The soft night air had been whispering to me, had told me secrets while we Kimeti stood ready to fill the darkness with our stories. Fever Dream was next to me, his tail lashing the backs of my legs. I nudged him a few times, but he didn't seem to be paying any attention. At first, I found it hard to focus, but I cast my eyes to the stars, and I knew the story that I wished to tell. In my naming dream, the rain fell without cessation, but I could have sworn I saw a single star plunge down against the horizon. The story I wished to tell was based on that, the longing I felt to reach out for that star.
I cleared my throat and flicked my head quickly to the side, shaking myself loose, waiting to speak. Finally, the words came to me. "Who, amongst you, has ever tasted a fallen star?" I held my breath, then released it slowly, waiting for some Kimeti to challenge my story. "I have heard it said that the heart of a star is a great delicacy, and that the ones which fall into the swamp are the most tender. They are told to provide vivid dreams of the future. How far do you think a creature would go, to taste those things?" I dug one hoof into the ground and cast my gaze around the circle. "Further than they ought, is the answer in this tale. There was once a young doe who found a fallen star, nestled in the petals of a swamp flower. She had never seen such a thing before, the way it refracted the light and mesmerized her. She did not even touch it, for the first two days. Hour upon hour she knelt by the flower, in the muck and the water, her mane becoming matted with damp and her knees growing stiff. She would not leave it, could not look away. And yet, she did not even have a name for this thing which had enraptured her so." I paused, to catch my breath, and listen to the gentle wind blowing past.
"On the third day, she knelt in to breathe the flower's scent, to sniff at the thing which rested on in its center. The smell was incredible. She felt simultaneously as if her parents and her love were there, as if the weather was perfect, as if the air was fresh, as if it was the happiest day of her life. For two more days, she knelt by the flower, growing weaker and weaker, even though she felt inexplicable bliss. Her physical body was malnourished and exhausted, sore from remaining motionless, but she could not possibly realize that. Such was the bewitching power of a fallen star, and she did not even know what it was."
"Imagine those who would seek it for its power, knowing what it was? The desire within them would be tenfold what that young doe felt. Regardless, that is not the end to the tale." I lost my pace and slowed down, my head bent. The story was not one which ended happily. "The doe, on the fifth day, could not even make her body move. Finally, her love found her, and nuzzled her face. She would not budge, nor respond, until he leaned in to look at what she was staring at. He saw the star, and felt its light, but there was something sick in the dead, flat eyes of his love, and so he was spared its mesmerizing charm." Fever Dream, standing next to her, exhaled heavily, frustrated at the inevitable sad ending.
"He begged her to wake, said, 'Let us leave this thing together! It is just a flower, with some rock in the middle.' She replied, 'Not a rock, not a rock,' and leaned in, sniffing the fallen star again. Her face melted into contentment. 'Please, we must leave; you're unwell, and it has been days since I saw you last. You look like you haven't slept, or eaten, since I last saw you.' His love simply kept on staring at the fallen star in bliss. He nudged her again, but she toppled into the mud, flailing her hooves and trying to knock the fallen star out of the flower. She rolled upright and licked the star." I took one deep breath, paused and looked each Kimeti in the eye.
"That one taste made her feel a bliss so unimaginable that she never drew breath again. It is told that she experienced the universe alligning, the life and death of the swamp, the glow of fireflies, the sound of cicadas, the gentle brush of willow branches against the top of her head. It is told that she felt the birth of children, the intimate love of her dear buck, the bursting of a sky full of stars... and yet, there was no way to be sure what she did feel in that time, for her love was the only witness. Her lifeless body was left to be claimed by the swamp, and her love, hardened by the experience and at a loss for words, gathered the 'rock' which he felt she had loved more than she would ever love him, and put it in a small pouch. He carried that pouch everywhere, and it never left his neck. It is said that his heart hardened, and he sacrificed it to the fallen star for an immortal life."
I felt a stillness wash over me, now that my tale had come to its end. "Perhaps this should serve as a cautionary tale, to place our love with care. Perhaps the fallen star is real, and perhaps there is more than one of them out there... In the end, I suppose we all return to the swamp, to the earth..." And I quieted, content to listen to the others and let the weight of my story constrict me.
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