Prologue: Somewhere Along the Highway

Beneath a canopy of stars, upon empty, rolling plains, a boy and his father lay upon a blanket by a modest fire. The great milky scar from the universe's creation bisects the night sky, free of the occluding glow cast by cites, the serene painting only broken by the occasional transport zipping between the spheres, or a satellite as it rapidly circles the globe. The father propped himself up on his elbow and packed his pipe, smiling as his son stared wide eyed into the heavens.

With insomniac cities intent on keeping the night at bay, this was the first time the boy had witnessed such natural splendor. The father struck his match as the son tried to name the twinkling jewels above. His father had taught him constellations and shown him star maps on the computer, but he had never seen them in real life. He spotted the Dawn star, the brightest point on the starry canvas, and traced out the image of the child in his mind. The boy could not recall being more at peace in his life and knew the memories of this evening would sustain him for a lifetime.

“Alden, see there?” The man said, breaking the silent reverie. “Those three points of light not like the others?”

Alden coughed as he caught a face full of pipe smoke and waved it away with a tiny hand. He squinted and followed his father’s outstretched hand but could not see the stars he spoke of. They all looked pretty much the same to him.

“There, that green one.”

Alden gasped in delight as he spotted the pale green orb. To the right of it was an orange-ish red light, and above them was a sickly yellow sphere.

“Aye papa, are those planets?”

The father chuckled with pride at his son’s astuteness. “Yes, my son, those are planets, but they are also goddesses.” The father clumsily drew an outline of the constellation in the air. “See those stars? They make up the sisters.”

Alden squinted against the non-existent glare. “I see it.” He lied.

His father blew out another cloud of fragrant smoke. “That green one is Linh, next to Enyo, and above the two of them is the Eldest sister, Malady. They usher in the seasons.”

Alden knew the stories; he had even visited the temple to Linh in Saragdahl once before. His grandparents were devout followers of the old ways, offering tributes of fresh slaughtered lambs to Enyo in summer, and the buds of fruiting trees to Linh in spring. His father had even proposed to his mother in the old ways, constructing a cottage of sticks and leaves in the forest, and keeping it stocked with food for a full month. While his mother had never been a religious woman, she purified herself at the temple regardless before accepting, saying it was the most romantic gesture anyone had made before.

There were even those still alive who claimed to have seen the sisters, but Alden did not put much faith into those claims. The sisters were only stories as far as he knew.

“Who are the sisters again papa?”

His father smiled and silently toked on his pipe. It was a story Alden had heard numerous times before, but he never tired of it.

“Some say they are Eloi, either cast out or escaped from Elysium at the time of creation. When this rock was barren and lifeless, Linh made it green. When the elder folk clawed their way from the soil, Enyo made their crooked backs straight with youth, and gave them iron to fend off the minions of darkness. Malady brought the harvests, and the great equalizer that is time, so that mortals could not usurp the gods and had an incentive to grow. She is the eldest and wisest of the four.”

“And the fourth?”

His father paused, clouds of smoke intermittently obscuring his hard-lined face. “She is an outcast, and twin to Linh, she seeks to undo all her sisters have wrought. She bears the keys that unlock the hearts of mortals, freeing the souls of their bodies when their final hour is struck. Her sphere only appears in winter, when all others flee. Only malady can stand to be in her presence, but then, only for a short time. Hers is the sign of death, and I dare not speak her name.”

Alden laughed. “It’s just a story papa.”

“Oh? You think so do you?”

Alden nodded. “They either died or went home.”

His father frowned. “A goddess is immortal my son.”

“How come we don’t see them anymore?”

The father shrugged and dumped his pipe. “Who knows? Perhaps because little boys don’t keep their ways anymore?”

Alden smirked. “Or perhaps because those boys’ fathers haven’t been to temple in years.”

His father loosened his collar and chuckled. “Perhaps, perhaps.”

Alden turned back to the sky, and the three sisters above. Linh was just a research station and burgeoning colony, they had found no goddess on its lush surface, and Enyo was a barren rock. The atmosphere was too thin and toxic for life, only a handful of men had even walked her surface. Then there was malady, he learned in his natural sciences class that she was not even a planet, but something called a gas giant. If there were goddesses, they had certainly chosen some odd homes.

“Look there!” His father exclaimed. “A shooting star.”

Alden looked up to see a tiny ball of fire streaking across the heavens.

“Make a wish.” His father urged.

The meteorite seemed to be coming right towards them as Alden closed his eyes. He wished to someday finally meet one of the sisters, assuming they existed at all. He opened his eyes and saw the ball of light coming closer and could have sworn her saw a face before it blinked out of existence.