We hear it coming before it appears shimmering like sunfish from shadow into light, led by a woman with a flute. Behind her a revelry of zealots with vesper flamingos, children with stones. A father puts his daughter on the ground and moves to follow them but his wife throws out her arm. It’s a powerful thing, this music, this procession of saboteurs in gimcrack costumes. Most of the women lean in doorways. Rumors go mouth to ear that somewhere toward the end of the line is a caged king, almost naked. Fireworks make gold ornaments in the sky, and some of them rain down on roofs catching fire. It would be magical if it didn’t ruin half the town. This will be the last of its kind, this parade, these people from the last eclipse staggering toward the sun. I was only here to listen to a story, and then all this, this treeshine and goblins jigging into town. But I could love them all given half the chance, the ragged and joyous and evil. So I follow them over the next hill to catch them before they disappear. I run, smiling, lifting my arms like an idiot catching the clouds, making the air twirl with dust.