Ian's Story, Parts I and II

Part I

Cold, stiff, frozen. Freezing toes, numb toes, no toes. Ice, wind, ice, wind, sleet in my eyes. Sleet, freezing, freeze to death. Freeze to death, die here now, no, keep walking.

Ian hugged himself more tightly as he trudged along the great St. George Bridge. The noble statues held no awe for him tonight. On warmer nights he was wont to linger and gaze on the saints, and imagine what they would say to him if they saw him. He thought perhaps Saint John the Baptist would admonish him for his sins, especially the resentful mutterings he often directed toward unforgiving, self-important men who pushed him out of the street into the deep puddles of freezing slush. The Virgin Mary would smile on him with sorrow, and Our Lord on the Crucifix would feel his sufferings. But Saint Nicholas was his favorite. For Saint Nicholas, he was sure, would look down on the little child shivering in delighted dread at his feet, open his arms, and say, “My child, come receive your gifts.” And good Saint Nicholas would give Ian a bar of solid gold, and bless Ian on his way as he ran to buy hot food, warm clothes, and—wonder of wonders—a room at the inn where the firelight shone through the windows.

But tonight, Ian pulled his shoulders in toward his shivering chest and closed his eyes against the stinging ice. Firelight, firelight, firelight, firelight… The image of the glow in his mind spread a small flicker of warmth through his chest and arms… until a blast of frigid wind extinguished the fire.

The bridge was only a quarter mile long, but to Ian it seemed that an hour went by before he crossed it. Here on the other side, the wind was not as chill, though his bones still felt like sticks of ice. In a moment they would shatter and break, and Ian would no longer feel the world’s icy touch.

Ah, what was that heavenly smell devised by hell to torment him? Roasting meat, potatoes, herbs… Food, sustenance, spiced wine to warm his blood… And whence came that glow as that of a benevolent angel smiling upon him? Ian stood just outside the square of light on the snow beneath the tavern window. Many a night had he passed this tavern, but never had such a divine fragrance beguiled him as the smell of roast beef did now. Ian shivered convulsively. This must have been the coldest night of the year. Knives of ice shot through his nostrils and throat and into his chest as he breathed.

Can’t go in, mustn’t beg, scraps of food in the street… somewhere. Mustn’t beg, always beaten, horrid women, evil men, broomsticks, beaten, no, don’t go in. Smell of meat…

Ian took one step, trembling, into the square of light. Maybe, maybe… maybe there is no stick, maybe there is someone kind, pity, maybe just a scrap, just a trimming, just an end, maybe a piece has fallen on the floor, unfit for guests. Maybe no beating, slapping, shoving, maybe just a second of warmth in the doorframe.

Ian stumbled, convulsing with cold, closer to the door, forgetting to look for a back door. Suddenly, the door opened, and Ian jumped back, heart pounding. A large man in a dirty, threadbare coat stumbled out into the night with a bottle in his hand. Ian realized with shock and dismay that the man was his father, and the bottle was almost empty.

Two years before, when Ian was eight years old, his father had come home from a tavern to find Ian shivering and weeping over his mother’s starved, half-frozen body. His father had gone into a drunken rage, flinging Ian about the shack, and finally hurling him into the street. Ian still bore many scars from the encounter, and had never dared return.

Ian crept back into the shadow cast by the inn wall. His father lurched over the threshold, tripped over his own feet, and fell flat on his face on the snow. Ian was horrified, but did not dare to move. He crouched, shaking, against the wall until the sweat of fear on his forehead froze and his very heart seemed made of ice. His father never moved. At last, Ian inched around the corner, and then fled. Terror had long ago chased the thought of meat from his mind.

If his father found him, Ian was sure that his father would kill him. Ian feared life with its hunger and pain and cold, but he feared death still more. In his first few years of life, Ian’s mother had told him a little of heaven and hell, but Ian thought that God would hardly notice someone so small. God might forget to call him to heaven, and he would lie trapped in his frozen body forever. His imagination filled him with horrors of what he did not know.

Ian had not stopped to look over his shoulder and see whether his father had risen and pursued him. In his irrational terror, he did not realize that his father could not have run even if he had wakened and wanted to. His father took on the supernatural strength and gigantic size of a demon in Ian’s mind—a dark shadow that hunted his fleeing footsteps. Ian took no thought for his destination, and did not realize that his feet had carried him back to the St. George Bridge. Suddenly, he slipped on an unseen patch of ice, reeled against the rail of the bridge, and pitched over the side.

Ian closed his eyes as he fell down and down and down… He braced himself for the impact with the icy, cold, tempestuous river. He wondered whether, perhaps, death might not be the horror he imagined it to be. Maybe he would even find his mother, who was the only one who had ever loved him. God, don’t let me be trapped… trapped… I don’t want to be trapped. Make me brave please, God, if you can… Perhaps you don’t hear me, I’m so small…

But the impact never came. From the moment Ian had begun to fall, time seemed to have slowed down or stopped altogether, despite the wind rushing round his ears as he fell. It had not occurred to Ian to wonder just how long it would take to reach the water. But his senses were awakened by the growing warmth in the air, and the sensation that gravity had reversed itself. Though he had fallen backwards, he now felt the pressure of rushing air on his chest instead of his back. He wondered—oh how strange—whether he was falling up!

At last, he dared to open his eyes. He was surrounded by the deep, rich, wet midnight blue of the sky; but the stars, instead of growing smaller and farther, grew larger and nearer. And as they raced toward him—or rather, as Ian raced toward them, though without feeling the movement—their light became warmer and more golden, instead of the cold, silver-white pinpoints of light we see from the ground.

When the stars were quite large and bright, and their golden light seemed to penetrate the still cold darkness and give it warmth, Ian realized that he was no longer moving toward them. At first, he lay quite still, afraid to move at all, lest he break the spell that kept him hovering there and plunge back toward the earth. Then his curiosity overcame his fear, and Ian attempted to sit up. He seemed to have forgotten how to move, now that he was no longer bound by gravity, but through great mental exertion, he finally sat up. He realized that there was little point in trying to walk, since he was not on the ground, so he maneuvered through the air with vague motions of his arms, as if he were swimming. The air seemed thicker up here than it had on the ground; it was resistant, like water, yet it somehow did not feel wet, and he was able to breathe. In fact, the air up there was more refreshing than the air on the earth, and Ian felt stronger and more alert, and quite forgot his hunger.

As he swam through the sky, he moved upward, as if he were climbing as well as swimming. The higher up he went, the thicker the air grew, until it was like moving through gelatin, but without stickiness or wetness. Yet it had all the beauty and warmth of midnight blue velvet. And the thicker it became, the stronger Ian became, so that he did not tire quickly. As he came closer to the stars, they appeared to be divided into separate square beams of light. The air had become even warmer, and it seemed that the cozy warmth was mixed with a refreshing cool, so that Ian always felt both warm and cool at the same time, and never too much of either. At last, he was only a few dozen yards from the stars, and he could see now that they were little houses, and their light streamed from the square windows. Unlike the light that came from the windows in the town below, these lights welcomed Ian, and he felt sure that they were an invitation rather than a dangerous temptation.

Suddenly, the door of the star closest to Ian was opened, and light poured out around the shining figure standing in the doorway. Ian moved toward it eagerly.


Part II

As Ian drew nearer to the figure, the brightness grew stronger, so that his eyes became dazzled, and he could not at first tell whether more light came from the doorway or from the figure in it. The light was brighter than any he had ever known, yet though he could not see clearly, he felt no pain, and no urge to shut his eyes to the piercing beams. The rays did not lighten the dark blue around him; and thick substance of sky seemed to stop the beams after they had pierced it a short distance.

At last, Ian's swimming motions brought him into the square of light. He stopped. He saw only a blur of gold brighter than the star itself. The star-person stood still also, and then spoke.

"Welcome, Ian," said a voice like ringing bells. "You have come. I am Rinnling."

Ian was astonished, and said nothing. What astonished him was not that the voice was like great golden bells ringing in rich tones, with an added quality like tiny, high, silver tinkling bells. Neither was it that at the moment Ian heard the voice, he noticed that the light held the same quality as the voice; little silver-white sparkles were mixed with the gold. No, it was the language of the voice that startled him, for it spoke in a tongue Ian had never before heard, yet he understood every word. The other thing that made Ian speechless was that the star-creature had said his name. Ian’s surprise was due partly to the star-creature's knowledge, and partly to the fact that Ian had not heard his own name since his mother died. He had almost forgotten it. In the world below, he was nobody. Here, he was a person with a name, and this both gladdened and frightened him.

After what may have been a few minutes or a few hours, for the thick sky seemed to slow the course of time, Ian answered.

"H-have I d-died? Is this heaven? Is my mother here? Are you... are you an angel?"
Rinnling laughed--a laugh that was again like bells, but far less jolly than a human laugh. Yet for all its lack of earthy jollity, it was so joyful that it almost hurt Ian to hear it.

"No, Ian. I am not an angel, and you have not died. I am a stardring, one who dwells inside a star, and you have been called here by our Master. We do not know why he has called, but he told us you were coming. Your mother is not here, but I have no doubt that you will meet her again."

Ian stood silent again. His prosaic, coarse speech seemed to have no place among the stardring's language of light and music. Ian was filled with fear and wonder. Down on earth these emotions would have created a whirlwind of confusion, but up here they reposed quietly beneath a blanket of calm. Nothing could here cause his head to spin and his knees to shake.

Rinnling smiled at Ian's silence, and opened the door wider.

"Come in! Come be filled with light."

At the word "filled," all of Ian's hunger came rushing back to him, and he stepped inside gladly. At last he had an invitation.

Rinnling called, "Hannring!" and another blaze of light came into the room.

The smaller, slighter figure told Ian that this was a female, or, as he later learned, a staradrin. Rinnling spoke a few words to Hannring, and she left the room, then came back bearing something in her hands. It was a golden bowl, and it appeared to be filled with yet more light. She offered the bowl to Ian, who took it hesitatingly, half afraid that it would burn him. But it did not burn, though it was warm, and it had no weight. Ian understood that he was to consume the light, and as he swallowed it, he felt perfectly warm throughout his entire body, even to the ends of his toes.

Something else happened after he swallowed the light. When he looked into the bowl again, he saw the faintest rosy tint in the gold light. He lifted his eyes and looked around the room. Ian's human eyes were too weak to see clearly inside of the star or its inhabitants, but as he ate the light, his eyes grew a little stronger, and the shapes of Rinnling and Hannring became a little clearer. His whole body felt stronger, and he felt more alive, as if the light had fed his entire being, not just his body.

Ian lived with Rinnling and Hannring, and consumed light everyday. Each day his eyes strengthened, and he could see more colors. The stardringa and staradrina remained soft-edged and brilliant shapes, but he began to distinguish one from another by the faint and fleeting colors that danced through their gold and silver light. Another result of consuming the light, of which Ian was not aware, was that light began to stream out from the ends of his fingers, and his eyes began to sparkle with real glints of silver. Eventually his skin became translucent, and he glowed like glass placed in a fire.

Time was impossible to measure in the place of the stars (Stellingra, as the star-dwellers called it), because there were no days. It was always night, yet neither the stardringa nor Ian slept. The stardringa and staradrina were creatures full of life--an intense internal force, hot as fire, cold as ice, and constantly shifting like their colored lights--yet they were not creatures of action. They rarely spoke or moved; they mostly just existed. Ian found himself doing the same, in total contentment. He thought little and spoke less; to be was enough.

On the rare occasions when Rinnling spoke, Ian's curiosity awoke, and he asked many questions.

"Why do we see constellations?" he once asked. "If stars are just your houses, do we imagine the shapes we see?"

"Some you imagine, some you see truly, and others you do not see," Rinnling answered. "We build our houses in shapes to honor the fallen, to remember legends, and to praise the Maker."

"Which ones are real? Could we see all of them if we looked hard enough?"

"The one you call Orion is real, though its name is of your own making. It was built to honor Gwendring, a great warrior who fell in the days of war between stardrings and the flaming comets, before the Maker had finished fashioning the first humans."

After this, it was many weeks of our time before Rinnling spoke again, but when he did, Ian asked him about the Maker.

"Who is the Maker?" Ian was ashamed to show his ignorance, but an unknown force compelled him to ask. "Is it... he... God? Do the stardringa have religion?"

"The Maker is our master, as he is master over all things. Yes, he is God. We stardringa do not have religion as you humans do. Our praise and our ritual are existence and light. For this we were made--to stand still in the sky and reveal his glory by our light. This is our obedience, yet it is not the same as yours, for we cannot do otherwise. Though we stand over your heads, ours is a lower order."

Ian was silent for minutes, hours, or perhaps days as he pondered this knowledge that was so far beyond any his mother had imparted. When he had finished pondering, he asked a question that was not entirely relevant, but was just the sort of question a small boy would ask.

"What happens to stardringa and staradrina when they die? I saw a shooting star once. Do they just... fall?" Ian had a horror of falling, forever and ever dropping through space, which his strange fall from the bridge had not cured.

Rinnling's light flared brighter, which Ian had learned was his smile.

"No, Ian. You see only the empty dwelling fall. Stardringa, when they grow dim or die in battle, are called by the Maker to the great heaven you call 'the moon,' and we call --."

The last word Rinnling spoke cannot be reproduced in any human sounds, and the sound of it pierced Ian's heart like a sword, colder than ice, hotter than fire, sweeter than his mother's lullabies, and more sorrowful than death.

Ian cried out, "Oh, what is it, what is it! That word is different... I d-don't understand it, and it... it hurts!"

"I am sorry," Rinnling's distant, unemotional voice replied. "I had forgotten I must never speak to you in the silver tongue. The golden tongue is what you hear now and understand. It is the language we Stardringa use for all things except the spiritual. When we praise the Maker we use it, and for the names of God and of the high and middle heavens. The low heaven is named in the golden tongue."

Ian could never after recall the beautiful, painful word Rinnling had spoken, but the terror and awe of it burned in his memory and kept him silent for a long time. That word only had disturbed his strange peace in Stellingra. Yet through his silence, a question remained unanswered, and after a month of our time, he asked Rinnling, "Is there more than one heaven for star-dwellers?" A thought struck him. "Might... might there be more than one heaven for people, too?"

"You are even now in the low heaven, which the Maker made to represent his Majesty, and the expanse of his mercy. Middle heaven is the moon, where we stardringa are called to dwell and renew our light while the universe remains. It is an orb of light and beauty unspeakable, yet a dark mist veils first the part and then the whole, to remind earthly beings that it is still temporal, part of the universe. Yet the stardringa and staradrina drink its light unceasingly, and see not the dark veil. And high heaven has a name I cannot tell you, for it would break your heart, and there dwells the Maker and surveys His creation."

Ian now spoke the question he had long desired to ask.

"Why am I here, in low heaven? I am so small..." A vague memory of his earthly fearful insignificance passed through his mind like a foul-smelling, nauseating breeze.
This time Rinnling stood silent, his figure swayed gently, and his light dimmed and brightened. Ian had seen stardringa do this before, and had realized with awe that they were listening to the Maker or one of his messengers.

"You are here," Rinnling at last replied in a solemn, silvery tone, "because the Maker has called you. Yes, you, Ian; for he knows you and your name. Do not look so surprised. He has called you for many reasons known only to himself, but also for one that he has imparted to me. In thirty days' time, I will tell you."

During these thirty days, Ian thought rarely of the reason Rinnling would reveal. To be in low heaven was enough, and gelatinous contentment and dark velvet peace softened the edges of his formerly sharp curiosity. Ian gazed around him, he drank light, he gazed again and saw what he had not seen before, and that was his existence. Most of that time he neither spoke nor thought, and his body grew steadily brighter and more translucent through his ritual consumption of light. As his vision strengthened, he had less need of speech, for he could begin to see truth in the perpetual dance of colored lights inside the stardringa and staradrina. And as this truth made him wiser, he became less like a little boy and more like a stardring.

Stellingra is a strange place that slips through the clutching hold of time, where time passes, but its passing is not felt. Ian took no notice that the day was drawing near, but at last it came, and Rinnling summoned him.

Rinnling stood again in the doorway of the star as he called to Ian. Just as when Ian had first seen Rinnling, the light from the star glowed through the midnight blue in golden squares, and Rinnling was a brighter blaze in the square of light from the doorway. Hannring stood still and graceful by his side. Other stardringa whom Ian knew stood in an arc facing him. There was Glimmerling, Dinnatring, and Dranning. A few staradrina were there also; Sringalinn, Mrenndring, and Wennannglinn stood beside Hannring. Ian had never spoken to most of these star-dwellers, but they had brightened and smiled on him, and he had read truth in their inner lights.

“The day of your choice has come,” Rinnling spoke solemnly at last. “A year of your earthly time has passed since the Maker called you to Stellingra. He has revealed to us the reason you are here. You must now choose. Will you remain with us in Stellingra forever, or return to the cold city from whence you came? Consider carefully. The answer you speak is final. If you choose Stellingra, you will never see earth again. If you choose earth, you will never again enter the blue realm of Lower Heaven, though if you live well, you may gain admittance to a higher realm through death. Choose now.”

Ian closed his eyes. He saw in his mind, as a vague memory, the snow and sleet, the houses that shut him out, his father’s hand raised threateningly. A faint recollection of the sensations of cold, pain, and hunger stirred within him. Ian opened his eyes and gazed on the illumined faces of the stardringa and staradrina. Something akin to love shone from their faces, but it was not human love. It was love cold enough to freeze him, love hot enough to burn him; it was beautiful, but alien to him. He closed his eyes again.

There I am small, unknown… Here known, but not loved... Only cold love… Cold, freezing, bones aching, heart shattering… Hungry, empty, hollow… Beaten, struck, bruised, bleeding… Hurt, pain… There is no love there. Here is light, warmth, peace… Wisdom, cold wisdom… Perhaps I was missed… Perhaps there was love, not yet found… If I return… Warmth? Human love, with real arms to hold? Or more fear, still outcast?... Now I must choose… Now choose… Choose…

Opening his eyes, Ian spoke.