When stars fall

[Seven Xu]

Spring, 502 AV
The Star Festival.

“She waved at me.”

“No, stupid, she waved at me.”

The revelry waned at their backs as they began the short journey home. Lifen was the first to succumb to the day’s celebrations, and her mother had gathered her into her arms as she refused to walk. Seven and O’Ren followed, and bickered. All were swathed in soft white silk. Seven had long discarded his crystal mask, and it hung carefully from the elbow of the Woman who had brought him at her husband’s request.

“Why would the Star Lady wave at a Widow,” the Woman chimed, “when she’d just as happily send her guards to crush it?”

Seven’s chin tilted skyward. He caught the white-orange glow of a lantern floating carelessly against the black of night, and he smiled. “I’m going to be her guard, one day.”

“Are you? And who, darling, is going to let you? You’re … how old are you, now? Nine? There are boys your age and younger that begin their journey—their privilege—to serve in the Shinya guard. Good boys; boys without fangs and claws and murder in their hearts.”

There was a heavy silence for what must have been a chime. O’Ren adjusted the alabaster hem of her skirt as she shuffled in line behind her mother; Seven’s mouth had opened and closed several times, but no word of response had dared come out and his brow had wrinkled into something resembling defiance; the Woman had hastened her step; a stirring body wrapped its gangly arms around her neck and waist.

“You’re lying,” he finally said, small white hands balled into fists. “I don’t want to murder anyone.”

“Of course not, not yet.” The Woman’s arm swept back to round his shoulders, giving him an encouraging push forward.

“What’s murder?” Lifen’s sleepy head rolled across her mother’s collar, wiping away spittle that had gathered in her short sleep. And then, as if the subject bore no weight, she murmured, “Are we home?”

“Almost. Come, Ren, Seven. Hurry along, let your father know we’ve arrived.”

As the pair ran ahead, O’Ren turned to her brother, fists pumping at her sides and sandaled feet slapping hard-packed earth as she kept pace. “What did you wish for tonight?”

Seven laughed.

[Seven Xu]

It had happened again.

Whether it had been the night of prayers or wishes tied to burning paper lanterns or the sweet rolls he’d eaten, the boy woke in a cold night sweat, knees curled to his chest, heaving and shuddering and sobbing. He kicked away his sheets and sat up so quickly his vision dimmed and his head spun.

He could never remember her face after he opened his eyes, and he could never remember to keep them closed. Even so, he knew who she was.

“What did you wish for tonight?”

My mother.

The words had been scribbled hastily upon the thin strip of paper, fastened to the lantern and thrown into the sky. That wish had been written for three years now, as soon as he could write he knew what he wanted most. And year after year, that wish fizzled like a candle in the black of night. Sometimes he’d forget it completely in favor of distraction, but it would always come back.

The air smelled tangy with remnants of the night’s dinner. Sweat clung cold to waxen skin. The soft pads of his feet whispered across a wood floor. A door swept away from its berth and let the warmth of a hearth wash over gooseflesh arms and legs.

He’d only known the weight of the file in his hands for a heartbeat when his father’s voice broke the silence. Seven turned on his heel, mouth agape in guilty astonishment.

“You’re up early.”

“I was just—I—I wanted to …” He pursed his lips. “She told me that Zintila hates me.” A half-truth and a change of subject did little to abolish the feeling that lingered in his stomach like a hot stone. He paused, licked his lip. “She said that I could never join the Shinya, because I’m a murderer.”

“Did she, now?” Zhao sat nearby, rubbing sleep and incredulity from his brow. “Who have you murdered?” There was a pause; he beckoned his son to his side. “Listen to me, Seven. You need to stop twisting words—” there was a squeak of protest, and a hand shot up between them to silence it, “—you need to stop it. You cannot join the Shinya. We all have our paths. That’s not yours.”

“How do you even know that? You won’t let me try.”

“I’m sorry, Seven.”

Somehow the words hurt even more coming from his father’s mouth, as if they carried more truth than the Woman and her silver tongue. His chest tightened and he blinked away a haze that stung the corners of his eyes.

“Taking a file to your nails or teeth won’t change what you are, either.” The cool metal was plucked from Seven’s feeble grasp. Zhao’s dark gaze turned hard. “Go back to bed.”

[Seven Xu]

“You must be still.”

It wasn’t supposed to hurt. “I am.” Seven protested, wiped his aching thumb against his forefinger, and tried again to relax.

They had spent the morning with that file; she had embraced the challenge of removing those obsidian talons from the boy’s left hand, and he had sat for the tedious bell it took to rub one away to where nail met white flesh. He was quiet until black dust began to coat the table beneath his palm again.

“I don’t feel any different,” he said, “my thumb just hurts more now.”

“Your thumb isn’t used to being touched there. And unfortunately,” the Woman squeezed her husband’s bastard’s forefinger in her own bony grip, “declawing you will not change you.”

“What will?” Unnatural crimson darted between her busy hands and her face, and he wrangled his spittle-slick bottom lip beneath a sharp canine.

“Nothing—magic, perhaps, but you’re more like to end up a corpse—so nothing.”

“Nothing.”

Seven’s knees found his chest, toes curling over the edge of the chair. If he could not change, maybe he was not the one in the wrong.

“Promise me you’ll stop your nonsense with the Shinya. There are people that would just as soon see you thrown from the highest peak than let a symenestra guard this city. You’ll get over it, you’ll see.” She released him. As much as she resented him, this living, breathing reminder of her love’s affair with a Widow, she would not let the child’s mind thrive on the impossible. “It’s hard enough on your father, you know; you don’t need to make it harder.”

“I promise.” It was a halfhearted vow, but the words were there, and that was enough.

[Legion]

Thread Award Seven Persuasion +2, Disguise +1 Consequence & Commentary This was a lovely thread. Don't apologize for introspective flashbacks. They are thoroughly enjoyable especially when they are as well composed as this. I look forward to the discourse between Seven and Zintila.