Glory Alley and the Star Riders (The Glory Alley Series) (45 page)

“This way,” said Bone, ushering
Glory
toward the scene.

“I
feel
dizzy
.
”

“Talking makes it worse,”
Needle informed.

Pressure squeezed from every side
. She
felt like
a ripe melon
about to burst
.
Needle shoved h
er
forward between
two shades of green
.
The discomfort ended and suddenly they were standing inside a huge cathedral
, probably the one she
had seen
atop the rocky
plateau.

She
wobbled
like
a kid in
her
mama’s high heels
.

Needle
offered a steady hand.

The room was
as
spacious as a
professional
sports arena
, but vastly more remarkable.
Four-story high arched windows
lined the walls
. R
ainbows hung like valance
s
at the top of them
.
Through
the glass
,
the
intensely blue sky
touched the violet-colored ocean below. Coppery
clouds
drifted past the windows like cotton candy.

Sunlight bounc
ed
off the pristine white marble floor
inside
the cathedral
.
The walls leaned inward as if bowing in worship toward the center of the room
, r
eminding her
very much
of the way the
wall
s
inside
the enchanted cavern
had bowed to the Elboni.

“Whoa,”
Glory
whispered again
.
“It’s
incredible
!
”
An indescribable
airy
joy lifted her spirits, making her forget her woes, if only for the moment.
“
How far did we travel?”

“
An infinity miles and none
,” said White Feather. “For w
e
have entered the green side of the
Elboni
,
yet
we
remain firmly inside Queen’s Mesa
.
”

“
Huh?”

“What do you think of this place?” Needle asked.

“
I
don’t get
how we got here,
but
this is the grandest place I’ve ever seen
.”

The
Wybbil
s nodded in approval
.

Bone released h
er arm
.
“
’Tis
good to be home.”

“Aye,” agreed the others
, the
ir
eyes misting over.

The
y turned to the center of the cathedral
,
got down
on
their knees
,
and kissed the floor three times each
.
After they stood, White Feather puffed out his chest, and said,
“
T
his cathedral boasts seventy-two win
dows in all
, including the four glorious rose buds
.
”

“Seventy-three if you count the split arch as two,” Bone added.

“Regardless,” Needle said
. “T
here is no other place quite like it in the spectrum.”

Glory
turned
in
place
to take it all in.

Beyond the walls
in
the
shimmering sea below a
clipper ship with a rainbow sail bobbed over the
waves
. Even within the confines of the building
,
the
faint smell of salty
sea
spray hung in the air
.

"Is this heaven?
”

For the first time
,
the Wybbils’ grins didn’t feel threatening. They seemed quite happy here, almost childlike in exuberance
.

"Not quite
heaven
,
”
Bone
explained
.
“B
ut it
sure
feels like
paradise
to me
.
”

“
As an emissary my life is not my own,
”
Needle remarked.
“
I
f I had my way
,
I’d never leave
this world
again.
”

“We are in North Star Cathedral in
the
Sea of Serenity
,”
White Feather added.
“
Your cavern and this
c
athedral
are mystically superimposed over one another
.
Outside
and all around l
ays
Wybb
, o
ur home planet.”

"Wybb
?
Impossible
.
Only a second
ago we were on
Tullah
.
"

"Wybb
.” White Feather said
stomping the floor of the
cathedral
.
He held
up his white feather
.

“Amazing
.
”
As hard as it was to believe
,
everywhere she looked proved he was telling the truth.
“
Your white feather, I mean the
Paraplume
,
brought us here?

White Feather nodded.

“Where
did
you get such a thing?
”

“
Fr
om
where all
great gifts come
from
—
the
Elboni
.
Through it
,
I’m able
to bypass
time and space to get from one side of the cosmos to the next.”

Glory
nodded, but didn’t understand. More questions were on her tongue, but the view beyond the windows caught her att
ent
ion. A
yellow
flying
craft circled the cathedral
.
From the side it looked like a
spongy
mattress, but as it turned in the
,
air
s
he saw
it was
shaped like a triangle, a big flying wedge
.
One
Wybbil
ro
de
at the helm, while one, two, three
...
ten
Wybbil
s rode cross-legged behind
him
.
The thin wedge glided through the open
. A
trail of
bubbly
vapor
stream
ed
in its wake
.

“
Wild
,”
Glory
said
.
“
I’ve never seen an airplane like that before
!
”

“It’s called a whifferdil,” said White Feather. “Under normal circumstances the sky
would be
swarm
ing
with them, bringing pilgrims to the cathedral, but we’ve had to halt tours
because of one troublesome Tullahn.
”

Just then
,
the whifferdil began to tilt into a dangerous lean.

“Someone’s going to need to turn them back,” Bone said to nobody in particular
.
“
P
ilgrims
aren’t
allowed
here
until the
Elboni
situation resolve
s
.”

It look
ed
like it
might c
rash
. “Do they always fly so, uh, crooked?”
Glory
asked.

“No.
”
White Feather
said sharply.
“If the pilots
be
struggling to keep the
ir crafts
airborne then Wybb’s connection to
the
Elboni
be
unraveling faster than expected.”