Chapter 2 The Starmap Truce #2
His body slackened, but his mind refused the surrender of true sleep. He closed his eyes, floating, half-absent, before his will dragged him upright again.
By the time his gaze sharpened, more time had passed. The faint sounds of night life flitted from outside the tent. Raucous laughter, music, the clinking of flasks, and the clang of men sparring. The air stilled—no longer raining.
He reached out—and found the bed empty.
His blood froze.
Gone.
Resh snapped into a sitting position, pulse pounding. A rustle from behind made him spin.
She crouched by his satchel, her movements too fluid, too silent. Entirely out of place in his tent, wearing her robe of starlight and moonbeams. Like a vision had stepped out from one of his battle-worn dreams.
Her clothing made no sound as she moved; her floor-length silver hair shimmering in the fading glow of the Polis lantern on his desk.
Every inch of her called to him: the way the fabric draped over her hips, the enticing dip of her waist, even the curve of her tiny wrist as she tapped the supply chest before her.
Resh forgot how to breathe as he watched her rummage through his things. She tugged open one of his saddlebags and pulled out a shiny, glittering orb—a rare star map, one of his most prized treasures.
He stood quickly. “Wait—careful with that, it’s fragile—”
Before he could take a step, he froze.
Completely.
His body locked in place, pulse racing, lungs turning to stone. Adrenaline flared. His hand ached to reach for his blade, but the connection between his mind and body had been severed. He couldn’t move. Couldn’t twitch a muscle.
She turned toward him, holding the map with both hands. Her head tilted. Soulful slanted eyes narrowed—not in malice, but in study. The quicksilver within churned with wisdom that did not belong on such a youthful face.
A ripple of magic thrummed through her fingers. She stepped closer, lifted one hand, and traced a glowing symbol in the air. It hovered briefly, then faded.
Resh still couldn’t move. He tried and tried but couldn’t. Even his lungs barely obeyed, each ragged breath burning in his gullet.
Drowning. He was drowning. Suffocating.
Her hand rose, brushing his chest, sliding upward to his collarbone. A gasp. Her lips parted, and her fingers fluttered like startled bird wings. She leaned in. Her brow furrowed.
“Solen ir ma tohr ga na,” she murmured, tracing his neck—his jaw, his cheek, then the center of his forehead.
Understanding rose like a sunrise in her gaze.
“Kailorien,” she whispered—his true name. On her tongue, it sounded like a promise and a warning all at once.
How did she know? How could she know?
Something pulsed between them.
The runes carved into his back, chest, and right arm flared to life in warning. The magic hissed as it awakened—coming to its host’s defense, colliding with the woman’s spell.
But the tide of the Resh’Agar’s might did not prevail. It broke on the rocks of her will. The woman’s face shifted, her eyes narrowing, her delicate brow furrowing. She stared at his chest as though she could see through his armor to the symbols beneath.
A moment of stillness as she fought the surge.
Had he been able to speak, he would have warned her. This wasn’t a battle she could win. None could suppress the Resh’Agar.
But then she did.
His runes calmed, the roaring magic within sputtering and retreating into dormancy.
She blinked, and everything released. The spell broke.
He staggered, caught himself on the table.
She stepped back, eyes wide, sweat beading at her temple.
He held up his hands. “It’s all right. I’m not angry.” He drew a breath. “You were protecting yourself”
His runes backed down from a threat. Her power over them had been absolute. How had this tiny creature managed to immobilize him? She barely reached his sternum. He could lift her with one arm. Break her with one hand. And yet…
His thoughts drifted. To her long white lashes. To the sharp intelligence flickering in eyes too knowing, too ancient. She set the star map on the table with infinite care, then pointed.
Resh turned, slower this time. “You want me to open it?”
A small nod.
“There’s a button on the inside curve,” he gestured. “May I?”
She nodded, and he took the golden orb into his hands, pressing down on a hidden spot.
The device popped open, and a warm bright light threw projections of the stars up on the walls and ceiling of the tent.
The map charted a portion of the sky few modern scholars remembered, and as she turned—just so—the constellations aligned with the glowing freckles on her face.
This time, it wasn’t a spell that bound him, but awe.
The woman’s eyes filled with a nostalgic gleam. She reached out and touched one of the constellations. Not the brightest. One of the faint ones—off to the side. Forgotten.
She whispered. One word. Barely audible.
Resh leaned in. “Say that again?”
She touched her chest, then the star. “Auryn’reh Solah.”
His heart thundered so loud he thought she’d hear it.
“Is that your name?”
She didn’t answer.
So he whispered back: “Auryn, then.”
When she finally dared to smile—soft, fragile—something in his chest broke open. An ache. A promise. Something he would spend a thousand years trying to understand.
As she lowered her hand, her knees bent. She swayed. Instinct overrode hesitation. He stepped forward, hands catching her shoulders before she could fall. He checked his strength, afraid he’d crush her if he didn’t.
Her head dropped, breath uneven. The color had leached from her face, her lips pale and trembling. The glowing freckles on her face dimmed to dull silver.
“You’re spent, little star,” he murmured. “That spell took much from you.”
She allowed him to steady her. This sudden closeness was dizzying.
Her scent coiled around him like a siren’s lure.
His hand stayed on her back longer than it should have.
Just resting there. Grounding her. Grounding him as he helped her sit, guiding her to the stool beside him.
She settled in without protest. Resh knelt beside her and opened the star map again.
The tent glowed around them—constellations drifting across the canvas above like fragments of a dream.
For a long time, they sat that way—shoulder to shoulder, watching the stars move.
She pointed to some. Spoke in that strange language again. Naming things. Sometimes asking questions he could only guess the answers to. Every time he shared what he remembered of the skies, she quieted.
Not just watching.
Learning.
And Resh couldn’t help but marvel at the sight.
Later that night, he lay on his cot with his arms folded behind his head, eyes wide open, the faint glow of the starmap casting shifting light across the canvas ceiling of his tent.
The exhaustion of sleepless weeks tugged at some part of him, but his thoughts rebelled.
Since Auryn had awakened, he’d only left the tent once—to fetch them food and drink, though he’d had no appetite himself.
The rune carved into his spine, Eihwaz, ensured his body did not crave food or rest. He forced himself to eat, if only to feel more human.
Somewhere beyond, night moved on without a care, slinking through the camp enshrouded in thick mist. It blew a gentle yet insistent breath across the grassland, rattling the canvas but not passing through it. Inside was safe and warm; Resh’s wards meticulously placed to guard against such elements.
In pockets of the rolling fog, zirrin bugs chirped and flaunted colors of all shades of blue, so bright they blended with the starmap’s hues—even through the tent’s embrace. Cries of lonely souls, echoing through the mist in search of their other half.
Outside, a kind of thrill had crept into the rows of carts, anvils, fires and forges, into weary hearts and restless minds. His Reskala warriors spoke to one another in a mixture of excited tones and hand signs, ready to set off within the next few days now that their Resh’Agar was back.
‘Back to the Crystal City’—one signed in complex dips, curves, and finger motions, gesturing in a grand arc to signal Krystopolis. ‘Nineteen years of service. The reward will be glorious.’
Resh had spoken with the warriors Zarrek stationed at his tent after Auryn fell asleep, a brief exchange to catch up on any news from the past few days.
Nothing exciting, really. A boar attack, remedied with effort and no casualties.
Brackenrood, safeguarded from flock of carrion wailers searching for easy pickings in the children playing on the streets.
With the company leaving, the town would need to fend for itself.
The death toll would rise, for their neighbors—the Tazharyn—owed them no allegiance, and the Gliders looked no further than the growing unrest in their own Nestings.
Perhaps Maradryn would send assistance if Brackenrood requested it.
The city was Daesmoria’s busiest and most developed human bastion and could spare soldiers.
His eyelids felt heavier than stone, but he wouldn’t sleep. Not until Zarrek could stand guard over his body. He clung to the only thing that kept him anchored in wakefulness, the memory from the temple.
Auryn in his arms, still cold from the ice. Her silver eyes shining like the mystic light of stars, pulling his very soul into the galaxies within. Her voice, smooth and lilting.
Kailorien.
His true name, spoken with such sensual familiarity—by someone who shouldn’t know anything about him. Yet, she had whispered it as though the skies themselves were crying out to him.
Like it belonged to her.
Like he belonged to her.
He turned his head.
Auryn lay on his bed nearby, curved around the now-open star map like a child around her mother’s talisman.
Her plate of food lay on the small table beside her, untouched, hair flowing like a waterfall of moonlight in every direction.
The runes of the map cast shifting constellations across her cheekbones and the arching wings of her brow.
He caught a glimpse of her ears—human, yet not.
Pointed at the peak, a divergence marking her as something other.
Resh exhaled into a soft ache that settled in his chest. He lost himself in time just watching her. Couldn’t shake the feeling that his name on her lips had un-stitched a vulnerability he’d sewn shut long ago. A weakness he’d abandoned.
I am the Resh’Agar. The Arm of the Void. The sword of the Destroyer.
The Arm knows no fear.
And yet, he was afraid now.
What was he thinking, taking this woman—this voice of stars and prophecy—back with him? What was he going to do with her now? She wasn’t a rare tome he could place back on the shelf when convenience struck. She lived and breathed—glowed and smelled of something sweet and dizzying.
He’d get no answers tonight. Maybe not even in the next several months on their journey home.
He considered praying but discarded that thought as swiftly as it came.
Faith had never served him well. Neither the Doctrine nor the Void seemed to have any interest in his fate.
It was just as well. As Resh’Agar, he was not bound to such things.
Resh rolled onto his side and closed his eyes. The journey to Stonewake would be fraught with peril. As Commander, he couldn’t afford distractions of this scale. Auryn would join them, or she would not. He vowed not to press her either way.
Behind closed lids, he envisioned his empty bed, his star map abandoned on the pillow—ignored the stabbing dread the image wrought. Shifting in his cot, he settled into his blankets and hoped the storm Zarrek warned of wouldn’t arrive until morning.