A knock sounded on the door to Lyss’s room. Ella glanced at Lyss in the mirror, bobby pins in her mouth, hands poised to secure another curl. “Would you get that? It’s probably flowers from Dugald.” She smiled, fluttering her eyelashes.
Lyss rolled her eyes. “You and men.” She chuckled, shaking her head as she opened the door. “Hi, Du-.” She stopped short, blushing. “Sorry, Christophe. Ella was expecting flowers.”
“No offense taken. It’s always nice being mistaken for someone half your age.” He winked, then grew more serious. “Do you have a second? I have something to show you.”
“Of course. I’ll just get a cloak…” Lyss gestured to her white ceremonial gown, then said, wryly, “This isn’t exactly meant for day-to-day wear.”
“Oh, no. It’s right for you...right here, I mean. That is, I have it with me.” Christophe grinned sheepishly. Reaching into the purse at his waist, he drew out a small wooden box and handed it to Lyss.
What was it? Lyss wondered, looking up at Christophe, not sure if she should open it, or admire the carved cover, or what.
“Go ahead…open it.” Christophe fiddled nervously with his purse-strings.
Lyss obliged, drawing back the tiny silver clasp, and lifting the lid. What she saw made her gasp.
Two silver earrings lay nestled on white velvet, delicately spun filaments sparkling in light. But what made Lyss draw in her breath were the tiny jewel drops that hung from the silver wire. They seemed to burn with an invisible flame; their colors shifted from lavender to violet to deep purple and back again…like Lyss’s eyes. “Mage’s eyes!” she whispered, awed. “Christophe…where…how?” She froze suddenly. “Are they for…?”
He chuckled, relaxed by the glow of happiness and wonder in her face. “Of course they’re for you. And I owe you an apology: they came on the day of your final Mastery, and I had to rush off to make sure you didn’t find out about them. I felt awful about it later. I hadn’t realized how bad off you really were.”
“As if it mattered. Where did you get them?”
“The dwarves. It’s a funny thing, actually; they don’t usually sell them. I mentioned that I wanted them for a girl who had eyes that matched them, and this one dwarf, a girl by their standards, I think, called out to me in that awful Borderlands accent ‘Is ‘er naime Lyss?’ After that, they were suddenly far more eager to sell. It must have been someone from Mistress Minn’s.”
Lyss gazed down at the contents of the box again. “Oh, bless them!”
“Oh…I forgot…this was a present from them. May I see them for a second?” He took the box and whispered something, waving his hand over it once, then handed it back to Lyss. The drops had gained the semblance of simple silver. Christophe beamed. “I thought it would be handy, what with your quest and all.”
“You know?” All thoughts of the earrings fled Lyss’s mind for a moment.
The Finder nodded. “Of course. The Queens talked to me about it.”
“Why me?”
“Because you’re the best, of course.” Christophe winked. “Try not to worry about it.”
“As if I hadn’t TRIED…” Lyss sputtered angrily
“Try harder.” The Duke glanced out the window at the sun, which was beginning to dip behind the trees. “Have to run. I’ll leave you to primp. Seriously, though, I wouldn’t worry about it. Enjoy your Master’s Ceremony; there will be plenty of time to fret over the Star. Good luck tonight!”
He waved at Ella, who was still seated in front of the mirror, fussing with her hair, and turned, striding down the hallway. Lyss stood, holding the precious earrings, and watched after him, unable to ignore the feeling that he knew more than he had told her.
The Great Hall sparkled, the soft light of witch-globes reflecting off chandeliers, crystal, and fine jewelry. The hall echoed with the sound of cutlery and the gentle murmur of cultured voices as the Castle choir softly sang of the history of the world. Students dipped and swirled between tables, carrying trays of delicacies, dancing to the rhythm of shouts of “You! Page!” and the regal snapping of fingers. From her seat upon the dais, Lyss sat entranced. Always, she had been a part of the production, serving wine or singing or constantly resetting the spells that illuminated the Hall in pearly light. Never before had she been able to simply stand back and be amazed at the wonder of it all.
“Beautiful, isn’t it?” Slenn was seated to her right. The question was soft, as he hoped to not break the spell cast upon the Hall. Lyss smiled. “I was just thinking that.”
“I could see it in your eyes.” He pointed to the giant banner, emblazoned with an embroidered septagram eighteen feet high. “Last year, when the banner had a picture of the Castle on it, all I could think about was the amount of times my fingers had bled from stitching it. I can look at it now and wonder at the workmanship and the beauty of it, and not associate it with pain.” Slenn winked, but Lyss remembered her own struggles with the banner and knew that he was only partly joking.
Ella leaned over from Lyss’s left. “I for one can’t think of a thing but trying not to spill wine on my dress and being nervous about the Ceremony. How can you two think of embroidery at a time like this?”
“How can you think of dresses at a time like this?”
Ella opened her mouth to reply, shut it, opened it again, and finally laughed. “My roommate.” Her brow furrowed suddenly. “The choir’s chords are starting to change. Almost time for the ceremony to start.”
Lyss nodded, straightening the seams of her dress, then stopped, remembering. She was, as the night’s surprise, invisible. Only until the end of the Ceremony, when she was announced to the crowd seated below, would the dignitaries gathered here to judge the Castle’s finest learn that there was a new StarMaster. Until then, the state of her dress was of no consequence. It would only become disarrayed again during the dance.
Beside Lyss, Ella rearranged an errant curl, pinning it back up again. “Do I look alright?” she asked.
Lyss rolled her eyes. “You look beautiful. You always do. Don’t make me jealous.”
Ella reached over to squeeze her friend’s hand. “You’re the best, Lyss.”
A single, echoing chime of a bell rang through the hall. In an instant, the mob below fell completely silent, save for the quiet chanting of the choir. Another bell followed the first, and another, and another, until seven had rung out in the room, one for each of the points of the star. As the final chime faded away and was gone, the Queens and the fifteen soon-to-be Masters rose from their chairs. The table and their surrounding seats melded into the floor and were gone. A slight murmur rose up out of the hush at this display of wizardry, and then sank back down into the floor. And the choir sang on. One by one, the mages upon the dais took their places, forming the Elvin Star. A Queen stood at each point, one of her followers at each of her hands. Their ceremonial robes, brilliant with the colors of their magics, sparkled under the lights. Lyss stood, hidden in the center, breathing in the taste of anxiety and excitement and magic. Her senses burned with the pure power of it all. She had never imagined that there could be so much magic in one place at one time. The very air reeked of it, the power that connected the Queens together, to their young charges, to the very stones of the Castle. Lyss stood, waiting. Then the choir rose out of their singing into song, their words filling Lyss with the rush of belonging and connection that was the Star, and the dance began.
Always before, when they had practiced, Lyss had had to concentrate on the steps, on turning at the same time as everyone else. Now, the song and the magic swept her up and spun her. She did not seem to take any steps at all; instead, she simply flew on the wings of the choir, of the Star. She felt strangely connected to the others who surrounded her, as if they were all strands of the same web, spun from the same source, forever woven together. Five times before, she had sung the same song that now held her so tightly in its embrace, and never known their power.
The choir began to sing faster and faster, and the Star spun in time with the frantic voices, pulling Lyss with it. Faster and faster she twirled, the room swirling about her, and higher and higher the choir sang. The feeling of power within the room multiplied, pressing against Lyss until she thought she would explode. She could no longer see the room; only a swirling, seething mass of light. Somewhere in the distance, someone cried out; Lyss realized with a start that it was she. Desperately, she tried to latch on to something stable, something to save her from completely losing herself within the magic surrounding her. A voice within her mind cried that it was too much with another person; the power was too great. And then the choir hit their final chord, the Star bursting open with an explosion of power, leaving all on the dais to stand, dizzy and overwhelmed, overcome by the power that had passed through their bodies just seconds before.
The seven Queens and the Masters-to-be fanned out into a long line upon the dais. The Queens were first, in order of age, then the students, Lyss last. She was no longer invisible, but it was easy to conceal her small form behind Slenn and Dugald and the others. Lyss’s pulse still raced, adrenaline rushing through her veins. Struggling to relax, she breathed in deeply thrice, and was rewarded by feeling her heart beat recede.
Laeleena and the other Queens stepped forward deliberately, in time with the gentle music of the choir. Emotion surged through Lyss’s entire body. “This is it,” she whispered to noone in particular. One by one, the other fourteen moved forward, each flanking his Queen, one on each side. Lyss stayed behind, hidden, waiting her time. The choir’s soft song soared suddenly, crescendoing to a chord that finally crashed with power. At this cue, the Queens turned from the crowd to face their students.
“May it forever continue!” they cried. The magic in their words struck everyone who heard like a blow.
“May it never end!” the fifteen replied. Lyss braced herself for the power that would be unleashed with the next phrase.
“May it begin!”
One by one, each Master was anointed by her Queen and crowned with the Master’s symbol of rank: a thin chain upon which hung a charm that showed each person’s appropriate Mastery. Lyss watched with pride and sadness as her classmates stepped forward and were graduated. It was, she knew, and end of an era, even as it was a beginning. When…if…she returned, those who remained at the Castle would be forever changed, as would she. If she returned.
Dugald was last to kneel, paying homage to Aurora, and being invested in return. Lyss watched him with growing anxiety. She was next. A seeming eternity later, the new Sun Master rose and bowed first to the Queens and finally to the crowd. A cheer rang out as he touched his sword in a gesture of fealty. Finally, he stepped aside to join the other Masters, and the crowd below saw Lyss for the first time.
Unlike the others, Lyss was not announced; she simply walked forward to the edge of the dais, exactly as she had practiced dozens of times before. Except, she reminded herself, hundreds of eyes had not been fixed on her every move when she practiced. A murmur of surprise rippled through the crowd. Lyss concentrated on simply walking. Silently, she chanted to herself, “Spine straight, shoulders back, chin up, eyes with pride.” How many times had she said that, preparing for weapons class, hand on her sword hilt? Master Arash would go down the line of students as they recited, shouting back at them, “Eyes how?”
“With pride,” Lyss whispered silently. “With pride.” Mustering that pride, she walked to where the Queens stood on the dais.
“Lysistrata, we welcome you!” The Queens spoke in unison. They gave her no last name, for she had none. As the spirits had said, she was a child of noone.
But of everyone, Lyss remembered. Perhaps they were right.
“We welcome you,” the Queens repeated, “…StarMaster.”
A gasp went through the crowd, and Lyss almost smiled. The Queens had been correct in thinking that their “secret” had been well kept. This new revelation would force the Castle’s enemies to rethink a hundred strategies, postpone a dozen battles. If all went well, the Star would already have been found by the time the Lirrick forces had prepared for this new stone in their path. But tonight was not the night to worry about her destiny; it was the night of her Mastery, and she had the court curtsey to think of.
It came off without a hitch.
