Submission (#3363) Approved

Lunarity shivered, reaching for another log to toss on the fire before retracting his front paw back into the blanket nest he’d made. He’d gotten lucky, he supposed, he’d reached the travelers’ lodge before the snowstorm had hit, if only by an hour. But he’d been here a week now, and the snow was piling up. He was lucky that one of the other travelers had the ability to spit fire, a wandering Noble who had offered to stay with them all until the storm had abided and they could melt a path to the next town for everyone.

Although, if he was being honest, their abilities had come much more in handy making a frankly unreasonable amount of grilled cheese sandwiches. He’d retreated to his room rather than pester them alongside the other kittoms, lest they start asking why he was on his own so far away from home. ‘Home’, at this point, was only the place in Kyendi that he used to store the various trinkets he’d obtained on his journeys. It wasn’t like any wandering Noble would know why he didn’t remember anything, anyway.

The window rattled. He glanced over, to see a leafless branch slam against the window several times, shaken by the wind. Some of the snowflakes, bigger around than his paws, were all but falling horizontally. His room was on the fourth floor of the lodge, but it wouldn’t stop the snow from rising to cover even his window. At least the fire was warm and crackling, and he could stay near it until he got hungry enough to brave the other travelers of the lodge and get some food.

In the meantime, the lodge was a good one, and good lodges in Strynhalde had some unspoken requirement to keep a full bookshelf in every room, just in case a snowstorm like this passed and there wasn’t much else to do. He’d taken one of the thinner, easier-looking tomes from the shelf, and it sat now beside him, whenever his thoughts drifted too much and he needed something to focus on.

He shook his head a little. No. No thinking about the flood that would come when all this melted. No thinking about that at all.

Lunarity turned to study the tome again, open on its second chapter. Pomus and You, said the heading, written in the barest hint of a cursive. At least he knew how to read cursive. Pomus were small shadow-creatures that floated alongside elnin, achieved at some point during kittomhood, and turned into lanterns during the miasmic months. He’d only seen one pomu in this lodge, an early-riser whose elnin seemed the opposite; and many lanterns.

He didn’t have a pomu of his own, at least not yet. For all he knew, his missing memories would mean that he’d never get one, or worse, that he’d had one and lost it forever. Maybe that was why…

“No,” he said, and his voice seemed quiet, but firm. “We are not going to do that right now. We can do that later, when we’re not stuck in here surrounded by snow. We are not doing this. There is enough miasma outside, I don’t need it in my head too.”

He lifted the book from its place on the rug, tipping it towards him so he could read, stretching out in his nest of blankets. ‘When a kittom gets a pomu varies entirely by when they’re ready to receive one, and alongside the quest for resonance and growing to adulthood, is one of the three central milestones in an elnin’s early life. They are small symbiotic creatures that hide in the shadows of their owners, transforming into crystals of anima during the winter hibernation months…’

A pomu would be nice to have, if only because then he’d have someone to talk to. Someone who would stay by his side, regardless of where he was going or what he was doing or how much he screamed whenever something snuck up on him. A pomu would ensure he was never alone, and someone could always bring him out of his fears by doing something silly, like the pomu downstairs that had somehow, despite all evidence to the contrary, withdrew enough dried food from their owner’s shadow to feed no less than four kittoms.

                ‘A common tradition during the miasmic months is to carve lanterns to tie to one’s tail or horns, keeping the pomu crystal within the lantern to keep it nearby without it floating off. Some elnin take the time to read by this light, as their pomu is no longer thieving books into their shadows, and some brave the miasma alone with their lanterns, trusting it to see through thin patches of miasma to open safe passageways.’

The wind rattled at the window, slamming the branch against it again. Lunarity looked up from his book, sighing. It was going to be a long stay, that was for sure. It was one of the reasons he was as solitary as he was. Without his memories or a pomu, standing on the edge of elnin society looking in, feeling so lost…

Someone knocked at his door. He looked up, turning towards it with a shuffle of his downcast ears. “It’s open,” he answered, faintly baffled.

The door opened to show the Noble elnin from earlier, their pomu resting between one horn and their ear. “A few of the other pomuless kittoms have discovered the treasure trove of scraps that Haruki hid in my shadow,” they said, smiling with a flick of their ear. “They’re going to be making some practice lanterns. Would you like to join them? It’s good to have company in times like this, and I’ve got a few scraps of ribbon that would go wonderful with your eyes.”

He blinked, and smiled, lifting his ears the two inches they could lift. “I would love to,” he answered, honestly and without a second thought. “That would be wonderful. My name’s Lunarity – yours?”

The Noble dipped their head. “Hello, Lunarity. You can call me Astrae.”