A Sliver of Stardust (7 page)

“They're beautiful,” he was saying in a worshipful tone.

“How can you say that?” Wren snapped. “Mutant birds are standing in front of us and you think they're
pretty
?”

Simon spun around, his face looking confused. Jack took a cautious step toward Wren. Seeing his friendly countenance look so worried evaporated Wren's anger, and a recklessness swept over her, the wild desire for adventure replacing the fear she felt upon initially seeing the birds. “Let's ride them,” she said, her heart
quickening at the idea. “Let's do it. Mother Goose rode through the air, right?” She ignored Simon's openmouthed stare and hurried up to her falcon. “Last one up is a rotten egg.”

Wren was close to her bird now, and if a falcon could look angry, this one did. It swiveled its head, screeching right into her face, and then spread its wings wide.

“No! Wait!” Simon yelled. “Don't go!” But the falcon was gone, barreling up and out above the tree canopy and into the sky.

Wren watched it get smaller and smaller until it was a black speck on the gray clouds. She turned around and saw Simon staring at her as though he'd never seen her before. A breeze blew through her hair, taking the sense of adventure with it, leaving Wren feeling like her normal unflappable self again. “I have no idea what just happened,” she said in her more normal-sounding voice. “I'm really sorry.”

“Don't be,” Mary said, coming toward them with her arms full of blankets, several leather contraptions hooked over one shoulder. “It's your first time working the stardust. It's not unusual for there to be an emotional response.” She moved on to show Jack how to fasten the saddle, but every so often Wren caught Mary
giving her tight, purse-lipped glances.

Simon needed no help, of course, so Mary drew near and gave Wren's shoulder a quick squeeze. “The falcon will come back any moment. All will be well.” She patted her own bird, which stood docilely by her side, the tip of its head reaching her shoulder.

“Do you typically find yourself having such strong emotional reactions to new scenarios?” Mary asked Wren casually as she pulled the strap against her falcon's underbelly.

“Absolutely not. The last time I flipped out like that was when I was four and lost my favorite stuffed animal.” Wren smiled at the memory. It had taken the whole afternoon for her dad to calm her down. “My dad says nothing can ruffle my feathers. You know, because my name is Wren, like a bird?” Wren winced as the unsuitability of it hit her. Could her parents have picked a worse name? She shrugged. “I have no idea what happened just now.” Her analytical mind began to kick in. “Maybe it was the falcons. Like an allergic reaction or something.”
Or a phobic one.

But Mary didn't give her opinion. While they'd been talking, Jack and Simon had kept busy with their birds. And now Jack was astride his, and the giant falcon set
off with a jerky run, spreading its wings wide, and then took to the air.

“Jack!” Mary shouted up at the sky. “Jack! Are you all right?”

Jack soared past them, steering his falcon up and over the woods. He waved his arms and whooped.

Mary clapped one hand over her mouth and laughed. “There's nothing like a Fiddler's first flight,” Mary said, watching Jack crouch low over his bird. “You'll see soon enough, when your falcon comes back.”

“Right,” Wren said, feeling sick to her stomach as the reality of what Jack was doing sank in. Not only did she have to be close to the falcon, have to talk to it, and even have to take care of it, but she had to actually ride the thing. They watched Jack do another loop around the mews. “I can't wait.”

Old King Cole was a wise old soul.

A wise old soul was he.

He called for the stone, and he called for his bowl,

And he called for his Council three.

W
ren stood, looking up at Mary's fully grown falcon. Her own hadn't returned, and now that the last lingering daylight had faded into shadowy dusk, Mary had decided they would leave for the Crooked House without it.

“My falcon is strong,” Mary said, adjusting the strap on her saddlebag. “It can carry both of us.”

Jack was still circling overhead, and Wren could tell Simon was itching to join him. He moved toward his falcon, which instantly offered him its tan back. In one smooth motion, as though he'd been doing it his
entire life, Simon was up on the creature, knees tucked behind its wings.

“Excellent, Simon.” Mary whispered something to Simon's bird, and Wren thought she saw the creature nod its head in response. “Remember to hold the neck feathers and lean low.”

Mary reached out a hand, beckoning for Wren to join her on the white falcon. Wren wished the feeling of adventure was back. Or something that might make it possible for her to get up on the thing. She shut her eyes and clasped Mary's hand. Mary pulled hard, and Wren scrabbled at the slick feathers, and then she was up, seated behind Mary. Her knees tingled. The falcon hadn't even moved, and the ground still seemed a long way down. The bird stretched its wings and then bounced forward into a choppy run. Wren could feel powerful flapping beneath her, and then they were gaining ground, higher and higher, until they were past the treetops, the dark trail of the road dwindling away below them.

Wren tightened her hold around Mary's waist. Next to them, Simon was laughing, hands straight up in the air. “I'm flying!”

Wren managed a weak answering cheer and peeked
down. Her ears heard Simon's words and her eyes saw the way the landscape changed below them, but her mind couldn't actually process what was happening.
Flying. In the sky.
The air was icy cold, and Wren's cheeks prickled numb as the falcon found an airstream and began to glide. The roar of wind in her ears soon overtook the muffled rhythmic thump of wings. The falcon skimmed the countryside, coasting above silvery trails of water and up over a mountain, and then beyond to the wide expanse of the sea.

Wren's hands were beginning to cramp from their death grip around Mary's middle. She had been so fixated on not falling off that the glimmering flecks surrounded her for some time before she recognized that they were flying in a glowing cloud. In front of her, Mary was singing a rhyme and weaving the stardust so that webs of light swirled around them.

Wren couldn't be sure how long they stayed like that, wrapped in a great trail of twinkling light, but she sensed the warmth fading. Something in her fought the cold, wanted to draw more of the sensation into herself, but she let it go. She felt the chill of the night air, and the dust evaporated enough that she saw the falcon's feathers again, and beyond the falcon, a shadowed
mountain coming closer and closer, impossibly fast, and she yelled that they were crashing, but the bird plummeted onward, at the last moment swooping onto a rocky ledge, and they were back on the ground once more.

Or at least near the ground. The falcon had landed on a rough ledge that jutted out of the mountainside, forming a rocky grotto that flickered in the light of two torches wedged between stones. Jack had arrived first, and he was sliding easily off his falcon. Mary tugged on Wren's shoulder, and Wren half fell, half flopped down the side of the bird after her. Her legs wobbled, and her heart raced wild.

“Here I come!” Simon yelled from behind her. She whirled around to see Simon's bird plummeting toward them, diving in to land nearby, the rush of its wings blowing Wren off-balance. Simon easily dismounted, giving his falcon's side a friendly pat. Beyond him, Wren could see a valley sprawling below them, a shimmering river snaking its way through the shadows and emptying into a choppy ocean that stretched off into the distance. Overhead, the stars shone brightly, dimmed only by the swirls of turquoise and yellow that remained from the aurora. The broad outcropping they
had landed on led inward to a natural cavern, but the shadowed cliff face itself stretched up and out of sight, marked only by the twinkling lights of what might be other falcon-landing ledges and the few stone stairways that connected them.

“Well done, Wren and Simon.” Mary scooped some kind of food for her falcon from a barrel near the wall. She had returned her bird to regular size, and Wren saw that while she'd been stargazing, the boys had been busy doing the same.

Wren joined them in time to watch Mary weave a pinch of stardust with a hurried whispered rhyme. The next moment she held up her palm, and a glowing ball of light cast shadows about her face.

“How did you do that?” Wren asked.

“So many questions. You must contain them. Fiddlers don't like nuisances.”

“Hey!” Wren didn't like being called names.

“Of course I don't mean that you are a nuisance, Wren.” Mary darted an alarmed look at the wide black archway behind them. It was covered with thick reams of cobwebby dust that shone in the moonlight. “Look, Baxter and Liza and I. There's more than one reason we take extra care at the Crooked House.”

“Doesn't make any sense, if you ask me.” Jack folded
his arms across his chest. “All the other Fiddlers come here, don't they?”

“No one's asking you, Jack,” Mary snapped. “And all those other Fiddlers will eat you alive for less than arguing if you cause trouble. Apprentices spend years in the kitchens before they even touch the stardust, and you want to waltz in there and befriend them?”

“There are other apprentices?” Simon asked, setting down the bucket he had been using to feed his falcon.

“You think you three are the only Fiddler apprentices ever?” Mary's eyes looked tight. “I've told you again and again, Jack, but you refuse to listen. Apprentices aren't coddled here; they work hard for every scrap of knowledge they learn. I know you're excited, but the Crooked House is not a vacation spot.”

“Meaning?” Wren didn't like the sound of that.

“Meaning that you'd best be on your guard. Do only as I say.” Mary looked first into Wren's face, then Simon's, and finally Jack's. Wren couldn't tell what she was hoping to see. She counted her heartbeats, willing away the tiny pricks of fear that threatened to balloon into panic. It felt like an eternity, ending only with a strange shiver that rippled through her from the cold night air.

“Speak only when spoken to,” Mary said. “Answer
respectfully”—she gave Jack a pointed look—“and apprentices must always use the title ‘Fiddler.' You will call me Fiddler Mary. Under no condition are you to approach a full Fiddler on your own.” She took a deep breath. “This first hour will be the hardest, and then we will see.”

Wren looked at Simon, who was nodding thoughtfully. For once, she wished he had been taking notes—how were they supposed to remember all of that? Jack seemed to bristle with excitement, as though he hadn't heard any of the threat underlying Mary's words.

Wren and the others followed Mary through the door and up winding stone steps that curled around on themselves, circling higher into the mountainside. Soon, the stairs beneath them turned slippery with moisture, and the walls on either side shone thick with water and sparkling veins. Mica, perhaps, or some kind of silver, but Wren didn't stop to investigate. They walked single file, so there was little space for conversation. Instead, Wren watched Mary's shoulders in front of her and heard Simon's and Jack's soft footfalls behind her. Mary was setting a quick pace.

Up, up, up they went, until it felt like they were miles above where they'd started. Suddenly, Mary came to a stop, and Wren stumbled into her back with
a muffled apology. They were standing on a small landing that opened out into a giant cavern. Mary's tiny ball of light was lost in the iridescent glow of the space in front of them. The walls and ceiling looked as though they were made of blue ice, pulsing with some unseen energy, and their uneven surface gave the effect of a giant off-kilter crystal cathedral.

The natural formation had obviously been modified by man-made improvements. The farther they walked, the more Wren saw evidence of synthetic alterations. The icy walls were coated with some kind of varnish and polished to a marble-like smoothness. The walkway under them was similarly finished except for places where boardwalks bridged particularly uneven stones. Staircases dotted the walls, climbing to upper levels marked by wooden balconies and green doors. But it wasn't only this that made Wren want to stop and stare.

Wren couldn't tell if they'd walked into a science laboratory or a historical documentary. A woman in a long corseted dress passed by them, holding a lantern high in one hand and a thick stack of books balanced in the other. She nearly dropped both when she saw them approaching.

“Jane,” Mary said in a hard voice and breezed by, leaving the woman standing and staring after them.

A man wearing a white lab coat and goggles pushed up over his forehead leaned against one wall, his face flickering in the light of a tablet.

On the balcony above him, two men with their shirt sleeves rolled up were hunched over a table covered with papers, arguing about whether Darwin might have perceived stardust when he visited the Galapagos. They stopped short as they caught sight of Mary.

Wren glanced behind her and saw that clusters of people were gathering in their wake, whispering and not bothering to hide scornful looks.

“Fiddlers,” Mary said over her shoulder, “as you can tell, are a very diverse group of people.”

“Who obviously aren't pleased to see us,” Wren said as she passed an ordinary-looking woman who was carrying a crate full of lab rats. “What are they all doing here anyway?”

“Some live here. Even those who make their homes elsewhere return to the Crooked House for research materials. All come to uncover old rhymes, debate hypotheses, hone their craft, and spy on one another. Everything is about power here. Assume that no one is trustworthy, and you'll be fine. Better yet, don't assume anything. Stick close to me, and keep your mouth shut.
That goes for you too, Simon,” Mary said.

Simon had fallen behind, where he stood examining some kind of fungus growing on the rock wall and making vigorous notations in his book.

“Keep your wits about you, and don't you dare ask questions, even to satisfy your curiosity,” Mary continued with a pointed look. “Draw no unnecessary attention to yourselves.”

They followed Mary onto a bridge that appeared to be floating on a cloudy pool of turquoise water. On the other side, soft waves lapped the edges. A man with his nose buried in a book shuffled past, bumping into Simon and somehow navigating the bridge without looking up. He seemed to be the only one who hadn't noticed their entrance. Everyone else trailed behind at a safe distance until Wren had the eerie feeling that they were foremost in a bizarre parade.

Wren looked across the water to see a girl a little older than she wearing an apprentice cloak. When the girl saw Wren noticing her, she ducked her head and hurried onward, moving from green door to green door, depositing something in front of each. Soon, she disappeared from view, making her way into the farther reaches of the cavern.

After the bridge came a large circular room that had once opened to the outside. Now, the opening was covered with glass, letting in a panoramic view of the bejeweled night sky and the distant waves below. On either side, the sloped cavern walls rose gently, stretching up into a natural amphitheater with rows of seating.

Opposite the window, four figures sat on throne-like seats carved into the rock wall. As Mary led them onward, one figure rose, holding out a hand.

“Of course it would have to be her,” Mary said with a formal little bow for the woman who beckoned to them. She turned to Wren and the others as they crossed the amphitheater. “Say nothing.”

“We got it. No questions. No talking. Blah, blah, blah,” Jack said, with a half grin for Wren.

“Well, remember it,” Mary snapped. “Keep your head bowed and eyes on the floor.” And then they were standing before the group of important-looking Fiddlers.

“Mary,” the woman said. “You are not welcome here.”