Andrea Höst - And All the Stars

Knocked backward, the Core failed to evade reaching hands – Nash, Tyler, Claire and Quan – all of them crowding forward. The Core lasted only a few moments longer than Noi’s Moth, and then it was nothing, a collapsing jellyfish.

"May you rot."

Gavin stepped forward, and for a moment seemed about to spit, but shook his head instead and turned his back. And then they were all looking around at each other, eyes large.

"You finished the dragon–?" Madeleine asked.

Pan turned, checking. "Nah, it’s still galumphing up the road behind us, but the Core was the primary target. Time to snicker-snack, ev–"

The Spire stopped screaming.

Madeleine found enough energy to slew around with the rest, to stare across Hyde Park at a familiar skyline, where Sydney Tower was the tallest building, and no midnight spear stabbed the dawn.

Then, as cheering rose all across the park, the dragon reached them.

A neutrally-decorated guest bedroom dominated by a four poster bed. Sunlight streamed through French doors, danced with dust motes, and kept Madeleine, tucked beneath a quilt, toasty-warm. Inertia pinned her in place.

"I’ve bad news if you’re planning to stay in here permanently. All your little playmates are talking about leaving town."

Madeleine shifted gingerly, moving from her side to her back. "Noi told me," she said. "Did you find your friends?"

"Only Eliza. She thinks Josh is still Plus One." Tyler put down a carry bag and sat on the side of the bed, rearranging the long skirt of his dress before surveying Madeleine judicially, from her scraped and bruised face to her tightly wrapped left arm. "Malingering, or genuinely can’t cope?"

"Both?" There had been a patch, when she’d woken early in the evening after the battle of the Spire, where it had all slammed down on her and she’d wept herself numb, barely responsive even to her Blue’s hunger. The next day she’d slept when she no longer needed it, and struggled to have anything to say to Noi and Emily when they brought her food and news. "I just…don’t know how to be."

"Would it help if I mentioned that burning first loves rarely look quite so eternal from the perspective of a couple of years? Or weeks. No?"

"Has saying that ever helped anyone?"

"Probably not." Tyler shifted so he could see through the French doors to the long sweep of sunlit garden outside. "I will concede that this is deliciously complicated. You’re not sure if you were in love with the alien, or the boy, or a pastiche which was neither of them. What do you think would have happened if your Théoden had settled on a different host? The practical Noi, for instance?"

Tyler could be unsparing. Madeleine tried to picture a Noi who was Théoden, but it was impossible, so she dived into a different subject.

"Was the fight with the dragon bad?"

"No, highly entertaining." Tyler accepted the redirection without comment. "You chose a terrible moment to pass out, and missed a most impressive exhibition of bronco riding from our junior acting squad. Though with the Spire and the Core gone, I’m fairly sure the thing was only trying to run away. All I had to do was provide suitable applause." He caught Madeleine’s change of expression and gave a tiny shake of his head. "Yes, I am aware of the massive crush. Sixteen. Not going to happen."

Madeleine wondered if she was sorry, and sighed. "I’ve missed you, Tyler. You never walk on eggshells."

He laughed, that beautiful, warm chuckle. "You have a most lowering opinion of me, judging from that excoriation on my bedroom wall. How unsparing, Leina." But his smile faded, and he touched her strapped arm, which she’d been told was likely only a hairline fracture. "Did you blame me?"

"No. A bit. I blamed everyone. But I didn’t really care whose fault anything was – I just wanted to get away, not have to see any of those people again."

Tyler waited, humming softly.

"That’s not what I’m doing now."

"It mightn’t be what you want, but it is what you’re doing. Not that I haven’t gone out of my way to avoid an awkward conversation or two in my time. Do you really want to not have this one?"

The thought of talking to Fisher, sitting down and properly trying to work out where they stood… She squeezed her eyes shut.

"Things worth having are rarely easy, kiddo. There are worse responses than deciding how you want things to be, and doing everything you can to make that what is. Here." Tyler plopped the carry bag onto her lap. "If nothing else, get out of this room, sit in the sun a while. Your complicated beau is off having discussions with a crowd of military types who showed up this morning, so you’ll have an hour or two to lose your nerve. If it all ends up being too much, my couch is always available. Oh, and I’ve spoken to your parents, but you might want to call them."

Dropping a kiss on her forehead, Tyler left Madeleine to inspect the carry bag, which held a pile of unused sketch pads. She still felt absolutely no impulse to put them to use, but supposed she could at least open these without fear of coming across drawings she couldn’t bear to look at.

Madeleine’s eventual reason for getting up had more to do with not liking the extra burden she was putting on everyone. The two days since the fall of the Spires had spared the Musketeers little time for victory parties. Around a third of the Blues in the city were still possessed, and for the first day both they and the Greens had continued to either attack or hide. The second day the Greens had stopped, like run down toys, which was not a better situation, but after several hours of emptiness they’d started to show signs of reacting. And new Blues and Greens were returning to Sydney, helping to lighten the load of people who’d started out damaged and exhausted.

Two possessed Blues had surrendered themselves, but both Moths had died at separation.

It hurt to walk about, but it hurt to lie down, so there was no real reason to stay in bed. Noi had left her a choice of painkillers in the en suite, so Madeleine first took a fresh dose, then went through her bags until she found her original phone. A little reassembly, and a brief charge while she washed and dressed, and then she was listening to a stream of voicemail. Her parents had called every day, despite her warning that she wasn’t using her phone, just to leave a message, to let her know where they were. Her own call was met by a busy signal, so she sent a text and email.

Then, taking a sketchbook and pencils, she went outside.

The backyard was long, with a central gazebo, a number of blazing Japanese maples, and a wisteria arbour winding to a tennis court hidden by hedges. A tall sandstone fence, a shade darker than the walls of the house, kept it private, a little world of its own. Madeleine liked it very much, exploring with interest, then sitting on the rear stairs of the gazebo.

The house was Fisher’s. With half the Musketeers in various states of collapse, he’d suggested it as an alternative to the hectic confusion of the Elizabeth Street hotels. Because it was away from the centre of the fighting, and wasn’t known to others, they’d been able to use it as a retreat, moderately confident of not being attacked. Noi had told Madeleine this carefully, as if she’d half expected Madeleine to immediately try to escape out of the window. But the place didn’t bother Madeleine, just the prospect of talking to Fisher and finding someone unrecognisable.

Almost everything Théoden had told her had to be Fisher’s past and Fisher’s opinions. A smart, incisive boy, layered over with a quiet consideration which didn’t match up to the Fisher Pan had first described. It had not been Fisher’s deep anger and black fear, nor Fisher who would stop and be amused at himself. How many times had she tried to draw that expression?