Page 54 of The Stars are Dying

“It’s more like spell magick. They call them mages. They have gifts from their god, the Fate. Their magick is solarbound, like the celestials, however, so they were affected when the quake happened. The king sought them out at first too, but I don’t think there are many of them left. They’re the only ones who can spell the prized Starlight Matter into various enhancing potions.”

I’d never realized before. Humans…they created the coveted Matter. I was becoming both thrilled and daunted by what each species was capable of. But without having told her of my embarrassingly sheltered existence, I wasn’t sure if it was a bad thing Lilith assumed I needed all of this explained to me.

“Can’t you have them spell Starlight Matter to hide your heritage so you might wander like us?” I asked.

“The Matter can be addictive. For humans it’s no more than a taste for alcohol or a pipe. To the fae and celestials, it can consume them more powerfully and become hard to break. It can turn us into beings no better than the vicious nightcrawlers with their insatiable thirst for blood, or it can have the opposite effect and weaken us greatly.”

I shuddered as my memory drew forth the grim flash of taloned wings.Okay, so that isn’t a viable option.I didn’t know why my mind scrambled to help this stranger, thinking she was too kind and delicate to remain condemned to a fate of hiding.

“I can’t blame the celestial houses for protecting themselves beyond the veil, but many of my kind do, and I think it is why they join the king willingly. He hasn’t stopped building his army since solar magick started to strengthen again. Until…”

I set my spoon in the bowl at her troubled look. “It’s happening again,” I concluded, casting my gaze out the window at the growing darkness of night.

“I think so,” she confirmed. “Five hundred years ago something changed. Everyone felt it, like the world was cracking, like something had stepped into the realm that was never supposed to be here. I think everyone knew the Golden Age the star-maiden had ushered in was about to be shaken like the stars that began to die out.”

“Would she have made herself known?”

Lilith didn’t answer right away. Her gaze slipped to my chest, and I resisted the instinct to cover my markings in company. “Perhaps she’s biding her time. Or fate has been biding it for her.”

My head pulsed with everything I was learning. Lessons on the vast world I’d ventured into that I wished I’d known far sooner so I could be more prepared. Or perhaps I did, and they were part of the lost strings of memory I’d come to terms with never getting back.

“Your hair is like starlight.”

I looked down at the strand I’d been fidgeting with in my rise of anxiety. My gaze flicked out to the sky. Nyte’s voice didn’t intrude, but my neck heated to know he’d appreciate Lilith’s observation.

“How did I get here?”

“I found you at our gates. My parents are not home. I had to get you into something dry. I hope you don’t mind.”

Relief relaxed my shoulders to know it wasn’t Nyte who’d undressed me fully, though my chemise, especially soaked through, didn’t spare much dignity.

“I was alone?”

“Yes.”

Because Cassia wasn’t coming for me this time. My heart beat in shattered fragments. I lay back down.

“You must eat more.”

“Thank you for helping me. If I could rest this night, I will leave by morning.”

“Stay for as long as you need. Please.”

I tried to force a smile, but I wasn’t sure it broke on my face. Her eyes creased with pity, and I could only imagine my sorry state. Little did I care. I stared into the fire wondering what I would do next. Where I would go and who I would be. Lilith didn’t speak again before she left, and I would have felt bad if I could feel anything at all with yesterday’s cold recollections creeping back.

“Starlight—”

“Get out of my head if you can’t face me in person.”

Silence answered, but just as my eyes slipped closed, his presence slowly grew more tangible. Nyte was somewhere in the room, but I didn’t seek him out.

“I don’t know what you want. But I wish you would get it over with.”

“Is my company so intolerable?”

“Your company is always half-there.”

A beat of silence.

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