Luma and the Falling Stars

Humans think stars disappear when morning comes.

They don't.

They fall.

I should know. I'm the one who catches them.

My name is Luma, and I live in the hollow of an ancient oak at the edge of the forest. To a human, I might look like a fox, if foxes had silver fur, moth wings, and antlers small enough to fit between two branches. I am a Keeper, one of the creatures responsible for returning fallen stars to the sky.

Usually, the work is simple.

A star tumbles into the forest. I find it glowing beneath a fern or floating in a stream. I tuck it into the little glass lantern around my neck, climb the tallest hill before midnight, and whisper the words that send it home.

But one autumn night, I found a star that didn't want to go back.

It had fallen into a field of dead sunflowers.

I smelled it before I saw it. Fallen stars smell like rain on warm stone. I followed the scent until I found a golden light trembling beneath a bent flower.

"There you are," I said.

The star immediately rolled away.

I blinked.

Stars did not roll away.

I stepped closer.

It rolled again.

"Oh, don't be difficult."

I pounced.

The star shot between my paws and bounced across the field like a frightened rabbit.

I chased it through the sunflowers, over a stone wall, and halfway down a muddy hill before I finally trapped it beneath my tail.

"Got you."

The star buzzed angrily.

"Yes, yes. Terribly unfair."

I lifted my tail.

The little star floated upward.

For the first time, I noticed something strange.

Its light was dim.

Not dying, exactly. But tired.

"What's wrong with you?"

The star flickered.

Then, somehow, I understood.

I don't want to go back.

I nearly dropped it.

"Stars belong in the sky."

Why?

"Because that's where stars go."

Have you ever been there?

I opened my mouth.

Then closed it.

"No."

The star glowed slightly brighter.

Then how do you know?

That was irritating.

Keepers are not supposed to ask questions. Questions lead to doubt, doubt leads to mistakes, and mistakes lead to stars remaining on the ground where humans might find them.

Still, I looked upward.

Thousands of stars burned against the black sky.

I'd spent three hundred years returning them.

I'd never wondered whether they were happy there.

"What do you want?" I asked.

The star drifted toward the distant village.

I groaned.

"Absolutely not."

It drifted faster.

"Humans collect things! They'll put you in a jar."

The star ignored me.

So I followed.

At the edge of the village, we found a girl sitting alone on a rooftop.

She couldn't have been older than ten. A blanket covered her shoulders, and beside her sat an empty chair.

The star stopped.

The girl looked up.

For one terrible second, I thought she could see us.

Then she whispered, "Dad said the brightest stars were people we missed."

The little star trembled.

The girl stared at the sky.

"I know that's probably not true."

Her voice cracked.

"But I wish it was."

The star suddenly darted forward.

"No!"

I leaped after it.

Too late.

It landed in the girl's hands.

Golden light spilled between her fingers.

Her eyes widened.

For several heartbeats, nobody moved.

Then she smiled.

Not a large smile.

A tiny one.

The kind that appears when someone has forgotten how to smile but decides to try.

The star burned brighter than I'd ever seen one burn.

And I finally understood.

It hadn't fallen by accident.

It had come down because someone needed it.

The girl held the light against her chest.

"Thank you," she whispered.

The star rose from her hands.

Higher.

Past the chimney.

Past the trees.

Past the clouds.

It returned to the sky without my spell.

I watched until its golden light became indistinguishable from all the others.

The girl went inside.

I remained on the rooftop.

For three hundred years, I had believed my job was to return lost stars.

I had been wrong.

Stars weren't lost.

They were visiting.

Sometimes they fell into rivers. Sometimes into forests. Sometimes into the hands of lonely children who needed one impossible thing to happen before they could believe tomorrow might hurt a little less.

So I changed the rules.

Now, when a star falls, I don't immediately send it home.

I follow it.

I watch.

I wait.

And every so often, a human looks into the darkness and finds a small light waiting for them.

They call it luck.

They call it magic.

They make wishes.

I never correct them.

After all, humans are wrong about many things.

But about wishes?

They're closer than they think.

The trouble with changing the rules is that eventually someone notices.

For me, it took exactly thirteen nights.

I was following a blue star through the forest when the moon spoke my name.

"Luma."

I froze.

The star kept drifting.

"Luma."

There are many sounds that can frighten a magical creature. The growl of a shadow wolf. The bells of a wandering witch. A human saying, Did that fox just talk?

But nothing is quite as terrifying as hearing your name spoken by the moon.

I looked up.

"Yes?"

The moon stared down through the branches, enormous and pale.

"You have delayed thirteen stars."

"Twelve."

"Thirteen."

"The green one fell into a pond. That wasn't my fault."

"Luma."

"Thirteen."

The blue star hovered beside me, glowing innocently.

The moon's voice became colder.

"Keepers do not decide where stars belong."

"I know."

"Keepers do not allow stars to wander."

"I know."

"Keepers do not interfere with humans."

"I scratched one human."

Silence.

"He deserved it."

The moon vanished behind a cloud.

That was worse than yelling.

When it appeared again, its light seemed sharper.

"Bring the blue star to the Hill of Returning before midnight. Then come to me."

My ears flattened.

"Come to you?"

"Your place among the Keepers will be judged."

The moon went silent.

I stared at the blue star.

It floated toward the village.

"No."

It floated faster.

"Oh, wonderful."

I followed.

The star led me somewhere I had never been before.

Beyond the village stood an abandoned railway station. Ivy covered its brick walls. Grass grew between the tracks, and the old clock above the entrance had stopped at 6:17.

No trains had passed through in years.

Yet someone was waiting on the platform.

An old man sat on a wooden bench with a suitcase beside him.

He wore a brown coat and held a faded train ticket.

The blue star settled on the tracks.

I approached carefully.

"Why him?"

The star pulsed.

Wait.

"I don't have time to wait. The moon is angry with me."

Wait.

"Easy for you to say. You don't have a job."

The star flashed brightly enough to make me squint.

"Fine."

I curled beneath the bench.

Minutes passed.

The old man checked the broken clock.

Then his pocket watch.

Then the tracks.

At last, he sighed.

"I suppose you're not coming."

His voice was so quiet that I almost missed it.

He opened his suitcase.

Inside were letters.

Hundreds of them.

Some were tied with ribbon. Others were folded into yellowing envelopes. On top rested a photograph of two young men standing beside a train.

The old man picked it up.

"My brother," he said to no one.

The blue star trembled.

I sat up.

The man continued.

"We had a foolish argument here."

He laughed once, but there was no happiness in it.

"Fifty-two years ago."

Wind moved through the weeds.

"I told you never to come back."

He stared down the empty tracks.

"And you listened."

The blue star began to glow.

I understood.

"You're waiting for someone who isn't coming," I whispered.

The star floated toward him.

But before it reached the platform, something enormous landed behind me.

The earth shook.

I turned.

A creature stood between the trees.

It was taller than a horse and thin as winter branches. Black feathers covered its body, and six white eyes stared from a face hidden beneath a silver mask.

A Moon Warden.

My blood went cold.

"Luma," it said.

The old man didn't react.

Humans couldn't see Wardens.

Lucky humans.

"Return the star."

I stepped in front of the blue light.

"It isn't finished."

"The star belongs above."

"It came here for him."

"That is not your concern."

The Warden stretched out one claw.

The star flew backward.

"No!"

I jumped and caught it between my paws.

The Warden's six eyes narrowed.

"You would defy the moon?"

I thought of the girl on the rooftop.

Her tiny smile.

I looked at the old man clutching the photograph.

"Apparently."

The Warden lunged.

I ran.

I raced beneath the platform, blue light clutched against my chest. The Warden tore through the old wooden boards behind me.

"Luma!"

"Busy!"

I shot between two trees.

The Warden followed.

I couldn't outrun it.

So I did something extremely stupid.

I flew.

My wings had always been decorative.

At least, that's what I had assumed.

I spread them.

For half a second, nothing happened.

Then the ground vanished beneath me.

"Oh."

I shot upward.

"OH!"

I crashed through leaves, spun sideways, clipped a branch with one antler, and somehow flew directly into a pine tree.

The star popped from my paws.

It fell.

Straight toward the Warden.

"No!"

But the blue star suddenly stopped in midair.

Then it exploded with light.

The entire forest turned blue.

The Warden screamed.

And somewhere behind us, a train whistle sounded.

Everything became still.

The old man stood.

A train was coming.

Not a real one.

I knew that immediately.

Its engine was made of silver mist. Its windows glowed like candle flames. Flowers grew along its sides, blooming and disappearing as it moved.

The train stopped at the abandoned platform.

One door opened.

A man stepped out.

He looked almost exactly like the man in the photograph.

Young.

Smiling.

The old man's suitcase fell from his hand.

"Temidayo?"

The young man smiled.

"Hello, Gabe."

The old man's knees nearly gave way.

For fifty-two years, he'd carried words he thought he would never get to say.

Now they all seemed to disappear.

"I'm sorry," he whispered.

His brother crossed the platform.

"I know."

Gabe began to cry.

The blue star floated between them.

They spoke for only a few minutes.

About childhood.

About their mother.

About the argument.

About all the years that had been stolen by pride.

Then the train whistle sounded again.

Temidayo stepped backward.

Gabe reached for him.

"Wait."

Temidayo smiled.

"You waited long enough."

He boarded the train.

The doors closed.

And the silver train disappeared.

Gabe stood alone on the platform.

But something had changed.

He tore the old train ticket in half.

Then he picked up his suitcase and walked toward home.

The blue star rose into the night.

I watched it go.

Behind me, the Moon Warden slowly stood.

I prepared to run.

It didn't attack.

Instead, it looked toward the sky.

The star had returned brighter than before.

"Interesting," the Warden whispered.

"What?"

It ignored me.

Then every star in the sky went dark.

All of them.

The village vanished beneath sudden blackness.

The Warden's six eyes widened.

For the first time, I heard fear in its voice.

"Luma."

"What did I do?"

"Nothing."

Above us, the moon flickered.

Once.

Twice.

Then it went out too.

Something moved in the darkness beyond the sky.

Something vast.

Something hungry.

The Warden lowered its head toward me.

"Keeper," it whispered, "run."

So I ran.

(Due to the fact that I couldn't figure out how to keep this story within the word limit I put part two under my bio for all those that want to know how it ends.)