Star Mother (Star Mother #1)(52)

Shu lost a spear to the spinning. Yar had to grip his net with both hands. The gremlin flew until his body hit a tree.

“Stop this at once!” Yar bellowed.

But one cannot simply command the stars to stop shining.

I stood in the midst of my tornado and screamed, “You will not have him!”

And then my starlight grew so bright I could see nothing else.





CHAPTER 15


I started awake, splayed across the forest floor like a fallen doll, and jerked upright into a sitting position. My breathing was heavy; a few leaves drifted to the Earth. I had not been out long. A smattering of metallic dust covered half of one of the trees hit by the gremlin, and I wasn’t sure if it was some sort of godly blood or if the small godling had perished. I saw no signs of Yar or Shu. Even Shu’s harpoon was gone. That hungry sensation, not quite fatigue, buzzed through my body.

Ristriel lay in the shadows, still as a corpse. The tree closest to him appeared to be rotting, its branches drooping downward as if to point to the place he had fallen.

“Ris!” I cried, crawling to him. I blinked, trying to see better. My starlight had winked out, and only the light of the sleeping heavens guided me. I took Ristriel’s head into my lap. He was cool to the touch, but he always was. His chest still rose and fell beneath the semblance of his clothing.

Panicked, I grabbed one of my fallen bags, looking through it for medicine, bandages, my needles and thread—anything that would help him. In doing so, I noticed a sliver of moonlight across the back of my hand.

Moonlight. I had always thought it weakened him, but did it not also ignite his ability to change? And if he could reorder his body, perhaps he could close the wound in his leg.

I had to try.

Abandoning my things, I rushed to Ristriel and grabbed him under the shoulders. For a being seemingly made of shade and pixie dust, he was heavy as any mortal. I searched our grove, finding moonlight just at the edge of it, where the trees thinned. Above us, a narrow cloud loomed close to the waning moon. I glared at it, daring it to pass over the light.

It took several ungraceful jerks, my feet occasionally slipping on the recently remade forest floor, before I managed to drag Ristriel into the moonlight. The moment the light fell over his shoulders, my hands passed through him, and I had to push him in instead. I managed it, and he turned shades of purple and blue, glimmering like an early night sky.

He gasped and sat up, and I dropped against the roots of the tree, fatigue finally smothering me. I looked at his leg, but it was the same ethereal substance as the rest of him, as though the injury had never been.

His dark eyes found mine. “Ceris.”

I breathed hard, letting my body relax. “They’re gone.”

Shaking his head, he came to my side. “You have made enemies of them.”

“I hardly care.” My ring was still black. Sun would not know unless Yar and Shu told Him, and they did not seem the kind to readily admit their mistakes.

Ristriel paused, staring at me like I’d spoken another language. He lifted a hand, but it was spirit, and it passed through my cheek.

Sitting back, he shook his head a second time. “You mustn’t do that again.”

“I wanted to help you.”

“You mustn’t,” he repeated, firm. His tone was a mix of anger and fear, just as mine had been moments ago. “You only have so much starlight within you. You must use it wisely.”

I paused. That was the emptiness I felt, then. The siphoning of my starlight, each time I used it. Sitting up straighter, I found some energy in indignation. “And that wasn’t wise? They were going to take you, Ris. You might not fight back, but I will.”

He pressed his lips together. Looked away. “I should not have bargained with you.”

“Too late.” I wiped my hand across my forehead. “It’s my starlight. I’ll use it as I see fit.”

“You will become mortal.”

“And what’s wrong with being mortal?” I pushed myself up, then found I lacked the strength to stand. “I’ve been mortal my whole life.”

He didn’t answer for a beat. “It would be a great loss to see you die young.”

Exhaustion swept over my anger, uncovering honesty. “Oh, Ris. I don’t know if I want a life that doesn’t have you in it.”

It was more of a confession than I’d intended to make, and a sudden one, for I’d known the godling only a week—two if I counted the time skip—but he was so much a part of my morning, noon, evening, and night I honestly couldn’t imagine returning to a life that did not include him, even if I were successful in finding my sister’s descendants in Nediah.

He didn’t look at me, but knelt, thoughtful, quiet.

Minutes passed. “Perhaps we should go somewhere safer,” I suggested.

He glanced up, taking in the metallic spattering on the tree in the wood. “We have time. You need to rest. Your body isn’t resilient enough to move on yet.”

Resilient enough to birth a star, just not wield the power of one. But I was too exhausted to point out the irony. And so, under Ristriel’s silent watch, I fell asleep cradled in the roots of a tree, moonlight on my face.



The dawn was so bold and bright that it penetrated my eyelids, banishing my dreams in a plume of smoke. I opened my eyes and blinked at the brightness, lifting a hand to block it, noting sore muscles as I did so.