{
  "$type": "site.standard.document",
  "canonicalUrl": "https://serpentsquiggles.neocities.org//posts/fiction/endless-stars/19",
  "path": "/posts/fiction/endless-stars/19",
  "publishedAt": "2019-05-18T00:00:00.000Z",
  "site": "at://did:plc:ivoe7cntxuy6at7uzmxzs2ft/site.standard.publication/3mfk6cpprzt2t",
  "textContent": "::: subchapter\nSometimes the stars visited in fire and rock and for a night we\nfluttered a little nearer to heaven.\n\nDown here, while you rested belly-down on some harsh slab, the stars\ncould almost be painted on a shell, and whatever numinous world they\nlimned could well be an existence apart. Most times it was.\n\nDusk dwindled away, and the stars were settling down. I thought they'd\nbe as bright and beautiful as ever. Below them, though, as some dark\nblue dot on some crumbly butte in some forgotten spate of cliffs in the\nvasty night, I stared up and couldn't keep the dew from my fangs.\nCouldn't not wonder just how we connected to this infinite sky under\nwhich two dragons could die, without it even flinching.\n\nA bright white rock was up there, burning its way across the dusk like\nan arrow sped from some forgotten bow. The night sky was vast and\naimless; but then like to a cynosure you could look up, and see that\nheavensent rock flying right there as it crossed the threshold of\nworlds, unbarred and unbourned, yet swift on some unknown mission.\n\nI saw it, and I smiled.\n\nWhen the meteors came, every year, it was a hallowed time; the star\nseason would lift anyone's spirit.\n\nAnd so, craning my head up, clearing my eyescales, and gazing at that\nseeking star, I let my worries and despair take a step back and let\nmyself wonder like a stargazer. Who was this meteor? What did she\nseek? Where might she light?\n\nThe Severance of Earth and Sky was pockmarked with exceptions, and one\nof those permitted sky-dwellers to recover sacred meteors. With a laxer\npenalty, that was. This one would doubtless be too small, not worth it.\n\nI let that thought take a step back, too. Every meteor was a little\npiece of heaven, and this one, it shined its light, for me, after a\nabsolute storm of a day, and right now, that meant more than even the\nwanion fireball we wrenched from the ocean in 545.\n\nDespite everything that had happened (and everyone it happened to...),\nthis was a night like all the others, spent atop a cliff, the stars in\nmy eyes. For the heavens, nothing had changed, and maybe for me⁠ ⁠---\n\nYou heard the rub of a scroll furling up, and then rough threads tied\ntight. Some deep murmuring. It was Hinte. I glanced over at the\ndarkgreen wiver, and like that some words fell into the quiet:\n\n\"My aunt told me Stellaine comes down on meteors like that.\" I waved at\nit. \"Like a gift from the Cloud Constructor, something to make life\nmore beautiful.\" It was a gift that House Specter had twisted toward\nmanipulation and deception⁠ ⁠---⁠ because of course they did.\n\nHinte spoke bristly and quiet, like she wanted the silence to stay. She\nsaid, \"Do you believe that?\"\n\n\"Of course!\"\n\nShe shook her head. \"There are no gods, Kinri.\" Her scroll fell into\nher bag.\n\n\"What!\" I looked at the darkgreen wiver, stared a bit. \"How can you\nsay that?\"\n\nHinte still stared out at the horizon, at the sun draining away.\n\nI looked up. Then I glanced back. \"If there's no Cloud Constructor,\nthen how do you explain all of this?\" I waved my wing all around. \"Why\nare there⁠ ⁠---⁠ why is the sky beautiful?\"\n\nShe hisslaughed. \"It is a mess.\"\n\nA mess. I gaped, and the alchemist just regarded me, her lips upturnt\nslightly. I turned around, drew my wings across my breast.\n\n\"Okay,\" I started. \"So you're a blasphemer, and you hate stars. Fine.\nOf course.\" I clouded my eyes for a beat, and let a smirk or smile play\non my lipscales. I said, \"If we're sharing embarrassing secrets, well,\nonce I thought I looked good in a bright red dress. No one said\nanything for a whole day!\" I covertly, under a wing, glanced back at\nHinte hoping for⁠ ⁠---⁠ I wasn't sure what.\n\nBut she still looked at the sunset, and kept silent. Her lips moved\nlike in prayer.\n\nOn the butte, behind us, the two tiny trees were now burning down to\nashes. All the scrolls lay in her bag. Our lunch was bones.\n\nHinte shifted. Frill held in foot, she relented and added, her voice\nlike early flowers, \"...Sometimes, I still pray. To Hazer, or to\nRegene. Mother⁠ ⁠---⁠ Haune believed. Had believed. It is⁠ ⁠---⁠ a\nhabit.\"\n\n\"Still a blasphemer.\" I blew my tongue. \"The Cloud Constructor reigns\nhigh.\"\n\n\"Over more than clouds?\" Her flicked tongue twirled in the air.\n\n\"Err, it's kind of a twist in translation. In Käärmkeili it means more\nthan clouds. Every high floaty peaceful thing. Every cloudly thing.\"\n\n\"Then why not say that? Why translate it to y Draig?\" A tossed head.\n\n\"Because it's... political? Important names are translated. I'm a\nSpecter, and not a Kummitus. It's supposed to be universal. So it's\nHouse Locrian instead of House Ristiriinen, Cynosure instead of Huomion\nTähti, Selcouth instead of⁠ ⁠---\"\n\nAt that Hinte jerked her head. \"Selcouth?\" She saw me nod, and\nslowly said, \"Tell me what that is.\"\n\n\"...It's a⁠ ⁠---⁠ weird house. With weird dragons. Always bagged up\nin heavy cloaks, never walking the street without a path clearing for\nthem. They take the best tables at all the balls, and the next-to-best\ntoo, because no one will sit near them. They never show up to summits.\nThey don't have an estate. I don't even know who their Zenith is!\"\n\nHinte had a subtle face throughout all, frowning like when seeing that\nfirst human.\n\nI waved my tongue. \"Why do you ask?\"\n\n\"No reason,\" she quickly said. Before adding, \"Your naming scheme is\ntongueless.\" She clouded her eyes, muttered, \"Sky-dwellers.\"\n\n\"Forest-dwellers,\" I rebutted. \"Mother always said you were godless.\nWhy are you like that?\"\n\nOnce again looking at the horizon, she said, \"Unlike the sky or anyone\nelse, we are⁠ ⁠---⁠ we were free thinkers. We did not let a church\ncower us into submission.\"\n\nI flinched at the jaggedness of her tone. She'd been bristly before\nnow, but this was another step. Had I pushed her too far?\n\n\"So um,\" I started. \"...What do you pray for?\"\n\nShe didn't speak for a bit. With a glance, she frowned at me, and\nlooked away. \"You would not like it.\"\n\n\"So? Tell me. We're friends. No secrets?\"\n\n\"Many things. Different things.\" The wiver shifted, and one foreleg\nfell over the other.\n\n\"Okay. Were you praying earlier? I was.\" No response. \"I can share\nwhat I prayed for first. I... was hoping those guards find solace\nsomewhere beyond. It was⁠ ⁠---⁠ I don't know why they had to die.\"\n\n\"I do,\" she growled.\n\n\"Why, then?\"\n\nShe shook her head. \"It was right in front of you.\"\n\n\"Fine. What did you pray for, Hinte?\"\n\nStaring at the horizon, now. A sigh. \"It was not a prayer. It was a\npromise.\"\n\n\"Hinte, what did⁠ ⁠---\"\n\n\"I will tell you tomorrow.\" She stood up wings wide, muttering\nsomething that could've been, \"I hope you'll forgive me.\" She was\ncrouching to leap.\n\n\"Hinte-gyfar, you said you wouldn't walk away again.\"\n\n\"I did.\" Still crouched.\n\n\"So I want to come with you, whatever you're doing.\"\n\nHinte paused, folded her wings. On her lips a thoughtful frown\nbloomed. Then she flared wings anyway, and without turning said, \"Did\nyou not already tell Mawla you would be with her this evening?\"\n\nI⁠ ⁠---⁠ did. She was expecting me. Was I an awful friend? Would she\nhate me now?\n\n\"Oh no.\"\n\n------------------------------------------------------------------------\n\nThis could have been⁠ ⁠---⁠ should have been⁠ ⁠---⁠ my first enjoyable\nflight all day. Not to be tainted by nervousness (of being late to\nHinte's), or dread (of what Adwyn really wanted), or anticipation (of\ntrudging through the Berwem again) or sheer panic (of chasing the\nthieves).\n\nInstead, it was all of them.\n\nIt could have been the end of any other day, and I could have just been\nflying, winging out to the cliffs southern to relax and gaze the\nstars. I wanted it to be like that.\n\nI did this every night. Sure, Mawla would be there, but that should\nhave made it better. I could relax around Mawla, and not worry if I\nmeasured up to some invisible standard. She already thought I was\ncool, and not even knowing my boring day job or seeing Hinte⁠ ⁠---⁠ more\nheroic than me by far⁠ ⁠---⁠ could change that.\n\nBut smelling me late and tasting that I didn't seem to care at\nall⁠ ⁠---⁠ could that ruin it?\n\nI'd already had enough practice this evening: I let the worry step\nback. Now I looked down instead of up, at the houses and mesas blurring\nbelow.\n\nThe south gate stood on the far side of a neighborhood, and you could\nonly call that neighborhood colorful. While the ridges had their\nbusinesses in Gwymr/Frina, rare was the mountain-dweller actually\nliving in the cliffs; but all of them seemed to end up here, on the\nsouth side. The canyons seemed to hesitate in sending over anything\nsave advisers or diplomats; but when those dragons deigned their way\nnorth, all of them seemed to end up here, on the south side. And while\nnews never left the land of frost and flame, sometimes dragons did; yet,\nas if the ash-dwellers wouldn't go farther north than needed, they too\nended up here, on the south side.\n\nYet looking down at the dragons right now escaping the twilight, you\ndidn't forget that this was Gwymr/Frina. The crowd was in the key of\nbrown and red. But like spices, mixed in were the dragons only at home\non the south side: the mottled grays of the odd mountain-dwellers, the\nfaded oranges of the canyon-dwellers, the blacks or bright whites of\nash-dwellers. There was one dragon whose scales were lightgreen.\n\nYou would think I'd live here. You'd think it'd be easier to light\ndown, and brandish my fittingly unfamiliar scales. You'd think I'd\nbelong here and not in the sterile, rootless center.\n\nI hope you'd make that mistake, because I had.\n\nThe south side saw me visit three times: first for somewhere to sleep,\nthen somewhere to work, then for someone to talk to. I'd learned the\nsame thing each time: the south side was still Gwymr/Frina.\n\nCanyon-dwellers were just cliff-dwellers with higher stances and lower\nviews of everyone else; the ash-dwellers wouldn't even speak to me\n(Uvidet excepted); and the mountain-dwellers seemed okay, but there was\na reason Digrif always asked me to make his deliveries to the south\nside.\n\n(And no, I had",
  "title": "Notice"
}