I hurry to keep pace with Galad, keeping my eyes affixed steadily at the back of his silver-gilded inlaid scalp lest it slip from me once more.

The people of Serasis appear eager to stop me, their revelry and indulgences in the festival making powerful obstacles of them. The town’s green is large, greater in area by half than that of Selsis, and yet with half the Barony gathered in a single town, even that had been filled to far greater capacity.

Between Galad and me, the path is flooded with villagers, townsmen and all other sorts of folk. Thick woollen attire has been abandoned in the place of thinner, linen summer wear. Flaps of cloth flutter with the energetic movements of their wearers darting to and from the stalls set up across the grass, and the air is thick with the sounds of joy and the smells of rare delicacies.

Gingerbread and toys are on full display, flying from their shelves almost too quickly for vendors to keep up. Corks from ale and ginger beer arced into the sky like birds, and through the glare of the sun I swear I can make out some hint of formation to them- as though their trajectory were guided by more than merely gravity, inertia and air.

Ribbons whipped in the wake of sprinting children, and the sharp clack of wooden swords came from all sides as the few sufficiently sized vacuums amidst the crowds are rendered playground and make-believe battleground alike.

Such is the unbridled giddiness lighting the faces of the youngsters that it almost drives me to join in with them. At thirteen, I would surely not be the oldest on the green to do so.

In the end it is not fear of embarrassment that stays my hand, holding onto such trivial concerns is all but impossible when surrounded by this much distilled joviality. Galad’s almost hastened steps are responsible for pulling my eyes away from the imaginary warfare and games of quick-sand.

By the time I’ve managed to catch up with him, we’ve crossed another sixteenth of the green in our haste.

I ask him about the unusual pace, he just flashes that grin he always gives, the one that seems to say he’s about to do something incredibly mischievous only for you to forgive him, and tells me to wait and see.

We pass dozens of different vendors, and even with the excitement of whatever surprise Galad’s prepared for me, it’s hard to pull myself away from them. Selsis would get perhaps only one peddler every four or five months, seeing so many gathered simultaneously is practically surreal.

Many sell strange toys, carved of wood or light metals, bearing the craftwork of Singularity make. All moving parts and complex mechanisms, each one doubtlessly priced to equal more than I could save up in a month.

Others sell food, bizarre kinds I’ve never seen before. Strange shelled creatures with no limbs suspended in a viscous green fluid, meat rolled into cylindrical shapes and slathered with a dark red sauce and leaves that I’m sure I can hear crunching as people bite down on them.

Flooded with desire to run around each and every stall like the other people, I ask Galad again if we can stop at some. He banishes my questions with yet another grin, telling me that my wait will be more than worth it.

His smile seems to infect me, and I can feel my own mouth lifting upwards to mirror it. My complaints cease.

Soon we come to our destination, and I realise how right Galad was. A man stands at the centre of a crowd of people, adorned with brightly coloured patchwork clothing seemingly woven from solidified rainbows. He has frizzy hair and a weathered, lined face, yet one with an incredible softness to it.

I glance up at Galad as my grin spreads wider, his cyan blue eyes meet my own, and every patch of his smooth, sharp features are crinkled by the boyish grin which washes over his pale face.

A storyteller. Mystics with the knack to project their words as illusions, poly-dimensional projections on the air itself. People who can create moving pictures to show whatever it is they picture in their mind, and render any spoken tales infinitely more exciting.

There’s not been one within a dozen leagues of our Barony in near to a decade, and with my youth at the last’s visit this marks the first time I’ll remember seeing one of the performers with my own eyes.

He seems to be setting up equipment for a performance, and I recall what mother told me about storytellers. Their magic works best in the dark, where it need not contend with ambient light from the sun.

I glance up at the sky, shielding my eyes as I study the positioning of Ara’s movement across the sky of Mirandis. By my estimate, we have another two or three hours yet until sunset.

I grin. Two or three hours is little time to wait at all, when one is surrounded by a fair of such indulgences. With a hurried thank you to Galad, I turn and make my way back towards the vendors who more solidly clung to my memory, coin purse clutched tightly even as it hangs in my pocket.

My tongue is splashed with alien tastes, my senses awed by some of the many performing artists, my energy whittled away as I leap and laugh and run around as though I were a child once more.

By the time the sky has become flecked with crimson streaks, and the sun’s retreat past the edge of the horizon has reached near-completion, my savings of five stars and seventy-two moons has been depleted to little more than pocket change.

I feel no regrets, making my way back to the storyteller. No better way to spend it all comes to my mind.

With the field darkened as it is, desaturated and monochromatically transmuted, it takes me some time to find my way back to Galad. Though any delays caused by directional issues are more than compensated for by the eagerness of my gait.

Galad is easily spotted, his hair glinting in the waning sun like a mirror. I rush to him, brimming with delight at the imminent performance, snickering to myself at the knowledge of how irritated Astra will be to find out she missed such a rarity.

When I reach my uncle, however, something seems immediately wrong. His posture is far from the usual, relaxed stance he takes. More rigid, almost wound up- like a compressed spring ready to explode with movement.

He’s facing a man I’ve never seen before, tall, with a scar bisecting his left eye and skin so dark I hadn’t thought a person could ever possess it. As I near the pair, the dark-skinned man turns to me.

The look in his eyes is chilling, dehumanizing, almost. Rendering me no more than an insect under a microscope.

Glancing back to Galad, he speaks...