“You look like you’re champing at the bit, Stella.”
“I’m feeling so much better, Aunty, but I really do need to work off some of my renewed energy.” Stella wondered how much, if anything, her aunt still remembered.
“Well, there’s not much needs doing around the farm, not this late in the year, so maybe you should go for a long walk.”
“But will you be alright? Are you still in...”
“I’m fine. Don’t go worrying about me. It was entirely my own fault. I don’t see why you should suffer for my own stupidity.”
“If you’re sure, Aunt Prescinda?”
“I am. Off you go. I’ll make sure there’s a good sized portion of pie for you this evening, I’m planning on...”
“Well, actually, Aunty, I reckon a really good long walk would do me the world of good. But I was thinking, if it becomes too much for me, I might just stop over at an inn.”
Prescinda looked a little taken aback.
“After all, I don’t want to end up setting myself back, now do I, Aunty?”
“I suppose not, but...”
“I’ll be safe enough. There are plenty of decent ones about.” She smiled as disarmingly as she could and her aunt eventually smiled back. “If you wouldn’t mind letting mum and dad know, though? Dad’s no longer in the kitchen.”
“No, he’s gone with Grog to clear a ditch.” Prescinda’s eyes narrowed and she placed a hand on Stella’s. “You just take care, though, eh?”
Stella lowered her own eyes and stood. “I will. See you later,” and she squeezed her aunt’s hand and left without looking back.
In her own room, she quickly bundled a change of clothing into a bag and was about to go down to the kitchen, to find some food to take with her, when her eyes rested on the loose floorboard. She looked in her bag. “Plenty of room,” but then hesitated. “You never know,” she finally said and quickly removed the metal box, complete with papers and dictionary, and slipped them into her bag.
A bottle of mead from the cold store, a pork pie and some carrots from the larder and she was soon in the passageway, putting on her coat. “Well, here we go again, Dad, being foolhardy,” she whispered as she swung the bag to her shoulder and quietly slipped from the house.
24 A Wish Upon a Falling Star
Her second walk to the Star Tower since her recovery confirmed, in her own mind at least, that her fever had indeed been linked to Leiyatel. Stella had covered the eight miles in probably little more than a couple of hours, arriving well before noon. Whoever happened to be on duty would almost certainly be tucked up in bed by now, and so she walked into the swirl of stars in the chamber beneath confident she wouldn’t be met at the top.
When she stepped from the star-strewn patch on the floor of the dome’s lofty balcony, she hurried the short distance around to the Star Chamber’s passageway, where she bumped straight into a stranger.
“Argh!” the bleary-eyed young man shrieked, stepping back into Elmond, who yelped.
“Shit,” Stella gasped, her hand at her heart. “What the blazes are you doing still up and about?”
Elmond’s wide-eyed stare washed away his own bleariness. “Stella? I don’t understand. I thought you weren’t coming back.”
“Err, well, I’m not.” She turned to the stranger. “Who’s this?”
“Ah ... this is Banderin Lampetter, your...”
“My replacement I take it?”
“His second night,” and Elmond looked from one to the other.
Stella extended her hand. “Welcome to your new post, Banderin. I hope Elmond’s looking after you?”
Banderin just stared at her, but Elmond drew nearer Stella. “What’re you doing here? I was told...”
“I’m just picking up my things, that’s all. I won’t be long.”
“Ah, now, given we didn’t expect you back, Banderin’s taken your room ... sorry.”
“So where’s all my stuff then?”
He looked a little sheepish and turned back down the passageway, waving Stella after him. Banderin followed like a lost dog.
Elmond opened the door to a waste room, in which Stella saw a large sack resting against a refuse chute.
“Thanks very much,” and her words dripped acid, but more for effect.
“As I said, we didn’t... And anyway, we’re both knackered, Stella. It’s been a long night, what with Banderin’s training and whatnot. We were just on our way to bed, so we’ll leave you to it if you don’t mind? Oh, and all the best with wherever they end up sending you.”
With no more than a nod, he swept Banderin down the passageway and out of sight onto the balcony. For a short while, their rapidly receding footsteps echoed about the crystal dome.
Stella listened for the closing of the dormitory door then went in to the waste room and riffled through the sack. She transferred what little she really wanted to keep into her own bag and threw the rest down the chute, the waft of brimstone stinging her nostrils until she’d resealed its hatch.
Quietly, she pushed the waste room door to behind her and listened for a moment, silence settling about her. When she neared the Star Chamber, she hesitated, peering in at Leiyatel’s glittering white beam. As usual, it struck up from the centre of the floor and out through the crystal dome to the daylight-hidden stars above.
Fear struck at Stella’s heart, fear of Leiyatel’s nearness, and so she hurried, close against the chamber’s wall, and quickly slipped into the lemgang’s cubicle. She put her bag down on its small floor and peered at the glowing column of legends embossed on its wall.
The topmost appeared duller than the others. “Steorrator,” she whispered before as clumsily reading down the rest. “Feower Saawandistores, Oferloeciana, Leigarre Perfinn Forca and Galgaverre.”
“Typical. The Royal College doesn’t appear to be listed, and the only one I recognise – Galgaverre – is definitely where I don’t want to get off,” but now she remembered the dictionary.
Taking it from her bag, and much to her own surprise, she soon teased out that Feower Saawandistores meant Four Season-Towers – the Towers of the Four Seasons of course – and that Forca was nothing more than a fork.
“I think,” she said, knitting her brows, “Leigarre Perfinn is a place. It rings a bell somehow. Yes,” and she remembered the text she’d come across in her father’s papers, beneath the heading Eynstaelleten af plaeceden-aneowe Buinnstrang.
It didn’t take long to find it again, and there she read, “...fram Leigarre Perfinn tar hit reposen eyn Baradcar,” then looked through her notes. “Ah, here we are. ‘...from Leigarre Perfinn to its rest in Baradcar’.”
She leant back and slid down the cubicle’s wall until she sat with her knees raised before her. “Of course,” and she stared into the chamber, at Leiyatel’s beam. “Eynstaelleten isn’t in-stabling at all,” and her gaze followed the beam up and out through the dome. “Not in-stabling but installation, installation of a replacement Certain-Power, of the new Leiyatel – the one I was meant for.”
A door slammed, footsteps once again echoing around the crystal dome, louder as they drew nearer. Stella took one last look at the column of legends and quickly traced her finger down and past each one.
“Steorrator – shit, of course, that’s here, then the Towers of the Four Seasons, so Oferloeciana must be...”
“You still here, Stella?” she heard Elmond call from just outside the chamber.
Over-something? Stella thought as her finger stabbed at the legend. Her stomach immediately went light, a panel rising before her, quickly blocking out the chamber and its beam.
The lightness of her stomach soon turned to butterflies as she craned her neck and stared at the small, flickering ceiling, knowing the next cubicle would already have slid into place above, hiding her hasty exit. The flickering stopped, replaced by a soft glow that let her turn her attention back to the dictionary. She leafed through, searching for Loeciana as she slowly felt herself becoming heavier.
<
br /> She found “Look”. “No, ‘looker’, that’s it,” but the dictionary’s own growing weight now forced it from her hand, falling closed into her lap. She braced herself until all of a sudden she felt her normal weight again.
“Overlooker? Damn, but that doesn’t sound at all like the college,” and then she noticed the legends on the wall all now glowed equally, although Oferloeciana slowly blinked.
Without warning, she was pushed firmly against the wall at her back and stayed that way for a good minute as a faint whistle and a distant whine seeped into the cubicle. Stella stared at the glowing wall in front of her and crossed her fingers, for now she could do no more than wait and hope.
25 The Fall and Rise of Fortune
Stella continued to sit on the floor of the cubicle until boredom got the better of her and she investigated a hand-sized hole in the wall beside her. It had an upper lip which, when pulled, hinged out a padded seat. She now sat in a little more comfort as the minutes slowly ticked by.
At one point, she felt herself gently thrown to one side but it only lasted a short while, briefly interrupting her thoughts.
She’d come to the conclusion that her father’s new Certain Power, the place called Leigarre Perfinn and Baradcar – the site of Leiyatel – were all somehow connected. Not for the first time did she berate herself for having taken so little interest at college in the old tongue. Was that why she’d decided to bring the metal box? In the hope Lord Nephril might give its contents some greater meaning?
But could she trust him?
When the cubicle slowed, sometime later, Stella nearly slid from her seat, but this time, when it finally came to a halt, she felt herself grow heavy. Hardly breathing, she watched the top of the wall in front of her as she impatiently waited. “Not long now before I’ll know at last.”
A gap appeared so suddenly it startled her, the wall silently and smoothly lowering to reveal a high, vaulted ceiling. Deep and richly depicted murals appeared beneath it, and she breathed a sigh of relief, recognising the Royal College entrance hall.
The cubicle came level with its floor, revealing two men on the far side, their backs to Stella, a guffaw preceding a raised voice. “Nah, it ain’t It’s just a worm. Makes sense. It’s underground after all,” and he cast his arm out, encompassing the lower third of the mural.
“I tell you, it’s a depiction of light. I’m sure of it,” a more thoughtful voice insisted. “When have you ever seen a worm wi’ such a regular wave-like shape?”
“Stylised, that’s all it is. Don’t mean no more than that.”
Caught in the glow of the cubicle, Stella flattened herself against its wall just before its light winked out. Now less noticeable, she stuck her head out, enough to see along to the hall’s entrance. Damn, she thought, seeing three figures bustle in, clearly intent on the broad staircase that rose above her head.
One of the men opposite turned to the group, his gaze steadily following a young woman amongst them, drawing his eyes nearer and nearer to where Stella stood.
She snatched her head in and quickly looked down at the glowing legends, shrugged and pressed “Leigarre Perfinn Folc”.
“Just my luck,” she growled to herself as the cubicle descended, flickered and again lit to a soft glow. “I only hope Leigarre Perfinn Folc isn’t within the walls of Galgaverre, though. I’d be bound to be spotted straight off, then what would I do?”
The journey took a little longer this time, slowed on three occasions when it seemed to Stella that the cubicle descended even lower, like going down some gigantic staircase. She was beginning to nod off when, on the fourth slow to a halt, she felt the now familiar heaviness of a rapid ascent. As the cubicle eventually slowed, she stood and again stared at the top of the wall opposite.
It soon slid down but revealed nothing more than darkness, a musty smell of mildew and utter silence seeping in. She blinked beyond the glow of the cubicle, seeing nothing, even less when the cubicle itself went dark.
Stella could hear her blood thump in her ears as she waited for her eyes to adjust. It seemed to take forever, but slowly, at the edges of her vision, she began to make out the rough stones of two walls, a little way off to either side.
She leant forward and ran her hand onto the wall beside the cubicle’s opening, feeling the same rough stone. When she slid a foot out, though, it found a smooth floor – a very smooth floor – and she reached down to touch what felt like metal, slightly warm to the touch.
“Where the blazes...” The loudness of her voice startled her. “Where am I?” she now whispered.
Cautiously, Stella shuffled out, her soles squeaking underfoot, and sensed another wall close before her. Reaching forward, she touched the same warm metal she’d felt on the floor: as smooth as glass.
Her sight had by now improved enough to see corners to the stone walls on either side. She chose one and edged towards it, the black metal wall beside her appearing to curve away, broadening the gap through which she now tentatively stepped.
She’d not gone far when, stark in the darkness, a small but bright, slatted pattern of light came into view, shining from the stone wall further around. It looked like reflected sunlight, and Stella’s hopes rose.
Sliding her hand along the curve of metal beside her, she hurried as best she could until a vent appeared, high up in the middle of yet another stone wall. She looked from the hint of blue sky seen through it to the patch of light on the wall, then up into dimly revealed rafters high above.
“It looks like a barn; a barn with a huge metal drum inside,” which, when tapped, made little noise.
She could just make out a double door directly beneath the vent, its handle easily swinging down when she came to rest her hand on it, the door clearly not locked. Cracking it open, Stella peeked out at a tall, dark wall of privet.
As all seemed quiet outside, she opened the door wider to find a short and narrow curved path, flagged and hemmed in by yet more tall, well-clipped privets. She slipped out and quietly closed the door behind her.
The path almost immediately came to another, cutting across it. Stella peeped around the end of the hedge, her eyes following the path past borders that fronted a moderate but seemingly well-appointed house. A small flight of steps led up to a centrally placed front door.
Looking the other way, she saw the path almost immediately came to a gate, set in a tall wall that ran in a line from the gable end of the house right up to the barn she’s just left. Stella held her breath and listened – still nothing.
Other than a heart stopping squeak from the gate’s latch, she was soon through and out into a small, cobbled yard that ran steeply down beside the gable wall. At the bottom, between huge bordering hedges, a wide gateway revealed a road, nothing beyond the roof of the house opposite but blue sky and lazy grey clouds.
“I need an open view,” Stella told herself, although already relieved that none of it looked anything like what little she knew of Galgaverre. So where was she?
The road turned out not only to be quiet but deserted. The properties along its length, what could be seen of them through their overgrown gardens, seemed more desolate and run-down than the one she’d now left behind as she hastily crossed the road. On the far side, she turned and looked back, her eyes quickly widening.
“The Scarra Face,” she gasped, “but the other way round, seen from the south.” Her mouth dropped open. “Damn, they were right after all,” and she looked up at the sun’s place in the sky then back at the angle of Mount Esnadac’s long shoulder, stretching back from the Scarra Face.
“It can’t be later than two o’clock. That’s ... that’s about thirty five miles in some three hours.” She slowly shook her head, but now noticed the property she’d only just come from, and her eyes narrowed.
The house hid completely behind a high yew hedge, one that ran all the way around the property. It was massive, a thick and unkempt wall of dark green that, well, that truly did stand out like the proverbial sore th
umb.
26 To See a Ghost
The echo of her knock quickly died away behind the closed door as Stella stepped back and waited. Nothing happened, but then she noticed a handle jutting out from the door’s stone surround.
A faint tinkle of a bell rewarded her tentative pull, followed by a hint of feet within, squeaking nearer. Stella jumped at the sound of the latch and clutched her bag to her chest as the door opened.
A tall woman stood there, brows lofting as she looked down her nose at Stella. “May I help you?”
Stella swallowed. “I’m ... I’m not sure I have the right house, but I was hoping Lord Nephril might live here.”
“And you are?”
“Oh, sorry. I’m Stella, Stella Sodbuster.”
The woman seemed to weigh Stella up for a moment. “Are you expected?”
“Err, well, no.”
“Wait here,” and she closed the door.
Stella looked across the garden at the thick wall of yews along its border, feeling a little daunted, but then the door swung open. She turned, about to speak, only her jaw dropped.
A man’s deep grey eyes penetrated hers, holding their gaze. His own sparkled, as though with youth, although they seemed to draw her in to a timeless void within. Only when he spoke did they release their hold.
“Mistress Sodbuster?”
She couldn’t gather her words, her mouth fit only for catching flies. His face, pale and smooth, hid between a frame of thick black hair, curling onto his narrow, square shoulders.
“I...” but the hook of his long nose distracted her. It made him look like an eagle staring between heavy curtains, noble but with a keen eye to its prey.
“Stella Sodbuster I was told.”
“Err, yes. Are you Lord Nephril?”
When he smiled, her heart leapt. “I am indeed,” and his gaze briefly wandered lower, an eyebrow raised. “Do come in,” he said and stood aside, his arm outstretched.
Starmaker Stella (Dica Series Book 6) Page 11
