Dead Star

I will never forget how the king reacted when I said the name Meissa. Fear and hope blazed on his face so intensely, that for a moment I thought he was angry. He took a half-step towards me.

"Meissa? You spoke with Meissa?"

Startled, I nodded mutely. He turned and began to pace, almost knocking over one of the tripods. I caught it, put it back in its spot, and stayed well out of his way; he seemed blind to everything around him. Sirius cocked his head in puzzlement from his position next to me, practically glued to my side. My heart ached for the dog, even if I couldn't manage to feel anything about everything else. Eventually the king whirled to face me again.

"Come with me."

He strode purposefully out of the room, and I hurried to follow. To my surprise, Sirius followed, after hesitating to stare back at his master.

We went down countless hallways of varying levels of decoration, ranging from halls that were practically lavish ballrooms, to narrow byways with bare stone walls and wood floors. I quickly gave up on remembering the way back. As we walked, the king spoke.

"There are some odd legends about Meissa, written by people who had encounters with them. Some of these accounts are verified. Many are not. One tale, that I believe is true, is a prophecy that Meissa gave to a previous king, so long ago that we aren't even sure which king it was. The prophecy states that we would save the sun, and the sun would save us. Your story and Dschubba's starkiller made me think of that legend, but I wasn't sure what to think; the sun didn't seem to need saving after all. But if Meissa spoke to you...Tell me, what did they say?"

If I hadn't been a spirit, I would have been out of breath as I kept up with him, Sirius trotting alongside me. "They said what I saw was important, and that I needed to act quickly."

"And what did you see?"

"Your sun is already dead."

He stopped abruptly. I realized how bad that sounded, and hurried to explain.

"No, I mean-! It's okay! It's probably been dead for longer than you've been alive, probably longer than your history goes back."

He stared at me in absolute befuddlement. I more or less facepalmed at the mess I was making of this conversation, and started over.

"Your sun is what's called a 'white dwarf'. It isn't making any new fire, but because it's so big, it takes countless generations to cool down. The fact that it's dead won't be a problem for such a long time, you might as well not even think about it. Think of a metal pot after taking it off the fire; it's not getting hotter, but it radiates heat for a while. Does that make sense?"

He looked at me searchingly. "Why do you have a name for this?"

"Did Master Finnegan mention I'm from another world? Or did he leave that out because it would sound impossible?"

"He left that out, and I can't blame him for doing so."

I laughed nervously. "Oh. Well. Surprise? Anyway, in my world we can see other suns that are very far away at night, so far that they're tiny little specks, like your stars, except they don't move. At least, not as much."

How in the world was I suppose to give a king a crash course on astronomy in a world that only had a sun, moon, and meteors to study?

"Since we could see those other suns, which we called stars because for a long time we didn't know they were the same thing as our sun, we studied them. A lot. That's how we know there are different kinds of suns, including white dwarfs. Dwarves? Nevermind. The main point is, you don't have to worry."

He nodded slowly. "Alright. Perhaps the prophecy means we must relight our sun, for the sake of future generations."

"I don't think that would be a good idea. Maybe I'm wrong, but I think you'd just cook your world if you even could reignite the sun."

He stroked his chin thoughtfully as he turned and resumed walking. "Perhaps. But the fact that Dschubba is trying to kill the sun, plus the fact that Meissa told you to act quickly, seems too much of a coincidence. I want to show you something, and hear your thoughts on it. Meissa spoke to a few other kings in later times, and based on what Meissa said, those kings worked on a project to someday save the sun."

I realized we had gone down a lot of stairs between hallways, and now we were going down a very long spiral staircase made of stone. We were probably underground at this point. Sirius started to pant, so I picked him up. He squirmed a bit in surprise before settling into my arms. I'll admit, I nearly dropped him when I saw into the chamber at the bottom of the stairs.

Chamber is too small of a word. I had seen pictures of sports stadiums with retractable roofs; this was comparable to that in size.  A gleaming brass tower rose in the center, with a dozen or more metal "roots" extending from it, branching out into smaller and smaller tubes that connected to massive crystals on brazier-like stands. These crystals were at least as big as my head, and pieced together to form hemispheres that looked like a stained glass dome had tried to grow into a three-dimensional bouquet. Mages scurrying this way and that lent themselves as size comparisons, and I gaped at the sheer scale of it all. I didn't look at the king next to me, but judging from his tone, I think he was enjoying my reaction.

"So, what do you think? Pretty impressive, right?"

Mouth still hanging open, all I could come up with was "Uh-huh."

"The original idea was to put a shield around the sun, but pretty early on in the project we realized that was unfeasible."

"Reverse Dyson Sphere."

"What?"

"Nevermind. Continue."

"We kept studying how we could increase and control power output, thinking if we could foresee whatever threatened the sun, we could place a partial shield right where its needed, or destroy the threat itself. This device is how we are shielding the whole city."

"The whole city..."

"Yes. We can't keep it up forever, but we figured this unusual situation would be a good opportunity to test what we've been working on for generations. We have an army of mages standing by to record everything that happens as the celestial magic hits us."

I tried to see the top of the tower. It seemed to nearly meet the ceiling, but I saw a slight glimmer of railings. "What's on the top?"

"Hm? Oh, that's where the focusing lens is."

I thought back to the cobbled-together contraption Dschubba had fastened to the side of that huge sundial. "I hope Dschubba never gets ahold of this."

"I had the same thought myself as you described his starkiller. I believe the sun is setting, the celestial magic should arrive soon. Do you want to watch our sun-saver at work?"

I looked around at the enormous room, taking it in from one end to the other, before looking at Sirius. He had his head over my shoulder, unimpressed by the very big room with only metal and crystals to smell. He gave a big, doggy sigh.

"Your Majesty, I think I'd prefer to be with Orion."

He nodded understandingly, and led the way back upstairs.