Techromancy Scrolls: Adept (15 page)

I swallowed and smiled back. It looks like I wasn't the only one in the family full of secrets and surprises.

The servant came out and quickly bowed and set up another place setting for the Duke. They quickly brought him some wine. Then I just sat in stunned silence as 'Fred', 'Donnie', and my mother caught up.

A few minutes later, three people came out of the kitchen with serving trays, followed by Cook! I liked Cook a lot, she was always fair to my brother and me when we came bearing eggs for sale or trade. The woman covered her mouth over a little squeal and ran to the table as mother stood. “Margret, so it is true! You've returned to us!” The ladies hugged each other before mother sat down once again.

Mother said through her smile, “Hello Corwin.”

Then Donovan blustered out, “Does everybody in the keep already know of this?”

Cook slapped the top of his head playfully. “Now Donovan. If Bernadine knows of it, then all of the Realm does by now.”

He nodded with a sly smile. “You're right of course, Cook.”

Then we were served a four-course lunch. I still don't know where I was putting all of this food!

The Duke talked mother into resuming her position as the head of Special Projects for the Keep. The office was dissolved when she left. And he set Jace up as a runner for the Knights after having fun testing his knowledge of different locations in the village. He said it really wasn't a job for a Lord, but he was young and needed to learn the workings of the keep from the inside until he hit his majority.

Then he smiled and said, “Margret, instead of the small nobles quarters in the castle, your old manor in Uptown, just outside the Castle gates had been sealed, and Bernadine has made sure it remained vacant on the odd miracle you ever returned to us. Don't ask how she accomplished it, but it is best not to ask questions about her methods, even I'm smart enough not to.” He grinned.

Mother tilted her head in acceptance and said, “Thank you. It is good to be home Fred.”

He excused himself and Celeste looked at her father, who was already deep in conversation with mother. “Can you see them to the seamstress father? For proper wardrobes? I need to get Laney situated in the room off my quarters.”

He nodded and we stood. I kissed mother on the cheek and was pulled toward the kitchen. As soon as we got into the noisy kitchen she smiled. “I just wanted to get you to myself for a bit. It has been such a hectic day I haven't had a moment alone with you.”

I blushed as she dragged me up to Cook. She looked at me then smiled and asked, “Have you ever had ice cream, Laney?”

I furrowed my brow. “I get good cream in the market.”

She grinned and wiggled her eyebrows at Cook then held up two fingers. Cook just pursed her lips in a tight knowing smile. They evil women were conspiring against me. The elder woman popped away and the came back a minute later with two small china bowls with what looked like a glob of butter in them and two spoons. We took them and she started pushing us out the outer door into the courtyard. “Now shoo, I have a few hundred knights and servants in the main dining hall to feed.”

We stepped outside and my hand was getting cold and I looked down at the bowl. I put my finger on the butter and it was quite frigid, I knew that the ice mongers supplied the castle, the butcher, and some of the vendors in the market. They cut the ice from the Whispering Walls Range and the glacier on Heaven's Gate Mountain. It was quite a luxury. It was even rumored that some of the estates in Uptown had ice boxes in their larders.

She smiled and scooped a small bit of it onto her spoon, held it toward me in a prompt then ate it. The smile she had, as she put it in her mouth, was almost seductive. I melted then took a big spoon full and she caught my hand. “You want to take small bites. Too much at once and you can get an ice headache.”

I nodded then took a small scoop and brought it to my nose. It smelled sweet, of vanilla. I stuck my tongue out and took a taste. It was like the icing on a sweet roll. I smiled and took a bite. It was freezing and tasted like nothing I had ever eaten. I closed my eyes and savored it as it melted off my spoon in my mouth. I opened my eyes and took the spoon out and said, “Oh my lord. That's amazing!”

She gave me a knowing nod as we both dug in as she started us walking south. Before I knew it, we were stepping out of the archway into the Great Meadow as we ate the sinfully delicious dessert. She had a million questions for me, but I refused to answer unless she answered my own questions in turn.

After a while, we found ourselves stepping onto the bridge across the Hawktail, toward Lord's Way. Celeste stopped a page who was running past, and handed our bowls to him with our thanks. Then she offered her arm to me. We walked slowly and I pulled her to a stop midway over the bridge and released her arm to watch a fisherman float below us in a little rowboat.

I turned to her timidly and asked a question that had been plaguing me, “Why are you so nice to me Celeste?”

She tucked my hand back into the crook of her arm and just watched the man in the boat below us cast his line. She shrugged and said simply, “Because I like you.”

That answer seemed so loaded to me for some reason, but before I could ask her to elaborate, something cold and wet hit my cheek. We both looked up as the heavens opened and rain started falling all around us. RAIN!

We were all smiles, staring up at the sky and laughing. People were coming out of buildings in Uptown to look at the sky in wonder. It isn't that rain is unheard of but this far out to the Fringe, near the uninhabitable lands, we only saw rain two or three times a year. Not like they got in the central area or in the mountains. I've even only seen snow twice in my life here.

If it weren't for Dragontooth Lake, the streams, and rivers that we use for irrigation of the crops, and the plentiful ground water, Wexbury would not exist.

There is virtually no place in the habitable lands that you can't dig a shallow well to get water, except the deserts. And it is why the grasslands don't dry out. The scholars say that there was no way that those oceans I saw on that picture were all vaporized during the Great Impact. They believe that the continental shelf is resting on a subsurface ocean, which has been proved out by deep drilling.

But rain... rain was free water with no effort. It was a treat as amazing as the ice cream had been. There were rain gutter systems, water barrels, and troughs all throughout the keep to capture this gift.

I watched as Celeste untied her hair and let it fan out down her back as she ran her fingers through it like a river of flame. It was mesmerizing. I followed suit, and we just stood on the bridge with our arms spread wide, eyes to the sky and reveled in the rain as we slowly spun.

I glanced over. She was so beautiful, and almost innocent looking in the rain.

After the storm, which lasted two hours, where we were even treated to a couple lightning bolts with rolling thunder, we met with mother and Jace at a beautiful manor. It was huge, we could have fit our entire cottage in one of the three bedrooms in it. It was, as Duke Fredrick stated, directly outside the main castle gates in Uptown. It was the prime location, you walked off the lush grounds and into the main arch. I wondered how Bernadine had kept it vacant for more than twenty years.

Then we said our good nights and we met with Lady Verna and Sir Kristof at the livery. They were speaking with possibly the thinnest boy I had ever seen. Gangly would be an overstatement. He had extremely short, light blonde hair and I swear his freckles were so numerous they formed one huge freckle on his face. The only thing that broke them up was a severe case of acne. He had a pack on his back with tubes or wires or something strapped to his arms going down to some gloves. He was dressed in a noble's tunic that draped on his thin frame and he had it tied off at the waist with a belt that had at least a dozen pouches. Over the top of it all he had the sash of a Squire with the crest of Wexbury, and house crest of Kristof and Verna.

Don't get me wrong, I thought the guy was cute in an awkward way and he had a smile of excitement that seemed to be full on, full time.

The knights greeted us and clasped my arm like they would a peer. Then Verna said, “Lady Celeste, Squire Laney, we'd like to introduce Kristof's new squire, Bexington.”

The young man offered his left arm to Celeste as she offered her right. His gear squeaked as he switched arms and then bowed slightly, almost headbutting her as he said, “Lady.” Then he offered his hand to me and I shook as he repeated, “Lady.” We couldn't help but smile at the poor boy. I no longer felt the most awkward person in the group.

I bowed slightly. “My Lord.”

Celeste looked about to say something, but Verna beat her to the punch as she backhanded my shoulder lightly. “None of this Lord and Lady stuff you two. It gets tedious. All knights are nobles, and we'd get nothing done if we played the titles game. That's not to say we don't follow social protocol in non-casual situations, it is paramount then, but among our group, do not. Also, if any knight gives you leave to ignore it, or prefers to enforce it, then do as they ask.”

Then she got a grin on her face at the next part. “And Laney, you do not bow to Bex anyway. He is a baron and you a baroness, the same station, yet you actually outrank him as Techno Knight Ascendant as he is just Knight Ascendant.”

Celeste grinned at her friend. “Well said.” Verna playfully inclined her head to my Lady.

I stood tall and then said to the young man, “Laney is just fine. Should I call you Bexington?”

He had a toothy grin for the group. “Bex, please. It is less cumbersome and more dashing.”

I couldn't help but smile, he reminded me of Jace so much, with his enthusiasm. I assured him, “Quite.” Which just got a smile from Verna and Kristof.

Then Celeste offered, “Celeste.” He nodded and stopped himself from bowing again. Then she said to the group, “We need to get into some dry clothes and I need to get Laney here situated in my quarters. We also need to get Laney's family moved tomorrow. Will we see you on the training grounds tomorrow afternoon?”

Verna shook her head and offered, “Take Bex with you tomorrow, he's got able hands and a strong back. It will be easier if we train the two concurrently, then we don't have to go over the same orientation material up front. Until they have to split Laney off for Techromancer training with that magic shit you do. And I'm sure she'll need education too.”

Celeste grinned at the 'magic shit' then beamed a proud smile at her. “Laney can read. And I'm sure she knows her maths as well?”

I nodded and blushed. “Mother insisted that Jace and I were learned.”

Kristof boomed out, “Grand!” You could tell that he, like my mother, was a proponent of everyone in the village getting a basic education.

Celeste inclined her head at the three and said, “On the morrow then.” Then to Bex she added, “We will be in the livery courtyard at daybreak.” He nodded.

Then she offered her arm to me again. I timidly took it, in front of her peers, and she strode off with me in tow.

I don't know what I was expecting, I'd never seen a noble's quarters before. And I still wasn't sure I had. This was a knight's quarters, they were the entire south end of the castle closest the livery stable. I knew from stories in Cheap Quarter that the knights who chose to bunk there instead of living in a manor, were set up three to a room, unless they were married, then they had their own quarters. Squires would bunk in the small anterooms attached to the chambers.

They were situated close to the livery in case of emergencies, that way they could mobilize as quickly as possible. Twice a year they had war drills, which were a wonder to see. Over a hundred knights came thundering out of the castle to the huge bellows powered war horns of the keep. Their charger's hooves pounding the cobblestones and shaking the ground as they passed through the north and south portcullis. The Techno Knights leading the charge.

Unlike any other realm except the Capitol up in Highland Keep, we were possessed of four Techno Knights in our ranks. Only the capitol itself had more, with eight among their one thousand Knights of the Realm.

It was things like this that that made Wexbury so special. We were the third smallest keep in the eleven realms but had the fourth largest defensive force. One hundred and fifty Knights of the Realm and seventy in reserve. I learned today, through our talks, that Celeste was in charge of the mobile battalion. Whereas Techno Knight Tiberius was in charge of the home defense battalion. Then we had two other techno knights that could take over if the leaders fell. May that tragedy never occur.

Other keeps usually had but one Techno Knight as Techromancers were vital to the upkeep and modernization to any Keep and could not be spared for defense. Except Solomon Keep, across the Whispering Walls, who had two Techno Knights, and the second largest fighting force in all the realms.

Solomon was the jewel of the Lower Ten; The ten realms in the largest expanse of the inhabitable Lands of Sparo, or Lands of Hope, that were across The Gap from Highland realm. Soloman was located at the south of the Great Sea. A lake so immense, it was over two hundred miles long and over a hundred wide. It was the largest known body of water on the surface of the planet and was surrounded on all sides by mountains. What a sight that would be to see, water all the way to the horizon, fed off the mammoth glaciers on Heaven's Gate.

We passed a young page stationed in the long hall, which I knew was repeated on all levels of this wing of the castle. Then we walked past seven arched doors before entering the one at the end, Celeste's quarters.

I looked around, the living chamber was twice the size of our cottage and was adorned with beautiful wood furniture and chests. Tapestries hung on the walls to give warmth and life, in all the rich colors of nature, to the otherwise cold and lifeless stone walls. Thick rugs and runners adorned the marble floors that shone with a high polish.

A great fireplace commanded the inner wall with paintings of the forest, and of a young Techromancer Donovan, a beautiful Lady, a boy of maybe five, and a cute red headed girl around six or seven who had a mischievous smile on her face that matched Celeste's.

I turned toward the outer wall to the east, and there were the three smaller alcoves. I could see draperies pulled aside on one and could see a grand bed on four posts through it and blushed. Celeste's sleeping chamber. There were two small arches at the far end of the quarters with iron bound oak doors. There were three narrow, operable stained glass windows, letting in the natural light on the far wall.

I glanced back at the other two alcoves that had heavy drapes hiding the small rooms beyond. “How many others share the rooms here?”

She smiled at me and looked a little embarrassed, and said as if she were reading my mind, “As commander of the mobile battalion, I have private chambers.”

I blinked at her and looked around again, my eyes landing on the two great brass chandeliers above, realizing the dozens of glass domes in them were electric lights and not gas or candle powered. I stuttered, “All this space?” I would be alone with my Lady?

She chuckled. “This is actually one of the smallest. I chose it because it is one of only two on the outer wall that have an unobstructed view of the Grove and Whispering Forest below. That is why the windows are so narrow, too narrow for an enemy to enter even if they are somehow able to attack from the Grove and scale sixty feet of sheer polished granite. There are steel shutters without, that can be closed to prevent projectile attacks.”

She grabbed both of my hands and walked backward with a grin. “Would you like to see your antechamber my squire?”

I grinned in excitement, and that excitement bled through in my voice as I said, “Very much so.”

She pulled me through the second heavy oak door at the end of the great room. There was a space as large as my cottage with three small alcoves large enough for someone to sleep on a straw mattress.

I knew this is where the squires for the three knights that would usually be assigned to the chambers would live. Two alcoves had fine cushions in them with dozens of colorful pillows. The other had been fitted with a great chest with many drawers and a cushioned chair in front of it with a mirror of finely polished silver above the chest with a silver tray that had a variety of brushes and combs on it.

Obviously none of this was what was normally in any of the sleeping spots.

But the thing that held my attention was the grand bed that looked a smaller version of what Celeste had in her space. Four great posts and a canopy of white fabric that was lit up in an array of soft colors cast by the single thin, operable stained glass window on the south wall. There was a fine white bedspread on it and more pillows than a single person could ever hope to use.

There was a thick forest green rug covering the stone floor in the place with only the fringes of the marble visible at the edges. There were various antique chests and what looked like a small writing table with a matching chair and a reading lamp. I had never seen such finery.

She was searching my eyes then she reached over and turned a knob on the wall and the small chandelier chained high in the anteroom sprang to life, lighting the room. It had electric lighting as well. She shrugged and asked, “Do you like? It was the best I could have done since Sixth Day. Father knew the Duke would approve your squire appointment.”

I looked at her in disbelief then back at the room. Logically I had known my life had changed before, but for some reason this brought it all home for me. This was mine. This was my life now, Cheap Quarter left behind. I was beholden to a Lady of the Court. An angel that had taken my family into this new world.

I nodded with tears in my eyes and she looked distressed and pulled me to her as I sobbed uncontrollably. I still don't know why. I buried my face in her tunic as I cried, and my Lady patiently held me. Stroking my hair and murmuring things like, “Shhh... I know Laney. It's okay.” And “I felt the same so long ago.”

Finally, I pushed away and looked down. “I'm sorry. I don't know what came over me.”

She smiled and shrugged. “It is a lot to process. But this is your space now.”

I looked at the bed and pushed my hand down into the mattress. It was soft with some sort of springy support. It wasn't packed with straw. And felt to be only padded by goose down the top couple inches. I grinned at her and she nodded and I launched myself onto it. The bedspread was of the finest cotton stuffed with goose down and I bounced on the bed when I landed.

She chuckled at me as I beamed at her. Then I thought about how dirty I was from the day's activities and still slightly damp from our excursion in the rain earlier and scurried off the finery. I smoothed it down with my hands. She was just watching me with an unreadable expression on her face.

Then she turned away when I heard a light knocking at the door. “Be right back.” She gave me a grin and stepped out of the anteroom and crossed the great room to the door and said, “Enter.” A young woman came in and mumbled something to her and handed her some parcels wrapped in paper. She bowed and left the room in a hurry.

Celeste rejoined me and handed me the parcels. “The seamstress has finished one outfit for you and one for your training. The others will follow in the next few days.” She nudged her chin to the parcels. I sat them on the bed and hurriedly opened them. There was a grand dress in the colors of the realm, with some accessories I didn't know what to do with. And a pair of shoes that were of the finest calfskin with that odd coating on the soles. It looked like the type of outfit a lady wore from day to day.

I squinted at the dress then at her, then said, “There isn't much utility to a dress.”

She actually laughed out loud at that. “No, but I bet it will look pretty on you. I think that is father's doing.”

Then I looked at the other packages. Some trousers made of thick canvas-like material with multiple pockets and flaps. A tunic as fine as any I have seen. Then I paused and lifted a sash. I blinked at it then ran my fingers timidly along the emblems embroidered on it. The crest of the realm with a sword and lightning bolt crossed before it, with the addition of a small silver star, the crest of a Techno Knight Ascendant! And the coat of arms of the House of Celeste, marking me as hers.