Page 498 of Kingdoms of Night

Our trajectory slowed, but the effort increased to thunderous cracks. This jarring noise must be why dragons were blamed for bad weather, or even why weather gods across nations were depicted defeating a serpent of some sort. They may have been warring for supremacy over the skies, as the Evening Star had done to the Moon.

Envisioning these celestial jewels as conscious had never been easy for an admirer of the sunless heavens, and it somehow remained so when I had the Prince of the Phases pressed to my back.

The conflict that had led for our paths to cross was tied to the gravity threatening to bring my elation crashing down. It was as unavoidable as the piercing chill that contained us, but for a glorious moment it faded like mist at dawn as we reached the highest echelon of our sky.

“Oh,” was all I could manage at the sight that stretched before me.

A ring of bluish-white solid light surrounded the edges of the sky. It contained the barrier that held in the lunar atmosphere, a circlet crowning the pale, luminous world below.

“The halo,” I realized as Iltani landed on it.

Tamuz disembarked first. “The remnants of Mahala were bound to her favorite part, and became our defense.”

“But not for long.” I dismounted by falling into his open arms, hesitant to set my feet on the thin sheet of light. Uncertain, I touched down one sole, like I was dipping my toe to test the water. Upon finding it solid, I landed by him and faced what I had dreamed of since I first opened my eyes.

There weren’t words within human comprehension that could describe what I was witnessing. The size and scope, the sheer amount ofspace.That was the only thing that could encompass the endless stretch that surrounded, not just us, but the two worlds we had beneath us. Space.

Countless stars sparkled across the fathomless void. Luminous diamonds and their glimmering dust scattered throughout a rich, velvety canvas, the shades of midnight blue, indigo and violet that held them varying in consistency and brilliance. Whole patches were dark and marked by distant dots, and in others they were clumped together in patches like shattered glass.

No matter how impractical the desire was, I wanted to touch them. But I could settle for how I felt, standing here bathed in starlight.

Entranced by how my skin shone, I wished I could see myself how Tamuz saw me. As something worth beholding, bright among far dimmer people, and worth approaching with reverence.

For now, I had to settle for seeing him first.

I spun to face him and found his dark profile, angles of a glassy exterior that consumed more light than it reflected.

Disappointment broke the dazzling moment. “Could we get closer to them?”

“You can’t, this is the furthest you can go as a mortal,” he said. “I could, but I shouldn’t.”

“Why?” I shoved at him, wound up by the failure of the last option I could conceive. “Go, get closer where the light is stronger!”

“If I go past the barrier, I not only leave you alone, but risk attracting Ashtara’s attention.”

That was a tangle in the plan that I hadn’t considered. In my past life as a megalomaniacal priest’s daughter, I had to carefully measure how far to stick out my neck. Now, this wasn’t a conflict that could fit into my household, but one that spanned the world I’d left and the one I’d married into.

All the hopes I’d had pinned on this solution had come flying in piercing directions when his unchanged state ripped them to shreds.

“How fast can she cross the distance between here and her abode?” I rambled, patting at his chest. “If there is any time you can take to try then be quick! Reach for the nearest star and return before she can realize it’s you.”

He held me closer, petting my wind-blown hair. “Meissa, it’s too dangerous.”

His defeated tone deepened the crack in my resolve, bringing the whole wall down and unleashing all my worries and anxieties about our fates, and those that depended on them.

Desperation had latched at my edges, and clung me to his clothes, as if I could shake any sense into him. “It’s worth the risk!”

“We don’t know that, or the odds of this theory working.”

“Damn the odds!” I shouted out all the air I had breathed in, dramatically increasing the lightheadedness our position caused me. “Do it, please. Leave me here and go.”

Reluctance tightened his hold on me. “I don’t want to leave you.”

“You won’t, not for long.” I felt up his chest, palm over his heart. “You have to try. I’ll be here when you come back down.”

He looked out to the distance, giving in. “I suppose there are worse things we could do to catch her attention.”

“Like what?”

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