The Well of Stars and Shadow

"The Well of Stars and Shadow" is a short story by Caitlin R. Kiernan that features their recurring character Dancy Flammarion, the teenage albino monster-slayer. It was written at the end of October 2001 and published in November 2001 on Gothic.net--the first Dancy story (after Threshold) to appear, but the second one written (after "Les Fleurs Empoisonnées").
The story is set during Dancy's childhood in Shrove Wood in Okaloosa County, Florida. It describes her friendship with an elderly neighbor, Mr. Jube, who tries to protect her from the thing that fell from the stars and lives in the nameless lake Wampee Creek empties into.
== Characters ==
Dancy Flammarion: An albino girl who frequently appears in Kiernan's stories. While she usually appears as a teenager, here she is eight years old, described as a "strange albino child" with "bony shoulders." She claims to have never seen a schoolteacher, but knows how to read and has read the whole Bible. She wears a tarnished St. Christopher medal. She is told: “There were tears the day you were born, Dancy Flammarion. There are tears in your mother’s heart every time she looks at you.”
Mr. Jube: Dancy's elderly neighbor, who lives in a shack near the nameless lake. He has "skin the color of molasses," a bald head and "full white beard," and a "wide, false-toothed smile" with "tobacco-yellowed dentures." He has lived in New Orleans and St. Louis, and sells snakes, frogs, and turtles to men from Tallahassee. He likes to play checkers with Dancy, and buys her candy. He once saw a loup-garou. He has an understanding with the thing that lives in the lake that is threatened by Dancy's unexpected evening visit.
The Moon-Fell Whisperer: An entity that fell into the nameless lake during the great meteor shower of November 13, 1833: "Apalachee mothers told their children about the demons from the moon, the star-fall whisperers below the water." Little of it can be seen except its eyes, which are "twin balls of the deepest, the most vivid blue...pupil-less eyes that shine bright enough to blind and somehow give off no light whatsoever." It does have an appendage that's described as a "jointed thing that isn’t an arm" and a "black tendril."
== Publication History ==
"The Well of Stars and Shadow" was republished as part of Trilobite: The Writing of Threshold (Subterranean Press, 2003), and later appeared in Kiernan's collection Alabaster (Subterranean Press, 2006).
Category:Caitlin R. Kiernan works
Category:Expanded Mythos Works