I am a night-angel. A Nocturne. There
was a time when I wove among my former brethren of the light. But long ago there
was a War of Imagination. For all souls. A third of my brothers rebelled, and
the sun itself went dark. In horror at my catastrophic failure to help halt
this rebellion, I chose to leave the realms of Eth’iri. Despite the pleas of my
brothers. A self-imposed exile from the Fullness. The only home I’d ever known.
And so I became a wanderer in a thousand-year darkness. The world between
worlds. My wings remained, but my divine fire was dimmed to the faintest ember.
For what seemed an eternity I
staggered delirious and blind through ruptures in dreamtime. The ruins of
psyche. A realm of perpetual shadow. Until one blackened eve, I heard a dying herald
sing. A figment, I thought, conjured by the endlessness of my isolation. Or the
haunting memory of my former abode. But this distant voice was no figment.
Indeed, it was the herald of the Morn. I found Dawn herself, bleeding fatally, singing
with her last breath of wounds and wisdom. Curious, she gazed into the eyes of this
little boy lost. But I was a girl once too. Bright, with skin pale as
alabaster. Eyes brown and blue. Sensing this hidden aspect she took pity on me,
I suppose. Or remembered the place beyond the mirror, where I once remembered and
took pity on her. The boy she once was, bruised and black. A disgraced angel of
the Choral just like me. Either way, she chose to gift me with a secret,
feminine magic. The very last of her light and her life. A burst of brilliance tore
the black—and both my sight and sanctity were restored to me.
She died in my arms, but a revelation was granted. I couldn’t change what had happened a thousand years before. The rebellion. The war. But I could undo the death of the girl in my arms. I could reignite the sun, making radiance more than the dreaming augurs of Ethri-sol. I could resurrect the dawn. But I would have to die. Every night, for another thousand years. Like a moth to a flame. If not, I would be the only thing that remains. Immortal, wandering this ruin of shadow and salt alone. But I fell in love the moment I heard the herald’s voice. She beguiled me with her healing grace. How could I not offer her the same? Love asks more of both a Nocturne and a Star. We play all roles in the end. Do you know what I chose, Fallen? What both of us still chooses? We are within you, even now. Each one of you. Hear this. Perhaps alone I cannot halt a war in heaven. Or undo a genocide on earth. But I can bring back the light, even in darkness. I can try to heal the ones I love. Even if it burns.
