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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Silver Moon" data-source="post: 7023577" data-attributes="member: 8530">Chapter 122,  "Like a child on the first day of school",  September 13, 1882, 11:30 AM.Like Charles, Callum Stuart is attired in the full traditional Scottish regalia. The only difference is the Charles is wearing the modern version of the Royal Stuart tartan, with its vibrant red and bright gold band whereas Callum has on the more ancient version that matches the oldest of the outer room's tapestry, with the more muted red almost an orange color and the other colors less vibrant. This is due to the ancients having less access to exotic dyes for their wool. It suddenly struck her that the red gown she was wearing matched the brighter red of Charles' tartan, and she cast her eyes down for a moment before the smile returned to her face."I hope you slept well," she said. "I need to come here more often if I get to see all these well dressed Scots. When do the pipes start?"   Charles laughs and says with an exaggerated accent, "Ye want pipes before ye 'ave breakfast? Ye're a hearty lass!"   "Ahh, the soothing sounds of the Highlands," she sighed dramatically. "Their dulcet tone would lull any true patriot to sleep at night.  We are delirious with hunger, Cal. We'd better eat before we start a parade through the house." Breakfast is served and the Scottish theme continues. In addition to piping hot tea, they are served traditional oatmeal porridge, buttered scones, a rasher of bacon, banger sausages, hash browns, toast with jam and milk.  Meal conversation consists of Callum telling Charles about their trip into Paris the previous evening, with him talking about where they went and what they saw but omitting any details of their personal conversations. Abby was happy to let Cal do the talking and just enjoy the breakfast. She sipped the tea, slightly sweetened with lovely, floral honey, and finished the last bites of the buttered scone. For some, luxury was all about fine things. To her, it was just this. A hearty meal taken in the company of friends. Which is not to say she didn't appreciate the personal bathroom.  "I told Cal I expected to be treated like a Queen, and I felt like one. Being asked to dance by more than one gentleman didn't hurt either." Charles says, "Well then, I am glad that you are enjoying your stay here. If you will excuse me, I need to check in with my Agriculture Manager prior to the afternoon meeting."   Following the meal Callum says, "Would you care for the tour of is there anything else you would prefer to do first?"  "The tour sounds perfect," she said with a smile. "A bit of a walk with you is just what I need after breakfast."  "Well, this is obviously the main dining room. As this building was known to the public as Mary's 'countryside retreat' it was not necessary to have a room larger than this one." Pointing towards the rear swinging doors he says, "And those are the entrances to the kitchen, the pantry, and the first floor water closet."They head out into the main lobby with Callum narrating, "This room you already known. In Mary's day the large castle painting and the two large tapestries were all the adornment. It was Charles Stuart who added most of the remainder, including the statue of Mary."  Pointing towards the other side wall he says, "The door to the left of the Royals tapestry is the music room, basically Mary Stuart's room for entertaining. The door to the right is the library, which was her husband Francis II's room for entertaining. We'll save those rooms for last, come on upstairs." Abigail felt the pull of the library, but she knew she would have her chance to spend plenty of time in there later while the others were busy. She slipped her arm in Cal's and went up the stairs with him.  "Was there a lot of entertaining her during Mary Stuart's time here?"   He smiles and says "Yes and no. She held the occasional event for visiting Royalty, but in reality it was her magical research colleagues who she had here under the guise of entertainment."   They reach the second floor and he first gestures to the room she stayed in saying. "That guest room which you stayed in, and the one across from it are identical in size and each cover 375 square feet, excluding the bath facilities." Gesturing further down the all to the east he says, "The next pair are very similar in style and decor, but slightly smaller at 300 square feet, as the bathrooms for the end rooms take some of their square footage. The three doors at the east end are to a storage closet for the maids and for the two larger rooms at 500 square feet and 600 square feet, the larger now being Charles's and the other being Meagan's."  Turning left to the west he points to the next pair of doors saying, "These are smaller rooms, each only around 200 square feet in size and with water closets rather than a full bath. Each also has a door into the Royal rooms at the end of the hall. Mary Stuart's Lady-in-waiting used one of these while King Francis II's Page of Honor used the other."He then opens the door at the end of the hall, which is vast at 25 by 35 feet in size. The quantity of riches is brightening, with all furnished having gold guild-work and the richest of materials. "This was Mary Stuart's room, the largest in the building at 875 feet.  Both Meagan's grandfather and mother each used this room when they were the Landholder.  My Aunt Baronese chose not to, leaving it available for visiting guests.  I have done the same."  He then opens the final door to an equally opulent but slightly smaller room that is 25 feet square.  "This was King Francis II's room for the few times when he visited his wife here.  I am the current occupant, although in truth, I am never really comfortable living here given the museum nature of the room.  That is why I welcomed the extended visit from my Torchwood colleagues, as that gave me an excuse to stay at the farmhouse instead." She asks, "And I suppose you can't just choose to stay in one of the simpler rooms.  There is an image to maintain.  All of us, whether grand or humble have restrictions on our choices."  He replies, "Not taking Mary's room is as far down as I can go."  She says, "Much as I've studied, I can't really imagine this kind of life.  I'm glad you had the opportunity to stay at the farmhouse for a while, at least."  "That and I had friends there with my team. I will miss that life."They head back downstairs and towards the remaining two rooms. He says, "These mirror the size of the large rooms above them and with similar purpose.  The largest is the music room and was basically Queen Mary's entertainment room."  He opens the door, with the most prominent feature of the room being a harpsichord with elaborate designs on it in gold.  Other musical instruments are mounted on specially designed holders on the wall.  All of the furnishings in the room are elaborate 16th century pieces, with two sofas and fifteen chairs with matching end tables.  He says, "Mary Stuart had the harpsichord made in Italy.  She was ahead of her time, as the instruments were just starting to become popular then.  Bonnie Prince Charlie had it replaced with a grand piano, but when Aunt Baronese became landholder she brought Mary's original harpsichord out of storage and back here where it belonged.  We still have Charles's grand piano, it is in a magic room beneath one of the mock farmhouses where we use it for bardic magic."  "I had been wondering about bardic magic," Abby said a bit absently, her spectacles appearing from her pocket and then perched on her nose.  She moved close to the harpsichord, then some of the other instruments to examine them more closely."Since clerical magic isn't the thing here, Bardic magic would be the only healing magic.  Which means art really does heal," she said with a smile.  "I wish I'd been a better music student. I can get by on a piano, and I can sing well enough, but I have no natural talent."   Callum laughs, "By 'here' I assume that you mean France, not the Land of Queen Mary.  Mary Stuart's dream is about ALL MAGIC, which includes clerical magic.  The major forms of clerical magic that are practiced here are more druidic than priestly, as those are generally tolerated in the farming regions of France, but some priestly magic quietly occurs here too." Abby replies, "Yes, I meant in France.  I doubt there is any place in the Western world where the forbidden magic isn't being practiced quietly.  I suspect my own skills would be quite a bit further along if I had been born in France rather than America.  New Orleans is a lot more forgiving, but you still have to be careful.  After these last few days, I've been wondering if I need to focus on those talents for a while."   He says, "Well, the common theme in our more recent conversations is that both your future and mine appear to have a number of possibilities."He takes her next door to the castle's final room, the library. As with King Francis II's bedroom, this room is also twenty-five-feet square. Like the music room, it is lit with magical light but also has large elaborate windows on both exterior walls.  The room itself clearly has a more masculine look to it, with dark leather on all of the chairs and the desks, while ornate it is designed more for function.  Bookcases line two of the four walls, the interior wall with the door and the exterior wall opposite it. The wall to the left has a fireplace as its main feature (the chimney shared with the one opposite it in the music room). Along the walls to both the left and right of the fireplace are desks with chairs.  Above the fireplace is a set of mounted animal heads of what looks like a mythical chimera, with her assuming that both the lion and goat heads are real and the dragon head a magical or artistic creation.  The opposite wall has a gun cabinet and a liquor cabinet as its two main features.  Both appear to be fully stocked. "No offense to Queen Mary, but this is more like it."  She took a deep breath in through the nose and found the familiar scents of books and wood smoke.  "I'm not sure what that says about me."   She was immediately drawn to the walls with the bookcases, where her eyes moved quickly over the titles, making a quick survey of what was kept here in the more public part of the house.  The largest of the bookcase walls has very old volumes, many hand written.  Others date from the earliest European printing presses in the sixteenth century.  Almost every popular book she ever heard of that was written in the 16th and 17th centuries appears to be represented there.  The opposite wall has books from the 18th and 19th centuries categorized by topic, with a shelf of popular fiction, another of French, Italian and Spanish poetry, another with histories whose titles vary from English to French to German, there is half-a-shelf of modern books about engineering and a half-shelf about Chinese history.Abby says, "You could actually relax in this room, although I could do without the animal heads," she chuckled.  "Cal, it's a gorgeous place, but I can see why you prefer the farmhouse.  It's so formal."  Callum says, "Yes, the chimera head made me uncomfortable for the first few weeks until I became adjusted to it.  Now I just ignore it.  Megan's grandfather had it put there, he claimed to have slain it himself, but the truth is that the body had been found frozen in the Antarctic ice by a French whaling ship." Abby's eyebrows raise in surprise upon hearing that.  "I had no idea of it being real at all," she said, then went over to have a closer look at it.  "Of course, I was just spending time with a dragon.  It shouldn't surprise me."  He says, "Why yes, it is real, but they are extremely rare.  Each continent and major ocean has always had an 'earth spirit' guardian, which take the form of what are generally believed to be mythical creatures.  Each has a life-span of several centuries.  The heads on that one are actually not very big, so it probably died rather young."  A lump formed in her throat.  She knew nothing of these creatures, despite all her studies.  But that such a thing should have died young, and she could only imagine violently, wrenched at her for some reason."All the books relating your work are elsewhere, I assume."  He says, "Yes, the Stuart collection is in the magical library.  Some of those here are from my personal collection, the shelf about China for instance.  I wasn't just kidding about wanting to one day walk the great wall."   She asks, "Where have you learned all this, Cal?  I thought I'd been educated; I know enough to realize how little I really know, but there are layers to the world that I think have been completely hidden from me. How did you find them?" He laughs "We idle rich have a lot of free time on our hands to learn abut things.  Most of my family has always been obsessed about Scottish, English or French history, so I naturally gravitated to the opposite end of the world, which in my case is China.  I even had a Chinese language tutor for a short while but just could not grasp the language, so if I ever go there I will have to use magic to communicate."   She says, "Not about China darling, although that is fascinating.  The guardian spirits.  I have met a goddess. I have met a Priestess so devoted that she considers years of her life a small price for the chance to be one with her goddess.  I've seen a woman who is a dragon.  You tell me there are people living on other planets who actually come here.  I feel like a child on the first day of school." He smiles and says, "We all are dear.  I felt the same way when I first spoke to Pepe and Maracita, they have centuries of exposure to this while it was all relatively new to me.  Mary Stuart was on the right track, the entire world should be exposed to these riches of knowledge.  But while closed-minded politicians rule that will not happen.  So we need to just carve out our own part of the world to explore.  I get the impression that your friend Mina Parker feels the same way." "Yes, yes I believe so," Abby said, and sank down into one of the comfortable leather chairs.  "I've known since I started working with her that there was far more to magic than I'd know before, but the depth of knowledge about the world, the universe that I lack seems to be staggering."  She was quiet for a moment, obviously chewing over her thoughts.   "I was wondering how do I learn more, and then I realized I'm already on the path.  The first step is always finding out there is more to learn.  Have we time for a walk outside?  I feel the need for a bit of sunshine." He says, "Why certainly, you will have ample time to explore this room later today when I am in my cousin's meeting."  He holds out his hand to help her up, and does not release the hand afterwards.  They exit the room and head to the main entrance.  The space between the castle and outer wall has two water wells, one of which appears to be decorative the other functional.  Gardens fill most of the courtyard. Those immediately before the castle feature flowers, with the autumn flowers now in full bloom.  The other gardens appear to have vegetables growing in them. He walks her behind the castle itself where three other stone buildings are visible.  Two are within the same outer walls, which stretch far back behind the castle.  One is two stories high and about half the size of the castle.  The other is smaller, single story and around thirty-foot square with a pair of large outer doors that are currently open.  He gestures to the two-story building which is closer to the castle and says, "That is the servants quarters.  We won't be going any closer as we like for our staff to have their privacy."   She says, "The staff probably has more privacy than you do," she observed.  "I certainly hope that young lady who helped me last night wasn't obliged to be up early this morning."They then move towards the other building.  Inside are a pair of carriages, with space for a third.  As neither carriage is the one they took yesterday she assumes it is already on its way back into Paris to retrieve Pepe and Maracita.  They enter the building which appears to be a fully-functional carriage house, an assortment of spare wheels and carriage axles, a small blacksmith shop, and various tack and harness.   It took a few moments for her eyes to adjust from the bright sunlight to the shadows inside the carriage house. "Alone at last," she said lightly. "Cast a spell," he replies.   "What?"  "A spell, go ahead," Callum said with a quick nod.  "Alright," she paused a moment, then flicked her finger, releasing several small globes of light that should hover around the room casting a warm glow.   Abby is temporarily blinded by the brightness as twenty large globes ranging is size from 18-inches to five-feet in diameter appear, each radiating out almost blinding light. The ambient temperature in the carriage house also immediately rises at least twenty degrees, the heat coming from the miniature suns that are now nearly filling the building.  "Dear heaven!" she exclaimed, and quickly waved her hand again, canceling the spell. She exclaims, "How do any of you do anything small around here?"  He says, "It becomes less intense as you get further away from the well.  You are currently standing directly on top of it, the well is right beneath this floor.  This is where the power is at its maximum level, approximately twenty-times normal intensity.  The nearby barn is at around ten-times normal intensity, and the castle varies from three-to-seven times normal intensity depending upon where you are in the building."   She  says, "You could have warned me, I wouldn't have done something that could have burned us to a crisp," she breathed, adrenaline still pumping.  "That level of power is... well, unbelievable." He says, "I had a dispel magic ready, and would have stopped you from finishing the incantation if you attempted anything that would have been lethal.  And yes, it is unbelievable, which is why I needed for you to experience it for yourself."  She nodded. "Of course you wouldn't but tell that to my pounding heart.  You know the history, but how much do you know of how this well really works?"   He says, "We actually don't even know enough of the history, that is why we think that an archaeology dig might be in order, and could lead us to further clues as to how it works." "So nothing more than you've already told me about the strength of it, and what it was originally used for then."  Abby stopped and forced herself to take a few breaths until her heart calmed.  "Cal, you may be used to international intrigue and days of stress without food and sleep.  I'm not, so my nerves are still just a bit raw around the edges. No more big surprises like that, alright?"  He smiles and points to the nearby stone and wood barn situated on the other side of the outer wall and says, "No more big surprises today, okay, we'll save the barn for tomorrow." She replies, "It wouldn't be a big, scary surprise now, would it?  I've been forewarned. Let's go see what's so special about your barn."  She shook her head. Men always seemed to take what you said an move it one step further.   As they move towards the rear gate in the wall, the gate comprised of wooden timbers interlaced with thick metal he asks "So Abigail, what is the intended purpose of a wall surrounding a 16th century castle?" "Should I raise my hand before I answer, teacher?" she said with no lack of sarcasm.  "Mainly defense, of course.  Although like here they also create an outdoor space that is part of the house, like another room."  He smiles and says, "Defense indeed.  Which is why Mary Stuart had this barn built outside the wall.  Normally the wall protects those inside from people beyond the wall.  Here is does the exact opposite. She knew that there would be occasional guests at the castle, so with the rear gate locked it was unlikely that any visitors would find their way over to a rear outside barn."They approach the forty-by-fifty foot structure.  It looks like a standard barn, stone for fifteen feet, then a twelve-foot high second story comprised of wood with a pitched roof providing a third story loft.  He opens one of the large barn doors.  The interior looks like a standard horse barn, with the two upper lofts filled with freshly cut hay and a dozen stalls for horses below.  Six of the stalls are open, with no horses inside, as they would be off pulling the carriage.  Another six stalls have horses inside.  There are two stall-sized rooms with their wooden doors closed.  One has a sign in both English and French that reads "Tack Room", the other has a similar bi-lingual sign reading "Grain Room".She says, "Well, it's a barn.  I'd guess there's a door to some of the more sensitive areas of the manor?"  He replies, "Sort of, I wouldn't exactly call it a door.  Although I am not sure if I should show you until after my meeting later today.  Doing so now would only give Meagan more ammunition to use against me."  She says, "Then don't. I can wait, and I can survive if it has to stay secret for a while long.  I do understand that not all the secrets are only yours to share with me.  Just like I know you understand there are things I can't tell you about the AGELESS group.  Although Cal, the impression I've gotten is that your group isn't going to be convinced by Meghan's arguments.  They respect her, but I think they like the leadership right where it is."  He says, "Okay, enough of this for now.  Let's go for a short walk.  I'll show you something impressive that has absolutely nothing to do with magic."</blockquote>

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