Sorceress of Faith. Robin D. Owens

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СКАЧАТЬ rise as far as the stone ceiling, it ran along this portion of the tower ending at the wall to her right. To her left, there was space enough for a doorway. When she walked around the partition, she saw that the bedroom was approximately a third of the whole room. The other two-thirds looked like a study, except for a small, carved wooden closet protruding halfway down the round wall in front of her. The closet door faced her. She hurried to it, opened the door and sighed in relief at the sight of an old-fashioned toilet with the tank near the ceiling.

      When she was done, she left the closet in search of a sink and found multiple ones behind the closet. On the far side of the sinks was a counter that held glassware, like an old alchemist’s setup.

      Then came the door to the stairway and, after the door, a huge desk. Shelves lined the room, except for the three large window embrasures and a fireplace. A small grouping of two chairs and a love seat sat in front of the fireplace close to the stained glass.

      It was charming, but not home. How long would she be here? She only wanted help for Andrew, then she’d leave.

      A horn blew and Marian jumped. Bossgond’s voice came to her. Breakfast and lessons in fifteen minutes. None of the words were hard, so she grasped the meaning and hurried back to the clothes shelves in the bedroom.

      She touched the yoke of a royal-blue velvet garment, then lifted it and found herself holding a long gown with embroidered yellow birds. It seemed to be her size.

      Additionally, she had a green dress, a maroon one and a black gown—all with little yellow birds and narrow three-quarter-length sleeves.

      Though the blue robe had looked and felt heavy when she held it, the minute she put it on it seemed like gossamer. It molded around her breasts and lifted them, and Marian squeaked in surprise. Built-in magical bra! This would take some getting used to. The gown sent warmth to her skin—reflecting her own heat?

      Marian looked dubiously at the one pair of footwear on the floor, tucked under the lowest shelf. They appeared more like pouches to put over her feet than actual shoes. Picking them up, she found they had soft leather uppers and springy insoles. When she turned them over she saw a material that looked like fine scales. Snake? Dragon?

      Anyway, they looked far too big for her, and the uppers stuck up in folds. She couldn’t see any laces.

      Bracing a hand against the wall—it was warm to her touch—she slipped on one of the shoes. It felt lined with fur and she hummed with pleasure at the soft silkiness. Then the pouch tightened, molding to foot and ankle. She tottered, stumbled, took a few steps to regain her balance and fell onto the bed. She stared at her foot. Not only had the slipper conformed to her body, but it had turned the same color as her gown and now had little yellow birds all over it. She wiggled her feet—one shod, one bare. The one with the shoe felt better. Magical shoes.

      Her heart jumped. What if she couldn’t take it off? “Off!” she ordered.

      Nothing happened.

      She hooked her thumbs inside the shoe and pushed down. The shoe slid off her foot, tickling her sole, and plopped to the floor.

      All right; one of them could come off. But if she put on both, would she dance to her death? There were plenty of folklore stories about shoes and mutilation, like Cinderella.

      For a moment she just stared at the shoes, realizing that she was in a place far, far different from home. That it seemed somewhat like Earth accentuated her shock—she judged this place by Earth experiences, concepts, standards, and they might not apply. Any move she made, thinking she knew the outcome, could be wrong and lead her to her doom.

      She fell back on the bed, hands over pounding heart, touching the cloth that seemed like velvet but could be anything—fur, skin, plastic wrap for all she knew. Even her senses could be lying to her. Perhaps nothing here was real.

      And if she continued to think that way, to challenge everything—her senses, her mind, her experiences—she’d go mad. To her horror, tears dribbled from her eyes.

      This should be such an incredible, fascinating experience for a true scholar! A whole new world to learn, a new aspect of her own self—and magic!—to explore and master. She should be thrilled.

      Instead, she wanted to curl up into a fetal position and pull the covers over her head.

      Bossgond was waiting for her. With breakfast. Even the thought of food couldn’t move her.

      She was flipping out over a pair of shoes.

      They were magic shoes.

      Now her nose was clogged. She’d need to go to the toilet closet and get some tissue-stuff she’d found there. It was in a roll and had felt like regular toilet paper. She’d just used it, not scrutinized it. Who knew what it was?

      Was she going to let panic over the thought of a new world, a magical world, paralyze her?

      Wrong question.

      The right question was, How long was she going to let panic paralyze her?

      Marian had always thought of herself as willing to learn new things, explore new ideas—perhaps she’d even been snobbish about that quality. In fact, she was a coward.

      But her full-moon ritual had been about discovering why she’d experienced odd sounds and nightmares. Now she knew. Golden Raven had said she’d meet a teacher. She had. Now she had to figure out how all this could help Andrew.

      “Marian.” The rich, deep voice of Bossgond seemed to echo around the room. It certainly reverberated inside her mind. She turned her head to see a tube running down the wall next to her bed, with a flared opening like a trumpet.

      “Marian, the oeuf is cooling.”

      She struggled to one elbow, then the second. “I’m coming,” she replied in French—the language she’d been speaking for hours now—except for that tiny exchange with Alexa.

      Alexa! While wallowing in her own fear she’d forgotten Alexa—someone who’d already come from Colorado, had experiences she could share with Marian. She was pitifully grateful that she didn’t have to take everything on faith, walking into a fog without a clue as to the landscape around her. Alexa would help her. Marian was not alone.

      Just the thought of the other woman energized her.

      “I’ll be right there,” she called out to Bossgond, a Sorcerer who would teach her magic.

      She stretched, feeling her muscles pull, feeling something inside her that had been squashed and cramped, unfurl—a butterfly-breaking-open-her-cocoon feeling.

      She would practice wonder, learn all she could of magic, in relation to herself and to Andrew. He’d expect her to live life in the moment, wring everything she could out of each experience, good or bad, not worry about being in control or making mistakes.

      So she put on the shoes and forced herself to admire the feel and look of them. Then she marched to the toilet closet and took some tissue and blew her nose, washed her face with water from a tap.

      Then she went out her door to find out if “oeuf” meant egg.

      She ascended the stairs to Bossgond’s quarters one floor above her own. When she reached the door there was something like a harp СКАЧАТЬ