“Is this a projection of the night sky?” I asked, searching for familiar landmarks. My father used to take me out to watch the stars when I was little, picking out constellations.
But I didn’t see a moon. I didn’t see any familiar patterns at all within the mix of stars, some brighter than others, many connected to others with faint bands of light or nestled together.
“This is the life dome,” he told me. “Every life in the kingdom is reflected above.”
“Why does this exist?”
He smiled as if my bluntness amused him. “Sometimes shifters fight to the death here. Regardless, anyone who bets on a particular shifter—or against them—can come and check how they fare.”
He pointed to a star, and I took a step toward him reluctantly, trying to follow his gaze. “Those stars that are pink or purple? Those are Fae stars. The blue or green are shifters.”
“The rest are mortal stars.” Of course our stars were plainer, duller. Even our lives didn’t shine as bright. The thought filled me with a surge of rebellious rage, furious that even the magic belittled us.
“Do you want to find Tay and Lidi’s stars?”
I glanced at him sharply. I would’ve assumed that the cloud of duller stars faded into the background for every shifter here; the only ones that mattered were the bright stars of the Fae or the shifters.
But he’d proceeded as if he were sure of my response. His hand settled on my shoulder, and I breathed in his warm, clean scent as he moved closer to me. He didn’t seem to notice the proximity, instead focused on stretching his arm alongside my ear. But I was keenly aware of how close he was to me, of how his broad bicep sleeve brushed my ear just faintly as he tried to show me where to focus.
“See that blue star?” he asked me. “Above it, the cluster of two pink stars?”
“Yes.”
“Look down from the blue star, and you’ll see three stars clustered together.”
I followed his finger down, and my breath caught in my throat.
Two of the faint white stars touched a star that glowed blue.
Was that my star? I asked the safer question. “Are those Tay and Lidi?”
“I’ve spent a lot of time trying to make sense of the life dome’s magic and how to map stars to souls.” He spoke softly, as if it were a confession, and I wondered why. Fieran never sounded ashamed. “I think Tay’s is at the top. The one with the scar.”
Now that he pointed it out, I could see the fragmented edges of the upper star. “Is that because he’s dying?”
I almost kept the catch out of my voice, and I hated that he must hear it.
“It’s because he’s cursed,” he corrected. “But I suppose you need to hear that from the healer, not me, to believe it. At any rate, you can come in here any time. You can see their stars and know they’re still shining…even without your supervision.”
I wouldn’t believe my brother was cursed if I heard from the healer, either, because I assumed anyone here might well serve Fieran’s bidding. “Who would curse my brother?”
“I’m going to find out,” he promised, before he corrected himself. “Weare going to find out.”
As I watched my sisters and brother’s stars, memorizing their location, the blue star pulsed and grew brighter steadily until it flared. Then it was flame blue bright, so bright I blinked, before the color faded.
Until it was just a mortal star.
“What is that?” I whispered.
“I don’t know. But it’s why I came looking for you.”
For once, I believed Fieran wasn’t lying. “Is that why you were really in my village?”
“I came because of the monsters. That wasn’t a lie. But I’ve been searching for you for years.”
The thought choked me with overwhelm. If mortals could be dragon-marked, if they could be powerful, the kingdom might shift. Or I might fail and die in front of those who gathered to watch the arena. “Where’s your star?”
He pointed out a star. Bright blue. Brighter than any of the others, steady without flaring out like mine.
