of court and council melted away.
For a moment the pool tugged at her balance, and she rocked gently, steadying herself with the vine. A laugh bubbled up—quiet, thrilled—at the playful tug. She flexed her toes, finding no bottom now, only the slow embrace that urged her onward. Up to her collarbones the mud rose, cool surface glazing the gentle swell of her chest. She felt weightless yet held, small yet infinite.
Only her face remained free, brushed by a bloom-sweet breeze. She floated, lulled by frogs' distant croaks and the flutter of night moths over lilies. The vine coiled softly across her shoulder, as though the glen itself stroked reassurance along her skin. She let her eyes drift half-lidded, lashes catching droplets that slid like stardust down her cheeks.
Another breath, deep and contented, tasted of damp earth and moonlit petals. Moonbeam loosened her grip on the vine, trusting the pool to cradle her. Slowly, serenely, she allowed her chin to dip. Cool darkness closed around her jaw, her lips, her cheeks; soft, living silence enveloped her ears in a cocoon of hush. Just before the surface met her eyes, she whispered, "I am yours, and you are mine," and surrendered fully to the gentle dark.
Above, the blossom in her hair slipped free, drifting on the glossy expanse like a lone star on midnight water. Only faint ripples told of her passage, then stilled—moonlight resting unbroken on the pool where Lady Moonbeam dreamed in weightless peace, embraced by earth and night and her own willing heart.
And at the edge of the bank, two delicate barefoot impressions—each toe, each arch perfectly pressed into damp soil—remained as quiet proof of the path she had chosen: naked trust, soft surrender, and harmony with the living world.
The hush inside the pool was unlike any silence Lady Moonbeam had known—dense, velvety, as though even time drifted slower beneath the skin of the world. She floated in a warm darkness that seemed to breathe with her, cradling every line of muscle, every quiet drum of her heart. The vine she'd released moments before now trailed above like a ribbon, and moon-rinsed petals swirled in lazy spirals overhead, dimly visible through the glimmering surface.
She closed her eyes, counting heartbeats in the dark. With each pulse, tension unspooled farther—until thoughts of court, duty, and daylight dissolved into soft echoes, then into nothing at all. What remained was pure sensation: the press of velvet mud, the faint throb of waters deeper still, and the slow thrum of life in every grain of earth around her.
A subtle shift in current kissed her shoulder—a gentle nudge rather than a command. Time to rise, the pool seemed to murmur. Lady Moonbeam flexed her fingers, feeling the dense silt swirl between them, and angled her body toward the faint glow above. She moved with the unhurried grace of drifting kelp: slow stretch, soft push, letting buoyancy do half the work. Mud reluctantly released its hold in satin sheets, caressing her limbs as she ascended.
First her chin breached the surface, then her lips—silent but parted with a small exhalation that sent silver ripples widening into the dark. Cool air glided over her skin like a lover's palm. She drank a lungful, tasting moss, night flowers, and the distant promise of dawn. When her eyes lifted clear, the moon had slid closer to the horizon, tinging the tree-tops pale lavender.
She found the vine again, wrapping her hand around its living strength. The tendril felt warmer now, as though it, too, had gathered the night's magic. With a measured pull she rose higher, mud sluicing from shoulders and hair in shimmering cascades. The glossy surface clung a moment longer to the curve of breast and hip before sliding away, leaving her coated in sleek, gleaming patterns that caught the moonlight like black pearl.
Half-kneeling in the shallows, she paused. The petals drifting nearby drifted toward her, guided by a lazy eddy. One lavender bloom brushed her collarbone; she smiled and tucked it behind her ear, where its scent mingled with the earthy musk clinging to her wet skin. She shivered—not from chill, but from the delicious contrast of fresh night air on flesh still warm from the mire's embrace.
Slowly Lady Moonbeam stood. Mud, thick as melted obsidian, molded to her thighs and calves as she stepped toward firmer ground. Each lift of her foot revealed the pale sole beneath, only to be swallowed again with a wet, satisfied sound. She relished it—this playful tug, the proof that the earth still held her, even as it let her go.
At the pool's edge she stopped to study the pair of footprints she'd left earlier. The impressions were deep, but already water-dark earth was seeping in to soften their edges. She lifted a muddy foot and placed it directly beside the first print, pressing down until her toes found the same shape. It felt like sealing a letter to the night: I was here. I was held. I am changed, but still myself.
A breeze whispered through the lilies, carrying their fragrance over her shoulders. She slid a hand down her mud-coated torso, marveling at the smoothness, at the way the night's magic had left her skin humming. Flecks of starlight clung to the drying gleam, sparkling briefly before sliding off in tiny rivulets to rejoin the pool.
She turned toward the path home. On a fallen log lay a length of moon-white linen she'd brought for the walk back. Rather than wiping the mud away, she draped the cloth over one shoulder like a sash, letting dark streaks soak in where they pleased. She liked the contrast: midnight on milk, proof of harmony between opposites.
Before leaving, she faced the pool once more. The surface was calm now, broken only by the occasional swallow of a settling bubble. "Thank you," she whispered—not merely a courtesy, but a vow to remember the gift of surrender and return whenever her spirit wandered too far from silence.
As she stepped into the trees, bare feet pressing cool moss, tiny glints of dew sparked beneath each footprint. Behind her, the blossom she'd tucked in her hair glowed faintly in the moon's waning light, a beacon guiding her back through shadowed trunks. Ahead, the sky shifted from indigo toward soft gray.
When first birds began to stir, Lady Moonbeam paused on a ridge overlooking her distant citadel. In those towers, dawn bells would soon ring. She pressed a mud-streaked hand over her heart, feeling it beat slower, steadier, echoing the pool's patient rhythm.
"I carry you with me," she told the horizon, and she meant the mud, the moon, the vine, and every shivering petal. Then, with a serene smile and the quiet strength of someone freshly reborn, she continued down the path—barefoot, unburdened, and entirely at peace.
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