She was a light in the darkness, the glow of her white skin expanding infinitely into the black void. Her equally dark hair cascaded in rivulets down the center of her back, swaying languidly as she moved. There was no context to her environment, only the darkness.
It was not a foreboding darkness, nor one of solitude or grief. It simply was.
The feminine figure continued her movements for an indeterminable amount of time, the light of her aura shifting with the passing of sheer black fabric twisting about her person on a phantom wind.
The setting changed abruptly, her robes settling around her. In the never-ending blackness suddenly appeared the vague relief of distant craggy walls. The opening of a rocky tunnel floating in the void. As she continued forward, a faint light became larger, catching on the edges of the stone until it became clear that she was now surrounded by the rock. An obsidian cave.
The light encompassed more of the passageway until she turned a corner and it gave way to a large fully-lit cavern. Here, the stone was worn smooth and reflected the pearlescent light of a circular pool set into the ground. A pond of liquid starlight.
As she walked, the fluid fabric slid off her shoulders and floated to the ground, lost to the shadows. Her increased luminescence merged with that of the pool, her form disappearing in the white atmosphere. The stark contrast of her hair seemed a writhing black entity amidst the blinding light.
She approached the pool. Rather than stopping at the edge, she continued forward without hesitation, stepping out into the open air and plunging beneath the silvery surface.
She fell briefly until landing soundlessly in the center of another black cavern-- like stepping into an inverted copy of the previous cave. Here, the darkness was patterned with clusters of light resembling the night sky. A beautiful room of stars hidden in a pocket of the universe.
She took a few steps and extended a glowing arm toward one of the clusters. Up close, the clusters were not spheres of light, such as stars, but collections of thread. Thousands of silver threads filled the cavern, weaving and twisting with one another in an intricate tapestry of light. Each was thin enough to be nearly invisible on its own-- but together, their lights became stronger.
Moving with practiced grace to avoid the threads near her feet, the female grasped the intended cluster in her delicate fingers and lifted it closer. Hundreds of threads knotted together in a beautiful display of legacy. Each knot-- some tied by the female herself, others appearing of the threads' will-- represented a bond. The joining of two life forces from the world below.
The cluster showed no resistance as she pulled on the outermost threads, loosening the interwoven mass until she had room to slide her long slender fingers into the center. With deft movements, she selected a single thread between her nails and pulled it forward. As it moved, so did the rest. It was the nucleus of its cluster. One of many throughout the cavern.
She closed her eyes and rubbed the thread between her fingers, pursing her lips in concentration. A few moments passed, and she began moving across the cavern. Without opening her eyes, she navigated the tapestry of threads, all the while dragging her chosen thread and its mass of bonded souls with her.
She extended her other arm, fingers dancing across threads like a master harpist in search of the perfect chord. Suddenly, her motions stilled. Eyes still closed, she plucked the single resonating thread and pulled it forward. She held the two threads between her fingers, gently rubbing each in her respective hand. She listened intently-- reaching out into some unseen cosmos. Time passed, the figure as still as stone.
Finally, she moved, satisfied with her decision.
Movement fluttered behind her eyelids as she placed the two selected threads between her thumb and index finger and began rubbing back and forth. Once the threads had twisted together, she used her remaining fingers and a few deft wrist motions to create a series of loops on either side. With a calm exhalation, she twisted her hands and pulled the threads.
She opened her eyes.
Before her, the threads had twisted into a small intricate knot-- their lights combining into something brighter than before. She let go of the knot, and both threads began to retract to their previous position in the cavern, stopping in the middle when either side went taut.
The first thread, the nucleus, became enveloped by its ties once more.
The second thread...
Her gaze followed the thread back to its origin, and she frowned slightly. Where there had once been a large cluster of light, there was now black.
She walked forward, bending down to run her hands across the ground. When she raised them, her fingers were draped with a collection of blackened threads, frayed where the knots had been torn apart.
A distant sorrow filled her. Regret for the loss of so many souls at once.
She gripped the broken threads and turned back to her newly-created bond, stabilized in the middle of the cavern.
The second thread-- the sole survivor of its cluster's destruction-- reached across the cavern, weaving between hundreds of other threads, and dipped into the first cluster, pulling it to the center of the room like a too-thin tether.
She looked at the bond and contemplated, watching the collection of threads longer than she did for most.
After a weighted moment, the moon goddess looked away and started toward another part of the cavern where she could continue her work.
