Starsinger

Campfire Stories

Little speckled leaves rose around him like a cage, tickling Aaron's face. They rattled like sheafs of dry parchment in the wind as he crouched in the brush. Now.

Aaron leapt to his feet and the roe deer's head shot up in alarm, but the arrow was already notched in his bow. He felt the sharp twinge between his fingers as the string released. A sudden burst of red appeared on the roebuck's haunch as he stumbled to the ground.

Delia slid out from behind a tree, quick and quiet. She knelt by the deer and drew her knife smoothly across its throat. The roebuck instantly fell still.

"Child of stardust, your light is needed elsewhere," she murmured. "Gods above light your journey."

Aaron emerged from his bush. "A good death."

Delia shrugged and grimaced at the hunting dagger Raelyn had lent her. "The blade is dull. There may have been pain."

"It was quick." He lowered himself to the ground beside the roebuck and carefully removed his arrow. Aaron needed to conserve his arrows. They went hunting every fortnight now, ever since Delia had joined them. She was a skilled tracker, familiar with the mysterious twists of the Wistful Wood and the trails of the creatures who wandered there. When tracking game, she could blend in with the forest until the sounds of her steps all but disappeared.

Aaron started to lift the small deer by the haunch, but Delia circled her arms around its middle and hoisted it to her shoulders. She was strong, her arms and back well muscled from working the fields of Glenburrow. The obsidian links around her wrists glinted in the morning light. Aaron winced and glanced away.

He hefted his bow and they set off back to camp. Delia took slow, steady strides with the deer balancing across her broad shoulders. She was determined to carry her weight, throwing herself into the various chores of setting up and breaking down camp, joining hunting excursions, and then butchering and cooking the game they caught.

She talked about her family often, though never about her village. There was a permanent heaviness to her words and motions. Raelyn was the only one who could make her smile. It didn't happen often, but Aaron liked to think it was growing more frequent by the day.

Except when Jace was nearby. The striker and the mage had avoided speaking to each other almost entirely, which Aaron would have been thankful for if it didn't regularly thrust their group into tense silence. Every night at first star, she would bow her head over their fire and raise her arms in front of her, palms up in prayer. Quietly she would thank the gods above for the sacred gifts of light, warmth and life. Jace watched her prayers closely, eyes narrowed.

Sometimes Aaron thought about joining her, but he hadn't prayed to the stars since he was very young, and he wasn't sure he remembered the words. It surprised him to see a mage so religious. The Faith had been the first to turn on the mages when the wars of the Division turned ugly, calling magic unnatural, a sin against the gods, for which all of Re Vlynn was being duly punished. Only the gods may wield the great power of light, heat, and life, they murmured. When the Stone Daggers began their reign of terror, they hid in temples and cloaked themselves in the robes of the Faithful.

Raelyn loved to tease Delia about her Faith. "Did you ask the gods to send a starsinger to protect you from nightmares?" she asked. "Or perhaps you should ask why they only appear at night. Being blind half the day is fine enough for most creatures, but it's not very god-like."

"Starsingers are elemental warrior spirits. They've got better things to do than watch me sleep," Delia answered, flicking her braid at Raelyn. "And the gods are always there, even if we can't see them."

Raelyn rolled her eyes. "You're as bad as a luminary."

Whenever Delia tried to talk about the Faith, Raelyn switched the conversation to magic. She wanted to know everything, starting with the spell Delia had cast to defend herself in the tavern. She was awed that Delia had been able to summon and shape so much power so quickly, but Delia was nonplussed. She'd already had the spell bound in her labradorite pendant for months, a sort of preemptive protection.