The Starless Sea

here is a pirate in the basement. The pirate was placed here for numerous acts of a piratey nature considered criminal enough for punishment by those non-pirates who decide such things.

The girl brings a plate of bread and a bowl of water. Her feet fall softly on the stones and any sound they make is stolen away by the waves or by the mice.

The girl stares into the shadows at the barely visible pirate, gives a little disappointed sigh, and places the bread and bowl by the bars. Then she waits.

The pirate remains in the shadows. After several minutes of silence, the girl turns away and leaves. When the pirate retrieves his meal he finds the water has been mixed with wine.

The next night, the pirate waits by the bars for the girl to descend on her silent feet. Her steps halt only briefly when she sees him. The pirate stares and the girl stares back.

He holds out a hand for his bowl and his bread but the girl places them on the ground instead, her eyes never leaving his. She gives him a hint of a bow as she returns to her feet, a gentle nod of her head, a movement that reminds him of the beginning of the dance.

The next night the pirate stays back from the bars, a polite distance that could be closed in a single step, and the girl comes a breath closer.

Another night and the dance continues. A step closer. A step back. A movement to the side. The next night he holds out his hand again to accept what she offers and this time she responds and his fingers brush against the back of her hand.

The girl begins to linger, staying longer each night. She brings two bowls of wine and they drink together in companionable silence. Some nights she brings more than bread. Oranges and plums secreted in the pockets of her gown. Pieces of candied ginger wrapped in paper laced with stories.

Tonight, the pirate waits for the girl. She arrives empty-handed.

Tonight is the last night. The night before the gallows. The pirate knows that there will not be another night. The girl knows the exact number of hours.

They do not speak of it.

They have never spoken.

The pirate twists a lock of the girl’s hair between his fingers.

The girl leans into the bars, her cheek resting on cold iron, as close as she can be while she remains a world away.

Close enough to kiss.

“Tell me a story,” she says.

The pirate obliges her.

nce in a long while an acolyte chooses to give up something other than their voice as they take their vows. Such acolytes are rare. One will not remember the last, nor will they serve long enough to meet the next.

The painter has lost her way.

She thinks that choosing this path will bring her closer to this place she once loved, this place that Time has changed as Time changes all things.

The painter makes her decision without telling anyone. Only her single student notices her absence but thinks little of it having learned long ago that sometimes people disappear and sometimes they return and other times they do not.

The painter spends her time of isolation categorizing losses and regrets trying to determine if there was ever anything she could have done to prevent any of them. She thinks if she has an idea for a new painting at any point during her time locked away she will refuse this path and return to her paints and let the bees find someone else to serve them.

But there are no new ideas. Only old ones, turned over and over again in her mind.

When the door opens long before the painter expects it to she follows without hesitation.

The acolyte and the painter walk down empty halls toward an unmarked door. Only a single cat notices them in this moment and though the cat recognizes this mistake for what it is he does not interfere. It is not the way of cats to interfere with Fate.

The painter expects to give both eyes but only one is taken.

One will be more than enough.

As the images flood the painter's sight, as she is bombarded by so many pictures unfolding in such detail that she cannot separate one from the other, cannot dream of capturing even fractions of them in oils on canvas even as her fingers itch for her brushes, she realizes this path was not meant for her.

But it is too late now to choose another.

hance had never asked a boon of Death or Time but there was something that she wished, that she wanted, that she desired more than she had ever desired anything before.

A place had become precious to her, and a person within it more so.

She returned to this place as often as she could, in stolen moments of borrowed time.

She had found an impossible love.

She resolved to find a way to keep it.

First Chance went to speak with Death.

She asked if Death might spare a single soul.

Death would have granted Chance any wish within her power for Death is nothing if not generous, and nothing without Chance and Fate. This was a simple gift, easily given.

Chance spoke with Time.

(They had not spoken in a great while.)

Chance asked Time to leave a space and a soul untouched.

Time made Chance wait for an answer. When she received it there was a condition.

Time agreed to help Chance only if Chance in turn aided Time in finding a way to hold on to Fate.

Chance made this promise, though she did not yet know how to unbreak that which had been broken.

And so Time consented to keep a place hidden away, far from the stars.

Now in this space the days and nights pass differently. Strangely, slowly. Languid and luscious.

And so Chance found a way to keep her love.

An inn that once sat at one crossroads now rests at another, where only those that are not searching for it, but need it all the same, will find it.

here is a note down here with your name on it.

A slip of paper scrawled upon with a harried hand. Or a hand heavy with longing. Maybe the lines are shaky, hesitant, clear full of regret and loss.

It is one thing to die, to return to ash and dust. It is another to be truly lost, to be forgotten, for the last moment you are spoken of to come and go.

Down here, there is a note with your name on it.

When it is picked up again, found by the wandering hand of a hungry reader, will the dust shake off your bones? You, immortal that would cheat death, you have already gained your prize.

f you would come with me, sir," the man says, beckoning him forward. Simon follows the man into a room with a desk stacked with papers and books. Tiny drawers with metal pulls and handwritten plaques line the walls. A cat on the desk looks up as he approaches.

"Is this a library?" Simon asks, looking around at the books.

"After a fashion," the man says, opening a ledger. He dips a quill in ink. "What door did you enter through?"

"Door? It…it was in a cottage not far from Neverwinter. Someone left me the key."

The man had started writing in the ledger but now stops and looks up.

"Are you Jocelyn Keating's son?" he asks.

"Yes," Simon answers, a little too enthusiastically. "Did you know her?"

"I was acquainted with her, yes," the man answers. "I am sorry for your loss," he adds. "Your full name, Mister Keating?"

"Simon Jonathan Keating."

The man inscribes it in the ledger.

"You may call me the Keeper," the man says. "What did you roll?"

"They were all little crowns," Simon explains, recalling the dice on the pedestal. He had tried to see the other pictures but only made out a heart and feather.

"All of them?" the Keeper asks.

Simon nods.

The Keeper frowns and marks the ledger, the quill scratching along the paper.

he door wears a brass image of a heart aflame.

The doorknob turns easily when Simon tries it.

The room is filled with bookshelves and chairs and pillows and quills and ink and paper.

He turns his attention to a bookcase.

Behind him, the door swings open. Simon cries out in surprise.

In the doorway there is a young woman with white hair piled in curls and braids. Her eyes are bright green and wild.

"Who are you?" this girl who has materialized out of nothingness asks.

"Simon," he says. "Who are you?"

The girl considers this question longer, tilting her head. "Eleanor," she answers.

"Where did you come from?" Simon asks.

"How did you get here?" she asks him, ignoring the question. "Down here, I mean, the place not the room."

"Through a door, in a cottage—"

"You have a door? I thought most of the doors were gone," Eleanor asks. She sits on the floor amongst the chairs, cross-legged, looking at him expectantly.

Simon tells her about his mother, about the envelope and the key and the cottage. They speak for what feels like ages, though they never grow hungry nor thirst. Simon tells her things he has never told anyone. He confides fears and exposes worries, thoughts falling from his lips that he dared not speak aloud but it is different here, with her.

They continue to talk, soon sitting hand in hand. Eleanor traces tiny circles in his palm with her fingertips as they discuss the Harbor, the hallways, the rooms, the cats.

The books.

"Do you have a favorite?" Simon asks.

"I do. I…I do. It's…" Eleanor pauses. "Would you like to read it?". She reaches into her knapsack and withdraws a book, with a gilded cover bound in faded red leather. "Then we could talk about it. If you like it."

Simon, at a loss for words, takes the book, looking curiously at its gilded cover. "Thank you. I left one in the cottage that I would share with you, if you like?"

Eleanor's eyes light up, and she nods.

"Wait a moment then."

Simon turns to the door with the heart and steps into the hallway, book in hand.

"On second thought, why not come with me?" he says, turning back to the room, but it is empty. "Eleanor?"

Simon steps into the room but there is no one.