Starfell Willow Moss and the Lost Day (Starfell #1) - Dominique Valente Page 0,11

the Long War. The old witches and wizards gathered together their best spells to fight them, but they were stolen, and the Brothers of Wol killed thousands of witches and wizards, destroyed enchanted forests and burned all the spell scrolls they could to try to rid the world of magic.

But they had failed. They didn’t know the truth. Magic never dies – it simply waits until we are ready for it. When centuries had passed it trickled back, ever so slowly, into Starfell.

But this magic wasn’t like the magic from before. It had changed. Perhaps it had learnt. Maybe it worried that if it gave too much it would be ripped away again. When it did at last come slowly slinking back, it did so cautiously, only gifting a few with tiny slithers of itself.

These days people who had a magical ability usually didn’t have more than one, yet they still called themselves witches and wizards. But they were not like the old witches and wizards from before, known now as the old magicians of Starfell, who didn’t just have a singular magical ability – they had many. Magic in the world was different then too; it ran freely through the land, through the streams and rivers, mountains and glades. And some of the most powerful magicians back then harnessed this magic through powerful spells.

But that world was long gone. Just like those old powerful spells that the magicians had gathered together to fight the Brothers of Wol, which had passed into myth as the Lost Spells of Starfell. Today few witches and wizards could perform even the simplest spells, and, as far as Willow knew, no one with a magical ability could do what Moreg seemed to be doing now, which was to use magic like it was available on tap.

‘How do you keep all of that with you?’ Willow asked.

Moreg, who had just taken a fancy purple cushion out of her cloak, looked up and shrugged. ‘Oh … I don’t. I believe in travelling light really.’

Willow’s mouth fell open. ‘B-but then how do you have all this stuff?’ she exclaimed, looking from the table to the stewing pot and folding chairs in disbelief.

Moreg cocked her head to the side. ‘I don’t, not really – it’s a portal cloak. I had it made in Lael, so now I have access to my store cupboard, cellar and kitchen at home – very useful, I can tell you.’

‘A portal cloak?’

Moreg dished up the thick, hearty stew, handed Willow a heavy stoneware plate and sat down opposite her on her own fold-up chair, plumping the purple cushion, which she put behind her back. ‘Lousy lumbago,’ she muttered. Then seeing that Willow was still waiting for an answer to her question she said, ‘You know what a portal is?’

Willow thought. ‘It’s like a door to somewhere else?’

‘Exactly, except it doesn’t need to be a door, it can even be a—’

‘A cloak,’ breathed Willow in wonder.

Moreg smiled. ‘Quite.’

‘Wow.’

‘It has its uses. Not all of us have your skill – anything you need summoned like that.’ She snapped her fingers. ‘That’s truly something.’

Willow shrugged. ‘Only if it’s lost, though. It’s a bit annoying. I can’t summon my own toothbrush unless I’ve lost it first … and leaving things at home doesn’t count as lost.’ She ran her tongue over her teeth and sighed. She had, in fact, forgotten her toothbrush.

Moreg tapped her nose conspiratorially, then winked. ‘But you work around that … don’t you?’

Willow’s mouth fell open in surprise. How did she know? Could she really read minds, like some people thought?

Willow did ‘lose’ things that might be useful later. You couldn’t be too deliberate or else the magic wouldn’t work, but if, for example, you placed a spare bit of change in a pocket that you ‘forgot’ had a hole in it, well, it could save you running home for your wallet on market day. (Incidentally this had caused Prudence Foghorn to appear momentarily impressed the other day, before she asked after Willow’s more remarkable sister Camille.) Sometimes it helped you to plan ahead when you wanted to ‘accidentally’ lose a rather lumpy old quilt that had been made from several of your granny’s hairy dresses. You’d have to forget on washday, just, for example, while you were hanging it up to dry, that there was a gale-force wind forecast. But who knew when you might need to summon the warmth of an additional quilt?

Moreg laughed, but she looked no less scary. ‘It’s what