Wheeling Gull Isle have you come here to play jesus

“S-Starshine.”

It was too early in the evening for stargazing, but Coelacanth lifted her finely drawn skull and tipped it skyward, thinking of Kirynnae, the grand matriarch, weaver of stories — of Kailani, the Seabird, named for the sea and the sky — of Olive, the sidereal saronide, immaculate and untamable. The Cortens were voyagers, ocean-enamored and ever-wandering, and she possessed her own measure of wanderlust — but this was home, now. She drew in a breath so deep her concave flanks quavered with it before allowing it to fall shakily from her fox-fine muzzle in a deep sigh.

In the wake of what had happened with Komodo and Aditya, Seelie’s heart was too heavy to dance; but she cradled the name with a swanlike crane of her neck, folding in on herself as if by so doing, she could imprint its sibilant syllables upon her own heart. Starshine. Neptune eyes fluttered closed as `Io’s button nose traced the Aralez’s cheekbone. She could not trust the uniquely-painted female’s vow — she was ingenuous no longer and had learned the hard way that very few things were everlasting — but she appreciated that `Io wanted to make such a promise.

“Hurry,” she commented, “`Io, `Io guppy, Maegi.” After a beat, one tufted ear fanned out and to the side in indecision; her cerulean eyes opened and she looked curiously at the winter raven. “Worry,” she clarified in a sheepish whisper, ducking her head in embarrassment. She was worried about the trio, and about Poppy, too. A soft whine stirred in her hollow throat.