‘She summoned me, the night before she and the other Elemagi withdrew to their bower. She commended that letter to my safekeeping. Told me to present it to you when you came of age.’
My legs tremble. I sink onto a stone bench to the right of the portrait, grateful for its solidity, as everything else starts to sway.
‘I haven’t read it,’ Orthriel says. ‘Noelani enchanted it so none but you can break the seal. The blood rite honed her powers into something formidable; she developed means of concealing those parts of her mind she wished to remain shrouded – even from me. But I have my suspicions about what it’s likely to say.’ Again, that sorrowful smile. ‘If I’m right, this could be it, Leilani. The answer to all your problems. Your way out.’
THE SPACE OF A SUNRING
LEILANI
THEDISCOFviolet wax bearing the Stellarion seal is smooth and brittle against my shaking fingers, but then softens, bows, disappears entirely. I snatch my hand away, shuddering. Magic. Star-damned magic.
The envelope contains four sheets of parchment, covered in the same spidery amethyst script, preserved as if written last night, not some eight hundred sunrings since. My heart thrums like a hive as I scan the pages.
Leilani,
How strange to finally commit your name to parchment, a name that has stalked my waking dreams for so long a time. I can only imagine how much stranger this must be for you. I ask only that you read this with an open mind.
Hope remains, because of you.
The visions began shortly after Arden disappeared. At first, I saw glimpses of your face, so like my own, and I didn’t understand their meaning. But these flashes soon became a message.
‘Two magi will rise. One of fire and one of stardust. One fated to destroy the world; the other to save it.’
And then a name.
You, Leilani Stellarion, last of the Starborn Seers, are fated to purge the Sickening and save the realms. You are Arcelia’s last chance.
I don’t need to tell you our shared gift is one of inference only; the precise means of revoking Arden’s curse will be yours to discover. But on one point, my second-sight is crystal-clear– to do so, you must retrieve the Starlight Staff. Our protective wards won’t last forever – just long enough, I hope, for you to come of age and embark on your search. By now your brandmagic will have manifested, and you will need all your Starborn faculties to stand a chance of succeeding.
I lean back heavily against the stone bench. ‘She can’t mean that I…’ My tongue and lips won’t form words. They’re thick and slow. My thoughts are the same, swimming in treacle.
‘I’ve always known you were special,’ Orthriel whispers. ‘Suspected you were destined for greatness. I was never privy to the contents of her letter, but when Noelani entrusted it to me, I confess I hoped – but this exceeds my hopes.’ The look on my Guardian’s face as they stare down at me is one I’ve never seen before. Pride.
‘Special,’ I sputter. ‘Orthriel, I’m cursed. I don’t want my magic; I can’t even wield it. Noelani could summon starshine, move things with her mind. Maybe in her hands, safeguarded by her talisman, it was a force for good, but you know brandpowers manifest differently in all the Sistertouched. I can’t control anything. All I do is hurt people.’
‘Or maybe you’ve just never tried to master it. You’ve always wanted a chance to prove yourself – this is it. Your fate is star-writ. You can’t turn your back on the chance of finding the Starlight Staff, of saving the realm. Of saving all the realms.’
And there it is. Dangled before me, tantalising as freshly sliced starfruit.
My means of redemption.
And though the looping ink is swirling before my eyes, and my hands are trembling, making the words on the page near impossible to parse, I force myself to read on.
I have enchanted the Celestial Chain; an inscription will appear when you hold it to the light of the Flowering Moons tonight, revealing the location of my sceptre. A generalised location for now; details await you in the Starshrine in the Silver City.
I cannot risk revealing all my secrets at once lest they fall into enemy hands– her hands.
For this reason, share the contents of the inscription with no one.
The location of the sceptre is for your eyes only.
My stomach unclenches. Cold waves of relief and disappointment crashing over me simultaneously. These words are the ravings of a woman on the brink. The last desperate hope of a desperate mind.
‘This isn’t a way out of my binding at all,’ I say. ‘She claims I need the Celestial Chain to seek the sceptre, and that’s been lost for generations…’
Orthriel murmurs a stream of soft sylphic words to the air. Another object materialises into the room. An object immediately familiar, though I’ve never seen it before. The sight of it stops the words in my mouth.
The Celestial Chain eddies above me. Gripping Noelani’s pages tight in one hand, I open the other and the chain drifts to a rest there. It’s heavy, and cold as frost. I draw it close and inspect the delicate string of diamonds, emulated almost exactly in the duplicate lying on the podium that’s shortly to bind my hand to Astrophel’s. But the presence of the missing starstone renders the replica worthless by comparison.
