63. Years from Now I Will Lie About This Story
Years from Now I Will Lie About This Story
When Asteria’s lonely daughter
asks me about her mother,
I will pretend that I did not know
how she created the fox.
But the truth is I was there.
I walked with her into the woods
that day. I followed Asteria and
I watched her pluck a dying star
from the night sky. I watched her hold
the fiery thing in her bare hands.
I found her the bones of that long-dead
creature she asked me for.
I saw the way she tenderly placed
the beating heart and lungs of the star
inside that perfectly preserved dead thing.
I took her hand while we waited.
And that fox made of fire and stars
came to life and blinked before us.
Long tail leaving sparks everywhere
as it swished and moved.
When we walked out of the woods together,
the fox at our heels, Leto spied on us and asked
how we had done it. And we swore her
to the same secrecy we had sworn each other.
No one could ever know.