Star Mother (Star Mother #1)(8)

I was . . . not lying down, but neither was I standing. Yet as I moved to right myself, I noticed I was not myself at all, but something else. Something that, like the room and the man, was difficult to describe. Like my skin was made of crystal, glimmering and hard, yet still pliable. I was not clothed, not exactly, but neither was I naked. As though this new, crystalline version of me were a carapace built to my body without emphasizing its subtle details. Unable to interpret them, perhaps.

“Come,” said the being at the window. His voice was masculine, deep, and all encompassing, as though the very room we stood in was His mouth.

I oriented myself and walked toward Him, though I couldn’t feel anything solid beneath my feet. The brightness should have hurt my eyes, but somehow it didn’t. I stood beside Him and looked into His brilliance. His skin was made of flame, and His hair billowed like a lion’s mane. The glory of His face made it hard to distinguish any individual features, but I thought He had a strong brow and nose, and eyes as white gold as the Sun.

The Sun. The Sun.

I thought to prostrate myself, and yet couldn’t remember how.

Lifting a finger, He pointed above Him, where the walls that weren’t walls gave way to open sky. “See there.”

I looked, and the brightness wasn’t mere light anymore, but a vast heaven brighter and more beautiful than any night sky I had ever seen in Endwever. Endless stars stippled a black velvet sky like hosts of angels. Never before had I seen the colors of the stars, but here, in this place, I could—white, red, yellow, even blue. So many colors and sizes, such utter majesty.

I should not have been able to identify where the Sun pointed—it was a simple gesture among millions of stars. And yet I could. An empty spot amidst the many pinpricks of light, spilled like glass beads. A tiny point, vanished.

A grave, an absence.

He was showing me the star that had died, the loss that had prompted Him to seek a means of replacing it. Yet replacement seemed cruel. One does not merely replace a child. Sorrow spun off the Sun as surely as light did. If anything, that was the most tangible thing in this place. I had never before considered that the gods might feel as we did.

“I’m sorry,” I offered, feeling small.

The Sun merely nodded. “It is how the passage of time works. They are not meant to be forever.” And finally He looked at me, His gaze penetrating and absolute in a way that struck both awe and fear into my core. He was the most beautiful and most horrifying creature I had ever laid eyes on. There was an ancientness to His face, and yet, if I were to stitch His likeness into a tapestry, He would not look any older that a man in his midforties. Not that I had the talent to capture the visage of a god, nor the dyes to try.

He was a god.

“There is purpose to all things, Ceris.” My name sounded powerful on His lips. Of course He knew my name. Had He not watched Endwever all this time? Had He not reached down to light the torch? Had I not felt His expectations the moment I whispered, I will be star mother? “There is a balance in the universe, which is ever shifting. It is never easy and always painful. Your kind glimpses only a sliver of it.”

I wasn’t sure what to say, or if there could be any response to such a claim. So I simply nodded.

The Sun looked out the window again, then stepped back, studying me fully. I felt self-conscious, as though He could see more of me than I could of Him. As though He could see past skin, blood, and bone to my very soul. To my surprise, His lips curved up in a soft smile.

“You are unexpected,” He said. “I know the burden the stars bring to mortals. Few volunteer, without persuasion.”

A pain like a slender skewer pierced my chest as memories of my home, Caen, and my forsaken future fluttered to life. But the wonder of my surroundings, of Him, staved off my mourning. “I might be mortal,” I tried, “but I am farseeing.”

The Sun nodded, seemingly content with this answer. “Have you lain with mortal men?”

Were my body my own, it would have burned with the question, but this crystalline form did not react. “Does it matter?” I asked, feeling every sultry daydream about Caen unravel in the back of my mind. “N-No. Not yet.”

He nodded, solemn, but the soberness did not hinder His light. “Ceris.”

I held my breath.

“If you wish to turn back, I will allow you to do so.” He looked away from me, at something that was there yet not there. Something on a plane beyond my perception. “It will not be a slight to your people.”

I swallowed, stiff with anxiety. My heart raced as though I stood at the peak of the highest mountain, my toes lined up with its edge, my body ready to jump.

Struggling for my voice, I said, “Do . . . I not please you?”

He shook His head, still not meeting my eyes. “I always give the volunteers a chance to change their mind. Only one, but I give it.”

I worried my lip and peered up at the glorious sky. “And if I don’t take the chance now, I won’t be able to later?”

“No. The law must be honored.”

I hugged myself and slowly drew my gaze from the stars.

“I will hurt you.” His voice was hushed, but the words startled me. “I do not wish to, but I will. Such is the manner of my existence.”

My heart pounded. Not quickly as it had before, but hard, like my chest was an unwanted wall in a cottage that needed to be torn down.