The Star-Shattered Fane is nigh-unreachable, nestled between the shifting dunes. Yet artisans across the world report dreams that describe the meteorite cradled there, each ending with an ominous vision of its cracking.
’This vision has infected part of my workforce. A shame, certainly, but it’s provided another opportunity…'
'The Stars learnt how to hide from the Hours long ago, but those who have seen them can be made to see all others… with the proper guidance, that is.'
'If only one of the locals here had the dream. Perhaps you could have earned something yourself, Librarian. Far too many Stars go unused this side of the world.‘
Lady Audrey planned to use her workers afflicted by the dreams to find and exploit other Stars hidden in the world.
’Stars are not meant to fall. Neither are they to awaken.'
'The Madrugad stills what is dead upon the earth. If she didn’t still this Star or its dreams, why not? And if she did, why does it stir again?'
'…Because something has set a new spark of life within it, and whatever lives within is sheltered from her light. Very little can escape that, which tells me an old compact is at work here - one worringly old.‘
Manly concluded an old compact prevented the Madrugad from stilling the spread of dreams and worried about what lay within the Star.
'The Stars are always hatching. How else do you think they shed light? But this one hatches differently. The only question is how.”
'The Calyptra, they were given the Eggs of Stone, left by those last gods of the redder sun. I do not think this is one of those Eggs, but I believe it could be… with a little warmth.‘
An excited Subcomandante Zuazo decided to grant the fallen Star warmth, in the hopes of its eventual hatching.
’One of my neighbors, he spoke about this dream. And now he’s sculpting dragons.'
'The only thing which dragons and Stars share are an old connection to Stone… as well as Nowhere. Worms manifest where those two intersect. I’m certain nothing good can come from these dreams.'
'Stars and dragons both once obeyed a lower, redder sun. It’s gone now, but the Sun-in-Rags bleeds red. If my neighbor sleeps in his light, this mess should finally end.‘
Emilia came to believe the Sun-in-Rags could bring an end to the visions intruding on her neighbor’s dreams.
’Where people share dreams, trouble is bound to emerge. So what of dreams shared across the world?'
'Dreams often draw upon the waking world. I have found few outward connections between those receiving these visions, so the answer must lie further beneath the surface.'
'The dreams of eyes, of course. So many memories sleep within bones, and the time for their awakening has come. Many people will soon need to make a choice: to remain, or to change.‘
Dr Mohammad determined the dreams arose from the bones of dreamers, and that they would be faced with a choice to remain or to change.
’Do you think me affected by the dreams? You aren’t correct, but neither are you wrong.'
'Dreams are a bit like eggs. What is within came from somewhere without. If I saw it once before, I might have seen it now. Or perhaps I have, and forgot. Memory turns to ash outside the mind, but ash is free to blow on the wind, and to become something else once more.‘
’Old temples to old powers barely survived the millenia. This one has not, and still the worshippers gathered beneath the shattered stones.'
'When the Flint was shattered, the Stars fled from her facets to the far side of the sky. But without her, the pull of Death loosens them from the firmament, until they fall upon the earth to join her in Nowhere. This one, for a time, lived by the fires its supplicants sacrificed; perhaps it seeks to be proof of her legacy, cold as it is.‘
’The relict-kinds who remain in the world. Do you think they were cast down, or that they chose to fall? I have my own answer.'
'The Thritige came from darkness, so being driven from the Sun’s light was not an exile, but a homecoming. The Star may have fallen from our sky, but it fell into another, painted beneath the dunes, to hear the whispered wishes of the hill-children.‘