Silver Dust: An Urban Fantasy (Mist Riders Book 3) by Stella Fitzsimons

Author:Stella Fitzsimons [Fitzsimons, Stella]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Butterfly Electric Press
Published: 2020-06-22T22:00:00+00:00

My head spun as I hurried down narrow passageways in the Education Sector. This place was amazing. Magical script in all the world’s languages, from old to new, from Sumerian to Ancient Egyptian to Afrikaans, was engraved on the walls in scarlet and gold.

I arrived outside the ornate double doors of the Central Museum. My heart pounded in my chest as I stepped through the etheric scanner and signed in at the reception desk.

“Where do I find the ancient scrolls?” I asked.

The clerk smiled and led me through aisles until we reached the ascending platform. She adjusted a dial and then left me. The platform was a marvel of sliding gears and plates that silently ground against each other like the moving pieces of a medieval clock fueled by magic. I stepped onto the first plate. The platform whirled and dashed to the right, then upwards, then downwards until it locked into place outside the Almanac Section.

As soon as my foot hit the floor, a seven-foot troll blocked my way. He was dressed in a green woolen vest and pants. His round wire frame glasses slid down his baby eggplant nose and he pushed them back up.

“None shall remove items from the Almanac chamber,” he said, his jaw shifting awkwardly as he spoke as if it was cracked and had not yet healed. “The secrets of the chamber shall remain secrets of the chamber.”

I nodded. “I am aware.”

“Penalties start with a six-month ban from the Museum and…”

He noticed the pin on my lapel that Helianna’s assistant had given me. It gave me unlimited access to archival artifacts, no questions asked.

The troll grunted in disapproval. “I am here if you need assistance.”

He stepped aside and let me pass.

I decided to find the Seventeenth Almanac on my own to hide my intentions as much as possible. After a few wrong turns I found my way. In deference to the book’s age, I gently set the heavy Almanac on a desk before carefully opening to the table of contents. I found no obvious reference to Cerber. Unfortunately, that meant slowly turning every page manually—all 3,238 of them.

I scanned page after page, searching for any mention of necromancy. It was on page 1874 that his name first appeared: Cerber the Eighth, Chief Master of the Necromantic Order and Changer of Faces, the Darkest of the Dark who had been offered a drink from the Immortal spring when he beheaded all six heads of the Great Kerverous, a weredog larger than a cave bear. Kerverous had ransacked through the Eternal Halls and the Divine Chambers wreaking havoc and feasting on the mounts in the Eternal stables.

The Immortal spring water had prolonged Cerber’s life to ten times that of a normal mortal. The images of him were small and blurry, but there was no doubt that Cerber could alter his facial features to match any age he wanted.

According to the Almanac, Cerber had been an expert in both martial and dark arts and a General in the largest army of undead ever to walk the Earth.

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