Lovely CareFree's Arc

Chapter 1 of 4

Lovely CareFree stood on the top glass floor of her palace and shouted her mother's name to an empty beach. No one answered. She wanted the throne her mother once held, before mortals forgot the goddesses and let their names fall silent. She wanted a family, and a world that made love ordinary. But she had spent all morning calling, and only the waves called back. She had written her message on a hundred glass leaves. Each one carried a promise: love freely, hurt no one, welcome everyone home. She had tied them to a willow near the water, a tall tree with a clear brown trunk and blossoms of pink and blue. When the wind moved through it, the leaves chimed. It was beautiful. It changed nothing. No mortal had come near the shore in years. A goddess needs a voice among the people. Lovely had none. "A cause no one hears is not a cause," she said. "It is a woman talking to a tree." She untied one leaf and held it up. Her pale blue hand shook. She could carve a thousand more and still stay silent, alone in a house of candles and empty rooms. The plan had failed. She needed a messenger, someone loyal enough to carry her words past the water where she could not follow. Something rustled below her, near the fireplace on the lower floor. Lovely went down the spiral stair. In the warm room, a small creature had climbed onto her couch. It looked like a fat bunny crossed with a chinchilla, its long fur streaked with pastel colors and thin gold sparkle. Its ears were huge and round. It held one of her fallen glass leaves in both paws and studied it like a jewel. When it saw her, it did not run. It chirped and lifted the leaf toward her, offering it back. "You can read it?" she whispered. The creature could not read. But it hopped to her feet, dropped the leaf, and pressed its face against her ankle. Its bright blue and green eyes fixed on her. Then it grabbed a second leaf, tucked it against its chest, and darted to the open doorway. There it stopped and looked back, waiting. Lovely understood. It wanted to carry the message out. It wanted to follow her. She knelt and held out her arms. The creature leapt into them and burrowed against her chest, warm and shaking with joy. She laughed for the first time in weeks. "Then you'll be my voice," she said. "You'll go where I can't." That evening she tied a small pouch of glass leaves to the creature's back. It waited by the water, ready to run. Her cause had a carrier now. But the moment it crossed the shore, her words would leave her hands. She could no longer control what the mortals did with them.