"Lunae ortus, diligens sidera, solem alligavit."
As she ran away, from her life, her past, her present, her future, she stumbled on to an old prophecy, and as she continued to dodge her own past, she searched for the answer to the questions she had lived with for all of her life. At last, she discovers a doorway into another reality, and once she passes through the door, she finds herself in an entirely new world.
In this new world, she finds that she belongs - she is no longer a freak of nature as she was before, or tormented for that which she could not control about herself.
However, when she is named by a mysterious stranger who saves her from some cruel people, she finds herself involved in something that has gone on far longer than she has been in this world, and she will find herself trapped in a situation she never once wanted.
But she can no longer run away. Not anymore.

Whoo! My first fanfiction on this website! I don't really have anything more to say about it; I'm sure you can gather most everything from the story itself.

Warning(s): This is an OC-centric, AU fanfiction, and so there will be a lot of changes within canon. Also, the main pairing within the story is Howl/OC, and the secondary is Prince Justin/Sophie Hatter - so anyone who prefers Sophie/Howl will be sorely disappointed, I am sad to say. If you prefer Sophie/Howl and fanfictions straight with the canon with no deviations (who the Hell wants to read a fanfiction like that? It's called fanfiction for a reason), you may want to click out of this fanfiction straight away. Also, Luna is a little screwed up in the head, so just remember that as you read this chapter; she does geet better, but this is just after she gets out of the place that broke her mind in the first place. So, yeah; she's nuts.

Disclaimer: I, unfortunately, do not own Howl's Moving Castle, nor can I claim to have come up with its majesty. All of the credit goes to Hayao Miyazaki (the genius), Studio Ghibli (the amazing), and Diana Wynne Jones (the brilliant).


Child of the Moon

Prologue
Past


"It appears that you were wrong, Induperator!" she shouted to the sky above. "All those years in my past that you told me I was worth nothing to you, that I would never find someone who truly would want to help me! Well, look who's wrong now!"


The scent of roses was the most prominent scent within the worn leather interior of his taxi.

He, the taxi driver and owner of the car, was nearly choking on the pungency of the scent; it was layered on so very thick on his latest passenger, his newest employer, he could almost taste it on this tongue - a saccharine, overwhelming taste, though there was a strange cloying undertone. But despite the overpowering tone of decay (bringing to the very forefront of his mind the image of a crimson rose, whose petals were unfurled and slowly blackening at the edges with decay), it was not an unpleasant sort of thing to be smelling.

He'd had worse customers than she, the strange woman absolutely drowning in black furs piled on so thick he could not tell where one piece ended and another began, and some of those customers had smelt of stranger and worse things than the decaying rose scent she wore as perfume. But still, there was something about this scent that stuck into his mind as the clearest memory of she.

He let out a small cough as he nearly choked, having taken in a large enough gulp of air that was flavored by the decaying of a rose. He'd tried holding his breath to escape the cloying scent that tainted the inside of his taxi cab, but it had not worked out for him in the slightest.

"Apologies," the woman in his back seat said, and he started in surprise upon hearing her speak, nearly jerking the wheel to the side and swerving out of traffic.

Luckily, though, before things could get ugly, he managed to recover control of his vehicle and continued along his predetermined path.

The entire ride, his nameless passenger had not spoken a word - not even when he had asked of her her destination. She had merely handed him a small map of the city, with the old chapel on the outskirts of town circled in the crimson ink of a pen. Then she'd settled into the back-seat, hiding in her curtain of black furs.

He didn't understand why she chose not to speak, especially not when he actually heard her voice; the sound of it was rather pleasant, husky and sweet in its low sounds. It was also quite musical, reminding him somehow of the mystic melody of traditional Celtic music with its sweetness; overall, the sound of her voice was rather enchanting, mystical and ethereal - like the voice that an angel might speak with in the dreams of its beloved. He felt caressed, as if merely by speaking out loud, she'd touched him with gentle, soft hands.

There was also the lilt of an accent to her speech, but for the love of him, he could not quite place it; it was familiar, like he'd almost heard it within a dream, but it was also unfamiliar and new at the same time. The contradiction of both her voice and her accent confused him entirely, capturing his mind endlessly.

"What?" he mumbled, glancing at the rear-view mirror hanging in the front of his car in the hopes of catching a glimpse of the woman. He barely managed to restrain himself from gawking at her rudely, but it was a hard-pressed battle - hard fought and hard won.

He caught a glimpse of amused, pale blue eyes (almost white in the light shade that they were) before what he could at that moment realize was a large hat, made of the same fur as the rest of her ensemble, hide her face once more, throwing it into deep shadows.

"I am apologizing for the strength of my . . . perfume," she said, her strange accent coloring her every syllable. "It can be rather unpleasant at times."

The woman sounded both amused and sheepish as she spoke, as if by coughing, he had reprimanded her harshly.

That's an understatement, he thought to himself, but he did not voice these thoughts out loud. Instead, he asked the question weighing on his mind the moment the words had come from her mouth. "Then why do you wear it?" he asked softly, curious, and she shifted slightly in the back-seat, allowing him to catch a glimpse of full lips, painted the crimson of a red rose; the ends, he could tell, naturally would turn upwards, but they had pulled down into an expression of deep unhappiness.

"Because I am running away," she murmured quietly, more to herself than him - as if that would explain everything. And then, realizing she had become visible once more, she ducked back into the shadows her hat provided for her.

He pondered her cryptic statement for a long while, and his cab devoured the miles between itself and the point where she would depart from his life - likely forever. He decided to try to garner more answers from her, but before he could question her further, the chapel she'd asked to be taken to slid into view on the horizon - towering and monumental.

It was an old church - that much he could tell. If he had to guess at its builder, he would say either the Romans, or someone who was inspired by their architecture; it looked fairly Roman-esque when it came to its appearance: tall, white columns of stone, from the tops of which sprung gracefully curving arches; the arches, emblazoned with the look of marble (though cracked and worn down by time's ever reaching hands) with veins of glinting gold and shimmering silver, supported the roof - a triangular shape that seemed to scrape the sky and flake off pieces of the clouds; and there were towers, too - tall, graceful things with windows that looked as though they had once been quite beautiful and majestic.

The church was entirely beautiful, but it had obviously been left abandoned (and he'd heard rumors that even church-goers refused to go near the place for some reason he didn't bother to stick around long enough to hear); there were visible cracks in the marble stone of the architecture and flakes of it would be peeled away by a stiff gust of wind, carried out towards the violet, ice-capped mountains that left them in a low valley of lush beauty.

There was tall, wrought-iron, covered in the reddish-orange tint of rust, fencing around the perimeter of the church, beginning at the wide staircase of marble leading upwards to the double-doors of the church - which were in pristine condition. The wood of the double-doors looked like oak, except for the crimson tint to the glossy wood, and he'd never quite seen a finish like that on any oak wood - no matter how hard the wood-worker tried. Even the knockers on the doors, looking as though they'd been made of solid gold, were in entirely perfect condition. Truly, the entirety of the double doors looked as though they'd been made only a few days ago and installed yesterday - maybe even that morning.

But that was impossible, he knew, because the gate of the iron-wrought fence was padlocked shut, and the entire ensemble was rusted over so much he doubted anyone with a key could get the key into the hole - if there was even anyone with a key.

As the taxi cab crept closer to the church, he caught sight of words carved into the marble archway above the double doors. It read, in a language he'd only ever seen before in school and didn't truly understand: "Si electus per portas istas transiit ad aliam Tellurem ibunt."

His brows knitted, then; if he'd had any other passenger in his taxi, he would have disregarded the words carved upon the archway of the church as nothing more than some trivial decoration, but she . . . she made him curious. He knew she was no ordinary person, and that she wanted to go to this particular church, with those particular words carved over its doors, well, that had to mean something. Right?

"It's an old prophecy," she said as way of explanation, as if reading his mind and gleaning questions from his thoughts, and, to his surprise, she took off the hat that hid her from view.

She was surprisingly beautiful - and quite young (he guessed her age to be about 14 or 15) - with a radiant complexion of ivory, a smattering of rose-like coloring over her high cheekbones. Her eyes, the irises a pale, pale blue - like the blue of ice, were like stars - burning coldly, framed by pale lashes that looked as though they had been frosted over. Her hair, strewn over her shoulders in a gently waving curtain of well-cared for strands, was the color of snow, pale and nearly sparkling - the way that snow is oft to do in the light of the sun. She had a small, button nose, and full lips, painted the color of the petals of a crimson rose in bloom.

As she continued to speak, with the voice of someone who has seen far too much and has already passed their judgment upon the world, she combed her fingers through the waving curls splayed over her slender shoulders; he caught a glimpse of a long and narrow, silvery scar across the middle of her throat, as if someone had tried to slit her throat, as she moved her hair through her long, slender fingers, but before he could examine the strange scar further, it was again hidden by her thick curls of pale white.

"It was told by an old, High Priestess of Janus* - the Roman god of beginnings, gates, transitions, time, doorways, passages, and endings - several centuries ago, in the height of Rome's glory. She desired to see the future of her people, the future of Rome, by calling upon the spirit of the goddess, Antevorta, of the future; she meditated, then, for three days and three nights, to accomplish this feat," she explained. "It is said that upon the third night, when the time reached midnight, she awoke from her meditation with a prophecy and a vision of the future. She spouted the prophecy that is written upon the archway of that church - her temple, actually - before her heart gave out and she died." She shrugged, then, as if the thought of someone dying meant nothing to her. "She burnt herself out trying to call upon the spirit of Antevorta and see the future of Rome. She failed, of course, and instead gave a prophecy that promised to never come true in Rome's lifetime. Disgraceful."

He scowled at her. "She was trying to take care of her people!" he could not help but snap at her, her utter nonchalance about the story and her condemning the High Priestess for her failure aggravating him beyond belief. "She wanted to make sure that the ones that she cared about would remain safe! I don't think that that is truly disgraceful!"

She blinked, as if surprised, and she smiled liplessly. "I suppose you wouldn't," she said, her voice colored by scorn.

He gritted his teeth, and her pale blue eyes flicked to the chapel.

"No doubt, the words inscribed on to the marble of the archway are not the exact words the High Priestess spouted before she died, and it's very likely that everything she said is not there. The architects likely left out a few words or such, either to save space or simply because they did not know the entirety of what she said." She shrugged again, and he caught another glimpse of the silvery scar across her throat. "Even so, the meaning is clear enough."

Before he could ask more on the topic, or shout at her again for her rude treatment of the deceased, she leaned forwards in her seat.

"Stop here," she murmured, leaning for balance on both his seat and the one next to him.

He did as she asked, bewildered into forgetting his anger with her. "Why?" he asked as his beloved car coasted to a smooth stop.

"Only the Chosen One the prophecy refers to" - she pointed, then, at a certain grouping of words on the archway before them - "is able to pass through the gates," she answered, and as he turned around to peer at her, he caught sight of true fear on her face. "If anyone unworthy, anyone else, attempts to answer, they will meet with one of two fates: at best, they will find themselves the victim of a simple and essentially harmless misdirection spell - they'd find themselves going in exactly the opposite direction that they once were going, with no recollection of why they were there."

"And at worst?" he prompted, and he watched as her eyes flashed with truest terror.

"At worst . . ." She gulped audibly, the sound low and hollow. "At worst, the unworthy trespasser with be incinerated; nothing of them will be left but ashes, easily blown away on the barest of breezes - all for the simple sin of encroaching upon holy ground." She laughed, then, but the sound was obviously forced and joyless. "But that rarely ever happens - it takes much too much energy to accomplish. Most often, it's the misdirection spell."

She grew serious again. "But every once in a while, as if to make an example of those who would wish wrong of the church, the trespasser would find themselves melting away into nothing - leaving only the barest hints of ash and the echo of the agonizing screams behind to mark their passing."

Before he could comment, likely to scold her for undertaking such a risky venture - especially at her young age (since she had so many years left before she should even think about death, let alone have that judgmental look in her eye and cynical tone in her voice), she let out what sounded like it must have been an expletive, except it was not in any sort of language he'd ever heard before.

"I've said too much," he heard her mutter beneath her breath, the sound of her voice far more husky in her quietness. "And they will discover my absence soon enough. And then . . ."

She trailed off, shaking her head from side to side. "I've put you in danger," she said, looking up at him and meeting his gaze with her apologetic, icy blue eyes. "I am so very sorry - both for the danger I've put you in, and what I am about to do in order to protect you."

She reached up, and he watched, stunned, as she brushed her fingertips along the raised skin of the jagged scar across her throat, revealing it to him in its ugly, silvery entirety.

"What are you talking about?" he asked her in a low, quiet voice to match her frightened whisper. "How have you put me in danger? And is there any way I can help you?"

The question was sincere; he wanted to help her in any way he could - return the smile to her face, return the twinkle to her eyes, return the light to her voice.

But she laughed a short, cold bark of cynical laughter. "You want to help me?" she asked, and when he nodded, stunned at her sudden change in behavior, she roared with humorless laughter. "At last . . . someone wants to help me after all these years!"

She shook her head, her body trembling with the cold laughter that she let tumble from her lips, laughter that left him trembling with chills. "At last, someone wants to help me, when I have given up! Oh, what irony is this!"

She tipped her head back, as if to stare at the sky, and her laughter slowed. "It appears that you were wrong, Induperator!" she shouted to the sky above. "All those years in my past that you told me I was worth nothing to you, that I would never find someone who truly would want to help me! Well, look who's wrong now!"

The cold mirth faded from her eyes, and she sagged against the seat, exhausted. Tear slipped down her cheeks.

"I'm right," she kept murmuring beneath her breath. "I'm finally right. I beat you."

He reached out to touch her shoulder, feeling that it was his obligation to try to comfort the poor, little mad child in his back-seat, but the moment that he touched her, she sprang back up, all evidence of her mental breakdown wiped away - erased.

She smiled joylessly at him. "Thank you . . ." she said, as if nothing had happened. "Thank you for everything."

Before he could so much as attempt to question her about her mumblings, about her mental breakdown, she leaned forward and pressed her lips to his cheek in a platonic display of gratitude.

His mind blanked, then, wiped clean, and he could think of nothing.

She pressed a thick wad of bills, hurriedly, into his hands. "Take this and drive away from here, quickly," she instructed him, her words falling from her lips he'd later say they reminded him of the beats of a hummingbird's wings. "Drive far away from this place and forget any of this ever happened. Retire from the cabbie business, settle down, get a new life for yourself."

She took a deep breath, as if to calm herself, but it was shaky and she still trembled.

"I am sorry," she repeated as she slid out of the car and walked out of his life forever.

He started the car back up and made a wide U-turn, starting back to town. He watched, though, in his rear-view mirror, as the young girl with wavy hair the color of freshly-fallen snow walked up to the gate.

She reached for the rusted-over padlock holding the gate closed, and it glowed the orange-red of fire for a moment. She flinched in surprise and recoiled, snapping her hand away from the lock as it all but exploded, clattering against the ground. The chains that had been held in place by the padlock melted away into nothingness, disappearing, and the gate creaked open of its own accord.

After a moment of hesitation, the girl steeled herself, and her nerves, and she passed through the gates and on to the land of the church.

For some reason that he could not explain, he felt a pang of fear for the beautiful, wraith-like girl, but he simply didn't understand why; he didn't know her - she was just another stranger he'd passed in his long life. But despite not knowing her, he still felt fearful for she, who looked as though she was made of moonlight, as she climbed the marble staircase.

She arrived at the double-doors that served as an entrance to the church, and she pushed them open, passing through them and into darkness.

As she disappeared into the opaque black, pieces of himself seemed to leave with her, and as the doors slammed shut behind her, so did they shut upon his memories of having ever met her.

And thus, their paths did part.


*I couldn't tell you whether Janus had priests or priestess, or whether he had them at all, but this is fiction and so there will be divergences from the real world.

And that's the end of the Prologue! What did you guys think?

I know the language is a bit . . . outdated, but it is what Luna was taught to speak with so the story will be told in mostly that style of writing. (Long road ahead; I'm gonna need more coffee.)

Feel free to let me know what you think of the story so far, what you think should happen, and what you think I would change. Also, feel free to answer the question of the chapter in the comments whenever you feel like it.

Question of the Chapter: Which minor character in Howl's Moving Castle (AKA: not Sophie or Howl) was your favorite?

Ciao!