Endymion had made it to the small area of the gardens where the small silver flowers mingled with the much taller, brighter golden flowers, and he had made the trip completely undetected. There had been no calls from Polaris asking what he was doing, or to slow down before he tripped, or to ask him to stop entirely.

Surely, he must have managed to sneak by the Star with all the stealth of one of those thieves he had heard people talk about in their prayers to the Stars. Well that or he was just that good.

A burst of giggling laughter came past his lips as he stepped through the taller flowers, their soft petals brushing against his hands softly. The feeling was startling. None of the silver flowers touched his hands if he did not ask them to, and when they did, their petals were cool to the touch, almost soothing. These flowers were very warm, and didn't seem to mind brushing against him at all.

The further Endymion walked, the more of the golden flowers were there, and it almost seemed they started crowding around him, like when more than just one Star came to visit Polaris at a time. They grew taller and taller, and with each flower the warmth increased until it became uncomfortable.

Endymion's breath came faster and faster until he felt as though he were gasping. Panic was beginning to take hold of his thoughts.

And in the space of a single moment, it was gone, replaced by confusion and curiosity.

The towering flowers around Endymion began to blacken as though they had been charred by fire. Their heat disappeared, and the slender stalks bent the blossoms away from his skin.

If he didn't know they were only flowers, Endymion would have thought they were afraid of touching him now. What had happened? Was this his fault?

Worried, Endymion reached out to the golden flowers as he had learned to do to the silver, only to have more blacken and shrink away from him.

And so he tried to reach out to the ground as well, to feel as though there were nothing for him to touch with any sense other than touch.

What was this?

"What are you doing to my flowers!" an unfamiliar female voice demanded, accompanied by stomping feet and a huff of breath.

Endymion looked up from the blackened flowers to see his sister, grown taller than him, her black hair falling straight like a black velvet curtain drawn only enough to see the fair features of her face, and her form draped in silks of red and gold. Though her face looked rather calm, he could see anger dancing in her golden eyes, as well as the crossing of her arms across her chest and the tapping of her toe upon the ground.

"Well, Endymion? Why are you in my flowers, killing them, when you have a whole half the heavens to yourself?" she demanded again, moving close enough she could poke a single finger into his chest. "Break your silence and tell me or just run back off to Polaris and bother him!"

Endymion's jaw dropped at Helia's words.

How dare she speak to him like this? She sounded even more serious than Polaris ever did.

And for that matter, when had she gotten bigger than him? She looked so old! What was her secret?

Endymion snorted grumpily, crossing his arms stubbornly before his chest.

"A snort does not count as an answer, Endymion!" Helia pointed out, her eyes flaming even more brightly.

Endymion took a step back from her as the heat began roiling off her skin towards him. She was becoming as hot as the flames her clothing looked like!

How dare she demand things like this of him? He had only been coming to visit her because Polaris and Sol seemed determined to keep them apart, which made no sense to him at all.

"And now are you going to run away?" Helia continued speaking, not even giving him a proper chance to reply. "Fine, go ahead and go back to where you belong without saying a word to me. Grow up, Endymion. Learn to control your Power before you come back and kill more of my flowers."

"Kill your flowers?" Endymion asked. He blinked with surprise, looking down at himself at the sound of his voice. He still might look like a child by the standards of the surface, but now that he had spoken, he had a smooth tenor voice that sounded more mature than he appeared. "How am I killing you flowers? All I did was walk here."

A smirk came to Helia's face making Endymion scowl moodily. He seemed to have fallen right into the trap she had set to get him to talk.

"There. I knew you could talk, I just had to bother you enough. You can tell Polaris he can thank me on his next visit," Helia said haughtily. Taking a step closer to her brother, she patted his arm with a hand that was a bit cooler now that she did not seem too angry. "And you are killing my flowers just by standing there. Your Power and mine are opposite, and since you don't seem to have any control at all, you are just leaking that Power all over the place, killing the flowers that live and grow off of my Power."

Endymion huffed again, his scowl only growing with every word that he heard his sister speak. "What do you mean Polaris visits you?" he demanded, fixing his attention on that tidbit of information instead of the parts that sounded more like insults than information.

"Of course he visits me. Our mother left the both of us in his care until she should return to see us. But then you need so much more attention than me that he couldn't care for us both at the same time," she explained, still sounding as though she thought herself far superior to him.

The flowers around them blackened further as Endymion's temper flared. "You lie! Polaris stays with me because he loves me!" he yelled, stomping his foot like the child he resembled.

His protestations only made Helia laugh. "Is that what he tells you? All I hear are tales about how difficult a child you still are. He spends all his time trying to keep you from breaking your neck so he can't even go back up to his constellation," she continued. "Maybe you should ask Polaris if he loves you or if he regrets being the one mother gave us to every day he has to look at you."

A terrible cry tore itself from Endymion's throat as he turned on his heel and started to run back to his own side of the gardens. If he had paused to look, he would have seen a wide strip of the golden flowers died in his passing, so he could have seen all the way back to where Helia stood laughing as he fled.