Star Mother (Star Mother #1)(71)

He didn’t answer.

We sat in silence a long moment, our breaths the only sound between us. The oil lamp flickered. I wondered how long it would burn. I could not let it go out. I could not leave Ristriel in darkness.

“A star died before I became star mother,” I whispered. “Was that the star that freed you?”

He rested his chin on his knees. “I believe so. My chains must have drawn their powers from it.”

I nodded, piecing together our timelines. He’s been running for nearly a year, then.

“Will Saiyon—the Sun—Will my presence make it easier for Him to find you?”

He glanced at my ring.

I wrenched the priceless band from my finger and tossed it across the cellar. He watched it roll and bounce across the stones, spin, and settle.

“We’re in the Nediah Cathedral,” I said.

“I know.”

“Is it safe for you to leave?”

He glanced up at the stone ceiling as though he could see to the sky. “No. Not yet. It’s ill advised for Him or His servants to trespass a city, but they will not hesitate long.”

“I need to see Quelline so she knows I’m all right.” She’d last seen me marching off to meet with the Sun Himself.

He studied my face. Swept a few strands of loose hair from my cheek. “Go.”

“But you’ll be alone—”

“Ceris.” His expression turned sweet, loving, and in it I saw endless years. The face of a demigod. “I have spent my entire existence waiting. A few hours is nothing.”

I stared at him, heart surging, breaking, pounding.

And I knew what I had to do.





CHAPTER 22


I wound my way to Quelline’s home, the streets of Nediah seeming steeper than they had been. The house was quiet when I slipped inside. I wasn’t sure where everyone had gone; the abnormal activity had disturbed people’s normal routines, and Nediah was not yet functioning as it should. Some might have been resting upstairs, but I didn’t search for them. Instead, I went to that polished box and pulled out the fragile tapestries of Idlysi’s genealogy.

Unfurling the cloths, I ran my hand over the names, printed in stitches, some faded, some bright. It was everything I had missed . . . It was everything I could never have, regardless. If I had passed on to the hereafter, perhaps my family would have followed me. For all I knew, they had gone without me. I knew only this—I would never meet the rest of them here on Earth. No string of fate or chord of time would allow it. Still, I took a fine yellow thread from my bag, and beside my name at the top of the tapestry, I stitched a simple six-pointed star, and beneath it the letters S-U-R-R-I-L, because my daughter was the reason we were remembered.

I rested my head and closed my eyes, succumbing in part to exhaustion. In a dazed half dream, I relived my time in the heavens, with Saiyon and Fosii and Elta. I reappeared in Endwever. Saw my statue for the first time. Ran my hands over my family’s tombstones. Traveled alone until I met a midnight—a twilight—horse in the forest. I played every hour, every day, of my journey with him. The mysteries in the moonlight, the late-night chatter, every song sung and joke told. I relived my fears, my worries, the chase. The harpoon embedded in Ristriel’s leg, his body pressed against mine as shadows concealed us in the forest.

Returning to myself, I raised my head, wiping away a single tear with the pad of my thumb.

The door opened, revealing Quelline, a cloth sack of groceries hanging from her shoulder. “Oh, Ceris! I was worried about you.” She set the bag down and hurried to my side, taking my hands in hers. “Are you well?”

I nodded. “He merely wanted to talk.”

Quelline searched my eyes. “Talk with a god . . . I’d never have believed it before yesterday.” She paused. “What’s wrong?”

I smiled and blinked away another tear. “I have to leave.”

Her face slackened. “Leave? B-But you just got here!”

“I know.” I wiped my eyes again. “I know. And I may come back. I want to. I want to know you, and little Ceris, and Ruthgar and Argon and Yanla. But I have to leave. I have to protect him.”

Quelline studied me. Let out a long breath that deflated her shoulders. “But of course you do.” Her eyes shimmered, but she smiled at me. “He brought you here to us. He saved us. I want you to help him, too.”

A wet chuckle tore from my throat, and I threw my arms around Quelline’s neck, holding her tightly to me. She embraced me back, and we both cried into each other’s clothes, leaving marks of family against the fabric.

Quelline pulled back first. Patted my hands. “You’d best go now, or Argon will convince you to stay. Here.” She went to her grocery bag, then to her cupboard, to pull together a fine meal for me. She wrapped it in a fraying cloth and handed it to me as if it were a newborn. “Come home when you can.”

Home . . . yes, Nediah was home now, wasn’t it?

I thanked her, kissed her cheek, and placed the food reverently into my bag. Then I stepped outside into the evening light. The streets were already less crowded. People no longer had the balm of twilight to usher them home; they simply had to be there before the darkness consumed them.

I started for the cathedral, lifting my head toward the sky, to where I knew Surril would be, and whispered, “Thank you.”