˗ˏˋ go big or go homeˎˊ˗

She let out a scream, jumping as she turned to face the noise. Her hands went into little fists as she searched through the skinny aspen trees for the source. And she found it quickly. The figure wasn’t even able to hide behind the skinny white trees. It was a boy or what she thought was a boy. It was hard to tell. The youngling in front of her was wearing a scary mask, made from cardboard and hand painted to look frightening. Sharp teeth of torn paper, eye holes shadowed his real eyes, and what looked like ruby blood dripped down its boxy face. He had jumped back at her screech and clung to his home-made mask.

“Why are you wearing that?” she demanded, pointing. “Why are you out here?”

“It’s for the Shortest Day of the Star-Clock! Why are you out here?”

“Why does a mask matter for the Shortest Day?” she asked again, peering at the strange mask.

Their tones shared a childish whine; they both wanted to be deemed right.

The little Ever-Radiant looked the other up and down. The more she looked, the less frightening the mask was. Even with the paint that looked like blood dribbling down the mask’s face and the over-sized big paper-mâchéd horns, she could see that it was just a mask. Hand-made. The ‘blood’ was too orange-y like the sunset leaves on the aspen trees and the horns were just too big that they made the boy tilt on his axis. His tiny hands rose to adjust the box, holding it up to stand straight once more.

“What do you mean why?  Dressing up is the best part of the holiday.” He complained. “Where’s your mask? Why are you dressed that way?”

She couldn’t see his eyes look her up and down, but the cardboard box bounced as if he had moved his head in defiance. His questions made a flare of insecurity rise up her spine, a foreign feeling for the Ever-Radiant. Her arms crossed defensively. 

“Dressed like what? This is my finest dress,” she argued with a pout.

“It’s pretty, but it looks cold,” he said.

She looked away, her crossed arms feeling chilly. Her hands rubbed up and down them softly. The young girl was cold.

“Here,” the boy walked forward to grab her arm gently. He began to tug her further into the woods. “It’s warmer underneath the Star-Clock.”

“I kn-know that,” she replied as she stumbled over a rock. She huffed a bit as she tried to catch herself.

“But you didn’t know about wearing masks on the Shortest Day. Wait- are you… dressed up as, like, as the Star-Clock for the Shortest Day?” he eyed her tiara. “The crown looks like it’s made up of cogs and its glowing. Your dress is full of stars too.” He put the pieces together quietly, sounding like he’s pouting.

He said star-clock again… didn’t he know it was called the Ever-Lasting Star? And didn’t he know she was from it? She was the Ever-Radiant. The only Ever-Radiant of this era. Yet he was half-dragging her along like she was her aids or maids or nannies.

“I’m dressed up as monster!” he added, not giving her time to reply as he weaved in between trees. “My friends are too. We didn’t plan it! And we were catching starbugs! Want to join us?”

“F-friends?” she stuttered out. She had never met other kids her age before. Were they all like this boy?

“Yeah, they’re great! I just met them today,” he admitted, bashfully. “But they’re fun! Taehyun brought a telescope to watch the starset, and Beomgyu had the nets for catching fragles for his family, but theyre way better for starbugs.”

His rambles were cut off at the sound of children laughing.

“Look, you can see the cogs in the sky behind the clouds!” there was a voice, almost instructive in its tone, as he pointed out the inner-workings of the Ever-Lasting Star.

“Woah,” a voice murmured in awe.

“Don’t look too long; you’ll go blind,” one of them warned.

“No way, the Star-Clock wouldn’t do that!” another cried out.

Coming into a clearing within the forest, there were four other masked boys. The forest framed them in a grand circle; there was the flowing water of the Life River beside them, cutting through the aspen trees and berry bushes. There were five trailing white-stone rock paths coming together beneath the Ever-Lasting Star, forming a small circular platform of stones. There, a large-metallic tube of a telescope stood on a tripod. Three masked boys, all as short as her, huddled around the telescope. One boy was running in circles around them with a net on a stick. Flickering starbugs twinkled in the netting. 

“Hey guys!” her Monster called out. “I brought a friend with me!”

Their heads turned and she could see only their equally-handmade masks, all made of cardboard boxes in varying sizes.

“Hello!” one of the chimed excited, waving cutely at her.

He pushed his mask up over his head to reveal his face. His face was flushed-red probably from the lack of air circulation beneath the cardboard box. His hair was long, a whisp-y dark brown around his oval-face and… pointed ears? A sweet, almost ‘w’ smile was on his lips as he grinned over to her.

“What’s your name?” he asked.

“Soobin,” one of the boys cried out. “You’re not supposed to take your mask off; it brings bad luck.”

The boy called Soobin made a shocked face, a soft ‘o’ of his lips and his ears trembled in alert. “Oh,” he let out a sad sound before shrugging lightly and tugging the mask back over his face.

“She isn’t wearing a mask,” one of the boys pointed out, gesturing to her with his net grandiosely. As if she was a problem!

“She’s dressed up!” her Monster cried. “She’s like a princess. A Star-Clock princess!”

“You’re very pretty,” one of the boys chimed out sweetly. 

It made the young girl shift side to side in bashfulness.

“I said that, too!” her Monster countered eagerly. It was almost like a competition. He turned and continued. “I told you that, didn’t I—uh, what’s-what’s your name?”

“That’s what I was asking,” the one they called Soobin exclaimed, abandoning the telescope to approach the duo.

The Ever-Radiant had only been called that – the Ever-Radiant. Her title was her name to everyone at the Solarium. Or her Ever-Radiance or Starling by the Time-Keeper. Never just her name. Which she did have. Everyone had a name after all, and hers had been sewn into her baby blanket that had kept her warm beneath the Ever-Lasting Star on the brightest night of the year.

“I’m YN,” she told them. Her real name was breathed out into the air for the first time, really ever.

“I’m Yeonjun,” her Monster said.

Her head turned to glance at the other, her tiara sent flurries of sparkling rainbows casting over them in a constellation of light flares.

“Soobin,” the one in the blue painted card-board mask. His mask had equally gruesome marks. But with pretty aspen-leaves acting as ears, there was a softer element to his; glitter was painted in long stripes over the face, too.

“I’m Taehyun,” the one holding onto the telescope greeted, timidly. He shifted this way and that on his feet, shyly. His cardboard box was taller than the others and more often than not his little hands rose to keep it steady on his head.

“I’m Kai!” It was a boy in an olive-green cardboard mask and fabric wings. His mask didn’t look as frightening as the others. There were almost dopey-looking tubes making up his eye holes. He waved excitedly.

The last boy to answer was the one who pointed at her with his net. His mask was a reddish pink with fuzzy yarn making up a head of hair on the top of the cardboard box and sharp pine needles sticking out wildly.

He waved the net in greeting. “I’m Beomgyu.”

“Hi,” she greeted again.

The six children who met beneath the Ever-Lasting Star gasped as the starshine began to set and the velvet-blue of night tumbled in a whoosh. It wasn’t slow like a sunset, instead it was almost instantaneous. Like dropping food coloring into water, the colors bloomed across the light sky in a watercolor blur.

“Woah,” Taehyun murmured out, head tilting to peer into the telescope as he stared at the flurry of colors, mixing and melting into one another before the deep blue took over. It was a beautiful sight a starset. It was always jaw-dropping. The Ever-Lasting Star beamed and sparkled, the tick tocking brought in a fresh wave of night stars, dropping down from the night sky.

YN’s dress matched the night sky in this moment, a deep velvet with perfectly placed jewels matching the constellations high above them. She knew the sky by heart. Knew the stars by heart. And of course, she knew the Ever-Lasting Star like it was part of her. She smiled, happily.

The world didn’t cool beneath the Star; it was just warm enough to be comfortable and aglow beneath the Star-Clock. It was called the warmest part of the world regardless of day or night some said. The further you traveled from its epicenter, the more cool it grew.

“It’s so pretty,” Beomgyu said in awe, spinning a bit as he looked upwards.

“Did you come out to see the starset?” Taehyun asked her as he finally pried himself away from the telescope to give Soobin a turn. The boy once more took off his mask to do so – bad luck wasn’t that real (maybe his Mama will cast a luck charm for him if he asked nicely.)

“Oh, oh,” the girl stuttered before shaking her head.

No, she had just… felt the pull of the forest. She didn’t even know it was a holiday. It wasn’t a holiday in the Solarium. The Day of Eternal Light was celebrated when the air turned hot and humid. Sometimes they’d perform a ritual during the winter – when the star burned so hot, it was icy. When the cogs would stick and make the day or night feel like forever. Their prayers, the sacrifices, the offerings – everything gave the Ever-Lasting Star strength to carry on. 

“What’re you doing out here then?” The one named Kai asked.

He was now lying on the grassy knoll beside the river. Staring up at the stars she assumed. When she hadn’t replied quick enough, his head turned on its axis and he pushed up the edge of his mask up with a fist.

His face was round with cherubic features. Flushed cheeks and pouty lips and the most blinding icy-blonde hair she had ever seen was mussed over his forehead and ears. He tilted his head like a creature would.

“I don’t know,” she admitted. “I wanted to be away from home.”

Kai offered her a comforting look, his lips pursing in an approving way. He nodded. Not that he was happy for her yearning to be away from home, but like it was acceptable of a reason to the six-year-old.

“Where do you live?” he asked. “I don’t like the place I live either. It’s scary.”

“Scary?” she asked, brow pursing.  

“Yeah, dark and cold – the Star doesn’t like to shine there too often.” He admitted before looking up at the Ever-Lasting Star once more. His smile was fond, at peace. The cardboard box had been half-abandoned as he gazed up, the mask fell to the ground in a clatter.

 “Kaiii,” the one with the fuzzy-yarned cardboard mask, Beomgyu, whined, wiggling his arms back and forth in a tantrum. “You can’t take your mask off! We’re going to get bad luck for sure!”

The starbugs in his net buzzed in irritation at their trap being flung this way and that. It’s almost like in that moment he remembered what he was doing and he threw his arms out. “Do you want to catch starbugs, YN?” Beomgyu cried out, waving his net wildly in excitement.

A giggle broke free from her mouth at his erratic antics as she nodded. “Sure.”

She had never caught starbugs before. She had watched them light up the woods with their gentle glow. They looked magical from her tower – even if their glow dulled when caught. Sometimes they celeste-guards captured them and use them as lantern fodder across the Solarium. She liked to let them go free – they always beamed brightest when she did. Even now, their little lights ebbed and flowed as they wriggled against the netting.

“OK, Taehyun, YN’s going to use your net,” Beomgyu told him as he ran towards the other and scooped up the net he had left near the telescope.

Taehyun nodded, his cardboard head shifting this way and that unsteadily before he plopped down besides Kai to look up at the skies.

Together, the two children ran about catching star bugs with the nets. Beomgyu was really good. He would catch any bugs that flew away from YN’s reckless swiping. It wasn’t long before he had managed to have a net full of buggies while YN hadnt caught one yet.

“How are you so good?” YN complained, pouting. It wasn’t fair. She wanted a starbug! “They keep moving!”

“It’s harder than it looks,” Soobin giggled from his spot beside the telescope. The Star-Clock glimmered down at him with a twinkle and tick-tock. He awed.

“I’m the best starbug catcher,” Beomgyu declared. “Ever!”

“I want some!” YN stomped her foot, spoiled.

“I’ve got them all,” he teased, shaking the net at her. His bugs buzzed unhappily; their lights flickering in and out.

“Stop that,” Kai insisted, glaring at the other. “You’re hurting them.”

Beomgyu stopped suddenly, holding the net still as he peered at the bugs. Their glow was dim and faint.

“Oh,” he mumbled. “I’m sorry, buggies.”

A little finger rose to caress the net as if he was petting the starbugs.

“Maybe you should let them go,” Yeonjun prompted, joining the boy and girl. “Maybe YN could catch them then. She isn’t from the forest like you.”

“None of you are, stupid village-dwellers,” Beomgyu countered but tipped his net over and the bugs scurried out in a whirl of wings and squeaking sounds. Directly into their faces.

The three squealed childishly and ducked away from the flurry of bugs. YN fell back onto her back, painfully. Giggles escaped Beomgyu; meanwhile, YN had begun to cry, frightened. Everything had been so fast, the bugs were so wild, and her back hurt, and her elbow stung. In this moment, YN wasn’t an Ever-Radiant; she was just a little girl who got scared.

“Are you crying?” Taehyun asked, leaning up from the hillside.

Her cries were loud, big teardrops dripping down her cheeks.

“Oh, c’mon,” Beomgyu crowed nearby, hands going to his hips in defiance.

“YN,” Yeonjun approached with concern. He had lifted his mask to look at her clearer. He tossed it aside, dark brown hair mussed.

Taehyun was quick to join. He looked scary, towering over her with his cardboard mask.

“You’re being a baby,” Beomgyu complained nearby.  “Big baby, big baby!”

“Stop it, Beomgyu,” Soobin scolded.

The younger went quiet, underneath his mask he frowned. Petulantly, he went back to swinging his net, childishly. His family always made fun of him when he was got startled… it was normal. Why did he get scolded here?

Taehyun and Yeonjun crowded around YN as she remained in the grass, crying. Her tears stained her blue dress, and her hands wiped at her cheeks helplessly. Taehyun was silent as he watched; stoic with his mask on. Yeonjun stared at her with deep brown eyes, his little brows crinkled in concern. His hand reached out to rub her shoulder lightly, almost nervously.

“What’s wrong?” Taehyun asked.

Yeonjun wasn’t crying and neither was Beomgyu. Why was she being so strange? Taehyun wondered.

“Is it because you didn’t catch any bugs?” Yeonjun supported.

Innocently, he wrapped her into a hug. He always felt better after hugs.

“We can catch some together,” he encouraged.

Her cries turned to sobs, the type where she couldn’t catch her breath, gasping and gulping down air. He squeezed her tighter, and Taehyun even shifted to kneel beside her.

“We can catch the star bugs together.” Taehyun echoed.

She didn’t care. She didn’t care. She was hurt, and she felt hot and stuffy in her dress and the Ever-Lasting Star was too hot. Her arm hurt. And she just felt everything so much. She clung to her new friend and hugged him tight, sniffling.

“It’s okay,” he reassured. “It’s okay, YN.”

“I hurt my arm,” she finally managed to gasp out.

“Oh,” Taehyun cried out in understanding.

The masked boy looked closer at the scrape on her arm, the sleeve of her fancy dress torn and turned ruddy from the grass and blood. It didn’t look too bad. He got scraped up all the time from playing. Taehyun took to climbing trees like mushroom-toads took to jumping across lily pads.

“I can help!” Kai chimed out, hopping up and bolting over to them. It almost looked like he was levitating he was so quick.

He shuffled past the others, shoving his shoulders in between them. YN looked up at him with watery eyes, her cheeks red and blotchy from her tears. He frowned at the sight.

“Here! I can make it better,” he reached out for her arm, holding it in between his hands. His palm covered her injury and he shut his eyes. A murmur of an incantation escaped his mouth low and eerie.

“You’re a witch?” Soobin asked, nosing his way into the circle.

Yeonjun, Taehyun, Kai, and now Soobin were crowded around the crying Ever-Radiant. Beomgyu watched from afar, raising his mask up little by little to stare after them with a pout. Jealousy burned over him in a red flare across his cheeks. Kai didn’t reply to Soobin’s question as he continued to murmur ancient sounding words. Her arm tingled warmly like she had been laying out in the starlight for too long and, when he pulled his hand away, the cut was gone.

“All better,” Kai smiled at her brightly, his eyes opening to reveal a strange glow in his blue-ish eyes.

YN awed up at him. The faint thought of ‘was he like her?’ whispered through her. He seemed magical, more magical than her. She couldn’t heal someone… at least she didn’t think she could.

“Woah,” they all chorused in surprise.

“You must be a witch!” Soobin exclaimed with a bright grin of his own.

Witch? She hadnt heard about witches… were they like Luminaries? Her tear-soaked eyes looked between Kai and Soobin.

“No,” Kai said, turning to look at Soobin surprised. He hadn’t heard of witches before. “What are those?”

“My mama is a witch; she can cast spells and do magic things like that,” Soobin argued. “I can’t, because I’m a boy but if you can maybe I can one day!”

The sweet elf-eared boy chimed out optimistically as he grinned.

Huh. YN never knew magic was something other people could do. She thought only the Time-Keeper and the Luminaries held that power, and only through the grace of the Ever-Lasting Star. Just like how she was special because of the Ever-Lasting Star. Was Kai special? Was Soobin’s family… his mother? How many people were so-called special?

Kai’s eyes slowly dulled to a normal hue, and he went to fiddle with the back of his shirt, rubbing at his neck. “Oh, I don’t know my Mama, but maybe?” he offered warmly.

YN rubbed a finger over her injury-no-more; it was tender the touch but it didn’t hurt anymore. She sniffled.

“You okay, YN?” Yeonjun asked quietly. He was still hugging her close, his hands interlocked on her shoulder

Her eyes raised from her arm to look at her first friend. Without his mask, she could see that Yeonjun had a gentle pout, a flurry of messy brown hair, and eyes that were gentle and kind as he searched her expression. She nodded slowly.

“Yeah,” she replied, her other arm raising to wipe at her overwhelmed face.

“Here, we’ll help you catch some starbugs,” Soobin offered, his hand reaching for her. “Beomgyu!”

The boy was nearby watching intently. But at Soobin’s call, he dropped his cardboard mask back over his face. 

“What?” his voice muffled by the cardboard.

“Can you teach us?” Soobin asked. “I grew up in the Valley so I know how to catch butterflies, but these bugs are tricky.”

Beomgyu shifted back and forth on his feet, staring at them. The few bugs in his net flew away without him noticing.

“Please,” Soobin added, tilting his head a bit in exasperation.

The headstrong child contemplated for a moment longer before he huffed.

“Fineee,” he complained. “C’mon, I’ll help you, YN.”

The rest of the evening was spent capturing starbugs with the help of Beomgyu. The first one she manages to capture on her own sent the young Ever-Radiant into a fit of triumphant ‘I did it, I did it’ across the clearing. She ran and ran in excited circles making her new friends chuckle. Kai joined her in the care-free circles.

The night crept further in. Owls hooted in their tree-branches. The Ever-Lasting Star glowed bright, casting a ray of light over their little spot of land as they continued to play and talk.

Beomgyu bragged about his family and their ability to live in the woods, but at a scary hoot of an owl he jumped closer to the group. Taehyun spoke of how he loved to watch the star back home, on top of his roof. Yeonjun talked about how he had a cooler mask at home made of wood. Soobin talked about his family, referring to them as his colony, and said how his mama makes dancing lights. Kai was quiet but was happy, talking about games they could play and star-bathing in the light. YN was just in awe of all the different things they said.

All she had known was her Luminaries and the Time Keeper. She knew of rituals and rules and history. Not… games and woodmaking and family. What was a family…? Did she have one? There were others who had magic and didn’t need to confine themselves to rules. They lived and did more than just sit inside a Solarium reading rituals of old. She didn’t have magic – that she knew of. She was a Starling but what did that mean other than being of the Ever-Lasting Star? Kai seemed to glow like a star too!

She was baffled and overwhelmed but also happy. She liked chasing star bugs and playing hand games and singing lullabies about stars and light and treats. YN liked having friends she decided.

“I have to get going now,” Beomgyu was the first to say. She had yet to see his face; he had kept his mask on religiously. But he had sounded sad. “My dad will wonder where the fragles are by now.”

“My mom and dad will be checking on me soon too,” Yeonjun admitted, rubbing the back of his head.

Who was her mom and dad? YN wondered. She knew the Ever-Lasting Star was her origin; was it her mom or dad?

YN frowned as the pair stood. The others muttered similar excuses. Kai remained lying on his back, fabric wings splayed out behind him.

“Can we see each other again?” she asked softly.

Kai smiled brightly turning to look at her. “I’d love to play with you guys again!”

“Yeah!” Taehyun exclaimed.

“Let’s promise to meet up again,” Yeonjun prompted, standing forward and putting his pinky finger out.

The other boys chimed out in agreement standing up and interlacing their pinkies as they stood in a circle.

“C’mon, YN,” Soobin encouraged with a nod of his head.

“Is this like those clapping games?” she asked with a confused look. She had liked those and the silly rhymes they chanted out.

“You’ve never made a pinky promise on the Star-Clock?” Beomgyu outraged.

She gave a soft shake of her head as she stood and joined the boys.

“You’re weird,” Beomgyu commented.

“Hey,” Yeonjun exclaimed. “That’s mean.”

“You interlace pinkies, and you promise whatever and it has to come true,” Taehyun explained.

“That’s magical!” she chimed.

Yeonjun nodded excitedly. She interlaced her one of her pinkies with Yeonjun and her other pinky with Beomgyu.

“Let’s meet here again! No matter what, we shall come back here to see each other.” They wished below the Ever-Lasting Star.

And then they went their separate ways.

She snuck back into the Solarium walls; her dress scuffed up with grass stains. A guard caught her easily and scolded her with a gentle “Your Ever-Radiance, we’ve been looking for you!”

Her face looked like a child’s in that moment and not an Ever-Radiant. She was rebellious, her smile mischievous as she was brought before the Time-Keeper.

It was then she saw his rage. He fumed and ranted about how she had frightened the entire sect. She was henceforth forbidden from leaving the Solarium, scolded for putting herself into danger. Even if she declared it was the Ever-Lasting Star’s will, the Time-Keeper disagreed and raised the alarm. The Ever-Radiant wasn’t to be unattended until he deemed it appropriate. It was an order from the Ever-Lasting Star. She argued but was quickly shut down and sent to her room.

“If you wish to act like a child, you shall be treated that way, Starling!” he bit out as he turned the key to her bedroom, trapping her inside.

She slammed a fist painfully against the door before huffing and turning to look at her bedroom. Its grandness and many glass-windows revealing the skies made her huff. She didn’t want to be stuck here; she wanted to be with her friends in the forests again. She shouldn’t have even left them! The Ever-Lasting Star twinkled and shined through a nearby open window. She rushed to the bay-window’s bench, a place where she’d spend time with the Star. Talking and asking questions about this ritual and that ritual. But tonight, she stared down at the whole of Stellare Soleil rather than the Ever-Lasting Star. The lands she was fated to bring together under the radiance of the Ever-Lasting Star. The deep valleys, the forbidden forests, the rolling quilt-like hills, and the nearby stacked-upon-stacked village. Where were her friends? Would she see them again? How would she if she was forbidden and locked in her tower in the grand Solarium?

Every night since that night, YN would sit there, and think the same thing. The Shortest Day of Starlight wasn’t anything remarkable. Just six children running around, playing, catching starbugs, and stargazing, but YN remembered it so fondly. It helped her throughout her lessons, her rituals, the ceremonies. She yearned to just be as free as she felt that night.

Staring up at the Ever-Lasting Star from her tower window, she’d wish and wish, her pink outstretched as if wrapping around a phantom’s phalange. I want to meet them again please. Were her friends okay? Were they happy? Did they meet up without her? Did they remember her? Did they know she wished she could keep their promise but couldn’t?