30. A Story I Didn’t Know I Was Telling
A Story I Didn't Know I Was Telling
As the jagged mountains marking the border between Solis and the kingdom of Volantia crept closer, the sun hammered down until the air shimmered and vibrated across the horizon.
Even the occasional breeze brought little relief.
Just the dry rasp against our skin, carrying the sting of grit as it worked its way into our boots, our clothes, even our teeth.
The bone-pale sand shifted into molten gold under the midday sun. And then, when it turned to muted amber at dusk, we stopped for the night.
I slid off the horse like a sack of potatoes rolling off a cart. My knees sagged the second my boots hit the dirt.
Griffon was there to catch me before I wiped out in the sand. “I’ve got you.”
Wouldn’t be the first time he’d kept me from falling.
There was the cliff, then the window. And you can’t forget the airship.
I should consider writing a book titled Wren’s Guide to Gravity: A Practical Study in Downward Motion.
And then this would just be research for the chapter on embarrassing dismounts.
“Everything hurts.”
“It’ll take some time for your body to get used to it.”
“Time, sure,” I groaned. “If only we’d packed some extra in that saddlebag next to the common sense we clearly left behind.”
He half-dragged me to a flat boulder in the patchy shade of a jujube tree and thrust a waterskin into my hands. “Drink. You’re doing better than you think.”
I took a deep swallow, then glanced up at him. “I nearly fell off twice.”
“Only twice.”
Despite the bone-crushing ache in my lower back and the chafing that made me look like I’d been riding a cactus instead of a horse, I smiled. “You’re being very patient with me.”
He shrugged. “I figure if you can calculate projective geometry, you can learn ‘horse go forward’.”
“Clearly, those are equivalent skills,” I replied dryly.
He sat against my side. “Besides, watching you argue with your mare is the most entertainment I’ve had in years.”
“Glad my suffering amuses you.”
“Immensely.”
I shoved his shoulder playfully, but his hand shot out and snatched mine before I could retreat. Caught in his grip, my skin thrummed at the contact, warmth sparking in my chest that had nothing to do with the desert heat.
Dust drifted through the air as the moment lingered.
Flaxen waves peeked out of his hood and fell over his forehead as those sunlit green eyes held mine. Should I say something? Laugh? Run? Stop thinking, Wren, just blink.
Stars, maybe breathe while you’re at it.
Suddenly, he let go of my hand, breaking the spell. “I should…” he said, clearing his throat, “go set up camp.”
I nodded dumbly, my mouth still too dry to form words.
Griffon set up the camp with the ease of someone who’d done this countless times. I attempted to help, but he gently directed me to gather kindling for the fire. Apparently, I was just getting in the way.
By the time the sun dipped below the horizon, he had the horses settled for the night, a fire built, and tea brewing in a metal pot. I sat on my bedroll as every muscle that had worked hard today seized.
“Here,” he said, pressing a cup of tea into my hands, “this will help with the soreness.”
“Will it help in recovering my lost dignity?”
“That might take more than tea.” He said it with such fond amusement that it was hard to be offended.
We ate dried meat and flatbread as the desert cooled rapidly around us. Once everything was cleaned up, we lay on our bedrolls.
The clear, infinite velvet sky stretched out above us. There were no city lights, or clouds, or domed glass filtering the view. Stars, like scattered diamonds, formed constellations, winking and glittering in intricate webs of ancient stories.
Griffon shifted on his bedroll. He’d been quiet setting up camp and even quieter on our journey through the sands.
Sometimes hours had passed with only the creaking of leather, the clopping of hooves, and the distant cries of the vultures on the wind to fill the silence between us and the border to our kingdom.
He had that faraway, but analyzing, look in his eye that suggested he was strategizing against every possible disaster scenario after hearing the news from Volantia.
“You’re doing it again,” I said into the darkness.
“Doing what?”
“Thinking so loudly, I can hear it over the katydids.”
He huffed a laugh. “I wasn’t aware that thinking had volume.”
“Yours does. It sounds like a combination of grinding gears and the narration of a survival guide. You might need to add a chapter on overly curious travel companions that ask way too many questions.”
“Ah yes, the ‘Wren’ chapter. That may require an entirely new volume.”
I turned to look at his profile in the starlight. “You’re worried about the queen’s soldiers.”
He sighed. “The soldiers are just an annoyance. Koel is the complication. If he’s still tracking us…”
“Then we’ll deal with it.” I reached over and slipped my hand into his. “Right now, we’re safe. We have horses and supplies. Neither of us are injured, and no one is actively trying to kill us. We appear to have stumbled into a rare period absent of catastrophe.”
His fingers tightened around mine. “Give it time.”
“We can only work with what we’ve got.” I tugged at his hand. “Stop brooding and enjoy the stars. When was the last time you really looked at them?”
“Don’t know. Years, maybe.” He shifted so that our heads were closer, but he didn’t let go of my hand.
“Well, now's your chance.” I pointed with my free hand.
“See that bright star almost directly overhead?
That's Regulus. The heart of Leo.” I traced the shape with my finger.
“See how those stars curve back from it like a sickle?
That's his mane. And the triangle behind it marks his haunches.
He's stretched across the sky as if he owns it.” I paused. “Which, honestly, in April, he does.”
“You really know them all.”
“Of course I do,” I said, pulling the blanket up to tuck it under my chin.
“I spent nineteen years staring out that one window. I know what they’re all called, but I also know their stories.
Their tales of heroes and villains, myths of daring adventures and tragic fates,” I paused, not sure I wanted to admit it, but did anyway, “They kept me company during lonely nights.”
Griffon began tracing gentle circles on the back of my hand, but didn’t say anything.
“Did you know Castor was originally part of the constellation Auriga?”
He made a noise of disagreement. “Castor and Pollux are part of Gemini.”
“Now they are, because that’s the way the story ends. But originally, they belonged to different constellations entirely.”
“Are you sure you’re not making this up? Because this sounds suspiciously like one of your ‘theological implications of honey’ lectures.”
“I’m not!” I protested. “The twins weren’t always together. Really.”
“Really…” he said with a smile in his voice.
“Don’t doubt a girl who alphabetized all the known stars for fun.”
He laughed. “Somehow that doesn’t surprise me.”
“Anyway…” I said, shaking my head and taking on the rhythm of a storyteller.
“During the Age of Chaos, Castor was part of the Charioteer. It was a constellation of darting movement and brilliant, blazing light. But he burned too bright. The other stars couldn’t bear his radiance.
He burned away shadows, revealing every imperfection, and left nothing hidden.
The stars of his constellation cast him out, fearing that his light would consume them all. ”
Griffon went still beside me.
“And Pollux,” I continued, “was born into the constellation Crater, the cup. A pattern of mysterious stars of vast, deep shadow. But she was too dark, too still, too smothering even for them. The stars couldn’t bear her presence, as she dimmed their light and made them question their own brightness. ”
“So they cast her out, too?”
“Yes. They feared she would extinguish what little light they had.”
He held my hand tighter.
“For eons, in a time called The Wandering,” my throat tightened, “they drifted alone through the cosmos, believing that they were fundamentally wrong. Castor believed he was a mistake because he was too bright, too violent, destroying everything he touched. And Pollux believed she was a mistake, too. She was too dark, too cold, consuming everything she encountered.”
“How did they find each other?”
I smiled up at Gemini and traced the twin stars with my finger. “Castor, in his endless pain, screamed his frustration, creating a burst of solar wind, a flare of desperate energy. It was the sound of someone who’d been burning alone for so long he couldn’t contain it anymore.”
“In the deep silence of space, Pollux heard his cry. Because being what she was, darkness is an excellent conductor of sound. She recognized the scream that echoed through the void. In her own agonizing pain and in her own silent way, she’d been screaming too.
So she followed the sound to its source. ”
“What happened when they met?” he asked in a soft voice.
“Everything changed, and the Age of Balance began. Castor’s blazing light latched onto Pollux’s cold darkness.
He could suddenly illuminate instead of consume.
And Pollux’s deep shadows found shape in Castor’s radiance.
She could finally be peaceful instead of merely void.
” I turned my head to find him already looking at me.
“Neither of them needed to change who they were. Castor still burned bright, and Pollux still embodied shadow. But together—”
“They created balance,” Griffon finished quietly.
“Exactly,” I said, watching his face in the starlight.
It had shifted to something softer than I was used to.
More vulnerable. “The Sideri don’t believe that the universe needs perfection.
They teach that it really just requires balance.
And that sometimes the most glaring flaw can be exactly what saves you when you find your complement. ”