The Stars Are Dying (Nytefall Trilogy #1)

by Chloe C. Peñaranda

He’d learned that dying, no matter how slow and painful the seconds before a final breath, was nothing compared to living infinite more days without the one he loved.

“Who did this to you?” His tone grated with bitter-cold notes.

“I have no use for your soul outside your body, Starlight. A few fractions further and you would be dead, not knowing how to guard it.” I couldn’t believe my own inquisition under the circumstances. “Humans can protect themselves?”

I wanted the electricity I’d experienced with the stranger. Never before had I known what it was like to crave dancing in the rain until I was touched by a night storm.

“When falls Night, the world will drown in Starlight,” she recited. The words tugged on something in my mind, familiar but without context. “What is that from?” “A fable,” Calix chimed in. “Hope.” Calix eased a crooked smile at Cassia’s frown of disapproval. “A prophesy that is the only way to be free of the king’s reign of terror,” she went on.

“If we’re lost or apart, we’ll look up and know we’re mapping the same stars. And should death part us, we’ll know the other made it to the skies when the star that shines the brightest gives three blinks.”