Luminara Starwhisper's Arc

Chapter 5 of 5

Luminara left the fire tribe camp at dawn with a sealed sponsor scroll in her satchel and heat still humming under her palms. Fire was hers now. Love was not. The council needed a second signature from a power tribe she had never courted, and Blazen had told her plainly which door to knock on next. His wife led the love fairies. His wife owed him nothing, and Luminara less. She rode three days west on a striped winged colt the fire smiths had lent her, its baby wings still soft at the tips. On the fourth morning she saw the pink canopies of the love camp rise out of the mist, hearts stitched into the awnings, rose garlands roped between the poles. Two scouts stopped her at the outer path. She showed them the burnt journal Blazen had returned to her keeping and said she was here for Rosalind Emberheart. They took the reins of the colt and led her in on foot. Rosalind waited under the center canopy. She wore red and gold and did not rise. A pair of winged kittens tumbled in the air above a basket at her side, batting at each other with pink paws. "Blazen sent you," Rosalind said. "He sponsored my fire line," Luminara said. "I need a love sponsor next. I came to earn it." "You came because my husband told you to." "Yes." Rosalind looked at her for a long moment. "My tribe voted to delay judgment on me. I have two days left before they vote again. I do not have room for a stranger who wants a signature." "Then give me work that helps you keep the seat," Luminara said. "I will do it before I ask again." Rosalind's eyes did not move. "My second is turning the elders against me while I sit here. I need a witness at the elder circle tonight who is not tribe. Someone the council will believe. Sit through it. Say what you saw, sealed, if I ask. That is the price." "Done." "You have not heard what they will say about me." "I have heard enough." Luminara sat through the elder circle that night at the edge of the canopy while the second spoke against Rosalind for an hour and Rosalind answered in five sentences. Luminara took no side aloud. She logged what was said, sealed the record with star-dust in the margin, and gave it to Rosalind at first light. Rosalind read it, signed the sponsor scroll without a word, and pressed a rose-wax seal beside the fire coal. A scout brought a monarch butterfly to the edge of the canopy, its blue-marked wings folded flat, ready to carry a letter east. Rosalind held the scroll a moment longer before she gave it back. "You now owe me a spoken vote in the elder review when the council hears it. Not silence. A vote. That is the second price." Luminara took the scroll. Two sponsors sealed. Six power tribes still to reach.