>>6337159“Ah, my beloved has reached his limit as well. I would rather not be found here with you if you do not mind. I would have to explain the whole thing to Carnaval and she can’t even sign her own name, the poor dear.”
She sets her jaw, like she was about to say something else. Her crimson eyes linger over your offended hand, then her own chest, where the wound you carved through her has but completely faded.
Like kicking at the sea—you could make the biggest splash and nothing would change.
Perhaps tonight’s biggest failure is not Lithala’s and not even your own.
This thought settles in your stomach, cold and clammy.
“<span class="mu-i">Starless Night.</span>,” Lithala adds. “I was wrong again—I did say I received naught, and I was wrong. Your hug was comforting, Argia Candente. For what it is worth, I have seldom seen a soul shine as brightly as yours. No wonder Ansàrra has picked you over—”
She stops.
Her face sneers in a shade of pain, like a tenebrous spider hooked its legs into her mouth, then she shakes her head.
“But never mind that. I give you my best wishes.” She turns, and as she does her glamour reapplies itself: her hair withdraw and darken to a short brown, her horns and the stars amidst them disappear, and simple clothes flare around her body. When she reaches the wall, she is the same anonymous healer that took care of your hand for days and days, while Ansàrra could not.
“Likewise,” you mutter.
In a way, it feels like she might need them more than you.
She will never reconcile with Ansàrra.
Too much pain has been poured over that wound. It has been raked and sawed open and it has festered.
She turns her face to give you one last smile, and then she raises her finger.
“Oh, and one last thing. Do you know why we say ‘Starless Night’, Argia Candente?”
[cont.]
