Free Ellen Under The Stairs by John Stockmyer Page B

once, great Mage." The
bow.
    And they were trotting out of the
stinking prison, going up and up, John entering the dining room,
the women still at the table.
    "Platinia, you will stay with Zwicia
as before." She nodded. "Ellen, come with me," Ellen looking ...
worse.
    Of course!
    As the light outside began to fail
...."
    Grasping her hand, pulling her up,
John asked that they be directed to a bedroom close by, a young
soldier leading them to a room on first, the soldier bowing,
closing the door behind him.
    "After down-light," John explained, "I
can no longer understand what my own people are saying. I don't
know what would happen if they ever discovered that."
    "Seems there's a limit, even to the
power of the Crystal-Mage of Stil-de-grain," Ellen said
wearily.
    But with a smile.
     
    * * * * *
     
Chapter 11
     
    Ellen. Coughing in the night. Night
sweats. John staying with her, getting little sleep himself, making
certain she had water when she wanted it and that she had help in
getting to the small room down the hall called a garderobe, inside,
a toilet seat over a straight shot to a dung heap. Showed her the
sponge on a stick she would use to clean herself. Embarrassing
under other circumstances, but not when tending the
sick.
    The following morning, to John's
unpracticed eye, Ellen seemed better. Less fever. More interest in
her surroundings.
    The same improvement to be seen the
following day. Same for the next day.
    With Ellen on the mend, life in Hero
Castle fell into a routine. Eating, short walks through the castle
to keep up Ellen's strength -- not that either of them needed much
strengthening in this "light pulling band."
    John had assumed -- wrongly -- that a
day or two in the Magical light of this other world would cure
Ellen, her progress taking longer than he'd anticipated.
    "And to think this was built with the
simplest tools," she said, John and Ellen on another jaunt through
the castle, Ellen well enough in the daytime to do anything she
liked.
    "What?"
    "Just crude tools," Ellen repeated.
"Trowels, hoes, chisels, picks, pit-saws." She was definitely
better to take interest in the construction of this old pile, this
the second week after their arrival in Hero Castle, the magic of
the light continuing to make Ellen stronger. Ellen and John now
quartered in elegant accommodations befitting the importance of a
Mage, he still had a connecting door to Ellen's suite should she
want something during the night.
    Today, Ellen was wearing a white
tunic, the short, draped garment emphasizing the shapeliness of her
legs, the flat, Bandworld slippers just right for her model-tall,
five foot eight.
    How old was she, anyway? Younger than
Paul. Maybe two years older than John, not that age made a
difference.
    The two of them had been walking along
a darkened, flame-lit corridor. Were now descending flagstone
stairs, the encompassing walls magnifying the quiet scuffing of
their feet on the irregularly shaped risers. The only
unpleasantness was the air inside the castle: stale, as always,
smelling of dust and moldering rock.
    A right turn at the bottom of the
staircase took them through an arch into a tapestry bedecked
hall.
    As they entered, John thought he saw
movement at the far end of the gloomy chamber. Probably a slavey,
the castle's servants melting into the "wood work" when
encountering their "betters," the castle run by gardeners, drudges,
chamber maids, cooks, turn-spit, and a soubrette. Generally old.
Humble. Shuffling. More than anyone, the true owners of the
castle.
    On the other hand it wasn't that odd
to feel that someone was watching them, the castle a warren of
rooms, passageways, and pillars -- perfect hiding places for those
who wished to ... hide.
    Increasingly, John had the feeling
they were not safe here, isolated as Hero Castle was, with so few
soldiers to protect them. Anticipating the day when Ellen's health
would permit it, he'd had a messenger bird sent to the Palace at
Xanthin, (the castle butler