Page 44 of Fallen Stars
“Yes, that would be your dragun,” he chuckled, admiring it as it flew across the expanse of the ceiling before disappearing into the night. “She was called Dreamdancer, and she’d pull you across the skies while you sprinkled dreamdust onto the world below, helping them sleep.”
“Dreamdust,” Elara repeated, the word foreign yet lovely on her tongue. “I can’t believe that this was all mine,” she whispered. “What happened to it all? To Dreamdancer?”
Eli’s gaze darkened. “A story for another time.”
Before Elara could push further, she heard voices and turned in bewilderment. Ahead, on the other side of the room, were two figures.
“Who’s here?” she whispered.
“Let’s see, shall we?” A ghost of a smile traced his lips as he began walking down the expanse of the room. “But don’t stay too long here, Elara. Some dreams are more tempting to revel in than others, but all will get your soul lost in them.”
Elara followed, the sound of voices growing louder as she approached them, one figure kneeling, the other sat on a throne.
Eli stopped a few paces away from the scene, and as Elara finally made them out in the moonlight that flooded the room, she stilled.
Reflected back was herself, sitting regally upon a silver throne. Her eyes were the same—silver—yet glowing with an aether that Elara didn’t possess. Her skin was alabaster white, lips as full, jaw as sharp. But her hair was white, not black, though it flowed all the same to her waist.
And a stunning crown lay upon it, one cast in the same silver as the throne she sat on, a crescent moon.
Elara knew, gazing upon this goddess, that it was her in her most pure and godly form. That this was the Moon before she had been locked into a mortal body.
“How did you not recognise me in a mortal form?” Elara whispered to Eli as she took in the scene before her. “We look exactly alike.”
“Your illusions, of course,” he replied. “Merissa told you, didn’t she? That as a last gift before Ariete and the other Stars had bound you fully, you cloaked your friends and yourself in an illusion so you could never be recognised and hunted as a human. Now hush and watch.”
Elara switched her attention from Eli to the figure that was now being motioned by the Moon to rise. The figure inclined their head slightly, and Elara saw Eli, an almost identical one to the man who was standing next to her. The Eli in the memory slipped a letter into the Moon’s hands, and as she opened the letter, Elara felt the sigh that the Moon exhaled in her bones.
“My darling Moon,” she began, reading out the letter, “another day goes by as I watch you across the skies. Must this torture never end, to be so close to you yet so far—to see you upon your throne, unable to ever touch you myself? Until I can, know that every streak of light that I paint across the sky is for you. Every ray, every drop of me, is yours.”
The Moon trailed off, setting her mouth firmly as she glanced up at Eli. “He knows how much this pains me too,” she said quietly. “Only a sky away, yet so much between us.”
“I’ve reminded him of as much,” Eli replied. “Perhaps a day will come where the Dark rests, and you will finally be able to meet in the heavens.”
The Moon scoffed, eyes cold as she looked into the distance. “The Dark never rests, nor will she ever let me go. I’m a prisoner here as much as I am a queen—chained to obligation.”
“Don’t say that,” Eli said softly. “Better you ruling over us than her.”
The Moon shot him a sharp gaze, raising a finger to her lips. “Careful, Silvertongue. Even the shadows have ears.”
Eli bowed his head. “Call on me when you have a reply for him. I’ll deliver it with haste.”
Elara turned to say something to the Eli beside her, but to her surprise, he had vanished, leaving her alone to observe the exchange between the Moon and a past version of Eli. She wanted to know more, to stay and see how the rest of her and Enzo’s story played out, to see more of who she had been as the Moon. Despair and longing permeated the dream so much that she could feel it within her, what the Moon must have felt—fated to fall in love with her Sun across a sky, with no hope of them ever being able to meet. She could have stayed…but Eli’s warning rang in her ears, of how easily a dream could lure one in, sink their claws in, and never let go.
She stumbled a few steps back as the exchange continued between Eli and Elara, though her heart begged her to stay. She squeezed her eyes shut as she tore herself away from the scene, leaving the moonlit comfort of her throne room for the door.
She took one final look at the scene, at her godly presence—so regal and powerful—and at the Star who knelt before her. Eli had been someone important to her, though she could hardly make sense of it. And yet she knew it to be true in her bones as she lingered only a moment longer before stepping out of the dream.
Darkness greeted her once more, stepping stones hovering through thin air, which she took two at a time.
She had wasted precious time within that particular dream, and yet she was glad for it, for another piece of her story to have been uncovered. Eli was still nowhere to be seen, but Elara followed the same intuition that had guided her to that particular door, ignoring the others until another called out to her.
On and on Elara stepped down the corridor until finally, she reached one around twenty doors down on the right. Something within her was drawn to it, not as strongly as she had been to the previous one, but enough to pause. She heard the sound of laughter behind it. Her hand hovered on the doorknob, and without another thought, she opened it wide.
There, lay a plush four-poster bed on a pavilion. One suspended in the clouds, stars twinkling around. The air was balmy, a slight breeze as this dream remained floating in the night sky. Her attention was drawn by the sound of laughter, a woman’s she realised, trying to make out the blue of figures on the bed. As the figures focused, Elara could not believe her eyes.
A beautiful woman with white-blonde hair continued to laugh as Eli stamped kisses over her neck, pinning her arms above her.
“You’re mine,” he laughed into her. “You aren’t going anywhere.”