Moonstone, Magic That Binds (Book 1) (2 page)

“My name is Jessie, young man. How many times do I have to remind you? Give me a second to get comfortable.” Lotto figured she had immediately found her chamber pot when she got home. He giggled and rocked from foot to foot in excitement. The woman opened the door and looked down at Lotto and let him in. She always had a smile for him.

“You look clean enough today. It looks like you’ve gained a little bit of weight, Lotto. I must say, you even look taller.” She pointed to her table. “Sit in that chair,” she said as she poured apple juice into a couple of earthen mugs and handed Lotto one. She took another chair at her table and looked across at Lotto, who laughed as he drank the juice in one huge gulp, juice dribbling down his chin. “Now what do you have?”

“What is this?” He put the dirty rag on her table. She sighed and shook her head and then shrugged. Lotto just grinned as he uncovered the overgrown gem. “Don’t touch it!  It gave me the shivers when I first did.”

She tentatively reached out, but she withdrew her hand when she got close. “An object of power!  Where did you get such a thing?”

“Heron’s Pond. When it just about dried up, I poked around in the mud for nice stuff. I found some old clothes and this was hidden in a boot!” He laughed at the ridiculous thought of a gem in a boot.

Jessie squinted and looked at the youth. “Did anything happen when you touched it for the first time?”

Lotto nodded his head vigorously. “The thing was big,” he made a circle out of his hands, “A flash of light, like I was looking at the sun, and the shivers. It made me see blurry for a bit. It’s pretty isn’t it?”

“It is. Don’t show this to anyone. Who knows what it might do? I thought I felt a shimmer in the air a few weeks ago or so. You touched it soon after the rain started, didn’t you?”

How did the old lady know? Lotto nodded his head vigorously and wondered at the thought, but he trusted her more than any of the mean people in the village. He hadn’t been inside the old lady’s house since winter when he’d been sick. He liked the smells in her house. Herbs and dried flowers. Sometimes she would give him one or two of them and ask him to go looking for them in the woods. She gave him treats when he came back with the same plants, so he had gotten good at finding things for her.

He wondered if she would give him a treat if he let her keep the milky white orb. No. He knew he couldn’t do that. Something else might happen with that thing, so he would keep it. His mind seemed to buzz. Lotto shook his head and thoughts seemed to be clearer for some reason. He just didn’t have to think as hard.

“What does it do?”

The woman shrugged. “I don’t know, boy.”

She shook her head and pulled at her lower lip. “Is it hard? I won’t touch it.”

Lotto ran his hand over the gem. “It is. Hard as a rock.” He picked up the rag to polish it, but the old lady grabbed his wrist and pulled the rag through his fingers.

She moved over to a shard of light coming from her window and looked at it closely. “This is old silk. Not much silk in Besseth, except at palaces and castles. All of the world’s silk comes from southern Dakkor. Common people wouldn’t wear anything like this. The boot? Was it a farmer’s boot?”

Lotto ran out the door and found the boots in the back of his lean-to. “Here they are.”

The woman’s eyes rose. “A fine boot, this was, when new. You missed the silver buckles, tarnished black as they are, made in a strange design.” She tapped the black metal with her finger. “Enough of the shiny stuff in those to keep you fed all winter long, Lotto.” The woman closed her eyes and leaned back against the high back of her chair. “I remember the tale of a lord and lady that traveled through our lands and disappeared. Men from Zarron came from the north in pursuit of them. It happened before I came to Heron’s Pond. I wonder…” She fingered the buckle. “It was just about that time when you were found ailing and wailing on the steps of the inn. Maybe…” She shook her head. “No. Wouldn’t happen.”

“What wouldn’t happen?” Lotto said. He liked mysteries and grinned.

“Never you mind. You don’t go around showing this to anyone. Hear? Finish up that juice.” She poured more in the mug. “I’d like some herbs picked in the forest. I’ll fix you some stew if you find me some of these flowers.” The old lady gave a few sprigs to Lotto and showed him some pictures of flowers in a folio that she had lying on her table.

He grinned. “Soon as I put this back.” He ran out, putting the orb in his pocket and darted into the forest thinking about having a real dinner. They didn’t come often.

~

A man dressed in black hailed Restella and her ten guards before they entered the village of Heron’s Pond.

“You have found the stone?” she said as he held the reins for Restella while she dismounted along with two of her guards.

He shook his head. “No one knows anything and I’ve been sufficiently persuasive. I haven’t gotten to the village healing witch. A village idiot supposedly lives with her.”

Witch? With power?” Restella asked, remembering that Fessano had said that power had activated the stone. “It must be her,” she said, looking at the sky, “and it’s getting dark.” She mounted and left the others scrambling to catch up with her.

She let the scout from Walkington catch up to ride in front of her. She had taken off without having any idea where to go. Restella had to calm down. What if the stone didn’t do anything? She took a deep breath as they rode through the village and prepared for disappointment. She refused to accept that her long ride from Beckondale would be in vain.

The witch’s cottage didn’t look broken down at all until she spotted an old disheveled shack-like thing leaning against one of the sidewalls. The witch lived there? She stood back as one of the guards pounded on door.

“You are the witch called Jessie?” the scout said.

“My name is Jessie. I wouldn’t count myself as being a witch. I have some Affinity, but I don’t need it to give medicine for a fever or a poultice for a boil. Are any of you hurt?” She stepped out of her house and looked around.

Restella could sense a touch of fear in the woman’s demeanor, but then if twelve armed people from outside of her father’s kingdom showed up on her doorstep, she would have had reason to be uneasy. She dismounted and walked up to the woman.

“I’m Princess Restella, daughter to the king of Valetan. You possess the Moonstone and I would have it.” She put out her hand and the old woman fainted dead away.

~

Lotto tunelessly hummed to himself as he searched through the wood. Sometimes he would find what the old lady wanted and put that in the basket and other times, he would harvest whatever caught his fancy. He liked to eat mushrooms, but he would have wait for the old lady to pluck his collection. He’d been sick enough times eating the wrong ones.

The sky began to darken as the light from the sun began to yellow and then turn orange. He didn’t want to be stuck in the wood after dark, so he loped towards the village and stew dinner with the old lady. He could feel his mouth water at the thought.

He bolted from the forest into the old lady’s yard and pulled up short, seeing all of the horses and men. He watched from a distance and dropped the herbs and flowers when he saw the old lady collapse in the arms of one of the men. Lotto noticed a young woman standing yelling at the men. She had on velvety brown riding clothes and a fancy hat. The men wore uniforms. No one in the village had clothes like that. He wondered if the people came from across the sea like the lord and lady that the old woman had told him about.

He saw them carrying Jessie inside the cottage. “Leave her alone!” Lotto became angry and yelled. “She’s supposed to fix me my dinner tonight!” He walked up to the little crowd at the door, but then backed off when he looked at their serious faces. When he could sense that these men wouldn’t put up with his antics, he began to shake a bit with fear.

The young woman drew away from him and batted the air in front of her nose and made a face. “Who are you?”

“Lotto is my name. I live in the back of the old lady’s house. What have you done to her?” He looked closer at his landlady and saw that she still breathed. At least they hadn’t killed her.

“Make the witch comfortable,” the young lady said. The men immediately heeded her words. The girl must be someone important to be able to order all of these men about. He looked towards the village in the twilight to see a group of village folk inch their way towards the cottage. They must be interested in the young woman.

The old lady’s cottage couldn’t hold all of them, so most of the guards stood outside of the cottage refusing to answer the villagers’ questions. Lotto didn’t know if he had any questions or not. He wanted his dinner and these people were getting in the way.

They laid Jessie out on the settee. The man dressed in black looked at the jars and vials on the shelves and pulled one out, taking out the big cork and smelled. He blinked his eyes and screwed up his face, but brought the jar and waved it in front of the old lady’s nose. She blinked and made a sour face like the man did and sat up. She looked across the room and gave Lotto the most sorrowful look. It looked like he might not get dinner tonight.

“Where is the Moonstone?” the young woman said.

“It’s not mine to give,” the old lady said.

“Then who can give it to me? Someone who has power. That’s what my wizard told me. Who else in the village has power?”

The old lady looked at Lotto and pointed at him. Why would she do that? Lotto had less power, less strength, less brains than anyone else in the village. He’d been reminded of it often enough by the rest of the youth in Heron’s Pond.

“He has it.” She shook her head. “Sorry, Lotto. This is our kingdom’s princess. She’s a daughter of the King and I must tell her the truth.”

The man in black nodded his head. “Right.”

The old lady gave him a dirty look. “You’re no princess, you insect.” She turned her face away and looked into the princess’s eyes.

Lotto felt his knees wobble when the princess stepped up to him and put out her hand and said,  “I want the stone.”

A feeling like he’d never had came over Lotto. How could she take away his treasure just because she wanted it? It didn’t seem fair to him. “It’s mine. I found it and it flashed for me.”

The princess’s mouth dropped open. “You have power?”

Lotto shrugged. “Not me.” He pulled out the gem. It faintly glowed in the darkness as it lay on the tattered scrap of silk. Lotto picked it up and could feel something trickle into him from the stone. “If you leave the old lady alone so we can have dinner, then I’ll give it to you.”

The princess stared at him and then at the old lady. “He really will give it to me?”

A look of defeat crossed the old lady’s face. “He’s the village half-wit. If he values his dinner more than the gem, then he certainly will.”

The princess turned back to Lotto, who still held out the stone. The old lady said it right; dinner would sit in his stomach a lot better than the old stone. He did like the feel of it in his palm, though. His stomach reminded him of his hunger and that gave him the little shove that he needed to make a decision. “Here it is. Just leave us alone.”

She stretched out her arm to pluck it from his hand and as she touched it, a brilliant light filled the room and seemed to fill Lotto’s body. Both the princess and Lotto collapsed on the floor.

~~~

CHAPTER THREE

~

R
ESTELLA WOKE UP A INSTANT LATER.
The Moonstone had rolled on the floor, but she quickly snatched it up. It no longer glowed. “What happened to me?” she said, looking at the woman called Jessie. Restella put her hand to her head. Her mind felt a bit unsettled.

The old woman rose a bit unsteadily to her feet and sat at her kitchen table, looking down at Lotto, still passed out on her floor. “I’m not sure. You both glowed when you grabbed the stone out of the boy’s hand. I don’t know how or why it happened. It just did. I’m just a healer woman with a touch of the power, Princess Restella.”

The stone had shrunk down to the size of a good-sized grape. Restella had been sure it was much larger. “This is still the stone?” She looked up at the man in black, who nodded as he helped her up. She pulled out the purse at her waist and put the gem inside and then looked at the unconscious half-wit and the witch. With the purse still open, she took out a few gold coins and laid them on the table.

The feeling of guilt was an uncommon one for her, but the witch had fainted when she announced herself and she had no idea what happened to the boy or, indeed, what happened to her. Somehow she felt linked with the half-wit and that quite unnerved her. How could that be? The Moonstone’s magic? She couldn’t wait to get away from here, the site of such a strange occurrence, and back to Beckondale Castle. Fessano would have the answers. She took a deep breath and realized that she felt stronger. Perhaps the flash had made her weak and her body had recovered.

The men backed away from her. Restella kept her chin from dropping. She’d grown a little taller!  The Moonstone had done its magic and she couldn’t repress a smile. Her fantasy had come true.

She grinned. “Back to Beckondale!” Restella strode out of the house and mounted her horse and rode back through the village, barely waiting for those who traveled with her to do likewise

~

Everything looked hazy and darker than daylight should be, but Lotto watched a tableau unfold before his eyes. A dream!  He rode through a land that seemed cast in a different color. He observed the inside of a coach with a man and a woman.

The man was tall and looked rich, wearing fine clothes. His wife seemed tall, too. Lotto somehow knew them to be wed. She dressed in a dark blue filmy material. He’d never seen a dress like that before. It draped around her as if she had wrapped herself in the cloth. He thought of the rag that covered the jewel.

The man’s coat was dark wool, but thin. He wore a shirt that looked too big and pants that looked too loose tucked into black boots with high heels.