The Stone of the Stars

by Alison Baird

  “What if the Stone really does exist?” he said again.

  “Oh, Damion!” reproved Father Kaithan, crossing the room to refill his friend’s goblet. “Sheer rubbish.”

  “That’s what I said to myself at the time—no, no more, thank you,” Damion said. He glanced around the receiving room’s elegant interior, then back at Kaithan’s amiable, rounded face. He had gained considerable weight since Damion last saw him. “You’re looking well, Kaith,” he said, seating himself in a tapestried chair.

  “We all live well here at the temple,” replied the other, returning to his own seat. “Even minor clerics like me. What hypocrites we priests are! We like to put on noble airs about our great sacrifices, forswearing wealth and wives. But the truth is, most of us hadn’t any chance at wealth, nor even of marrying well, and are much better off being men of the cloth. You, though, Damion—with your looks you could have had any girl you wanted, perhaps even a rich one. But not for you the happy hearth, and brats gamboling at your feet. Oh, no: you must be a missionary, and go sailing off to distant, barbarous lands—”

  “Hardly barbarous—”

  “You haven’t changed a bit, Damion.” Kaithan gave a plump chuckle, and took another sip of wine. “Back at the orphanage you were always ranting about knights and quests! You may talk to me of mission work, but you were really seeking adventure. Trust you to find one—the Stone of Trynisia, no less!” His second laugh was loud and hearty.

  “I wasn’t talking about a magic gem,” said Damion, nettled. “I know that’s just a faerie tale. But what if that whole tale were based upon a germ of truth? What if there were a stone—just an ordinary bit of rock, I mean, that the Elei once revered back in olden times? A shooting star, for instance. The ancients believed in a literal Heaven, and any object that fell out of the sky would be holy to them. And if their veneration for this bit of sky-iron went on long enough, the whole thing might grow into an organized religion. Look at what we have done, with one lightning strike.” He waved a hand at the view outside the window. “Now suppose this sky-stone is still lying in a shrine somewhere, on some long-forgotten island up north. What if a Zimbouran expedition were to come across it one day, and bring it back home with them?”

  Kaithan shifted in his chair. “No one would believe it was magical nowadays.”

  “We wouldn’t,” Damion corrected. “But the Zimbourans would. They have never been enlightened, as we have: they still believe in all their old superstitions. There are even people on our side of the sea, Kaith, who might believe in the thing. We have our share of fanatics, including some of the clergy. Look at that eclipse of the sun we had last month. Lots of people thought it was an omen of some kind. Imagine if they had read that sentence in the scroll about the sun hiding her face at noon. Do you see now why one little stone could shake the Faith to its foundations? Or even cause another holy war? If that scroll is the key—”

  “My dear fellow, that’s utter hogwash, and you know it,” declared Kaithan. “I’ve talked to scholars here who had a look at that scroll of yours. It’s nothing but a fraud. The parchment it’s written on isn’t more than a few centuries old, they say.”

  “It’s supposed to be a copy of an older document.”

  “Which was very conveniently destroyed, making it unavailable for study. Pah!”

  “Well, what of the sea chart?”

  “More nonsense. No one will ever find Trynisia or the Star Stone, because they don’t exist.” Kaithan thumped the arm of his chair for emphasis. “You spent too long in the exotic east, my friend. It’s made you even more fanciful. Sacred jewels and lost scrolls—honestly, Damion!”

  Damion gave an impatient wave of his hand. “I’m not saying it’s really the scroll of the Apocalypse—we both know that’s nonsense. But there are people who believe it is, and one of them is the king of Zimboura. If his servants had placed it in his hands, he might well have taken that as a sign for him to start a holy war.”

  “Ah, but fortunately Damion Athariel thwarted his evil scheme, and saved the world!” Kaithan laughed again as Damion set his goblet down and looked around for a cushion to hurl. “Oh, come: you must admit it sounds rather—”

  “Silly, childish, incredible: I know! That is exactly what I thought at first. But now I’m not so certain. The Zimbouran king wants the Stone. He thinks it is the sign of his destiny and will help him to rule his people—not to mention all the rest of us. And now he knows where the scroll was taken.”

  “And I think your imagination’s running away with you.”

  “Is it? Two Zimbouran intruders turned up in the Academy a few weeks ago. I was at dinner when a servant came to the high table and told us there were strangers looking for the library. They were half-breeds, chosen because they didn’t look obviously Zimbouran, but I could tell. And I’m positive I recognized one of them, a Zimbouran-Mohara man. I saw him on Jana, walking with a column of the God-king’s soldiers. Can you look me in the face and tell me there’s no connection?”

  “Oh, pish-posh: foreigners all look the same.” Kaithan drained his glass. “Now, what about this girl of yours, this saint-in-the-making? She’s what really intrigues me.” He grinned.

  Damion groaned. “She’s not a saint, and she’s not my girl: I wish people would stop calling her that! ‘Father Damion, your girl was late for class again; Father Damion, your girl has knocked over a votive vase and broken it.’ Lorelyn means well, but she’s a great strapping lass and clumsy as a bullock in a glassblower’s shop, poor thing.”

  “Does she still hear her ‘voices’?”

  “From time to time, but she’s been told not to talk to anyone about them. The odd thing is that, voices apart, she seems perfectly sane.”

  “It needn’t be insanity. Has she been seen by a physician?” Kaithan asked. “There could be something wrong with her hearing.”

  “I never thought of that,” Damion admitted. “Thank you, Kaith: I will ask the sisters to look into it.”

  “As for King Khalazar, why not let him have the scroll? If he wants to go off to the north pole looking for a bit of stone that doesn’t exist, then let him! He might oblige us all and get himself shipwrecked: there’s many an arctic expedition that hasn’t returned. But if you really are worried about that wretched piece of parchment, then take it and burn it, and that will be the end of the matter. I see nothing to be afraid of, myself. There is no real reason to believe the Stone is anything but a myth—like everything else the Elei told our poor benighted ancestors. The truth, my friend, is that you want to believe in those stories, deep down inside. And so you’ve convinced yourself there is some truth to them; and now you’re frightened of your own imaginings!”

  A little silence fell while Damion tried to think of an answer to this. “We’re not little boys anymore, Damion,” Kaithan added. “We have been taught to read everything—the Holy Book of Books included—through the eye of reason. And reason must surely tell you that I’m right.”

  “But we’re priests, Kaith—it’s our duty to take some things on faith,” returned Damion. He was beginning to suspect that his friend might be right, after all, but he still could not resist arguing with him.

  Kaithan shook his head. “The Age of Faith is over, Damion. We clergy must accept that, or we will be left behind. Look at us—wearing these archaic robes, pronouncing ritual phrases in a dead language. We’re relics of a bygone age, that’s what we are—and so are most of our beliefs. God, now, and heaven—you don’t actually believe in a bearded old gentleman sitting up on a cloud somewhere?”

  Damion stared. “Well, no, but—”

  “Precisely. The Deity is—well, an idea. A splendid idea, that has served us very well for a few thousand years, but the world has changed since Orendyl’s day.”

  “Kaithan!” Damion exclaimed. “You’re saying you’ve lost your faith!”

  “No, I’m not saying that.” The other man smiled, but his eyes did not meet Damion’s. He gazed into his empty wine
goblet instead. “Not at all. But we must keep up with the times. We mustn’t be so literal. You’ve said it yourself, my friend: if we don’t learn to use our minds we will be forever panicking at eclipses, or waging wars over sacred pebbles, or believing that a girl with bunged-up ears is a saint. Who was it that made fun of Orendyl’s lightning strike a moment ago?”

  “I didn’t mean—that is—well . . .” Damion floundered.

  “You see?” Kaithan spread his plump hands.

  Damion looked at the floor. “I suppose you’re right,” he conceded at last.

  “You’re not offended, old friend?”

  “No, no. You’ve said nothing I haven’t been thinking myself.” But Damion’s heart felt lead-heavy as he stood and took his leave.

  AUTUMN WAS NOW IN ITS PRIME. For a month or so the weather along Maurainia’s east coast had been almost summer-mild, the trees and meadows untouched by frost, the air heavy and still. Great ponderous cumuli drifted across the sky like slack-sailed ships in a windless sea, and the distant hills and mountains were blurred blue with haze. Then a front came in from Rialain to the north: it struck the slow-sailing clouds and swept them before it, and beneath their flying shadows the sere, harvested fields seemed to flow with a motion urgent as a tide. The sun grew paler, cast sharper shadows; the trees gave up their green, and in the harsh new light their scarlet and gold and vermilion foliage glittered like uncut gems with a thousand sun-bright points. Summer had left the land at last.

  With its passing the last flowers withered, and the wind rattled through the stiffening stalks in farmers’ fields. Migrating geese haunted the night with their high unearthly cries; bears and little burrowers sought the tomblike holts where they would sleep the winter away. In the countryside villagers who still followed the old traditions lit huge communal bonfires to light the night, beat upon pots and pans, and hung horn lanterns painted with goblin faces in their windows to frighten away wandering shades. For this time of year, when the land’s life began to ebb and fade, was also the season of the dead. Even the Royal Academy, that bastion of reason, was not immune to the change. The turbulent air entered its stone buildings like an army of restless ghosts, twitching curtains from windows, slamming doors, leafing through the pages of books lying open on desks. And waking superstition.

  “The prince is walking again,” declared one of the girl students as they crossed the Academy’s central courtyard together like a flock of trouping doves, their short white capes fluttering in the wind.

  “Prince?” echoed Arianlyn, staring. “What prince, Wenda?”

  “The ghost of Morlyn—King Andarion’s son,” the girl replied. She spoke with a kind of fearful relish. “You remember, the one who dabbled in black magic when he was alive.”

  “Black magic! Hogwash!” exclaimed Janeth Meadows. She was one of the more intelligent and sensible girls, the daughter of a magister.

  “It’s true,” interjected Belina White. Her rather bulging, gooseberry-green eyes were filled with fear. “About the ghost, I mean. I’ve heard stories too. In the ruins he’s always dressed in his Paladin armor. But in the chapel he wears his monk’s robe with the hood up, and all you can see inside the hood is darkness, and two eyes like burning coals—”

  Wenda Dell gave a little squeal, and Arianlyn, remembering her duties as prefect, looked as severe as she possibly could. “Don’t be silly, Belina. You know there are no such things as ghosts. They’re just a pagan superstition. Spirits of the dead don’t hang about on the Earth, they go to Heaven.”

  “The good ones do. But what about the bad ones?” Belina persisted. “Some of the boys at the Academy have seen him. Ferrell Woods and Burk Armstrong both saw him one night, riding out of the ruins on his ghostly black horse. And Dail Moor once saw him too. Dail went downstairs to raid the buttery in the middle of the night, and when he got to the main hallway he saw two eyes in the darkness ahead of him—just eyes, glowing like candles. He turned and ran as fast as he could!”

  “It was probably just the head magister’s cat,” Janeth said.

  “Is his cat as big as a man?” retorted Belina. “It’s all true, I tell you. The prince haunts the old original parts of the castle, the ruins and the chapel, and the library—it used to be the monks’ old scriptorium, you know. When the librarians go into the library in the morning they find books and scrolls lying on the tables—even though they’ve tidied the place the night before, and locked it!”

  “The village people have seen him too,” Wenda added. “There’s a shepherd up Kairness way who saw him one night on the old path that leads to the castle, with old Ana walking beside him.”

  “What nonsense you two are talking!” said Lusina Field in her sharp voice.

  “Yes—utter rubbish,” agreed Janeth. “Why would Ana be strolling along with a ghost?”

  “Well, they do say she’s a witch,” Belina put in. “She lives all alone on the Mistmount, the villagers say, in the Faerie Cave. And she can—”

  “Girls, girls,” reproved Arianlyn, “how can you listen to such foolish tales?”

  “Yes, only fools listen to tales. And only fools tell them,“ commented Lusina, with a sidelong glance at Ailia Shipwright.

  The Island girl flushed at the sneer in the other’s voice. Her reputation as a storyteller was by now known throughout the convent, much to her dismay. Since that first miserable day she had never been at ease with her classmates, and had turned instead to the little girls of the convent orphanage, helping the nuns with them and telling them the tales that had enchanted the Island children. She had told them the story of the Unknown Knight, who was so modest about his valorous deeds that he never raised his visor lest anyone should learn his identity; and of Lady Liria, who disguised herself as a page so that she might follow her beloved Paladin into battle; and of Ingard the Wild Man, who was raised by wolves in the Dark Forest and lived in its groves like an animal until King Andarion bested him in a fight and became his friend. The orphans loved all the tales, and now whenever they caught sight of Ailia they would follow her about in an eager, pleading train: “Could you tell us about Lady Liria again, Ailia? And the Brazen Horse, and the Magical Flying Ship . . . ?” Her classmates, seeing this, teased her without mercy.

  “How is your cousin Jaimon, Ailia?” asked Arianlyn, trying gently to change the subject.

  “He’s well, thank you,” replied Ailia, giving her a grateful look. “He’s found work down at the docks, and has been providing for both our families.”

  Jaimon had paid her a couple of visits, and had told her that both her mother and aunt were growing homesick and wished to return to Great Island. “I told them it’s too early yet,” he said. “We still can’t be sure King Khalazar won’t attack. If anything, it seems more likely he will, now that King Stefon has called his warships back from the Island. What better time to launch a surprise assault? I can’t understand what he is waiting for. His Armada is strong enough.”

  “Zimbourans are terribly superstitious, aren’t they?” Ailia suggested. “Perhaps he is waiting for some sort of omen.”

  “That might be it. Though you’d think his augurors would be quick enough to provide him with one. There is something very odd about this whole business.”

  Ailia, recalling the conversation, felt anew the sensation of being wrenched apart. Of course she should hope that the Zimbouran king would not launch a war. But in that case her mother would certainly expect her to return home, leaving the Academy and its daily lectures and its wondrous library behind.

  “Well, give your cousin my regards,” Arianlyn said.

  “Poor Ari! You’d better give up on handsome Jaimon,” Lusina mocked as they entered the library. “He’s already been promised to his cousin—isn’t that right, Worm?” She turned to Ailia. “On Great Island first cousins marry, don’t they?”

  “Heavens! Do they really?” exclaimed Belina, opening her gooseberry eyes very wide.

  “Not often,” Ailia said. The air in the great
chamber was cool, but she felt suddenly as though she were stifling.

  “But it’s really quite reasonable,” continued Lusina, looking down her high-bridged nose at Ailia. “Living on that rock out in the middle of the sea, you’d be bound to get a little inbred. Why, that would make a good story for you to tell, Worm! A tale of a fair Island maiden and her undying love for her cousin—”

  A burst of giggles greeted this suggestion, and Arianlyn looked annoyed. Ailia swept on toward a study table, her cheeks burning. It was empty except for one other girl: Lorelyn, the orphan from the Archipelagoes. She was reading a book, gripping its covers with her rather large, strong-fingered hands as though she were wrestling with it. Ailia felt a little pang of sympathy. Lorelyn was a misfit too: tall and awkward, and rather plain but for her magnificent hair, which fell to her knees and made the Island girl ache with envy. It was common knowledge that Lorelyn was here on charity, and she had come in for her share of taunts and jibes (charity pupils apparently being an even lower form of life than scholarship winners). It was said that she had been raised in a Kaanish monastery, and had no idea of how a proper young lady behaved. She did not lower her lashes becomingly when addressed, as Maurainian girls were taught to do, but met everyone’s eyes directly with her disconcerting light blue gaze. Nor did she take dainty little steps when walking, but moved in long strides like a man, and had even been seen to run when she was late for a class, her skirts gathered up in one hand to show her bare knees. The nuns all shook their heads over her in despair.