The Hollow Star of Starlight Ruins

They met in the ruins of the Starlight Temple, where no prayers are spoken anymore.

Lilima was a priestess, her bloodline bound to the feral lineage, the Surnur. Those with sharp eyes and cunning in their veins. She was pious, precise, and polished like a mirror.

And she hated how easily he made her forget the names of her gods.

Krevoti was not of her kind. He had runes in his scale carved skin and eyes that glowed faintly green in the dark as one of the Eolo, a species shaped by the deep caverns of the world, said to be born without need of sunlight or blessing.

His kind were welcome in trade within Ragne, but never in temple halls. Not in bedchambers. Not in tales with joyful endings.

They were never meant to speak.

However, the Starlight ruins had secrets. A crack in the old wall led to a forgotten chamber, still lined with carvings of once-worshipped deities, some with the faces of beasts and others overtaking lesser deities. It was there, kneeling before the half-shattered statue of Yuun the Mender, that Lilima first saw Krevoti offering his blood rune carved charms to the rubble.

“You pray to our gods?” she asked, startled as she broke the silence.

“I pray to anyone who listens,” he said. “But it’s mostly the rocks. They listen best.”

She fasted for days after their first meeting, hoping reflection would cleanse her heart, but it never did.

She should have reported him, but for whatever reason she didn’t.

Instead, they began to meet in secrecy once a week, then twice. He taught her to read marble patterns like old sigils. She taught him the songs her mother whispered when the sister moons were full. They never kissed. Not then. But the air grew warm between them.

And then the blood brothers came.

Lilima escaped through the wall.

Krevoti did not.

They say he was taken to the Quiet Keep of the Deep in a secret corner of the Ancestral Isles. In the Quiet, they break people not with whips, but with memory.

They say the rune charms he carried were crushed beneath the heel of a silver eyed inquisitors and left as dust in the silence that followed.

They say Lilima is still a priestess. Quiet. Diligent. Still unmarried.

But some nights, if you visit the temple ruins…

You’ll find a single offering on the altar of Yuun.

A bone carved charm, shaped like a crescent moon.

Still warm to the touch.