In the days that followed, Honeysuckle Croft saw as many visitors as it did during the New Year. The very evening after my return, Mistress Jek invited Floridiana to dinner. The mage arrived practically exploding with questions about South Serica that her pride wouldn’t permit her to ask.

I regaled her with tales anyway, just because I was so nice.

Then, the day after that, one of the schoolhouse rats overheard Taila and Nailus giggling about me at recess. They alerted Master Rattus, who scampered to the carpentry workshop to check if Master Gravitas knew already. From the extra-impassive look on the cat spirit’s face when he showed up at Honeysuckle Croft, he hadn’t – and the rat had lorded it over the cat spy.

Bobo and Floridiana separately told Den that I was back – with varying degrees of excitement, I imagined – and of course the first words out of the little dragon’s mouth when he saw me were: “Let’s have a welcome-home party!”

But to my surprise, the idea of a night of dancing and drinking didn’t excite me as it used to.

Where? I can’t exactly swim, you know. Opening my wings, I shook my feathers at him.

Okay, technically, I didn’t know if sparrows could swim, since I hadn’t fallen into a river yet, but there was an even bigger reason that I didn’t want to reprise our parties in the Caltrop Pond Water Court. An absence, that was.

Stripey hadn’t come back to Honeysuckle Croft.

Of course he hadn’t. It wasn’t even close to a hundred years since he went on to his next life.

And yet. And yet.

“It’s not like I was going to hold it in my pond or something!” Den squeaked, taking my objection at face value. Floridiana’s raised eyebrows made him clear his throat and adopt a more dignified tone. “Ahem. It was not my intention to host the party in a location that would be inconvenient for any of my guests, much less the guest of honor. I am certain that the Baron would be honored to lend us the use of his great hall for the event.”

I’d bet. It might be worth it just to see that stuck-up seneschal’s reaction.

Come to think of it, Anasius had been Stripey’s blood nephew. Shouldn’t he have been at the battle too? Shouldn’t filial piety and reverence for the older generation have required him to sacrifice himself to save his uncle?

I opened my beak to accept Den’s invitation just to spite that duck – but the tiny voice at the back of my head, the one that always sounded like Stripey’s, whispered, Is this wise?

I stopped to think.

No. No. It absolutely was not wise. My homecoming had already drawn so much attention in the barony that word of it might even reach Heaven and, well, Heaven frowned on people masquerading as divine emissaries.

In the end, I told Den, I am honored by your welcome, but a formal banquet is unnecessary. It is enough simply to see everyone.

However, having set his heart on an epic party, Den wasn’t so easy to dissuade. “Aww, come on, Rosie! We’ve been working so hard. We haven’t had a party in forever. I haven’t seen most of the taskforce in forever! It’ll be fun to get everyone together, for old times’ sake – oh.”

He’d finally spotted Bobo. The bamboo viper had drooped into a despondent heap of coils next to the honeysuckle bush.

After a long, painful silence, Den cleared his throat. “Ah. Well. Yes. I see how a party might be too much. After…such a long journey. You must be tired. How long are you staying with us?”

To that, I could only shrug my wings.

Mistress Jek and Taila (mostly Taila) wanted me to sleep at Honeysuckle Croft, but Bobo begged me to stay with her, and I took her up on the offer. There was something we needed to talk about, something I needed to tell her, which was much better suited to a dark bamboo stand at night. Even so, it was a few days before I found the courage to bring it up.

Hey, Bobo? Are you asleep?

In the moonlight that filtered through the leaves, the bamboo viper was a blobby rope wound around a stalk of bamboo.

“Uh uh. You?”

Me neither.

A long silence. A light breeze rustled the bamboo.

Hey, Bobo?

“Uh huh?”

I saw him.

“You sssaw…him?” All of a sudden, Bobo’s front half shot up. (Snakes had some serious abs.) “You sssaw Ssstripey??? Where? In Sssouth Ssserica? How’s he doing? What’s he up to? What’d he sssay?”

I shook my head, knowing she could see it in the dark. It was up in Heaven. Before both of us reincarnated.

“Oh! Oh! What’d he reincarnate as?”

I could only shake my head again. I don’t know. After a moment, I added, He didn’t want me to know.

Bobo processed that. “Where’d he reincarnate?”

I don’t know either. But he asked if you were okay, and he promised that whatever he reincarnates as, wherever he reincarnates, whenever he awakens, he’ll come back here. We made a promise, to meet at Honeysuckle Croft.

Pattering sounds filled the bamboo stand, like raindrops on leaves. I turned away and pretended to preen my feathers.

Some time later, Bobo sniffled and said in a reasonable approximation of good cheer, “Ssso all I have to do is ssstay here! And wait for him! And he’ll come!”

I already regretted telling her about the promise. I couldn’t shake the impression of my last meeting with Stripey. He’d promised, yes, but in a perfunctory manner, his focus already shifting to the life to come. He hadn’t left any messages for his friends, for Bobo, either, although he might have guessed that I’d be able to carry them.

To be fair, I hadn’t offered. It hadn’t occurred to me to offer.

But if he’d really wanted to, he would have asked, wouldn’t he…?

No. He promised to come back, and a promise was a promise.

Yes, I told Bobo. Yes, I’m sure he’ll come.

Up in Heaven:

Flicker struggled to straighten his spine and thrust his shoulders back, but no matter what he did, they kept slumping forward, as if they wanted to shrink his silhouette. He should walk with purpose – he would be far less suspicious if he walked with purpose – but he couldn’t help ducking behind an ornamental boulder every time he saw another god’s or goddess’ entourage.

None of them paid him the slightest attention, of course. A lone star sprite clerk at the gathering of Heaven’s elite to watch the princess-of-the-night blossoms open? There were only two reasons he could be here: Either he’d been summoned by a superior, or he’d come to deliver a message to a superior.

Which was, in fact, accurate.

Earlier that day, he’d received a missive from the Star of Reflected Brightness. The Lady of the Princess-of-the-Night tells me her blossoms will open tonight. Come to the viewing party. I shall wait under the willow.

She didn’t need to specify which willow. There was only the one under which they always met. It had begun when she spoke to Soul Number 11270 (whom she hadn’t known was Piri – gods, oh gods, had she been furious when she found out!) about protecting Jek Taila. It had continued when she decided that he could provide her with intelligence on the inner workings of the Bureau of Reincarnation. And it was still going on, whenever she had an update for him on his biggest problem soul.

As if knowing what Piri was up to might enable him to rein her in!

It was not the Star’s department. She really shouldn’t be encroaching on another god’s domain, but the Kitchen God was never there to take offense. And the Star of Heavenly Joy was treading carefully – for a god – while his formal appointment as Assistant Director pended before the committee.

Bowing low, Flicker stepped off the path for the Goddess of the Moon and her lieutenants, the Jade Rabbit and the Lord of the Cassia Tree. Hopping after them was the Moon Toad and, finally, the exhausted Woodcutter brought up the rear, dragging his axe. He’d been sentenced for some long-forgotten crime to chop at the cassia tree that grew in the courtyard of the Palace of the Moon. His punishment would end only when he cut it down – which, given that the tree healed itself as fast as he chopped it, would never happen.

As for the Lord of the Cassia Tree, he’d earned his half of the punishment by boasting of his regenerative abilities too often and too loudly before the gods and goddesses from the Ministry of Medicine.

Once the Moon entourage had swept past in a cloud of cassia cinnamon fragrance, Flicker veered away from the courtyard where all the gods and goddesses were gathering. Down by the lake, a single crane maiden reclined on a carved stone bench. Nearby, a faint glow showed behind the curtain of willow leaves.

Pushing through them, Flicker bowed low. (In her spirit of magnanimity, the Star had ordered him to stop genuflecting after the first few times.)

“Rise, Flicker.” As always, her voice wrapped around him like starlight and breeze. His heart beat faster at the sound. “Haven’t I told you that there is no need for ceremony here?”

He straightened his back but kept his eyes cast down respectfully. “Thank you, my lady. How may I be of service to you?”

She waved one hand in what was meant to be a cutting gesture, but it flowed like a shooting star’s tail. “Enough of the formality. Please.”

He stayed stubbornly silent.

Eventually, he heard her sigh. “Very well then. Flicker, are you aware that – no, of course you wouldn’t be. But Soul Number 11270 has left Lychee Grove. In fact, it has left South Serica entirely.”

Flicker was so shocked that his head jerked up. “She left?” Tardily, he added, “My lady.”

“Yes. She has attempted to leave every life thus far, has she not? This time she succeeded.”

Stunningly, his first reaction was a sense of betrayal. But she promised, he wanted to say. We talked about it, and she promised to live out this life in Lychee Grove the way she’s supposed to.

But of course she hadn’t. It had been foolish of him to take her word for it.

His second thought – the one that should have come first – was: “Oh gods! Oh stars! Did she – did she make it back to – she did, didn’t she?”

“Yes. She did.” The Star’s face was drawn and tight, and exhausted in a way that reminded him of the Woodcutter. It made his heart ache. “Why can she not leave my daughter alone? Why, life after life, does she seek to meddle? You’ve seen her file – you’ve talked to her. What does she seek? Is it because, having saved Taila’s life previously, she needs to balance it out by destroying the child now? Why can she not leave her in peace?”

The last words came out almost as a plea. No, they were a plea. A plea for someone, anyone, even a star sprite clerk, to explain to her why the souls of her daughter and her nemesis were so inextricably tangled.

“My lady….” Flicker chose his words with care, knowing that she would not like his answer. Might even punish him for it. “It may be difficult to believe, but she does feel fondness for the people in the Claymouth Barony.”

The Star made a sound that, in someone who was not a goddess, might have been called a snort. “I’ve seen her so-called ‘fondness’ before.”

“That may be so….” Flicker hesitated again, then decided that he might as well go for it. “But my lady, she is changing. She is improving. She knows there is no further – personal gain – to be derived from their lives, but she still cares. She asks me about them and, since I cannot answer her questions to her satisfaction, she tries to fly back to see for herself.”

“Can’t she see that they’re all better off without her? If she truly cared about them, she would stay away from them! She destroys everything she touches!”

The outburst made Flicker jump.

The Star breathed in and out, deeply, several times. “Be that as it may, the next time you see her, tell her to stay away from Jek Taila. Tell her that is an order, from me.”

Flicker bowed low. “Yes, my lady.”

She left him then, floating towards the courtyard where gardeners had arranged pots of princess-of-the-night plants, under her supervision. The crane maiden rose from the bench at the edge of the water and followed. As for Flicker, he lingered by the tree, peeking at her back through the leaves. She really was a star, he thought, a shooting star streaking across Heaven far, far above him.

She got as far as the circular doorway to the courtyard before she turned. He could only gape as she crossed the garden back to their willow, stopped before him, and inclined her head.

“I’m sorry,” she said. At least, that was what his ears heard. His mind refused to process the words. “That was poorly done of me. Would you care to view the princess-of-the-night blossoms with me?”

“Uh….”

He gawked at her, but she simply waited with that serene smile.

He looked at the crane maiden, who nodded encouragingly.

He looked back at the Star.

He thought about how much trouble he would get into if anyone from the Bureau of Reincarnation heard about this, as they surely would. Then he bowed.

“I would be honored, my lady.”