The boy cupped the stars in his hands. Even as he held them, he knew he should not. Their jagged edges sliced into his hands, blood running over skin. They burnt his fingers until they were blackened and singed, but the boy clutched desperately onto them and pushed his way up the mountain. 

​

Snow pelted his soft face as he took one step after another, his heart pumping beneath his chest, feet aching as his boots dug deeper and deeper into the snow. He had to make it to the top of the mountain. He could only barely make out the thin stream of chimney smoke from the inn at the top. It was so faint that he couldn’t be sure if he was imagining it or not, but he knew the inn was there. The village elders had heard this story from the trees themselves and had repeated it enough times that the entire community lived and breathed its knowledge. 

​

At the top of the mountain, there is an inn. The inn is there to serve one guest. A tradesman who accepts only the stars as his payment. 

​

Wind whipped at the boy’s face. He could not feel his nose anymore, or his ears, for that matter. Tears had long since frozen against his cheeks and his eyelashes. He could hardly keep his eyes open at all. Still, he kept going, making his way up the mountain. He pulled the stars in closer to his chest, their mysterious patterns branding themselves into his burnt hands. 

​

The stars are dangerous things. They are not meant to be taken out of the sky. They are meant to stay up there in their heaven, regaling each other with tales of foolish mortals, laughing at our blunders and stumbles, at our human-ness. But even stars can fall. 

​

The boy knew it was foolish to stop. He knew the constant motion was the only thing keeping him from freezing over entirely. Still, he couldn’t stop himself from slumping against the broad tree and sinking to the ground. He was just a boy, after all. The snow cushioned him and swirled around him. In a faraway corner of his mind was a fireplace and a rocking chair, his brother sitting upon the chair and reading. But that was faraway, and now was now. He was here in the snow with stars sitting in his destroyed hands. He pried his blackened fingers open, squinting at the golden, unearthly, brightness of the stars. He thought he could hear them laughing at him, soft giggles that melded with the wind. 

​

It is a hard thing to find a fallen star. They are prideful creatures, stars, used to shining above all and being admired upon. They are things of stories, and not meant to be held by a mortal’s common hands. If they must succumb to the shame of falling, they will fall deep and they will fall hard, somewhere that they are sure they will be hidden. 

​

Even stars make mistakes. Even stars can be found by a mortal who is willing to look. The boy had looked. 

​

He had looked with the fury and fire that only mortals possess, and it is the one that comes from loss. The experience that mortals are all too familiar with, and will continue to be familiar with for the rest of time while the stars laugh at them. It was the fear of this loss (which may be even more powerful than loss itself) that drove the boy to look in the world’s deepest caverns and tallest trees, its wildest oceans and most abandoned islands, and find five stars that were now angrily clutched in his hands. 

​

It would all be okay now. He had the stars in his hands, enough to satisfy any lonely tradesman. He would hand them over, and everything would be alright. 

​

Find the stars and endure them. Once you reach the top of the mountain, you will find the inn. The tradesman will be there. He is no ordinary tradesman, but an old one. So old that we have forgotten the blood that runs through his veins, the gods that whisper to him, and the secrets in the wrinkles of his face. We have forgotten that we all used to be as he is: sacred, magic, and keeper of stars. 

​

The boy got back to his feet. It was the same mortal stubbornness that forced him to do it. It was the wind whistling something to him, the moon gently urging him, the pines persisting alongside him. He pushed his way up the mountain. 

 

The blizzard seemed to push him up the hill, every force conspiring to bring him to the inn. The stars laughed in the back of his mind and burnt it onto his hands. Bring the tradesman his stars and he will grant the wish that sits in the purest depths of your heart. 

​

The inn began to take shape in front of him, the mountain’s steep incline leveling out. The thin stream of smoke became a steady stack, emerging out of a small, wooden structure. It looked big enough to only hold one or two rooms. Trees surrounded it like guardians, warding it from view unless you knew what you were looking for. 

​

The boy walked up to the front door. It was a friendly sort of door, made out of a dark wood and rounded at the top. There was a circular knocker in the center, and the boy reached up to it and let it fall twice. 

​

The door took a minute to swing open and it did so without assistance. The boy peered into the inn, and saw no one. He could see through the door and into what looked like a lobby. There was a staircase swirling up to a second floor the building didn’t have, and there was a closet that should have taken up half of the available space. On the wall opposite the door, there was a sign that read: “Please don’t mind the magic, and come right in.” The boy squinted, eyes still half shut from the cold, but he walked inside after only a moment’s hesitation. The stars glinted off every available surface as he took slow steps through the lobby. Puddles formed around him, golden light shining onto them like little pools of starlight. 

​

The door shut softly behind him, soft enough for him to not pay it any mind. The only thing he could feel was the warmth against his skin and seeping into his bones. He slowly walked through the lobby and into the next impossible room with his puddles of starlight trailing behind him. 

​

The next room held a cozy armchair with a fire sitting in the hearth in front of it. Books covered the rest of the room; stacked against the walls, thrown into vases, and constructed into a makeshift table. The boy dashed to the fire, sinking into the chair with relief. The fire crackled soothingly in front of him, the reds and oranges flickering before his eyes. He could see snow and wind flying through the window, but here he was safe and warm, with the stars still tucked securely against his stomach. He dared not put them down. His eyelids began to droop, but he knew this wasn’t over yet. 

​

Not much is known about the tradesman himself. Very few have made it up his mountain. All that is known is that he covets stars and collects them like trinkets, either out of worship or out of spite. All that is known is that there was a time when stars fell to Earth like rain, and we lived alongside them. The tradesman is from that time, and all anyone wants to do is go home. 

​

The boy was about to let himself drift off when he heard heavy footsteps behind him. He started awake, glancing down at his hands. The stars were still there, surrounded by the flesh of his hands, their blood, and peeling skin. He had stopped noticing the pain of the stars early in his journey, but with the lack of the cold it came flooding back. 

 

The footsteps stopped behind the armchair. The boy peered over his shoulder.

​

The man was old, but not in such a mysterious way as the boy had expected. He was big, tall enough that his head almost scraped the ceiling with his back slightly hunched. He had white stubble growing on the hard lines of his face, and a red winter cap settled over his white hairs. He wore a large sweater and striped pajama pants, with wire frame glasses hanging from a chain around his neck. He held a candle in his hand and looked just as surprised to see the boy as the boy was to see him. 

​

“Well, you’re just a child,” he said, and his voice was ancient, seeming to hold the movement of mountains and the crackle of thunder within it. 

​

The boy, who normally insisted he was grown up, only nodded in response. The man’s eyes darted down to the stars clutched in the boy’s hands, and his eyes widened. 

​

“That must be dreadful,” he said. “Follow me.” 

​

The man creaked his way out of the sitting room and into another room, the boy jumping to his feet to follow. 

​

They walked into a cluttered kitchen, with a dining table tucked into the corner. The man cleared off the table, pushing various flowers, journals, paintings, and jewels out of the way. Then he held out his hands and the boy was all too glad to relinquish the stars to his grip. The stars simmered in his hands, but calmed down, and for the first time since his journey began, the boy felt quiet in his mind. 

​

The man must have seen something in his expression, for he laughed heartily, like waves crashing. “The stars are alive,” he explained. “We humans have forgotten that over the years. They don’t like to be held or carried. However, I’ve learned that they can be persuaded.” The man put the stars down on the table, five of them, laid in a neat little line. He pulled his hands away without a single cut or burn. 

​

“Are you the tradesman?” the boy asked. 

​

The man nodded, idly stroking the tip of a star with his fingertip. 

​

“And this is the inn?” the boy asked, needing to be sure. 

​

“Inns always manage to find their ways into stories, even the ones told by the trees,” the man replied, eyes still on the new stars. “This is my house, and I am the tradesman who grants wishes in return for stars.” The tradesman lifted his finger off the star and turned back to the boy. He found him crouched on the ground, his blackened and bruised hands clasped in front of him, begging. 

​

“Please, sir,” the boy begged. “I have heard stories of your trades. I have brought you all the stars I could find. So please, please save my brother’s life.” 

​

The man sighed. It was a weary one, tired of the world and its burdens that had been placed on his sagging, tired shoulders. 

​

“Stand up, boy,” he said, gently. “Let’s get your hands treated.” 

​

When the boy heard nothing else, he shakily got to his feet. His lips were still slightly blue and his layers were melting water all over him. But his eyes were wet, and tears were once again rolling down his cheeks. The tradesman ever so gently began to unbutton his coat and pulled it off him, laying it on the chair next to him. He went through layer after layer until the boy was left in a dry, red jumper over his thick pants. The boots came off next and then the boy’s drenched socks. The man had to search for a minute, but he returned with a pair of warm, woolen socks and he pulled them over the boy’s feet. Then, he led him over to the kitchen counter and made him sit. He applied ointment to the boy’s burns and cleaned his cuts, wrapping both of his hands in bandages. He put the kettle on and then sat in front of the boy, hands clasped tightly in front of him. 

​

Looking at the boy, the tradesmen thought of a faraway kitchen full of laughter and a small boy’s bright voice and wide eyes that trusted him on everything. But that was faraway, and now was now. 

​

“When I began my trades,” the man started, “the world was very different. Granting wishes was easy because wishes were what fueled magic itself. The yearning of people and the belief in those yearnings. However, over time that belief has slowly waned. Reality has set in, and with it the magic slowly left. No one has brought me stars in a very long time. I can still do little magic, such as tending to my stars or making this house as it is, but saving a life? That is more complicated. I would need more than five stars.” 

​

“Whatever you need, I will get it,” the boy said, wiping away his tears so the tradesman could see the fire in his eyes. “Whatever it is I must do to save my brother, I will do it.” “Sometimes,” the man said, very gently, “people are just meant to die.” 

​

“He is not,” the boy said, stubbornly. “He is good and kind, and he has raised me and taken care of me my whole life. Now he is sick and I must take care of him, and there is no other route left except for magic.” 

​

“Where you must go to save him is a place no one has traveled to for many years,” the man began, warily. “I am far too old to take this journey myself. It is a place untethered to reality and all the nuisances that come with it, like logic and time and countless other important things. There is a chance that you could take the journey and lose yourself to it.” 

​

“Please,” the boy said. “Show me how to get there and tell me what to do. I have no one else.”

​

The tradesman saw and heard the clawing desperation in the boy, the spiked fingertips grabbing onto the one thing he loved, and he sighed once more, for he had been just like that at one long-ago point in his life. 

​

“Listen to me very carefully,” the man said, and then he leaned in and gave the boy his instructions. The boy nodded along to every word, committing them to memory and steeling himself for the journey. 

​

When they were done, the boy stood up. The man knew he would not stay (as is the way with youth), and so he bid him to wait a moment and made him a cup of tea in a mug with the ocean painted on it. The boy gratefully accepted it in his bandaged hands. The man handed him back his partially dry boots and the boy let them dangle from his fingertips. 

​

The man led the boy to the back of the house, the very edge of his magic. Here, there was a door, so old and ancient that even the trees had missed it when telling their story to the village elders. It was made of the oldest wood, logs haphazardly pushed together during a time when door-making was not standardized. A symbol was carved into the door, a star crashing into the earth, sparks and fire flying up around it. 

​

The man placed his hand on a misshapen doorknob, whispering words the boy could not understand. Light exploded on the other side of the door, tendrils of it escaping through the gaps and shining on the boy and the tradesman. The man let out a breath and then removed his hand from the doorknob. 

 

He looked at the boy with an oddly mournful expression. “It is ready,” he said. “You will have to open the door yourself, I’m afraid.” 

​

The boy nodded. He pulled his boots on and then placed his much smaller and bandaged hand on the knob. The tradesman placed a gentle hand on the boy’s hair, ruffling it lightly. The boy turned and gave him a last, determined smile. Then, he pushed the door open and disappeared into another world, a lonely figure in a red jumper with a mug of steaming tea in one hand. The tradesman saw it for an instant- light dancing in shadows and colors exploding in darkness- before the door shut tightly, the light vanishing and leaving the man alone in an ancient hallway. 

​

He sighed his weary sigh another time, and then retreated back into the sitting room with his own cup of tea. He settled down in the armchair with one of his favorite books, and he began to wait.