For a long time before he penned the letter he paced his quarters, as the evening turned to night and the moon tried its best to shine in the window, puddling its light on the floor. Often it was obstructed by tattered clouds, the remnants of the storms that had sought to beat them to nonexistence. His candles guttered in the thin winter wind, and it seemed to him he could hear the sighing of the castle, full of ghosts and refugees.
 
Cirrus was silent, her head tucked below her wing, and he was otherwise alone. At last he set to writing, and the words spilled out in a flurry of ink that dotted the page like tears.
 
 
Queen Isra,
 
Please forgive me, that the first time we speak directly I must ask of you something I wish to have never had cause to give thought to.
 
I know disasters have befallen your Court. Terrastella has fared no better – perhaps worse, from what little I have heard. Our stores are not enough to get through winter; we have lost many to flooding and the ground collapsing away, and many more have been injured and can do no more than rest and recover. I know not what sins we may have committed, to be thus punished; I only know that if we stay through the winter there will be no one left to sow what spring fields we may have remaining.
 
I must ask you, then, for sanctuary. For my people – the sick and injured, and perhaps for what others of us are willing to leave, for the thickest snows have not yet come and still we are shivering and half-starved.
 
I don’t know what history you’ve been told between our Courts. I know I have been…reserved in my dealings with Denocte, but I think it’s fair to see we’ve both been preoccupied.
 
I do not wish to beg. Please, Your Majesty, ask of me what you will but shelter my people, if you are able, if you are willing. I love them and I cannot see them starved, and washed away, and swallowed by the earth. In return I offer you anything we are able to give.
 
I offer you myself, and what meager gifts I have.
 
Sorrowfully, hopefully, solemnly yours,
Asterion, Sovereign of the Dusk Court


 
He could not bring himself to read over what he had written, poured out onto paper like the cries of a madman; he only nudged Cirrus awake with the soft velvet of his nose and met her keen, dark gaze in silence.
 
From the window he watched her go with the moonlight on her wings.