Northstar Vale Thánatos

So much, but it had not been enough to save the girl. It had not been enough to spare Maxim and Towhee this horrible pain. Arsenio’s stomach tightened. He wished he could do more. He wished these circumstances could be altered and made better. They had done nothing to deserve this.

You are important to me, he said. To us.

Epoch was not as strong without Maxim and Towhee. Arsenio was not a man who would ignore these truths. He did not hold himself above them. They had helped to make the vale into a home.

Stirring, the redstone man stepped toward a juniper tree and reared back on his hind legs to reach a prickly limb with dark blue berries. He plucked the barked limb from its hold and stepped to the girl’s grave. The juniper branch and its berries were left atop the earth.

Arsenio sang a quiet song – a song for lost children, for grieving parents, for the girl who rested beneath the soil of the vale.