I’ll have to find another way in.
I skirt the Starshrine’s perimeter. By luck, two of the side windows have blown in. I choose the one with the least jagged glass remaining in the casement and clamber inside. The last thing I need is to sever an artery and bleed out in this desolate place, with only Serafine to hear my screams.
Inside, the devastation is almost total.
I squint, allowing my eyes to adjust to the gloom as my breath mists in front of me. The quartz floor is cracked and overrun with weeds, the air thick with must. I retrace my steps to the entrance of the shrine, following the pathway of tarnished silver stars inlaid in the tiles. Fresco cycles adorn the walls on either side of the central aisle, but they’re fouled with mould and peeling. Only a single image remains legible. A huge black bird with ghoulish white eyes. I remember these creatures from my mother’s Book of Starlore. From all the nightmares they engendered.
A few outliers, like my mother, believe the night-birds are still trapped in the bowels of the Astral Mountain, the cage the Dawn Sister confined them to. Her final resting place, and theirs. But conventional wisdom accepts the Elemagi banished them through their Blood Bond, drove them back to the Cradleworld. They exist now only as allegories, cautionary tales told to children so they obey their nursemaids and go to bed on time.
An elaborate silver plinth towers in the middle of the central aisle. The Mystic Scrolls lie atop it. I can just make out the glint of their jewelled cases. The sacred-writ, scribed by the Dawn Sister in her own blood as she lay injured, ravaged by the night-birds, later retrieved by Noelani from the mountain, and copied and disseminated as the Book of Starlore. It relates her life in the Cradleworld, her creation of Arcelia. Most of the Starshrine’s important historical documents were moved to Meissa when the city was forsaken, but the Mystic Scrolls were left in place. Legend promised terrible misfortune if they were ever moved, and with the Sickening already raging, no one wanted to tempt fate.
Radiating from the central plinth, like a starburst, are seven smaller aisles, which taper to points. I walk down each in turn, learning the layout of the shrine, trying to unearth the clue promised in Noelani’s letter, while searching for the Book of Mysteries, or anything that might reveal the secrets of the Branded – some way to purge myself clean. I open my inner eyes and ears too, in case visions or whispers speak to their location.
The first three aisles contain statues dedicated to the various constellations, places where pilgrims used to gather and leave offerings for a bountiful Thaw or a mild White. The fourth aisle also houses a statue, carved from quartz, and larger than the others. This one holds my attention. A figure of a woman, a book open in her lap. I recognise the subject straight away. Noelani’s lines are almost my lines, the sculpted resemblance even more uncanny than the Reliquary portrait.
There’s a title etched along the spine of the book Noelani holds. Litany of the Starborn. Creeping closer, I see a list of names on its open pages. Her name is first, but there are others beneath it. I can’t help but run a finger over the grooves, if only to prove to myself that so many of my kind once existed. Beside each name is a list of good deeds: a prediction that averted a poor harvest; a vision that spared a child’s life; another that brought good fortune to a family in need.
Something catches my eye a little further down the aisle. Hanging on the wall, to the right of Noelani’s sculpture, is a painting. One I’ve seen before. A portrait of the Elemagi, the twin to the one in the Reliquary, though this is larger. The version in Meissa must be a copy. But the size is not the only difference. This painting is whole. Four figures stare back at me instead of three.
Arden. For the first time, I’m face to face with her.
My heart thumps as I study her likeness. My breathing shallows. Her hair is braided, but ringlets the same fiery colour as Serafine’s plumage strain loose from their bonds. Her chin is pointed, her cheekbones and brow, high. Her nose is straight, her lips full. There’s a strength to her features, a pride in their sharp angles. And her eyes… glowing coals that rival even an emberwing’s in intensity. Not exactly beautiful, but majestic.
Dusty stubs of candles wreath this monument, and the statue of my ancestor. Each one brought here by a member of the faithful, in thanksgiving. I sink to the floor.
Once, my kind were venerated, seen as a force for good. Once, we were loved.
I sit there for a long time, then walk aimlessly through the remaining aisles, trying to reconcile myself to this truth, to this alternate reality, to what it might mean for me. But it’s dizzying, too much to process. Threatening to unravel a lifetime of tightly knitted self-loathing.
One aisle is lined with bookcases. I gravitate towards them. I don’t understand that memorial, or the emotions seeing it has unleashed inside me, but books… books I understand.
Many of the shelves are empty, their contents transferred to the Bindery, but a few still sag under the weight of dusty manuscripts. I take a few at random and inspect them. No sign of the Book of Mysteries, just astral birth-charts, though it’s all but impossible to read them. Water damage has stuck the pages together and bled the ink. Mould has invaded almost every page. Some crumble beneath my frost-chapped fingers. I wince at the wreckage.
This is the seat of my people’s history. It deserves reverence not ruin.
I place the spoilt documents back on the shelf and press my lips together. Arden did this, destroyed my people’s heritage – their culture. I use this flicker of resentment to drive my search through the rest of the ruined shrine.
Eventually, I stumble upon a niche dedicated to cartography. Starting with the highest shelf, I work my way through the documents that remain. The map of the caves – Noelani’s last clue – it must be here.
Shadows shift and stretch as I work. My fingers are numb from cold, fumbling with each new document I lift. Before long, I’m light- headed. Maps swim in front of my eyes, none the one I’m looking for. My legs sway beneath me. There’s a buzzing in my ears as I sink down on the dusty floor. Tansy was right. I’m not ready for this.
I rest my head on my knees, breathe slowly, until the worst of the giddiness passes, and I’m able to stand again and continue my search.
I find some interesting material: maps of Estelia, some charting the other realms, too. I set aside a large one of Xylia that’s avoided serious damage, together with another of Riveria – in sorrier condition, but still legible in parts. I hope there might be one of Oralia too, to complete the set, for my father removed all maps of the enemy realms from the Bindery in his most recent purges. But there’s none to be found. Many of the remaining records chart the High Lands and the Desolate Peaks. A great number are devoted to Talini itself. All these are of no further use to me.
I check through all the papers. Twice. But there’s no map of the Crystal Caves here. No sign of the Book of Mysteries either.
I hang my head and dust the grime from my knees.
Now what?
I put my faith in Noelani, remained stubbornly hopeful I’d find what I needed here.
I snatch up a plan of the Prism Glacier from the floor. I chose to trust my ancestor, dragged the Outrealmers on this quest on her say-so, brought them all to untold suffering in Galtair. Conditions on the Astral Mountain will test us further, might very well kill us if the tincture fails, and for what? If we ever reach the caves, I have no idea where to look for the lost sceptre. I slam the map back into place on the warped shelf with a heavy sigh, sending a loose leaf of vellum spiralling to the floor. I bend to pick it up and something catches my eye. A glint coming from a niche at the furthest end of the aisle.
I straighten and move towards the glimmer.
It’s coming from a large cabinet shaped like a moonbeam – an ancient symbol of enlightenment. It’s carved from starcrystal, inlaid all over with silver stars, echoing those on the floor. Its feet take the form of sculpted cielsylphs, drapery swirling around them to convey the vortices of the four winds. The cabinet bears more than a passing resemblance to Noelani’s desk, to the bookcase back at the Silver Palace. It has a diamond-shaped lock but no key.
