A Cloak Full of Wrong Assumptions

The blue sun had no business being that blue.

Penelope Starwrite pressed her nose to the round porthole glass and stared. The light outside fell across her sketchbook in a color she didn't even have a name for — somewhere between sapphire and a feeling.

"Incredible," she whispered.

The airship shuddered, then dropped beneath a layer of clouds, and below it — there it was. The Castle of Creativity, enormous and impossible-looking, built right into the side of a violet cliff. Towers jutted at odd angles. Banners snapped in a wind that smelled faintly of cedar and paint.

Penelope tugged her rainbow cloak tighter and flipped open her sketchbook. She was already drawing — towers, the blue glow, the banners.

She'd won a travel grant. A simple sketching trip. Three weeks, one sketchbook, one girl.

Nothing complicated.

The airship docked with a soft clunk, and the hatch swung open.

The Parrot Who Talked Too Much

A woman was waiting at the bottom of the airship ramp.

She was short, round, and wore a coat covered in little embroidered suns. Her silver hair was twisted into a bun held up by what appeared to be a paintbrush. She clapped the moment she saw Penelope.

"She's here! The Star-Maker is HERE!"

A bright green parrot on her shoulder shrieked: "STAR-MAKER! STAR-MAKER! FINALLY!"

Penelope stopped walking. "I'm sorry — the what?"

The woman grabbed both of Penelope's hands and shook them like she was ringing a bell. "We've been waiting months! The Great Prophecy said the Star-Maker would arrive wearing a cloak of all colors." She pointed at Penelope's rainbow cloak. "And HERE YOU ARE."

The parrot leaned forward on its perch. "Make the stars! Make the stars! SQUAWK!"

"I think there's been a mistake," Penelope started.

But a crowd had gathered at the castle gate — dozens of people, all staring, all nodding, all completely convinced.

The old woman smiled warmly. "The sky has been going dark for weeks. You're our only hope."