Celeste Luminara's Arc

Chapter 1 of 1

Celeste Luminara had promised mortals a bridge of starlight, and tonight she had nothing to hang it on. She stood on the balcony of her sanctuary, where northern lights poured down the walls in green and violet ribbons. In her hand she held a slender needle wrapped in shimmering thread. She caught a strand of starlight on its tip and pulled. The light stretched, held for a breath, then snapped and drifted away like smoke. She tried again. It snapped again. "A bridge needs two ends," she said to no one. One end she could fasten to the sky. The other end had to touch the earth. But starlight could not grip dirt or stone. It slid off everything below. Each year she made the same promise to the people who looked up and waited. Each year the thread fell apart in her hands. Her light brown eyes flashed with crystal fire, the way they did when her temper rose. She hurled the needle onto the floor. It rolled and lay still, its threads glowing. Celeste pressed her palms to her face. Whimsy had carried her this far. Anger would carry her no further. Then she remembered the old stories. Long ago, the first builders planted relics in the ground to hold what the sky could not. One such relic still existed. A spike of black obsidian, cut in sharp facets, old enough to bridge the gap between worlds. It was said to answer only to a celestial hand. She searched for three nights across the dark lands below. She found the spike half buried in frozen earth, its facets catching no light at all. When she touched it, the stone grew warm. She drove it down until it stood upright and firm. The tip rose high, pointed straight at the heavens. Celeste snatched up her needle. She caught a strand of starlight and drew it down to the spike. The thread touched the black facets. This time it did not slip. It held. The light wound around the obsidian and glowed bright. She laughed out loud, a sharp and delighted sound. She had her anchor. The earth end of the bridge was fixed at last. Celeste looked up along the beam of light, toward the far point in the sky where the other end must fasten. But the spike pulled harder than she expected. The starlight it held began to drag downward, bending toward the stone with growing weight. The thread stretched thin. Celeste gripped her needle tighter. The anchor held her light, yes. Now she had to learn how much the hungry stone would take before it pulled the whole sky down with it.