The Fixed and Wandering Stars

No simple explanation can be found for the stars. The fixed ones are set into a dark firmament which must be further away from the sun in the centre of things than our world is. Perhaps they are indeed holes into heaven from which our ancestors can see what we are up to. No better explanation is written.

The wandering stars, of which there are nineteen (a number that may be significant because it is a prime number) more slowly across the firmament tracing elegant arcs some over many years, some over less time than a year. These cannot be holes in the firmament because they move across it.

The best explanation for the wandering stars comes from Drathen. He says that they are other distant worlds like our own, reflecting the light of the sun and making their own way around the sun. This explanation is reassuring in the sense that it makes our world feels less lonely. Maybe those worlds have their own people, with their own ancestors, looking down on them from heaven.