47.6 Knowing That I'll Leave

General Summary

Hope: Day 4

I wake late in the morning at a very dusk-appropriate waking hour. My trio of new friends kept me up late into the night and we will all regroup later in the day.   Kiita has prepared a light, cool breakfast and pitcher of iced tea for me. She has also acquired a small vial of medicine to help with my pounding head. Once I’ve eaten, Starfire has requested a visit with me and so Kiita helps me dress and prepare myself properly. She is quite determined that I go out looking like a proper blessed one.   Starfire is awaiting me in a succulent-filled garden with her notebook, though she closes it when I approach. I mention the potion that Kiita gave me, and ask if any of the three of them are healers. I had thought Starfire might be, but she shakes her head. No Moon is adorably durable, Void is very aggressive, and the two of them prevent any harm from coming to Starfire.No healer needed, apparently.   As we walk along the lakeshore together, she points out that some people seem to be abstaining from food and wonders if this is a self-sacrificing culture. I explain the spiritual energy of the place and how spirits can subsist on the energy of the lake rather than physical food. Still - it’s a precarious position for everyone, given that they don’t know when the resupply caravan might arrive. But they have no choice.   I mention that I had thought I might investigate their food production and see if I could help. After all, I had quite a green thumb in a previous life. After a moment of silence, Starfire asks if I ever had children in any of these lives. I tell her about Liliales and the Day and Night tradition of being song-bound.  

A mother and child who died…live again?

  It's hard to explain without alluding to the strange future in which Fae of Day and Night ceased to exist for a while, but I explain how the relationship grew and how we’ll gain more memories as we cycle. It's harder and harder to dodge her questions (“So you’ll cycle back to Day and Night?") but I turn it back to her, asking why she is curious about children in particular.   She comments that No Moon moves slowly, and she’s not sure how to convince him to have children. She knows he wants children eventually, but not sure that they’re on compatible timetables. After swearing me to secrecy, she confesses that much like Void's mother, she is incompatible with life. She knows that she will burn out eventually, like all stars do, and she worries that No Moon won't be ready to have children before she does.   At this point in time (before Starfield, Starfury, and Eclipse), I am not sure if No Moon has loved a mortal before, and Starfire confirms that both he and Void have cared for mortals but maybe not loved them. No Moon was guardian to an empire for generations before they eventually felt unassailable because of their protector and became focused on conquering others. When that happened, he told them he was disappointed and left, pointing out to the current king that he was diverging further and further from his grandfather's vision and hopes.   I offer what advice I can - I think she should be honest about her lifespan and timeline. Learning about her timeline would cause grief for centuries, but I believe that it would help them acclimate and then of course he would hold to her timeline. Having navigated the transition from mortality to being Undying (and then facing death in Harmony), I feel strangely qualified to give this sort of advice. But I also know that Starfire burned out before Starfield was even hatched...so perhaps there is a limit to how much I can help.  

I don’t want to start a family knowing that I will have to leave…

  Starfire gives voice to a fear so deeply ingrained in any mortal that it can't even clearly be articulated. All mortals begin families with the knowledge that one day, their children will be alone. I tell her this, and we share a sad chuckle over it - it's a problem unique to someone who ought to be Undying but isn't.   But here I am, the second life of a mother with the second life of a son. Seeing me, she asks if I think it would be possible for her to leave a piece of herself behind for No Moon and their children eventually. Even without my wizarding brain, I think most things are possible and I say so. Perhaps she'll go to learn from the Fae of Day and Night and see what is possible.  

You've give me hope.

  And with that, we turn back to the present time and decide to go scouting without the boys. They are conspicuous in the daytime - enormous black winged creatures. Instead, Starfire takes to the air in her dragon form with me aboard.   She is slender, serpentine, and blindingly bright. Her horns and talons feel like they are made of pure starlike flames, and those same flames dance along her back. I can see what she means by burning herself out. I can see Starfield in her, in the cold brilliance of her fire. Wildfire, I imagine, is a consumptive, destructive fire. Starfire is bright and faraway. She has the same sort of overwhelming aura as Tide did, as a second generation dragon. I imagine No Moon will feel the same. Maybe I will too, one day.   We fly far enough that we can see pieces of Norcrack’s forces moving to surround the the entire lake in small groups that are not immovable, but would be hard to sneak past. Past this front guard is the actual Empire of Shattered Rock. It’s horrifying - it seems like something stripped away the outside of a volcano to leave behind this wreckage of rock and stone. The spiritual energy is immense.   We see what I assume to be Norcrack himself - a 50m titan who echoes the unrefined blasted stone of the landscape. What’s more, he is grabbing chunks of rock from the ex-volcano and shaping them into smaller titans. I have reasonably good vision for energy even without being able to create magic, but Starfire points out that only a quarter of the spiritual energy is going into each titan, while another quarter is consumed by Norcrack to sustain his work. The other half is simply lost, wasted.   I wonder aloud if we could do something similar with the lake and draw new spirits out of the water with less waste, creating our own army. It’s an academic question - I don’t think creating life just to fight a war is appropriate.   Nearby, there is something strange - a fighting arena where the titans are locked in combat. Another titan, this one robed in sand to the point that a sword probably couldn't reach its core, presides over the arena and moves forward with a deep bowl of water each time a titan wins. The winning titans are doused in the water and I can feel their energy grow, as though they are being infused with power from the spiritual water. It seems like Liva's thinking might be right - the raw intelligence gained by the titans is there, but none of the experience that would help them make sense of it. I worry that any reason-based agreement we make with Norcrack wouldn't be as easily held to by legions of powerful but only weakly intelligent minions. They're like children...but they are entering into bonds of fealty that a child should never have to take on.   As we circle and strain to see what’s happening, I start to see what is happening. The water is being used to create pacts between the raw titans and other sand-robed figures, with the pacts growing exponentially. All of them connect up to the largest sand-robed titan, who is connected to Norcrack. But their bond is different than the rest - it is almost like my own Heartsong and I can feel the love in it. Unlike the other pacts, which are intentionally created and in which power flows from the sand-titan to the many rock titans it supports, this one is mutually beneficial and organic. It has a strength and depth that mean it must have grown over time.   Seeing this stops me in my mental tracks as I consider our enemy. Everything we had known of them so far had been emotionless, rampaging and destructive. This is something new and familiar, and it makes me question what these two are doing. And if we can find out, and see if there is another way to engage Norcrack and his...partner? Family? Then maybe we can just dissolve all these fragile pacts and clean up the remaining spirits as primitive, instinctual creatures rather than aggressive, sapient people. Herding and relocating primitive rock energies would be much easier than angry toddler titans.   But that sort of strategy will still have to wait to talk to the boys and the rest of the city. Instead, we turn Southward to see if we can spot the re-supply caravan en route to the city and get more information about how long it will take to arrive. Aid should be coming from the mouth of the River up North, and they're sailing down the coast to land Southwest of the lake. Even if they're on track, we still might need to clean up some of Norcrack's forces to clear the way for them.   As we fly, she asks me some other questions. I realize she has been observing me with much more insight than I anticipated. Not that I have been doing a good job of obscuring my nature, but I have grown accustomed to powerful figures just accepting that there are strange people wandering around and not paying it much mind.  

You seem reserved, and a little bit unfathomable. Last night you would look at the boys sometimes and your gaze would grow sad - I noticed it because it was a discordant reaction and sometimes when you talk to me, you are pensive. I know Lady Asphodeloideae schemes deeply and meddles; I don’t question that she sent you here and I’m not surprised to find an ally waiting for us. I wish it was something she had done before - it would have helped Void to have more frequent contact with other fae, and I do hope you can stay with us for a long time to come. But I get a feeling that that’s not going to be the case.

You’re holding back even though you care a great deal more than I would expect for someone that we just met. The boys have an almost instinctual recognition of kindred souls - they don’t think about it too much. All it takes is a look at your sword and a few pints, knowing that you’re a friend in a strange place…they’ll take the battlefield without hesitation. They trust until something says they shouldn’t. Even something as burned as No Moon might be…trust first, questions later. He will puzzle things out but it will take him quite a while. He keeps asking questions and worrying at it but he’s in no hurry to answers. You know me - my sense of time is different.

So: Why you? Of all the fae of Drifting Seeds that Asphodeloideae could have sent, do you know why you? It can’t just be because of your strange multi-cyclic nature.

  I mull this over in silence for a while. Of course this is part of a scheme, but not one I could properly puzzle out with Starfire. I answer very carefully, trying to give her enough of an answer that my reticence makes sense but not so much that I give away pieces of the future that I shouldn't.  

In one of my other cycles, my fate tangles quite closely with No Moon and Void.   Your fate tangles with the boys’ but not mine?   Oh Starfire…   I know…   No - you really, really don’t.

  I can feel the tension between us in the air even as we glide in silence. I make the same sort of choice that has led me in the right direction every time I make it - I would rather tell this person the thing that will soothe their heart than keep my existence here 'safe'.  

Starfire, your daughter is going to be one of my closest friends.

  She reaches up and extends a gentle talon for me to clutch as tears stream down my face, feeling like a conduit for the eventual wound that No Moon, Void, and Starfield will all have one day.   She seems to understand my position now - if I have fate with her unhatched daughter then there is a limit to what I can say and tell her. But I have given her hope and a strong motivation to leave a piece of herself behind when she dies, maybe at a point I haven’t reached yet. I tell her that I’ll keep my eyes out for it when I return. Part of me wracks my my brain for any clue I might have passed by, any sign that she succeeded. Maybe Cereus knows, or Asphodeloideae. Maybe she left something that only No Moon would recognize. Still, I'm left with the aching awareness that Starfire doesn't get to meet her daughter (daughters? All I know of Starfury is that she was part of the Demon-Dragon clan, so her egg must have been stolen by the Zephyr).   As we continue onwards, she turns the topic back to the city we are dealing with, and how we might create crisis for the leadership. She suggests creating a totem or gathering point for the common folk which would smite enemies who approach while the generals fight their war. The people could run to it, but they would still have to fight to defend their homes and infrastructure - things that matter aside from their lives. We will need to pin this magic to a symbol that gives them hope and reminds them of a power that they will rely on when we are gone.   We turn this idea over, and eventually spot the supply ship a few days off the coast. There is a column of Norcrack’s forces between it and the city, including several of the sand-robed titans. It will be a good opportunity to test out what happens if the fealty pacts between them and the rock titans are dissolved, and Starfire and I might be able to handle it alone, but it will be easier (and more fun) with the boys.