The Girl Who Drank the Moon(84)

“Oh!” cried the citizens of the Free Cities. “Oh, oh, oh!”

And the families of the Star Children held the hands of their sons and daughters a little more tightly.

“I was taken from my mother,” Luna explained. “Like you, I was brought to a family who loved me and whom I love. I cannot stop loving that family, and I don’t want to. I can only allow my love to increase.” She smiled. “I love the grandmother who raised me. I love the mother I lost. My love is boundless. My heart is infinite. And my joy expands and expands. You’ll see.”

In town after town, she said the same thing. And then she climbed onto Fyrian’s back and returned to her grandmother.



Glerk refused to leave Xan’s side. His skin grew cracked and itchy without the daily wash of his beloved swamp water. Every day, he looked longingly at the Bog. Luna asked the former Sisters—friends of Ethyne’s—to please keep buckets at the ready to douse him when he needed it, but well water just wasn’t the same. Eventually, Xan told him to stop being such a silly and walk down to the Bog for a daily bath.

“I can’t stand the thought of you suffering, dearest,” Xan whispered, her withered hands on the great beast’s face. “Plus—and don’t take this the wrong way—but you stink.” She took a rattling breath. “And I love you.”

Glerk laid his hands on her face. “When you’re ready, Xan, my darling, darling Xan, you may come with me. Into the Bog.”



As Xan’s health began to fail more rapidly, Luna informed her mother and her hosts that she would be sleeping in the Tower.

“My grandmother needs me,” she said. “And I need to be near my grandmother.”

Adara’s eyes filled with tears when Luna said it. Luna took her hand. “My love isn’t divided,” she said. “It is multiplied.” And she kissed her mother and returned to her grandmother, curling up next to her night after night.



The day the first wave of Star Children returned to the Protectorate, the former Sisters threw open the windows of the hospital.

The Sorrow Eater by now looked as old as dust. Her skin crinkled over her bones like old paper. Her eyes were sightless and hollow. “Close the window,” she rasped. “I can’t bear to hear it.”

“Leave it open,” Xan whispered. “I can’t bear not to.”

Xan, too, was a dry husk. She hardly breathed. Any moment now, Luna thought as she sat by Xan’s side, holding her tiny hand, as light as feathers.

The Sisters left the windows open wide. Cries of joy wafted into the room. The Sorrow Eater cried out in pain. Xan sighed with happiness. Luna gently squeezed her hand.

“I love you, Grandmama.”

“I know, darling,” Xan wheezed. “I love . . .”

And she drifted away, loving everything.





47.


In Which Glerk Goes on a Journey, and Leaves a Poem Behind





Later that night, the room was quiet and utterly still. Fyrian had ceased his howling at the foot of the Tower and had gone to sob and sleep in the garden; Luna had returned to the open arms of her mother, and those of Antain and Ethyne—another odd, beloved family for an odd, beloved girl. Perhaps she would sleep in the room with her mother. Perhaps she would curl up outside with her dragon and her crow. Perhaps her world was larger than it was before—as it is for children when they are no longer children. Things had become as they should be, Glerk thought. He pressed his four hands to his heart for a moment, then slipped into the shadows and returned to Xan’s side.

It was time to go. And he was ready.

Her eyes were closed. Her mouth was open. She did not breathe. She was dust and stalk and stillness. The stuff of Xan was there, but the spark was not.

There was no moon, but the stars were bright. Brighter than normal. Glerk gathered the light in his hands. He wound the strands together, weaving them into a bright, shimmering quilt. He wrapped them around the old woman and lifted her to his chest.

She opened her eyes.

“Why, Glerk,” she said. She looked around. The room was quiet, except for the creaking of frogs. It was cold, except for the heat of mud underneath. It was dark, except for the shine of the sun on the reeds, and the shimmer of the Bog under the sky.

“Where are we?” she asked.

She was an old woman. She was a girl. She was somewhere in between. She was all of those things at once.

Glerk smiled. “In the beginning, there was the Bog. And the Bog covered the world and the Bog was the world and the world was the Bog.”

Xan sighed. “I know this story.”

“But the Bog was lonely. It wanted a world. It wanted eyes with which to see the world. It wanted a strong back with which to carry itself from place to place. It wanted legs to walk and hands to touch and a mouth that could sing. And so the Bog was a Beast and the Beast was the Bog. And then the Beast sang the world into being. And the world and the Beast and the Bog were all of one substance, and they were all bound by infinite love.”

“Are you taking me to the Bog, Glerk?” Xan asked. She pulled herself from his embrace and stood on her own two feet.

“It’s all the same. Don’t you see? The Beast, the Bog, the Poem, the Poet, the world. They all love you. They’ve loved you this whole time. Will you come with me?”