Wash the dishes, wipe the dishes,
Ring the bell for tea.
Three good apprentices,
I will give to thee.
Mary led them through the workroom to an alcove nestled in the back. There was a circular green door in the center, and Mary knocked on it.
When the door opened, a delicious smell wafted out. It promised pies and cookies and every delicious thing Wren had ever seen in a bakery window. The man standing beyond it looked older than Wren’s father. His dark hair was shot through with silver, and the crinkles around his eyes hinted that he often smiled. As if to confirm Wren’s suspicion, his face broke into a wide grin.
“Mary,” he said in a booming voice as he pecked the air near her cheeks. “You’re just in time for supper. Liza will be pleased.”
“Liza’s back? Where is she? Did she bring the potions I asked for?” Mary brushed past him into the room beyond, which glowed orange from the fire blazing in the stone hearth. Worn-looking furniture sat next to tables crowded with books. Shelves full of glass jars and bottles covered the walls, so that the space felt like a strange blend of an old-fashioned sitting room and an herbalist’s shop.
“Allow me to introduce myself,” the man in front of her said with a formal bow. “I’m Baxter, and I’d wager you must be the apprentices Mary told us about. Outstanding. I never thought I’d see the day. Two new apprentices from the wild.”
“Mary told you about us?” Simon asked, reaching for the pencil behind his ear. What he found noteworthy in that statement, Wren couldn’t imagine, but he rifled through the pages of his notebook and began to write.
“I’m Wren,” she said. “And this is Simon.”
Simon grunted and continued to scribble, talking without looking up. “This stardust,” he said. “How does it change the appearance of things?” He frowned down at the page in front of him. “Is there a material alteration? Or more of an optical illusion? Perhaps it might be both, because there’s no way the cottage we saw outside was as big as this place—”
“Do you like cake?” Baxter asked, bypassing Simon’s interrogation.
Wren opened her mouth, hunting for the thread of the conversation. Was this some secret code for stardust? Was Baxter talking about magic? Then Baxter laughed. “Why am I even asking? Who doesn’t like cake?”
He ushered them past the musty furniture and into a kitchen nearly the size of the first floor of Wren’s house. An iron chandelier filled with flickering candles hung from the ceiling. Two large stone countertops flanked the room, with all manner of cookware spotting their surfaces. Large bowls piled high with red and purple berries crowded next to one another, and a huge butcher block squatted in the center of it all, covered with flour. In one corner of the room, a black falcon perched next to another feathered in deep purple.
Baxter examined a row of tarts that were set out next to a flat circle of dough. “Beautiful!” he exclaimed, kissing his fingertips.
“Those look good,” Wren said. “You must like to cook.”
Baxter narrowed his eyes at her. “Like to cook? Oh, child,” he said, “you have much to learn.” He wiped his hands on the long white apron that hung from his waist and reached for the huge oven door. “One doesn’t just like to cook. One is born to cook.” He slid out a round chocolate cake, inhaling deeply as he set it down on the counter. “Or, as the case may be, to bake. Here, you take care of the whipped cream.”
While Wren scooped the perfect white peaks from a mixing bowl into a smaller serving dish, she looked around the kitchen. There was a pot of something steaming on the stove, and Simon had been put to work arranging fruit and cheese on a wide platter. Baxter hoisted a tray of frosted glasses and beckoned Wren to follow. They walked into a dining room where the walls were all windows that looked out on to a tangled green forest.
“Where are we?” Wren stared at the trees. This didn’t look like the college campus at all.
“Right where you belong, darling Wren,” a throaty female voice said. A woman with dark hair curving around her tanned face came up to Wren and kissed her, first on one cheek, then the other. The woman set the fluted glass she was holding on the nearby table, then lifted a perfectly manicured hand to riffle Wren’s bangs. “I could do something with you, I think.” She stepped back, examining Wren as though she were something for sale. The woman was dressed in black, her form-fitting clothes drawn together by a wide red belt. “Much potential.”
“Good luck,” Baxter said under his breath as he passed her with the chocolate cake, and Wren opened her mouth to snap out a retort until she realized he was wishing her luck with this woman.
“Leave Wren alone, Liza,” Mary said as she helped Baxter set the table. “She needs lessons in stardust, not in fashion.”
“Really, Mary, you’d never know we’re sisters.” Liza began picking at Mary’s ratty hair. “There is a most fabulous salon in Paris. If you would only—”
Simon had swapped his notebook for one of the maps he had brought to the coffee shop and was now unfolding it. “There is the observatory,” he mumbled from behind the wrinkled page. “And with Main Street running there”—the map jiggled as he poked it—“and the edge of campus here. Aha!” Simon carefully folded the map. “That must be the forest outside of town.” He looked around triumphantly. “I don’t precisely know how we got here, but it appears that Pippen Hill stretches underground somehow.” He glanced over at Liza and Mary, seeming to notice for the first time that there were other people in the room having a different conversation. “Oh, sorry. Wren asked where we were, and I . . .” He trailed off.
Liza raised her eyebrows and exchanged a look with Mary.
“Clever ones, these new apprentices of yours,” Baxter said as he set down the chocolate cake, now garnished with a bright red dipping sauce.
“They’re not mine,” Mary said stiffly and turned to Simon. “Well done, Simon.”
“He’s right?” Wren looked out at the forest.
Mary calmly picked up a pitcher of water and began to fill the glasses. “We were here long before the university, though they, too, found this to be a prime stargazing spot. The stardust hides the entrance to Pippen Hill. It’s how we keep out the nosy non-Fiddlers. They have no more idea that we’re here than you did.” The ice cubes in the glasses clinked together as she poured.
“But I’ve come to the observatory hundreds of times. How is it that I’ve never seen anything?”
“Because I didn’t yet want you to see anything. Now that you’ve awoken to the reality of stardust, you will find that many things are different than you’ve always perceived them to be.” Mary nudged her to a seat at the table. “Don’t look so distraught, Wren. The ability to do things unseen by non-Fiddlers is one of the perks of stardust. You can count on there being many others.”
She and Liza shared a laugh, obviously enjoying Wren’s confusion, and found their seats. They looked as much like sisters as the sun and the moon. Mary was fair, her long strings of beads trailing over her ruffled dress like some waifish hippie. Liza was swarthy and mysterious, her glamour straight out of the pages of a runway magazine.
“Decadent as ever, mi amor,” Liza said to Baxter as he set one of the perfectly baked tarts before her. It was shaped like a heart, and Wren could tell by the way Baxter winked at Liza that they were a couple.
Wren took a seat, her mind spinning. Hiding a whole house in plain sight? What else was possible with stardust? The mouth-watering smell of the cake Baxter slid onto the plate in front of her was irresistible. She felt a laugh bubbling up from somewhere down below. Magic was real. And she was going to learn how to use it.
“What do you think of our little feast, Wren?” Baxter was watching her carefully. “Good?”
“Perfect,” Wren said.