The Starless Girl

by Liz Delton

  They steered their horses away from the village as Kira told Zowan the full story of the creature made of darkness chasing her through the door. Zowan didn’t seem to think the mention of the door as anything special, as Ichiro and Nari had, but her description of the enormous dog-like creature made him silent for a long time.

  “If it came into my realm—the Starless Realm, I mean—it could return here, couldn’t it?”

  “One would think,” Zowan replied simply. Kira almost regretted telling him, for he looked more worried than he had been the whole evening.

  “It’s not starless, by the way.”

  “What?”

  “My realm,” Kira clarified. “There are stars there.”

  He smiled a little. “I’ve read about that, actually. A poet called Aizen used the name first. When the visitor Kotaro came from the Starless Realm, Emperor Kenzo honored him with his own poet, who went on to write scrolls and scrolls about the place. It was one of his poems that used the name Starless first. Some sort of pretty line about it being starless compared to Camellia.”

  They continued in silence for some time. Kira entertained the idea of being honored with her very own poet, assigned to her by the Empress—and stifled a giggle. Instead of being lavished with gifts, Kira was pulling weeds and washing dishes, hiding at Gekkō-ji from the rest of the realm.

  She didn’t want lavish gifts—she certainly didn’t know what she would do with a poet—she just wanted answers. And there were some things she wanted that could never be returned to her. But if she couldn’t have her mother back, she would find out if she had come from Camellia, and if so, there would be a whole lot more Kira could learn about her.

  “What do we do about Fujita now?” Kira asked when they reached the bottom of the stairs to Gekkō-ji. Everything was dark except for the perpetually burning stone lanterns and the soft glow of Light magic. She was glad she would make it to her combat lesson in the morning; she didn’t want to know what Master Tenchi would do to her if she was absent because of Zowan.

  “I’m going to visit the surrounding towns and see if they’ve seen anything similar. I’ll come back for you if there is.”

  Whether it was a warning or a promise, Kira left it at that and began the long ascent to the top of the stairs, where her soft warm bed waited for her.

  As he promised, Master Tenchi called their names the next morning along with the other armed novices. They earned a few questioning looks from their peers, but once everyone summoned their Light staves and began practicing, all the novices concentrated on not getting whacked by their partners.

  “Ow!” Kira’s hand went to her scalp, where she swore she could feel a bump already rising through the pain.

  “I’m sorry.” Jun rushed over. “I thought you were ready to dodge.”

  “I was. It just didn’t happen. I’m fine. Let’s go again.”

  Jun didn’t raise his staff. “How late did Zowan keep you last night?”

  “I don’t know. I got back sometime before midnight, I think.”

  “Is he supposed to take you during the week?”

  Kira hefted her staff and got back into fighting position. She didn’t want to give Master Tenchi any reason to notice them. Jun warily raised his own staff.

  “Hikaru said as long as it doesn’t interfere with the actual lessons, it’s fine. His brother Hoshi did the same thing.”

  They clashed with a crack as their glowing staves met.

  “Just don’t let him walk over you,” Jun warned.

  Kira pushed him away then rebounded at once. She charged at Jun instead of letting him come to her. He dodged just in time, and they whirled to face each other.

  “I won’t.”

  Chapter Seventeen

  Thistle

  Kira’s hands were covered in black ink.

  “Savage,” the calligraphy master called abruptly. “Are you even attempting to get any ink on the paper?”

  Her face flamed. She had thought Master Caledon couldn’t see her behind Hikaru’s wide back. Her attempts to wipe the copious amounts of ink from her hands with Nesma’s hand towel had not gone unnoticed.

  She kept her mouth shut, though. Every reply she could think of would no doubt increase Caledon’s irritation with her. They were all tart.

  He moved slowly toward her like a shark seeking prey through the desks spread around the well-lit room. Master Caledon’s room reminded Kira of the art room at her last school, but with elegant scrolls of script hanging from the walls instead of self-portraits and still-lifes done in pastels or acrylic. Her mother had always made her take art classes at all the different schools she had attended, because Kira should “have a well-rounded education,” she had said on the many occasions Kira tried to get out of it. She was never any good at it.

  Today they were supposed to be copying the poem called A Sky of Blackness by the great poet Aizen in their best hand. Kira had always performed well in writing classes back in the Starless Realm, but she hadn’t been given a ballpoint pen or a pencil to work with here. Today the class was working with big clumsy brushes, and she couldn’t understand how to make anything as intricate as the letter “o” without splotching herself and the page with ink.

  Caledon looked down at her page when he reached her desk but thankfully kept any further comments on her skills to himself. “Go wash. A Light knight strives for cleanliness, as much as honor or courage.” The last part he directed loudly to the rest of the class, who quickly returned their eyes to their own sheafs of paper.

  Kira restrained herself from slamming the lid on her ink bottle and stomping out of the classroom. What did she have to know calligraphy for anyway? She was just here to learn how to fight with Light magic.

  She trudged down the stairs, still rubbing at her palms with the towel. The fingers on her right hand were still black; the ink had seeped under her fingernails, which looked blue.

  The soap in the bath house erased most of the damage, except for the dark half-circles under her nails. After she finished scrubbing her hands at the large stone sink, she went out into the square and gazed up at the big clock on the Moonstone. There were only fifteen minutes left in the lesson. She decided there was no point in going back to be ridiculed some more. Nesma would grab her books.

  Still furious at Master Caledon, she trudged up the path toward the stable for her next lesson. She was so distracted staring at her fingernails that she barely registered the rustling in the leaves above her as she bolted up the path.

  When a fluffy little beast burst out in front of her, however, she noticed.

  Grey and white fur covered the tiny creature, which had sailed from a nearby tree to land on a sapling, bending it into the path. Huge, black eyes gazed up at her, and she gasped.

  “What are you doing?” Kira squeaked, not expecting the little beast to answer. But it did.

  “That’s a strange way to greet someone.” Its voice was the sound of wind in the trees, with a hint of annoyance. The sapling it clung to still bobbed from the force of its landing, completely blocking her way.

  Kira stared at it. What was the thing anyway? It looked like a fat squirrel, with tiny ears and enormous dark eyes. She didn’t think she’d seen anything like it before. Except—

  “Wait—I’ve seen you before!”

  Its delicate black whiskers twitched. “And I’ve seen you.”

  “You were with the little girl who fell into the rift, weren’t you?”

  The creature nodded its tiny head but didn’t say anything further.

  “Who are you?”

  “You may call me Thistle,” it replied. “The spirit of the mountain sent me to warn you of a great danger—”

  Loud footfalls interrupted Thistle’s speech, and suddenly the creature was gone. The sapling sprang back up to stand, and Kira felt soft fur brush her arm.

  Two squires strode down the path toward her. Kira looked frantically around the bushes for Thistle but saw nothing. She shuddered when she rememb
ered her encounter with the spirit of the mountain, which she still hadn’t told anyone about. With everything else going on, she had forgotten about it again. What had Thistle been about to tell her?

  She had a feeling the creature—or was it another spirit?—would be back. As cute as Thistle had been, Kira had yet to have a pleasant experience with a spirit and wasn’t looking forward to it.

  The stable was empty of people. She wandered past some of the horse stalls to where her horse care lesson usually met but stopped in front of one of the stalls when she recognized the markings on the horse’s face.

  “Panji?” That must mean—“Anzu!” she cried, spotting the knight, who was walking out of the tack room, a saddle in her hands.

  Anzu’s face broke into a grin, and Kira rushed forward. “Let me help you.” Kira pulled the saddle from Anzu’s hands. She had learned enough in her time at Gekkō-ji to know that it was a trainee’s place to help a knight.

  “Thank you, Kira.” Anzu chuckled.

  Kira followed Anzu to the door of Panji’s stall and heaved the knight’s saddle over a rail. The knight undid the latch with the clunk of metal and wood. Panji was nosing his way out of the stall before Anzu even made to enter, but she let the horse bob his way out into the aisle.

  “Master Starwind tells me you’re being advanced to page at the new moon,” Anzu remarked as she began brushing down Panji. “That’s quite an accomplishment.”

  Kira smiled and got a brush out of the bucket and joined her, glad she at least knew the basics now from her horse care lessons.

  “Yes,” she murmured then dropped her voice even lower. “I’m a little afraid I won’t be able to keep up.” She hadn’t admitted it to anyone else. Though she tried to hide it, Nesma was clearly disappointed that Kira was being advanced before her. Kira didn’t want to complain to her mentor and make it any worse. And she wasn’t about to admit her fear to Jun.

  Anzu paused in her grooming and studied Kira for a moment. “What sort of Light magic have you been able to summon so far?”

  Kira studied Panji’s coat, feeling the knight’s scrutiny. “I can summon a staff. But that was pretty simple once I figured it out. It’s just one long piece of Light, anyway. In class I’ve moved up to cups and bowls, but I’m having trouble with more intricate shapes, like a teapot.”

  Anzu nodded. “How about their strength? Have you tried breaking them?”

  “Yesterday, it took Jun four tries to break the cup I summoned,” Kira replied with a grin. “And so far, the staves have held up too.”

  “Good. But it sounds like you’ll need to focus more on the details if you’re having trouble moving up to a teapot. And what have you mastered in your combat class?”

  “Jun and I have been fighting with staves in the main ring.”

  “Really? That’s good. Master Tenchi is a hard teacher.”

  “Did he train you, too?”

  Anzu nodded and put down her brush, having finished her side. She patted Panji genially on the rump and moved to get a hoof pick hanging from the wall.

  “I’ll never forget the one time I arrived a minute late for his class. I’ve never been late for anything since.”

  At Kira’s wide eyes, the knight elaborated. “Two hundred hard strikes on a dummy with my staff. Wouldn’t let me leave the rings until I’d completed them all—so I missed my other lessons that day, too.” She grimaced and rolled her eyes.

  Kira made a mental note to never, ever be late to Master Tenchi’s class, even if she had to fight Zowan to return to the temple in time.

  “Is it true you’re the Defector’s page?” Anzu asked quietly.

  Kira felt her face redden, though she didn’t know why. “Um, yeah—yes. I met him after the earthquake in the village.”

  After picking debris from all four of Panji’s hooves in silence, Anzu let Kira saddle him. The knight didn’t say another word to Kira until they had led Panji outside to one of the paths that led down the mountain. The temple bell echoed dimly in the distance.

  “I don’t trust him,” Anzu said bluntly.

  It took a moment for Kira to realize what Anzu was talking about. She froze, tightening one of the saddlebags.

  “Why did he take you on as page?”

  Kira took half a step back, suddenly very aware of her feet. She scuffed one in the rocky dirt path. “Uh, well, because I helped him rescue a girl after the earthquake and he took a liking to me.” She wasn’t able to repeat her usual response without a slight quaver of her voice at the end.

  Further questions were forestalled by the sudden chatter echoing through the stable, announcing the arrival of most of Kira’s class. Anzu stuck her leather boot in the stirrup and mounted Panji in one swift motion.

  “Good luck at the new moon ceremony,” was all Anzu said before clicking her tongue at Panji and riding down the path.

  Tears welled up in Kira’s eyes, and she dashed them away as fast as they came. Anzu had never spoken to her like that before. It was obvious the knight disapproved of Zowan, but what could Kira do about it? She was sick and tired of lying about who she was—it made people hate her, it made people distrust her, and now Anzu was mad at her.

  She was almost late for the beginning of her lesson, despite having arrived so early. She made sure there was no trace of tears left, then joined the other novices.

  ***

  Kira simmered with frustration the rest of the day. She didn’t understand why the knight had been so curt with her. When Jun asked her what was wrong, she tried to explain, but Jun didn’t know Anzu and couldn’t much help decipher her actions either.

  After the frustration sizzled out, she remembered her encounter with Thistle. What was the “great danger” the small fluffy creature had been about to warn her of?

  Her first, guilty thought was of Zowan. But Jun trusted the Defector, and so did Ichiro and Nari. They wouldn’t have put her in his care if he were a danger to her, would they?

  On Saturday, she and Zowan headed for the clearing again. She glanced covertly at Zowan, expertly bobbing up and down in his saddle to complement Briar’s trot, something Kira had yet to master. She was getting used to being sore after each ride. Kira was again riding Meluca and felt much friendlier toward the animal today—she had gotten to groom her the previous day during her horse care lesson.

  No, the danger can’t be Zowan, she thought. It must be the Storm King and the dark-creature that found me in my realm.

  Since her encounter with Thistle yesterday, Kira had looked for the tiny creature at every spare moment, curiosity getting the better of her. But after a long and unproductive Light lesson—Jun had been able to produce a teapot, but Kira still couldn’t—the newest novices had been given extra chores, because many of the squires were out on quests. She hadn’t a spare moment to herself until the short walk this morning from her dorm house to the bottom of the temple stairs.

  Irritated though she was about Thistle’s abbreviated warning, she was sure the tiny creature would return. The uneasy feeling that she was being watched by the spirit of the mountain and his companion crept up on her often, but it was clear that they only wanted to confront her alone. She didn’t think that boded well at all. What did they want with her?

  Kira had enough to deal with—the new moon ceremony coming up, her training with both Jun and Zowan—but she was curious about what the creature had to say.

  When Kira and Zowan arrived at the clearing in the woods, she gasped aloud. Zowan didn’t hear; he was bent over scooping water from the stream and splashing it on his face. She had completely forgotten to do her homework. This was much worse than forgetting to do the reading for language arts class back in her own realm. What would Zowan do to her?

  She reached for the dagger tucked in her belt sash, thinking fast.

  Was it real, or was it Light? She still hadn’t covered the subject in any of her lessons, and she had been too busy training with Jun and completing her own training to return to the library at all.
/>
  Before Zowan could ask her about it, she asked, “What do you know about the spirit of the mountain—Gekkō?”

  Zowan, who had wiped his face with his sleeve and pulled his own dagger from its sheath, strode into the center of the clearing, blade raised. He clearly wanted this to be a productive conversation again.

  “The spirit of the mountain?”

  She pulled her dagger from its sheath, paying close attention to the weight. Was it lighter or heavier than she thought it should be? She didn’t even know if Light objects weighed the same as their counterparts. She had also never handled a real dagger before and had nothing to compare it to.

  Zowan gestured with the tip of his blade, pointing out the incorrectness of Kira’s stance. She fixed it, covertly reaching her thumb off the hilt to touch the metal. Was steel normally this temperature?

  Without warning, Zowan lunged. Kira sidestepped and hurled herself to his open side, daring a swipe of her knife.

  He grinned at her, dodging as easily as dancing.

  “Why do you ask?” he said, flicking damp strands of hair out of his eyes.

  Kira clutched her blade, wondering if he knew she was stalling. But she had wanted to ask Anzu about Gekkō, before the knight had so stonily departed.

  “I think he appeared to me a few weeks ago.”

  Zowan dropped his blade a few inches.

  “What did he want?”

  “Nothing,” she said. “He just talked about Light and Shadow, and then—he sent a messenger to me yesterday, some kind of fluffy little squirrel, who was about to warn me of something before we got interrupted.”

  Zowan sheathed his blade, and Kira raised her eyebrows.

  “The mountain spirits of Camellia—like Gekkō—are ever watchful yet rarely seen,” Zowan said slowly, but then his mouth curved into a grin. He shook his head. “You, my little Starless one, are trouble.”

  Kira choked out a laugh despite her worry.

  “I know only that Gekkō likes to take the form of an old man, and his constant companion is always that of a flying squirrel.