The Stars are Dying : (Nytefall: Book 1)

I sought the stars to calm me.

Finding the secluded space outside the castle had been too easy. Too eerily easy. My own mind was mocking me, leaking only faint guidance to quell the surprise of meeting new faces and finding new destinations. It was only foreign to one life; the other rejoiced deep inside to be back.

I gazed through the stars, losing myself for an incomprehensible amount of time as I soared among them in spirit. Two lives fought in one body, and I didn’t know who I wanted to be. If the past could influence the will of my future…maybe I didn’t want to remember.

Between my palms, the egg I held was heavy, but not in weight. I didn’t know why I’d brought it out here with me after finding Rose had left it in my rooms.

“It’s a celestial dragon egg.” Nyte’s voice was no more disturbing than a gentle stroke of the wind.

My eyes fixed themselves on the black-and-silver scales with more fascination. “Is it alive?”

“I wouldn’t be hopeful after all this time. Truthfully, I don’t know much about them.”

I hugged it against the cold as I said, “What if I come with you? When you leave for your home.”

It didn’t frighten me. I had nothing in this realm to call mine. In fact, I felt rejected by it, born in the shadow of something so great I didn’t even know if I wanted to be it—the star-maiden.

Nyte’s whole demeanor changed to a kind of blank stun, as if he’d been struck with a blade, his heart aching to meet the eyes of betrayal wielding it. He seemed to lose his response with the shock.

I shook my head. “It was a stupid thought.”

I wasn’t unfamiliar with the feeling of not belonging.

“Astraea.” He advanced closer before sitting down beside me. “You have to know I would want that more than anything if it were possible.”

“How is it not?”

“It’s too much of a risk. I have no guarantee you would make it through with me, and even if you did, we would only be taking the problem from one realm to another.”

“You don’t know that. It could be different—better able to withstand the power you think is too much for this one.”

His expression remained solemn, and my gut twisted with it. When his palm cupped my jaw, my brow pinched, and I leaned into it.

“This one is yours.”

The moon flooded his features, highlighting the midnight navy of his hair, and his irises turned to a pale gold. With him right here it was hard to imagine never finding them. After all this time, they would never search for me again.

I looked over the tranquil city, glowing as if starlight rained down upon it. Casting my sight across, I homed in far enough on the distance to make out a long streak of silver.

“I need to get past the veil to get to where I need to be,” Nyte mumbled at my observation.

“You have never been past it before?”

“I watched a vampire turn to smoke and dust with a cry of agony that haunts me still as he stepped through. It’s a masterful allurement of beauty, and you are wrong to think monstrous things are only attracted to the darkness.”

“You’re not a vampire,” I said.

Nyte frowned, contemplative. “I am many things—that wasn’t a lie or diversion. I was born fae, but because of my mother’s bloodline I was also something more powerful than one should be. When my father passed through the mirror with me, he was guided to this realm, but nothing is ever coincidence. There are always meddling fates, and this one happened to be the God of Death, who made a bargain with my father to enter here. He said he would not give the gift to my father because his ambitions were set. I had none. As just a child, that god bestowed more upon me than any being should ever harbor to give my father the unparalleled advantage he needed. It was never a gift; it has always been a curse.”

I wanted to touch him, offer something of consolation. Nyte stood, and I was drawn to follow. Slipping a hand into his pocket, he began a slow walk to the edge of the wall with no balcony while I stayed back.

“I didn’t know what had changed in me at first, only that I had too much of everything. My emotions were always at war, my cravings and desires amplified. I think the cost of becoming everything was never knowing what I am and always fighting to keep myself from reckless impulses. I gain strength from blood, and I enjoy it. I can feel souls, take them. And I have these.”

Nyte stepped right up to the edge. My breath hitched when he turned to me, and horror seized me when he leaned back…

And fell from the fatally high ledge.

“NO!”

I lunged forward, my heart threatening to leap after him. Then a beat of air stilled me, and what shot up from the place he’d vanished made me stumble back instead.

My gaze fixed itself to him, unblinking, as my back met the wall, and I clutched the dragon egg tightly.

What in the…?

He was absolutely breathtaking.

Nyte hovered in the air, cloaked by magnificent midnight-blue feathered wings—so dark they would be black without the highlight of the moon. I tracked him as he came closer, my pulse racing with exhilaration when his feet touched the ground in front of me gracefully.

“All this time…” I breathed, fighting every blink in case it could awaken me from a dream.

Those beautiful towering wings tucked together behind him.

“I couldn’t reach them behind the veil,” he explained. “It’s still taking some time for my abilities to come back to me after so much time out of use. It wasn’t a lie either when I said the past century has also been the most peaceful. Only because my mind had never been so silent. My emotions weren’t vulnerable to the power. Nightsdeath didn’t exist.”

No—he hadn’t lied. Never. And all at once I was ashamed for ever thinking so, realizing the difference between keeping secrets and withholding full truths that could do more harm than good if spilled at the wrong moment.

Now he was showing me everything.

“May I?”

He held out his hands, and I didn’t question him as I passed him the dragon egg. He made it disappear with shadowy starlight, but I trusted he’d sent it somewhere safe.

“You enjoy heights,” he said softly. “Until you figure out how to reach your own wings, do you want to fly with me?”

I blinked at the palm he extended. “My— What?”

His smile twinkled with delight. “Surely you understand what you are by now. Not the title.”

My breathing came hard. I swallowed, disbelieving, but it settled like an answer I’d searched endlessly for. “A celestial?”

Nyte’s grin erupted in my chest. I slipped my palm against his and walked vacantly with his backward steps.

“The most exquisite, beautiful celestial to have ever lived,” he said between each stride toward the edge.

My adrenaline pumped fast and my smile broke, though my body protested with nerves that this was absolutely insane.

He paused. “Do you trust me?”

My eyes locked onto his. “What are you—?”

It had barely left my lips when he leaned back, the arm around my waist making me tumble with him. I gasped at the flip of my stomach, circling my arms around his neck and holding onto those golden irises as tresses of midnight whipped around them.

For a beat of time, we were two falling stars.

Nothing more. Nothing less.

I kissed him in our free fall. Once, until his arm hooked under my knees, cradling me to him, and the air whooshed from me when a strong pulse stopped our fall gently.

Then it carried us high.

If there were words to describe this, I didn’t know them. Soaring higher than I ever thought possible altered my reality, and I didn’t want to ever come down. The air was so much sharper up here, pricking my nose and cheeks, but I gave a breathy, euphoric laugh. Buildings stretched out to no end and stars spilled across them. It became a kaleidoscope of scattered color against a maze of silhouettes.

Nothing could compare to this.

“How high do you want to go, Starlight?” he said across my ear, making my body shiver with the warmth that contrasted the nip of cold.

My hand reached up as though I could touch the moon. “Endlessly.”

We flew for not nearly enough time before Nyte lowered us to a high cliff topped with snow. When he set me down, I couldn’t break away from him. My eyes trailed over the curve of his wing and my hand was compelled to reach up over his shoulder. Nyte tensed at my palm on his chest as I traced the feathers, so much softer than I’d imagined them to be.

“What does it feel like?” I asked.

“Like any other touch of yours—and I don’t think I have the words to tell you how burdens lift with it. Even when you’re driving a blade through my chest.”

I winced, not regretful when it had served as the cause of this moment, but I hoped not to have another.

“I shouldn’t have found it as arousing as I did,” he murmured.

I met his eyes, incredulous, but all he gave was a light chuckle when I pushed away. The sound was beautiful. Rare, I realized.

Until it was stolen by a serious firming of his face as I anticipated a question.

“You’ve been holding onto something, Astraea. I’ve been wondering how to explain it to you.”

Trepidation settled in.

He went on. “You feel it in your chest. Like a second heartbeat not in the right place. It warms when you need it.”

Memories of that exact feeling echoed through me, then that same heat pulsed under my ribs, and I gasped, raising my hand to it.

“You should be able to do this yourself, but it might be best if I help you.”

“What is it?”

His brow pinched with careful sorrow as he stepped up to me, as though the answer was better explained with a demonstration. “Do you still trust me?”

At the same time as he asked his hand slipped under my cloak, around my back, before trailing along my spine and bringing our bodies flush with a firm press between my shoulder blades. This position flashed something familiar, and my breathing grew labored.

“Yes,” I answered, my back curving to his guide as his palm slipped over mine at my chest.

We locked eyes, and I held his desperately with the tingling that grew over my shoulders, vibrating every rib. Then a glow broke between us, and my lips parted. Nyte guided our hands to hover, and I felt like my soul was being pulled from my body.

Fear struck me as I remembered the time Nyte had done this before. The day we met. Or at least, he had shown me he was capable of it. With that recollection came the horror he’d warned me of death should it stray too far from my body.

I strained against his hold, letting the thought pass that this had been a trick.

“Relax, Astraea,” he soothed.

I tried, but it was difficult to fight against my basic survival instinct.

My palm heated underneath with a promising warmth I became transfixed by. An orb of white and blue pulsed above it. My eyes pricked, blurring the edges of the magnificent life I held, so pulsing and familiar my tears spilled, and I didn’t know how this was possible, only that I didn’t ever want to let it go. It echoed with a laugh that perhaps was only in my mind. I sobbed with a smile. It filled me with love and joy and all such carefree wonders.

“How?” I whispered.

“You took her soul at the right moment it was expelled from her body,” Nyte said gently.

It was Cassia.

I gave a single laugh through my tears. “She’s been with me.” This whole time.

I thought some part of me knew it. Strength had come to be when I wouldn’t have otherwise found it. Courage had pushed me against fear. My heart had opened to try to find friendship again.

“You have to let her go.”

That surged within me a denial that pulled the orb closer to my chest, but Nyte stopped me.

“I’m not ready!” I cried.

“I’ll give you a moment, but you can’t hold onto it. It’s been draining your own energy. Souls were never meant to be held onto. It’s time for her to join the stars.”

He eased away carefully as if I would defy him.

I didn’t. My heart cracked as I stared at the glow I cupped delicately in my grasp. I felt the resistance, knew it wanted to cast itself away, and realized it was only my own selfishness keeping her soul here.

“I’m so sorry,” I said. “I’m so, so sorry you didn’t get the life you deserved.”

The heat pulsed. Three times.

I laughed, trembling with the gift this moment was, but bleeding from the torn wound within me. “I did it. Can you believe I made it through the games? Of course you would. You would say you never had a damn doubt, because you were always the best kind of liar.” I chuckled, lowering to my knees despite the snow seeping through to my skin. “What I don’t think you would have believed is what I am. I don’t believe it. But I’m going to try. For you I have to try.” My heart calmed with acceptance. “I’m going to make sure Calix stays alive,” I promised her.

My body trembled stiffly. If I cupped my hands she would stay.

She could stay with me.

I looked up and tranquility began to lap at me, the memory of two drunk friends who’d filled their final hours together with promises and wishes. If there was one thing I could give her, it was this.

“You’re going to see the world now, Cass.”

My tears fell as I let go. As though her soul was attached to a string pulling her toward an opposite gravity, I let her fly.

Then I watched. Her brilliant soul became like a firefly as it soared higher and higher. Nyte was behind me, silent and patient. I didn’t tear my eyes from the sky, barely even blinking as she became no more than a spec of glitter among the stars—but I didn’t lose her.

Seconds, minutes, hours. I didn’t know how much time passed before a gentle flare erupted.

Then there she was.

I stood still. Then waited. My lip wobbled when I saw it.

Three blinks.

Finally, my eyes fell down. My neck ached, and I rubbed it as I turned to Nyte with a new kind of despair.

“If you don’t leave, the stars will continue to die,” I said, unable to meet his gaze.

“Yes.”

“How long will Cassia have?”

“I can’t be certain.”

There was no other way, and this kind of loss—something so damned by fate alone—was soul-destroying.

“I’m coming with you,” I said. Finally I looked at him, and the glittering misery in his eyes cut me. “I’ll help you get past the veil, then I want to come with you right until it’s time.” I wasn’t done accepting that this was the only way, but if I didn’t grant him my acceptance, I feared he’d try to push me away.

“But first we have to stop the king,” I said.

A low rumble resounded. I cast my sight up but found nothing as the source. It grew, vibrating under my feet, until the crack of thunder made me wince, the ground shook, and Nyte held me before my footing could trip me.

I went to cover my ears, but it stopped, easing away like a distant quake.

“We don’t have much time,” Nyte said, glancing at the stars.

“What was that?”

“It happens every now and again. It will become more frequent, the realm refusing the cosmic power growing on it. I think having your power suppressed has kept the damage low, but as you begin to find it again, it will clash with my energy. The celestials have had three hundred years to regain their strength after the two centuries we existed together that were detrimental for them. The impact this time can be stopped far sooner now I can leave.”

I couldn’t believe it. “Why did I come back?” I whispered in horror. “They could have taken back what was stolen from them without me. I’m not their savior—I’m their curse.”

Nyte’s eyes closed as if he couldn’t bear to hear it. “I’m the curse, not you.” His knuckles brushed my cheek. “Destiny is cruel to bring us together. Because you are the most precious gift I can never have.”

“How do I know…? How do you know that what you feel for me isn’t for a person of the past?”

Instead of matching my drop of uncertainty, Nyte’s face brightened like he enjoyed the question. “Your soul is magnetic. There won’t exist a time or place where I won’t be drawn to it. And, love, you might look the same, you might remember everything we almost had one day, but here and now I’m falling for you. I found you with a steel heart in my chest, and for the first time in three centuries it doesn’t feel so cold. Not because of what you were, but for everything you are. Do you believe that?”

How could I not when inside I erupted with such an unfamiliar feeling?

This… Was it possible to belong not to any place, but with a person? To find home not on land, but in another soul?

I didn’t know how to respond. He seemed to know it, pulling me into him, and I rested a cheek to his chest, trying not to let the ache overcome this moment.

The agony that had begun to tear open with the cruel countdown of time we had left together.