Claudia’s awareness slipped to black. Down she sank, layer by earthen layer, deep beneath the ground. The song called her onwards. Deeper and deeper. Through the pores of rock and clay and quartz she sank, her mind slipping through crevices darker than midnight.

If Claudia could have sighed, she would have. The song she chased was so beautiful, a lilting harmony that offered peace. Down and down she tumbled. Weightless. Formless. Until, at last, she seemed to have reached a sloping tunnel of stone.

The tunnel was dim but for the glowing clusters of moon quartz embedded in the rough, rocky walls. No longer pressed in on all sides by earth, Claudia found she could stand, in a manner of speaking.

Gazing down at herself, she found not a body as she had distantly expected, but a glowing mass of glimmering, ever shifting lights. Bright, sparkling yellows flitted amongst flaring shades of fuschia. Tints of violet bloomed alongside pink and orange and gold.

At the centre of this swimming riot of colour was a bright, almost searing, ball of silver. Like her own personal star, beating rhythms as her heart once had. The fluid mass silver light seemed the centre of her own orbit, tethering all the colours together.

The more she watched, the more her form unfurled, blooming like a flower into some semblance of her once-living form. For she was no longer living. Claudia realised that much, though the thought caused no distress, nor regret.

In fact, no thought came to mind at all, except the intense, elating desire to follow the song.

And follow she did. Step by floating step, Claudia trailed down the stone tunnel, her colours occasionally spilling or flaring or spiking outwards, as though curious of their own accord. Each time, a small pulse of the silver ball at the heart of her would call the wayward colour back to form.

Claudia travelled silently, almost timelessly, encountering nothing and no one even as the chorus swelled ever nearer. Her colours pulsed more vibrantly, a vital sort of hum imparted by the song as though each part of herself longed to join the harmony.

As the steep curve of the tunnel began to level, Claudia saw new light ahead. A silver-blue brightness rippled over her, like moonlight under shallow waters.

Smaller points of light appeared, floating pearls of silver, dancing within shrouds of glimmering mist. They flitted around Claudia, twisting to and fro, ringing with the same lullaby as that greater chorus, now so very close.

Claudia giggled then. Not a sound, but a playful flaring of her lights as the little pearls surrounded her, resonating like smaller notes of the greater song, goading her onwards. Chasing after the small, singing pearls, Claudia reached the arching mouth of the tunnel.

The first thing that enraptured Claudia’s attention was the thunderous waterfall, a great crashing rush of water that did nothing to dampen the ethereal choir still calling Claudia forth.

Claudia crossed the threshold of the tunnel and into the cavern beyond, stepping out onto a stone platform of intricate design which ringed the waterfall.

The cavern was enormous, round and rough hewn, with stalactites of glowing quarts jutting from the ceiling far above. The dim light of the stones glimmered from the cool spray of the waterfall, arcing in misty rainbows about the edges.

The waterfall poured from the ceiling far above, crashing from a circular opening at the apex of the cavern, down to depths Claudia could not see.

Large stone archways, much like the one Claudia had entered by, were carved intermittently into the cavern walls as far around as Claudia could see.

From these archways spilled other clusters of colours. Many were small, flitting through the air in looping arcs, others crawling across the stone. Others still prowled with feline grace, colours moving with fluid ease, while some moved in coltish leaps and bounds. At the heart of each roiling creature lay a pulsing silver star, much like Claudia’s own.

Little pearl lights danced in and out of the mist in playful twists, as if beckoning Claudia and the flowing menagerie of tumbling colours to join them.

As she watched, the creatures approached the precipice and, one after the other, tipped beyond the edge.

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Claudia’s silver heart flared, a sweet ache that felt a little of fear, a little of yearning. Like she had been here before and was now returning to a home long forgotten.

As she stepped towards the waterfall, an unexpected light appeared beneath her. A luminous line of quartz pebbles embedded into the smooth black stone of the platform. Another step forward, and the line lit again, a shining trail that reflected her own vibrant colours.

With a rush of joy, Claudia followed the line, glowing brighter and brighter with each step, until she reached the edge of the platform. The cool spray of the water passed through her lights, causing them to glitter where droplets touched, like raindrops on sunlit glass.

Reaching the very precipice of the platform, Claudia peered over. Hidden from view, just a step beyond the platform’s curved edge, lay a winding staircase of smooth, wet stone. It spiralled down and down, leading to layer upon ringed layer of narrow landings encircling the waterfall as far as Claudia could see. More stone archways opened from each of the landings, lights dancing within the thresholds. Countless pearly lights, all twisting and ringing out with exultant song.

The line of light beneath Claudia’s feet flared brighter, illuminating the first step down. Eager to follow, to bathe in that song that felt like stars and precious things and home, Claudia descended.

Step after step Claudia strode on. Down and down, across flat landings, past archway after archway, down case after case of stairs to the levels beyond. The glowing trail guiding her way never faltered.

In the deep distance, Claudia sometimes caught a flicker of other beings, other clusters of blooming lights, as they traced their own paths in a spiral around the waterfall.

The song was bliss. It was peace. It was assurance that everything in the cosmos was as it should be. Claudia surrendered to it, thinking of and feeling nothing but the song chiming within her colours.

At last, she passed by the final archway, descended the final stair, arrived at the final platform.

Peering up, Claudia could no longer discern the top of the cavern, or the beginning of the stairway. She could see only a shining column of singing lights.

The final platform was rough and pitted, pocked where it met the wall with sharp clusters of quartz and veins of gold. Extending from this platform was a stone pathway, a bridge, which crossed the choppy, tumbling waters.

As she stood before the bridge, Claudia was passed by other creatures. Birds with trailing tails of plum and sky blue; crawling beetle-like masses of greens and golds; scampering pinks and earthen browns.

Each crossed the bridge and was swallowed from sight within the falling waters.

Though her own trail light flared across the stone of the bridge, beckoning her forward, Claudia hesitated.

One foot on the bridge, Claudia cast a longing glance at the lights in concert above.

The water fell hard, a violent white rush flaring with curious ribbons of colour that continued falling on and into darkness beneath the bridge.

Was Claudia meant to cross before she could join the lights above? Had she missed a doorway she had been meant to enter? For the first time in her journey beneath the earth, Claudia felt stirrings of doubt. A familiar trepidation that caused wan, grassy lights to flare within her, dimming all other colours.

“Step forward, little light.” A voice, loud and deep, resounded louder than even the chorus above. A voice hard as the rock beneath her, yet precious as the gold in the stone walls.

“I see the colours of your spirits entangling the silver of your soul. They choke you. Do not doubt any longer, little star. I see you are so mired in the decay of it. Step forward and wash your pains away.”

The voice echoed from across the waterfall. Claudia thought she could see the barest shadow, a looming silhouette, moving on the other side.

Claudia’s colours erupted at the sound, the beating silver light of her core shining all the brighter, responding to the authority of that voice. Claudia stepped onto the bridge.

“Your soul has been so worn by your fears. Your doubts and heartaches. I see. I know. I understand. Come home, little light, and you will be safe once more.”

“Father..?” Claudia tried to call, though she could not speak. Instead, her lights bloomed in question, and the voice chuckled. Deep and detached, yet not unkind.

“I am not the one who made you. I am the one to bring you back to harbour. I am your mender. Your keeper and your guide. Do not tarry now, little star. Come. Cross.”

The shadow beyond the waters loomed ever larger, and Claudia found herself eager to reach it.

She crossed.

The waters roared around her. Claudia expected the hard force of water to hit her, to cause her to stumble. She braced against it, and yet the torrent simply flowed down and through her lights.

As she began to cross the way in earnest, the now-familiar line of light guiding her way, some of her colours began to break off.

First, around her edges, her extremities. From the shapes where her fingers and toes had been. She watched dispassionately as they were rinsed away with the flowing waters.

Next, the lights of her arms, her legs, the pillar of her body.

The silver, beating light of her core flared, a searching pulse of heat as if to recall those lost pieces back to her. Yet they were beyond reach. The silver light itself was untouched as her colours fell away, like petals fallen from an aged blossom.

As the last of her pieces began to scatter, untethered from that glowing silver light, Claudia’s awareness fell with them. She felt a detached sort of dismay as she watched the silver star that had been hers complete its short, floating trek across the falls. The brilliant point of light was claimed by the silhouette that, even now, falling free of the torrent, Claudia could not clearly see.

She fell in ribbons of colour and light, down into fathomless darkness. Away from the glitter of her own soul, the last star she would ever see.