Steadfast by Mercedes Lackey

Author:Mercedes Lackey
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Penguin Group, USA
Published: 2013-05-17T04:00:00+00:00

10

KATIE would really rather have gone straight to her dressing room, given herself a good wash, and had a bit of a laydown on her little sofa. Perhaps she could ask one of the other girls to bring back some cucumber sandwiches from a tea shop, but if not, she had some bread and butter and a bottle of lemonade. As exhilarating as her first star turn had been, it had also been exhausting. But she knew from Lionel’s tone that whatever it was that he needed to discuss, it needed to be talked over now, and she had the feeling it had to do with the “lights” the Breeches Girl had seen running up and down her costume.

She hadn’t noticed any such thing, but then again, she had been rather busy, and the billowing folds of the gown had rather effectively obscured her vision a great deal of the time. With the scarlet and gold lights from the magic lanterns playing on the fabric, it had been very like being inside a furnace.

She took great care cleaning off her makeup; if she wasn’t going to get the chance for a wash between shows, she wanted to be as clean as she could.

And she hoped that they would remember that she only had so long before she would have to get her costume back on for the evening show.

When she made her way down the spiral stairs into the ground floor, Mrs. Littleton’s room was quite dark, but Lionel’s workshop was heavily illuminated. She ventured in to find Lionel waiting with open lemonade bottles and some newspaper-wrapped parcels.

“I didn’t think you’d mind some fish and chips,” he said gesturing. “I sent one of the lads for them.”

Well, ordinarily it wasn’t what she would have preferred; it was hideously hot on stage, and she had just put on the most difficult performance of her life. But it was much cooler down in this room, and she discovered she was starving. She sat down with Lionel and proceeded to devour hot fried fish and chips with all the enthusiasm of any of the pleasure-seekers on the Boardwalk.

“Jack will join us after he has gotten someone to watch the door for an hour or so,” Lionel said, after taking a long pull from his bottle. “He is the expert on Fire magic, not I. But, this is why we urgently needed to speak with you. I presume that you didn’t notice anything . . . odd . . . during that last dance?”

“I didn’t,” she admitted, “But the Breeches Girl—ah, I think her name is Victoria Sanderston?—she said there were little lights running through it. I told her it was the special fabric.”

“Swift thinking. Yes, there were. I believe, although I do not know for certain, that those were Fire sprites. I have personally never seen them, only heard them described.” He frowned. “This is what is troubling. They came by themselves. You aren’t a Master, and yet they came by themselves.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.