Free Silver Cathedral Saga by Marcus Riddle Page B

possibly even
killed. Much like Ematay’s brother. Their clouds gradually grew
thicker within, remembering all that had happened. It seemed the
words the king gave them were not enough for the children to be
pleased with themselves.
    Another
came inside the room as the king rose back to his feet.
    This other
stood about five feet and ten inches tall.
    “What is
going on, father?” said the man walking in, nearer. He gave a
baffled expression when he saw the children, like his father did
when he first saw them.
    “By the
gods, it’s prince Etch,” said Eleanor trying to whisper, but she
became so excited the words burst out louder than she meant them
to.
    “It seems
we have some more Spell-casters in our midst,” said the king.
    “I have
never seen them here before,” said the prince in his well
pronounced, clear tone.
    “That is
because they have just arrived. They have lost their parents, their
home, and it is about time they settled into a new one.” The king
turned back to the children, at the left of the room, the door, at
the right. “If you are to live with us, then you have to work; just
like everybody else. This is where being a Spell-caster in training
comes in. You will have to decide upon the right deity to follow
soon if you haven’t already.”
    The two
children nodded eagerly and soon went off with a female
Spell-caster the king called for. She took them to their new
rooms.
    Yet in the
royal chamber, the Star-caster, prince, queen and king stayed.
    Ematay
looked at the king. He could tell there was something worrying him.
The queen and prince didn’t talk at these moments, and for some
time too.
    Yet after a
minute, the queen began:
    “Well,” she
yelled across the room at the king, the room echoing. “Are you
going to tell him—or not?”
    “Tell me
what?” asked Ematay.
    “That
disappointment comes from many angles,” said the king.
    The queen
carried the king’s conversation a little further than he intended
to do so himself: “And one of those disappointments—is from within
these walls.”
    “What I am
about to tell you is troubling news for us all,” said the ruler of
Astora with the might of a gloomy expression casting over his face.
“One of the Stone Swans has been stolen.”
    Ematay’s
face instantly changed to that of an astounded shock. “But that
means we are completely…” The Star-caster couldn’t finish, but went
in a different direction instead. “Nothing like this has happened
in over two hundred years,” and his reaction showed it.
    “Vulnerable,” said prince Etch completing the Star-caster’s words.
“We are mere target practice in the air.”
    “Which is
why we are forming a party immediately. Our best, to retrieve the
177th swan, wherever it may be. It has also come to my attention
that something is wrong on Amaranth. I had asked for readers to be
sent from Amaranth several days ago as well as the Sceptre of Power
to create an army of silver soldiers from our cathedral’s walls. So
I can figure out who has betrayed us and protect our world at the
same time. But nothing has happened, no response whatsoever. No
known action has been taken.”
    Ematay felt
as if cold snow engulfed the air around him. His sight of clarity
just diminished so suddenly. It made him shiver. “Something is
wrong. We better move things along quickly, my king.”

177 th Swan

Part
Two

Caught Up

    Christian and Eleanor walked slowly down the ever growing stairs
that turned in on itself, twisting around like a play slide you
would sometimes see at a fair. Parts of the wall were pure silver,
then as time went on they changed to that of rock. The colours
blending till there was a clarity of earth, telling them they were
in the rock part of the floating Silver Cathedral now. It was three
floors down where the sheen of the silver walls were taken over by
the dark brown, covering the royal colour completely, as if being
taken over by nature itself, or rather, working with