The Fickle Winds of Autumn
32. The Melancholy Stars

The cold hard night-time stone dug into Kira’s side; the shallow recessed niche, which cracked into the fissured side of the mountain, was just deep enough to shield her from the worst of the wind, but it could not calm the turbulence of her restless adrenaline. She tried to rest, to recover - tomorrow was certain to be a trying day, braving the elements and the uncertainties of the Pass - but every time she closed her eyes, she could not escape the fervent image of Ellis dangling precariously from the length of her arm; his eyes still seemed to pierce into hers and disrupt her thoughts; his life, his trust, somehow seemed so precious to her; it surged within her like the beat of her own heart.

It was a tense, precarious uneasy feeling; it was not comfortable or happy, but somehow it seemed more important to her than anything else she had ever encountered before.

She sighed and got up; she carefully stepped across her sleeping companions, out onto the exposed pathway.

The wind had calmed to a placid chill. She pulled her tunic tighter and rubbed her arms as the thin, shivering air brushed against her face.

The silvered Purity of the Moon illuminated the huge open expanse of ragged valley down below; a vast fall of fierce mountains and sheer cliffs; their stark, jagged silhouettes, determined to overwhelm and claim the lives of those not well adapted to their barren secrets. But in the vibrant silence of the night, it seemed a place not just of danger, but of a staggering and unworldly beauty.

Aldwyn’s lilting snore drifted and reassured her.

The trembling mountain breeze softly caressed her.

How small she was, how insignificant beneath the immense open sky and the unlimited, infinite landscapes.

A milky spray of stars peered down, curious to know her secrets, to inspect her every thought and worthiness.

She folded her arms against the coldness of the air, but she seemed to be warm inside from a hope that she dared not touch and could not name.

She gazed up at the overwhelming sky and asked the Surrounder for His guidance and what this strange feeling could mean; this unknowing certainty; to be so bravely afraid of the future.

Perhaps she would be better without it?

Perhaps the Surrounder, in His kind mercy, could remove it from her?

Or it might fall away from her once she returned to the dreary routines of the convent?

But the melancholy stars had already worked their deepest magik.