It burns when the stars fall.
The smell of singed fur mingles with choked sobs into an ambiance of torment. Colors—white, yellow, red, blue, purple—fade into the ash-gray of smoke as the flame of life is extinguished. The once velvet pelt is littered with patches barren of fur. And as the sky continues to darken, stars diving to die on the skin of the chosen, there is only agony.
Scars form—sprawling antique slopes and harsh straight lines—a language unknown on skin; even the wise crane and prescient spider cannot read the cipher that spirals over the soft planes of flesh. It is not theirs to know.
Agony fades; writing, illegible maps the child’s body. And it is a lifetime of wonder.
Why? What does it mean?
“I see the name of my love.” “My mother’s name is on your side.” “Do you know my son—his name is emblazoned on your chest.” “Funny, that you should have my friend's name on your cheek.”
Are they crazy? Is—
“They see their soul mates in your scars,” a voice says one day. “It’s the language of stars, you know, and soul mates are written in them.”
The answer blooms warm and kind in the child’s heart. A reason has been given, accepted.
“Who am I?” the child wonders.
“Don’t you know?” the voice is incredulous in its query.
The child shakes; its head bowed low in anxiety.
“You are starwrit. The stars have chosen you, among us all, to bear their secrets.”
A constellation of soul mates rings the child’s body and for the rest of its life it helps bring all together.