A Beginning

Near the dawn of time, when many things were that have ceased to be and many things that are were not yet, the Starwatcher tended the unhatched stars. When the time was ripe, the fathers and mothers of the peoples-to-be came to the Starwatcher's Garden and each chose the star egg that would hatch and serve to aid in guiding his or her people.

The Starwatcher watched with great curiosity as one father selected his people's star and, in its place, left a tiny barely formed star egg that had not come from the Starwatcher's garden. Even more curious, the Starwatcher saw that this star egg would exactly match another of the star eggs in his garden once it was ripe.

It came to pass that two sisters came to the Starwatcher's garden in search of stars. They were twins, exactly alike in form and manner. It is a truth that no matter how perfectly matched a pair of twins may be, one will always be the older and one the the younger. The elder of this pair, Maiora, saw the barely formed star egg and its match and knew that these were the stars for her sister and herself. Her face full of wonder, she showed these two stars to her sister, Minora, and told her they must return again when the younger star was ready.
Minora did not have the wisdom of her twin though and jealousy was born in her heart for she saw that the younger star, which would be hers, was not so well formed as its match. While the eggs around it were round and seemed to swell with light til they looked almost as if they would leap off the ground with the joy of it, this star egg was small and dull and sat heavily in the snow.
Even as she and her sister turned to leave, the seed of jealousy in her heart sprouted into a stem of anger that she should always be treated as inferior to her sister, always receiving the lesser share.

Though they had not spoken to him, the Starwatcher had seen the two sisters in his garden and had known, even as the older sister had, that the twin stars would go to the twin girls. He took up the two stars and brought them to a small side garden where he could care for them until the strange newcome star egg was ready.
He studied the barely formed egg for some time. Never before had there been a star egg that had not come from his garden and he wondered about this strange star's nature and origin.
With a sigh, he gently places the baby star egg at the base of a tree in one corner of the garden. He watched as the star and the tree greeted each other and the tree lifted itself so that the star could burrow into the warmth of its roots. He laid its match in a nest of grass nearby, turned and went into his cottage.