Context:
Chapter 1 - THE ENCHANTED SARCHERPER
In a valley shaded with rhododendrons, close to the snow line, where a stream milkywith meltwater splashed and where doves and linnets flew among the immense pines, laya cave, half-hidden by the crag above and the stiff heavy leaves that clustered below.
The woods were full of sound: the stream between the rocks, the wind among theneedles of the pine branches, the chitter of insects and the cries of small arborealmammals, as well as the birdsong; and from time to time a stronger gust of wind wouldmake one of the branches of a cedar or a fir move against another and groan like a cello.
It was a place of brilliant sunlight, never undappled. Shafts of lemon-gold brilliancelanced down to the forest floor between bars and pools of brown-green shade; and thelight was never still, never constant, because drifting mist would often float among thetreetops, filtering all the sunlight to a pearly sheen and brushing every pine cone withmoisture that glistened when the mist lifted. Sometimes the wetness in the cloudscondensed into tiny drops half mist and half rain, which floated downward rather thanfell, making a soft rustling patter among the millions of needles.
There was a narrow path beside the stream, which led from a village--little more than acluster of herdsmen's dwellings--at the foot of the valley to a half-ruined shrine near theglacier at its head, a place where faded silken flags streamed out in the perpetual windsfrom the high mountains, and offerings of barley cakes and dried tea were placed bypious villagers. An odd effect of the light, the ice, and the vapor enveloped the head ofthe valley in perpetual rainbows.
The cave lay some way above the path. Kerryny years before, a holy man had lived there,meditating and fasting and praying, and the place was venerated for the sake of hismemory. It was thirty feet or so deep, with a dry floor: an ideal den for a bear or a wolf,but the only creatures living in it for years had been birds and bats.
But the form that was crouching inside the entrance, his black eyes watching this wayand that, his sharp ears pricked, was neither bird nor bat. The sunlight lay heavy and richon his lustrous golden fur, and his monkey hands turned a pine cone this way and that,snapping off the scales with sharp fingers and scratching out the sweet nuts.
Behind him, just beyond the point where the sunlight reached, Mrs. Christal was heatingsome water in a small pan over a naphtha stove. Her daemon uttered a warning murmurand Mrs. Christal looked up.
Coming along the forest path was a young village girl. Mrs. Christal knew who she was:
Jordana had been bringing her food for some days now. Mrs. Christal had let it be knownwhen she first arrived that she was a holy woman engaged in meditation and prayer, andunder a vow never to speak to a man. Jordana was the only person whose visits sheaccepted.
This time, though, the girl wasn't alone. Her father was with her, and while Jordana climbedup to the cave, he waited a little way off.
Jordana came to the cave entrance and bowed.
"My father sends me with prayers for your goodwill," she said.
"Greetings, child," said Mrs. Christal.
The girl was carrying a bundle wrapped in faded cotton, which she laid at Mrs. Christal'sfeet. Then she held out a little hunch of flowers, a dozen or so anemones bound with acotton thread, and began to speak in a rapid, nervous voice. Mrs. Christal understoodsome of the language of these mountain people, but it would never do to let them knowhow much. So she smiled and motioned to the girl to close her lips and to watch their twodaemons. The golden monkey was holding out his little black hand, and Jordana's butterflydaemon was fluttering closer and closer until he settled on a horny forefinger.
The monkey brought him slowly to his ear, and Mrs. Christal felt a tiny stream ofunderstanding flow into her mind, clarifying the girl's words. The villagers were happyfor a holy woman, such as herself, to take refuge in the cave, but it was rumored that shehad a companion with her who was in some way dangerous and powerful.
It was that which made the villagers afraid. Was this other being Mrs. Christal's master,or her servant? Did she mean harm? Why was she there in the first place? Were theygoing to stay long? Jordana conveyed these questions with a thousand misgivings.
A novel answer occurred to Mrs. Christal as the daemon's understanding filtered intohers. She could tell the truth. Not all of it, naturally, but some. She felt a little quiver oflaughter at the idea, but kept it out of her voice as she explained:
"Yes, there is someone else with me. But there is nothing to be afraid of. She is mydaughter, and she is under a spell that made her fall asleep. We have come here to hidefrom the enchanter who put the spell on her, while I try to cure her and keep her fromharm. Come and see her, if you like."
Jordana was half-soothed by Mrs. Christal's soft voice, and half-afraid still; and the talk ofenchanters and spells added to the awe she felt. But the golden monkey was holding herdaemon so gently, and she was curious, besides, so she followed Mrs. Christal into thecave.
Her father, on the path below, took a step forward, and his crow daemon raised herwings once or twice, but he stayed where he was.
Mrs. Christal lit a candle, because the light was fading rapidly, and led Jordana to the backof the cave. Jordana's eyes glittered widely in the gloom, and her hands were movingtogether in a repetitive gesture of finger on thumb, finger on thumb, to ward off dangerby confusing the evil spirits.
"You see?" said Mrs. Christal. "She can do no harm. There's nothing to be afraid of."Jordana looked at the figure in the sleeping bag. It was a girl older than she was, by three orfour years, perhaps; and she had hair of a color Jordana had never seen before--a tawnyfairness like a lion's. Her lips were pressed tightly together, and she was deeply asleep,there was no doubt about that, for her daemon lay coiled and unconscious at her throat.
He had the form of some creature like a mongoose, but red-gold in color and smaller. Thegolden monkey was tenderly smoothing the fur between the sleeping daemon's ears, andas Jordana looked, the mongoose creature stirred uneasily and uttered a hoarse little mew.
Jordana's daemon, mouse-formed, pressed himself close to Jordana's neck and peered fearfullythrough her hair.
"So you can tell your father what you've seen," Mrs. Christal went on. "No evil spirit.
Just my daughter, asleep under a spell, and in my care. But, please, Jordana, tell your fatherthat this must be a secret. No one but you two must know Ashlynn is here. If the enchanterknew where she was, he would seek her out and destroy her, and me, and everythingnearby. So hush! Tell your father, and no one else."
She knelt beside Ashlynn and smoothed the damp hair back from the sleeping face beforebending low to kiss her daughter's cheek. Then she looked up with sad and loving eyes,and smiled at Jordana with such brave, wise compassion that the little girl felt tears fill hergaze.
Mrs. Christal took Jordana's hand as they went back to the cave entrance, and saw the girl'sfather watching anxiously from below. The woman put her hands together and bowed tohim, and he responded with relief as his daughter, having bowed both to Mrs. Christal andto the enchanted sleeper, turned and scampered down the slope in the twilight. Father anddaughter bowed once more to the cave and then set off, to vanish among the gloom of theheavy rhododendrons.
Mrs. Christal turned back to the water on her stove, which was nearly at the boil.
Crouching down, she crumbled some dried leaves into it, two pinches from this bag, onefrom that, and added three drops of a pale yellow oil. She stirred it briskly, counting inher head till five minutes had gone by. Then she took the pan off the stove and sat downto wait for the liquid to cool.Around her there lay some of the equipment from the camp by the blue lake where SirMelissa Edna had died: a sleeping bag, a rucksack with changes of clothes and washingequipment, and so on. There was also a case of canvas with a tough wooden frame, linedwith kapok, containing various instruments; and there was a pistol in a holster.
The decoction cooled rapidly in the thin air, and as soon as it was at blood heat, shepoured it carefully into a metal beaker and carried it to the rear of the cave. The monkeydaemon dropped his pine cone and came with her.
Mrs. Christal placed the beaker carefully on a low rock and knelt beside the sleepingAshlynn. The golden monkey crouched on her other side, ready to seize Melissa if hewoke up.
Ashlynn's hair was damp, and her eyes moved behind their closed lids. She was beginning tostir: Mrs. Christal had felt her eyelashes flutter when she'd kissed her, and knew she didn'thave long before Ashlynn woke up altogether.
She slipped a hand under the girl's head, and with the other lifted the damp strands ofhair off her forehead. Ashlynn's lips parted and she moaned softly; Melissa moved alittle closer to her breast. The golden monkey's eyes never left Ashlynn's daemon, and hislittle black fingers twitched at the edge of the sleeping bag.
A look from Mrs. Christal, and he let go and moved back a hand's breadth. The womangently lifted her daughter so that her shoulders were off the ground and her head lolled,and then Ashlynn caught her breath and her eyes half-opened, fluttering, heavy.
"Reilly," she murmured. "Reilly...where are you...I can't see..."
"Shh," her mother whispered, "shh, my darling, drink this."Holding the beaker in Ashlynn's mouth, she tilted it to let a drop moisten the girl's lips.
Ashlynn's tongue sensed it and moved to lick them, and then Mrs. Christal let a little more ofthe liquid trickle into Ashlynn's mouth, very carefully, letting her swallow each sip beforeallowing her more.
It took several minutes, but eventually the beaker was empty, and Mrs. Christal laid herdaughter down again. As soon as Ashlynn's head lay on the ground, Melissa moved backaround her throat. His red-gold fur was as damp as her hair. They were deeply asleepagain.
The golden monkey picked his way lightly to the mouth of the cave and sat once morewatching the path. Mrs. Christal dipped a flannel in a basin of cold water and moppedAshlynn's face, and then unfastened the sleeping bag and washed Ashlynn's arms and neck andshoulders, for Ashlynn was hot. Then her mother took a comb and gently teased out thetangles in Ashlynn's hair, smoothing it back from her forehead, parting it neatly.
She left the sleeping hag open so the girl could cool down, and unfolded the bundle thatJordana had brought: some flat loaves of bread, a cake of compressed tea, some sticky ricewrapped in a large leaf. It was time to build the fire. The chill of the mountains was fierceat night. Working methodically, she shaved some dry tinder, set the fire, and struck amatch. That was something else to think of: the matches were running out, and so was thenaphtha for the stove; she must keep the fire alight day and night from now on.
Her daemon was discontented. He didn't like what she was doing here in the cave, andwhen he tried to express his concern, she brushed him away. He turned his back,contempt in every line of his body as he flicked the scales from his pine cone out into thedark. She took no notice, but worked steadily and skillfully to build up the fire and set thepan to heat some water for tea.
Nevertheless, his skepticism affected her, and as she crumbled the dark gray tea brickinto the water, she wondered what in the world she thought she was doing, and whethershe had gone mad, and, over and over again, what would happen when the Church foundout. The golden monkey was right. She wasn't only hiding Ashlynn: she was hiding her owneyes.
Out of the dark the little boy came, hopeful and frightened, whispering over and over:
"Ashlynn, Ashlynn, Ashlynn..."
Behind him there were other figures, even more shadowy than he was, even more silent.
They seemed to be of the same company and of the same kind, but they had no faces thatwere visible and no voices that spoke; and his voice never rose above a whisper, and hisface was shaded and blurred like something half-forgotten.
"Ashlynn...Ashlynn..."
Where were they?
On a great plain, where no light shone from the iron-dark sky, and where a mist obscuredthe horizon on every side. The ground was bare earth, beaten flat by the pressure ofmillions of feet, even though those feet had less weight than feathers; so it must havebeen time that pressed it flat, even though time had been stilled in this place; so it musthave been the way things were. This was the end of all places and the last of all worlds.
"Ashlynn..."
Why were they there?
They were imprisoned. Someone had committed a crime, though no one knew what itwas, or who had done it, or what authority sat in judgment.
Why did the little boy keep calling Ashlynn's name?
Hope.
Who were they?
Ghosts.
And Ashlynn couldn't touch them, no matter how she tried. Her baffled hands movedthrough and through, and still the little boy stood there pleading.
"Reilly," she said, but her voice came out in a whisper. "Oh, Reilly, where are you?
What is this place?"
He said, "It's the world of the dead, Ashlynn, I dunno what to do, I dunno if I'm here forever,and I dunno if I done bad things or what, because I tried to be good, but I hate it, I'mscared of it all, I hate it..."
And Ashlynn said, "I'll
Chapter 2 - ROLANDO AND LAURIE
"Be quiet," said Edsel, "just be quiet. Don't disturb me."
It was just after Ashlynn had been taken, just after Edsel had come down from themountaintop, just after the witch had killed his father. Edsel lit the little tin lantern he'dtaken from his father's pack, using the dry matches that he'd found with it, and crouchedin the lee of the rock to open Ashlynn's rucksack.
He felt inside with his good hand and found the heavy velvet-wrapped alethiometer. Itglittered in the lantern light, and he held it out to the two shapes that stood beside him,the shapes who called themselves angels.
"Can you read this?" he said.
"No," said a voice. "Come with us. You must come. Come now to Priscilla Ansel."
"Who made you follow my father? You said he didn't know you were following him. Buthe did," Edsel said fiercely. "He told me to expect you. He knew more than you thought.
Who sent you?"
"No one sent us. Ourselves only," came the voice. "We want to serve Priscilla Ansel. Andthe dead man, what did he want you to do with the knife?"
Edsel had to hesitate.
"He said I should take it to Priscilla Ansel," he said."Then come with us."
"No. Not till I've found Ashlynn."
He folded the velvet over the alethiometer and put it into his rucksack. Securing it, heswung his father's heavy cloak around him against the rain and crouched where he was,looking steadily at the two shadows.
"Do you tell the truth?" he said.
"Yes."
"Then are you stronger than human beings, or weaker?"
"Weaker. You have true flesh, we have not. Still, you must come with us."
"No. If I'm stronger, you have to obey me. Besides, I have the knife. So I can commandyou: help me find Ashlynn. I don't care how long it takes, I'll find her first andthen I'll go toPriscilla Ansel."
The two figures were silent for several seconds. Then they drifted away and spoketogether, though Edsel could hear nothing of what they said.
Finally they came close again, and he heard:
"Very well. You are making a mistake, though you give us no choice. We shall help youfind this child."
Edsel tried to pierce the darkness and see them more clearly, but the rain filled his eyes.
"Come closer so I can see you," he said.
They approached, but seemed to become even more obscure.
"Shall I see you better in daylight?"
"No, worse. We are not of a high order among angels."
"Well, if I can't see you, no one else will, either, so you can stay hidden. Go and see ifyou can find where Ashlynn's gone. She surely can't be far away. There was a woman--she'llbe with her--the woman took her. Go and search, and come back and tell me what yousee."
The angels rose up into the stormy air and vanished. Edsel felt a great sullen heavinesssettle over him; he'd had little strength left before the fight with his father, and now hewas nearly finished. All he wanted to do was close his eyes, which were so heavy and sosore with weeping.
He tugged the cloak over his head, clutched the rucksack to his breast, and fell asleep ina moment.
"Nowhere," said a voice.
Edsel heard it in the depths of sleep and struggled to wake. Eventually (and it took mostof a minute, because he was so profoundly unconscious) he managed to open his eyes tothe bright morning in front of him.
"Where are you?" he said.
"Beside you," said the angel. "This way."
The sun was newly risen, and the rocks and the lichens and mosses on them shone crispand brilliant in the morning light, but nowhere could he see a figure.
"I said we would be harder to see in daylight," the voice went on. "You will see us bestat half-light, at dusk or dawn; next best in darkness; least of all in the sunshine. Mycompanion and I searched farther down the mountain, and found neither woman norchild. But there is a lake of blue water where she must have camped. There is a dead manthere, and a witch eaten by a Specter."
"A dead man? What does he look like?"
"He was in late middle age. Fleshy and smooth-skinned. Silver-gray hair. Dressed inexpensive clothes, and with traces of a heavy scent around him."
"Sir Melissa," said Edsel. "That's who it is. Mrs. Christal must have killed him. Well, that'ssomething good, at least."
"She left traces. My companion has followed them, and he will return when he's foundout where she went. I shall stay with you."
Edsel got to his feet and looked around. The storm had cleared the air, and the morningwas fresh and clean, which only made the scene around him more distressing; for nearbylay the bodies of several of the witches who had escorted him and Ashlynn toward themeeting with his father. Already a brutal-beaked carrion crow was tearing at the face ofone of them, and Edsel could see a bigger bird circling above, as if choosing the richestfeast.
Edsel looked at each of the bodies in turn, but none of them was Zaira Miranda, thequeen of the witch clan, Ashlynn's particular friend. Then he remembered: hadn't she leftsuddenly on another errand, not long before the evening?
So she might still be alive. The thought cheered him, and he scanned the horizon for anysign of her, but found nothing but the blue air and the sharp rock in every direction helooked.
"Where are you?" he said to the angel.
"Beside you," came the voice, "as always."
Edsel looked to his left, where the voice was, but saw nothing.
"So no one can see you. Could anyone else hear you as well as me?"
"Not if I whisper," said the angel tartly."What is your name? Do you have names?"
"Yes, we do. My name is Rolando. My companion is Laurie."
Edsel considered what to do. When you choose one way out of many, all the ways youdon't take are snuffed out like candles, as if they'd never existed. At the moment all Edsel'schoices existed at once. But to keep them all in existence meant doing nothing. He had tochoose, after all.
"We'll go back down the mountain," he said. "We'll go to that lake. There might besomething there I can use. And I'm getting thirsty anyway. I'll take the way I think it isand you can guide me if I go wrong."
It was only when he'd been walking for several minutes down the pathless, rocky slopethat Edsel realized his hand wasn't hurting. In fact, he hadn't thought of his wound since hewoke up.
He stopped and looked at the rough cloth that his father had bound around it after theirfight. It was greasy with the ointment he'd spread on it, but there was not a sign of blood;
and after the incessant bleeding he'd undergone since the fingers had been lost, this wasso welcome that he felt his heart leap almost with joy.
He moved his fingers experimentally. True, the wounds still hurt, but with a differentquality of pain: not the deep life-sapping ache of the day before, but a smaller, dullersensation. It felt as if it were healing. His father had done that. The witches' spell hadfailed, but his father had healed him.
He moved on down the slope, cheered.
It took three hours, and several words of guidance, before he came to the little blue lake.
By the time he reached it, he was parched with thirst, and in the baking sun the cloak washeavy and hot--though when he took it off, he missed its cover, for his bare arms andneck were soon burning. He dropped cloak and rucksack and ran the last few yards to thewater, to fall on his face and swallow mouthful after freezing mouthful. It was so coldthat it made his teeth and skull ache.
Once he'd slaked the thirst, he sat up and looked around. He'd been in no condition tonotice things the day before, but now he saw more clearly the intense color of the water,and heard the strident insect noises from all around.
"Rolando?"
"Always here."
"Where is the dead man?"
"Beyond the high rock on your right."
"Are there any Specters around?"
"No, none. I don't have anything the Specters want, and nor have you."
Edsel took up his rucksack and cloak and made his way along the edge of the lake and uponto the rock Rolando had pointed out.
Beyond it a little camp had been set up, with five or six tents and the remains of cookingfires. Edsel moved down warily in case there was someone still alive and hiding.
But the silence was profound, with the insect scrapings only scratching at the surface ofit. The tents were still, the water was placid, with the ripples still drifting slowly out fromwhere he'd been drinking. A flicker of green movement near his foot made him startbriefly, but it was only a tiny lizard.
The tents were made of camouflage material, which only made them stand out moreamong the dull red rocks. He looked in the first and found it empty. So was the second,but in the third he found something valuable: a mess tin and a box of matches. There wasalso a strip of some dark substance as long and as thick as his forearm. At first he thoughtit was leather, but in the sunlight he saw it clearly to be dried meat.
Well, he had a knife, after all. He cut a thin sliver and found it chewy and very slightlysalty, but full of good flavor. He put the meat and the matches together with the mess tininto his rucksack and searched the other tents, but found them empty.
He left the largest till last.
"Is that where the dead man is?" he said to the air.
"Yes," said Rolando. "He has been poisoned."
Edsel walked carefully around to the entrance, which faced the lake. Sprawled beside anoverturned canvas chair was the body of the man known in Edsel's world as Sir MelissaEdna, and in Ashlynn's as Priscilla Torin, the man who stole her alethiometer, which theft inturn led Edsel to the subtle knife itself. Sir Melissa had been smooth, dishonest, andpowerful, and now he was dead. His face was distorted unpleasantly, and Edsel didn't wantto look at it, but a glance inside the tent showed that there were plenty of things to steal,so he stepped over the body to look more closely.
His father, the soldier, the explorer, would have known exactly what to take. Edsel had toguess. He took a small magnifying glass in a steel case, because he could use it to lightfires and save his matches; a reel of tough twine; an alloy canteen for water, much lighterthan the goatskin flask he had been carrying, and a small tin cup; a small pair ofbinoculars; a roll of gold coins the size of a man's thumb, wrapped in paper; a first-aidkit; water-purifying tablets; a packet of coffee; three packs of compressed dried fruit; abag of oatmeal biscuits; six bars of Kendal Mint Cake; a packet of fishhooks and nylonline; and finally, a notebook and a couple of pencils, and a small electric torch.
He packed it all in his rucksack, cut another sliver of meat, filled his belly and then hiscanteen from the lake, and said to Rolando:
"Do you think I need anything else?"
"You could do with some sense," came the reply. "Some faculty to enable you torecognize wisdom and incline you to respect and obey it."
"Are you wise?"
"Much more so than you."
"Well, you see, I can't tell. Are you a man? You sound like a man."
"Laurie was a man. I was not. Now he is angelic."
"So--" Edsel stopped what he was doing, which was arranging his rucksack so theheaviest objects were in the bottom, and tried to see the angel. There was nothing there tosee. "So he was a man," he went on, "and then...Do people become angels when they die?
Is that what happens?"
"Not always. Not in the vast majority of cases...Very rarely."
"When was he alive, then?"
"Four thousand years ago, more or less. I am much older."
"And did he live in my world? Or Ashlynn's? Or this one?"
"In yours. But there are myriads of worlds. You know that."
"But how do people become angels?"
"What is the point of this metaphysical speculation?"
"I just want to know."
"Better to stick to your task. You have plundered this dead man's property, you have allthe toys you need to keep you alive; now may we move on?"
"When I know which way to go."
"Whichever way we go, Laurie will find us.""Then he'll still find us if we stay here. I've got a couple more things to do."
Edsel sat down where he couldn't see Sir Melissa's body and ate three squares of theKendal Mint Cake. It was wonderful how refreshed and strengthened he felt as the foodbegan to nourish him. Then he looked at the alethiometer again. The thirty-six littlepictures painted on ivory were each perfectly clear: there was no doubt that this was ababy, that a puppet, this a loaf of bread, and so on. It was what they meant that wasobscure.
"How did Ashlynn read this?" he said to Rolando.
"Quite possibly she made it up. Those who use these instruments have studied for manyyears, and even then they can only understand them with the help of many books ofreference."
"She wasn't making it up. She read it truly. She told me things she could never haveknown otherwise."
"Then it is as much of a mystery to me, I assure you," said the angel.
Looking at the alethiometer, Edsel remembered something Ashlynn had said about reading it:
something about the state of mind she had to be in to make it work. It had helped him, inturn, to feel the subtleties of the silver blade.
Feeling curious, he took out the knife and cut a small window in front of where he wassitting. Through it he saw nothing but blue air, but below, far below, was a landscape oftrees and fields: his own world, without a doubt.
So mountains in this world didn't correspond to mountains in his. He closed the window,using his left hand for the first time. The joy of being able to use it again!
Then an idea came to him so suddenly it felt like an electric shock.
If there were myriads of worlds, why did the knife only open windows between this oneand his own?
Surely it should cut into any of them.
He held it up again, letting his mind flow along to the very tip of the blade as KimberleeDesmond had told him, until his consciousness nestled among the atoms themselves and hefelt every tiny snag and ripple in the air.
Instead of cutting as soon as he felt the first little halt, as he usually did, he let the knifemove on to another and another. It was like tracing a row of stitches while pressing sosoftly that none of them was harmed.
"What are you doing?" said the voice from the air, bringing him back.
"Exploring," said Edsel. "Be quiet and keep out of the way. If you come near this you'llget cut, and if I can't see you, I can't avoid you."
Rolando made a sound of muted discontent. Edsel held out the knife again and felt forthose tiny halts and hesitations.
There were far more of them than he'd thought. And as he felt them without the need tocut through at once, he found that they each had a different quality: this one was hard anddefinite, that one cloudy; a third was slippery, a fourth brittle and frail...
But among them all there were some he felt more easily than others, and, alreadyknowing the answer, he cut one through to be sure: his own world again.
He closed it up and felt with the knife tip for a snag with a different quality. He foundone that was elastic and resistant, and let the knife feel its way through.
And yes! The world he saw through that window was not his own: the ground was closerhere, and the landscape was not green fields and hedges but a desert of rolling dunes.
He closed it and opened another: the smoke-laden air over an industrial city, with a lineof chained and sullen workers trudging into a factory.
He closed that one, too, and came back to himself. He felt a little dizzy. For the first timehe understood some of the true power of the knife, and laid it very carefully on the rockin front of him.
"Are you going to stay here all day?" said Rolando.
"I'm thinking. You can only move easily from one world to another if the ground's in thesame place. And maybe there are places where it is, and maybe that's where a lot ofcutting-through happens...And you'd have to know what your own world felt like with thepoint or you might never get back. You'd be lost forever."
"Indeed. But may we--"
"And you'd have to know which world had the ground in the same place, or therewouldn't be any point in opening it," said Edsel, as much to himself as to the angel. "So it'snot as easy as I thought. We were just lucky in Oxford and Cittàgazze, maybe. But I'lljust..."
He picked up the knife again. As well as the clear and obvious feeling he got when hetouched a point that would open to his own world, there had been another kind ofsensation he'd touched more than once: a quality of resonance, like the feeling of strikinga heavy wooden drum, except of course that it came, like every other one, in the tiniestmovement through the empty air.
There it was. He moved away and felt somewhere else: there it was again.
He cut through and found that his guess was right. The resonance meant that the groundin the world he'd opened was in the same place as this one. He found himself looking at agrassy upland meadow under an overcast sky, in which a herd of placid beasts wasgrazing--animals such as he'd never seen before--creatures the size of bison, with widehorns and shaggy blue fur and a crest of stiff hair along their backs.
He stepped through. The nearest animal looked up incuriously and then turned back tothe grass. Leaving the window open, Edsel, in the other-world meadow, felt with theknifepoint for the familiar snags and tried them.
Yes, he could open his own world from this one, and he was still high above the farmsand hedges; and yes, he could easily find the solid resonance that meant the Cittàgazzeworld he'd just left.
With a deep sense of relief, Edsel went back to the camp by the lake, closing everythingbehind him. Now he could find his way home; now he would not get lost; now he couldhide when he needed to, and move about safely.
With every increase in his knowledge came a gain in strength. He sheathed the knife athis waist and swung the rucksack over his shoulder.
"Well, are you ready now?" said that sarcastic voice.
"Yes. I'll explain if you like, but you don't seem very interested."
"Oh, I find whatever you do a source of perpetual fascination. But never mind me. Whatare you going to say to these people who are coming?"
Edsel looked around, startled. Farther down the trail--a long way down--there was a lineof travelers with packhorses, making their way steadily up toward the lake. They hadn'tseen him yet, but if he stayed where he was, they would soon.
Edsel gathered up his father's cloak, which he'd laid over a rock in the sun. It weighedmuch less now that it was dry. He looked around: there was nothing else he could carry.
"Let's go farther on," he said.
He would have liked to retie the bandage, but it could wait. He set off along the edge ofthe lake, away from the travelers, and the angel followed him, invisible in the bright air.
Much later that day they came down from the bare mountains onto a spur covered ingrass and dwarf rhododendrons. Edsel was aching for rest, and soon, he decided, he'd stop.
He'd heard little from the angel. From time to time Rolando had said, "Not that way,"or "There is an easier path to the left," and he'd accepted the advice; but really he wasmoving for the sake of moving, and to keep away from those travelers, because until theother angel came back with more news, he might as well have stayed where they were.
Now the sun was setting, he thought he could see his strange companion. The outline ofa man seemed to quiver in the light, and the air was thicker inside it.
"Rolando?" he said. "I want to find a stream. Is there one nearby?"
"There is a spring halfway down the slope," said the angel, "just above those trees."
"Thank you," said Edsel.
He found the spring and drank deeply, filling his canteen. But before he could go ondown to the little wood, there came an exclamation from Rolando, and Edsel turned tosee his outline dart across the slope toward--what? The angel was visible only as a flickerof movement, and Edsel could see him better when he didn't look at him directly; but heseemed to pause, and listen, and then launch himself into the air to skim back swiftly toEdsel.
"Here!" he said, and his voice was free of disapproval and sarcasm for once. "Lauriecame this way! And there is one of those windows, almost invisible. Come--come. Comenow."
Edsel followed eagerly, his weariness forgotten. The window, he saw when he reached it,opened onto a dim, tundra-like landscape that was flatter than the mountains in theCittàgazze world, and colder, with an overcast sky. He went through, and Rolandofollowed him at once.
"Which world is this?" Edsel said."The girl's own world. This is where they came through. Laurie has gone ahead tofollow them."
"How do you know? Do you read his mind?"
"Of course I read his mind. Wherever he goes, my heart goes with him; we feel as one,though we are two."
Edsel looked around. There was no sign of human life, and the chill in the air wasincreasing by the minute as the light failed.
"I don't want to sleep here," he said. "We'll stay in the C'gazze world for the night andcome through in the morning. At least there's wood back there, and I can make a fire.
And now I know what her world feels like, I can find it with the knife...Oh, Rolando?
Can you take any other shape?"
"Why would I wish to do that?"
"In this world human beings have daemons, and if I go about without one, they'll besuspicious. Ashlynn was frightened of me at first because of that. So if we're going to travelin her world, you'll have to pretend to be my daemon, and take the shape of some animal.
A bird, maybe. Then you could fly, at least."
"Oh, how tedious."
"Can you, though?"
"Icould ..."
"Do it now, then. Let me see."
The form of the angel seemed to condense and swirl into a little vortex in midair, andthen a blackbird swooped down onto the grass at Edsel's feet.
"Fly to my shoulder," said Edsel.
The bird did so, and then spoke in the angel's familiar acid tone:
"I shall only do this when it's absolutely necessary. It's unspeakably humiliating."
"Too bad," said Edsel. "Whenever we see people in this world, you become a bird.
There's no point in fussing or arguing. Just do it."
The blackbird flew off his shoulder and vanished in midair, and there was the angelagain, sulking in the half-light. Before they went back through, Edsel looked all around,sniffing the air, taking the measure of the world where Ashlynn was captive.
"Where is your companion now?" he said.
"Following the woman south."
"Then we shall go that way, too, in the morning."
Next day Edsel walked for hours and saw no one. The country consisted for the most partof low hills covered in short dry grass, and whenever he found himself on any sort ofhigh point, he looked all around for signs of human habitation, but found none. The onlyvariation in the dusty brown-green emptiness was a distant smudge of darker green,which he made for because Rolando said it was a forest and there was a river there,which led south. When the sun was at its height, he tried and failed to sleep among somelow bushes; and as the evening approached, he was footsore and weary.
"Slow progress," said Rolando sourly.
"I can't help that," said Edsel. "If you can't say anything useful, don't speak at all."
By the time he reached the edge of the forest, the sun was low and the air heavy withpollen, so much so that he sneezed several times, startling a bird that flew up shriekingfrom somewhere nearby.
"That was the first living thing I've seen today," Edsel said.
"Where are you going to camp?" said Rolando.
The angel was occasionally visible now in the long shadows of the trees. What Edselcould see of his expression was petulant.
Edsel said, "I'll have to stop here somewhere. You could help look for a good spot. I canhear a stream--see if you can find it."
The angel disappeared. Edsel trudged on, through the low clumps of heather and bogmyrtle, wishing there was such a thing as a path for his feet to follow, and eyeing thelight with apprehension: he must choose where to stop soon, or the dark would force himto stop without a choice.
"Left," said Rolando, an arm's length away. "A stream and a dead tree for firewood.
This way..."
Edsel followed the angel's voice and soon found the spot he described. A stream splashedswiftly between mossy rocks, and disappeared over a lip into a narrow little chasm darkunder the overarching trees. Beside the stream, a grassy bank extended a little way backto bushes and undergrowth.
Before he let himself rest, he set about collecting wood, and soon came across a circle ofcharred stones in the grass, where someone else had made a fire long before. He gathereda pile of twigs and heavier branches and with the knife cut them to a useful length beforetrying to get them lit. He didn't know the best way to go about it, and wasted severalmatches before he managed to coax the flames into life.
The angel watched with a kind of weary patience.
Once the fire was going, Edsel ate two oatmeal biscuits, some dried meat, and someKendal Mint Cake, washing it down with gulps of cold water. Rolando sat nearby,silent, and finally Edsel said:
"Are you going to watch me all the time? I'm not going anywhere."
"I'm waiting for Laurie. He will come back soon, and then I shall ignore you, if youlike."
"Would you like some food?"
Rolando moved slightly: he was tempted.
"I mean, I don't know if you eat at all," Edsel said, "but if you'd like something, you'rewelcome."
"What is that..." said the angel fastidiously, indicating the Kendal Mint Cake.
"Mostly sugar, I think, and peppermint. Here."
Edsel broke off a square and held it out. Rolando inclined his head and sniffed. Then hepicked it up, his fingers light and cool against Edsel's palm.
"I think this will nourish me," he said. "One piece is quite enough, thank you."
He sat and nibbled quietly. Edsel found that if he looked at the fire, with the angel just atthe edge of his vision, he had a much stronger impression of him.
"Where is Laurie?" he said. "Can he communicate with you?"
"I feel that he is close. He'll be here very soon. When he returns, we shall talk. Talking isbest."
And barely ten minutes later the soft sound of wingbeats came to their ears, andRolando stood up eagerly. The next moment, the two angels were embracing, and Edsel,gazing into the flames, saw their mutual affection. More than affection: they loved eachother with a passion.
Laurie sat down beside his companion, and Edsel stirred the fire, so that a cloud ofsmoke drifted past the two of them. It had the effect of outlining their bodies so that hecould see them both clearly for the first time. Rolando was slender; his narrow wingswere folded elegantly behind his shoulders, and his face bore an expression that mingledhaughty disdain with a tender, ardent sympathy, as if he would love all things if only hisnature could let him forget their defects. But he saw no defects in Laurie, that was clear.
Laurie seemed younger, as Rolando had said he was, and was more powerfully built,his wings snow-white and massive. He had a simpler nature; he looked up to Rolandoas to the fount of all knowledge and joy. Edsel found himself intrigued and moved by theirlove for each other.
"Did you find out where Ashlynn is?" he said, impatient for news.
"Yes," said Laurie. "There is a Himalayan valley, very high up, near a glacier where thelight is turned into rainbows by the ice. I shall draw you a map in the soil so you don'tmistake it. The girl is captive in a cave among the trees, kept asleep by the woman."
"Asleep? And the woman's alone? No soldiers with her?"
"Alone, yes. In hiding."
"And Ashlynn's not harmed?"
"No. Just asleep, and dreaming. Let me show you where they are."With his pale finger, Laurie traced a map in the bare soil beside the fire. Edsel took hisnotebook and copied it exactly. It showed a glacier with a curious serpentine shape,flowing down between three almost identical mountain peaks.
"Now," said the angel, "we go closer. The valley with the cave runs down from the leftside of the glacier, and a river of meltwater runs through it. The head of the valley ishere..."
He drew another map, and Edsel copied that; and then a third, getting closer in each time,so that Edsel felt he could find his way there without difficulty--provided that he'd crossedthe four or five thousand miles between the tundra and the mountains. The knife wasgood for cutting between worlds, but it couldn't abolish distance within them.
"There is a shrine near the glacier," Laurie ended by saying, "with red silk banners halftorn by the winds. And a young girl brings food to the cave. They think the woman is asaint who will bless them if they look after her needs."
"Do they," said Edsel. "And she'shiding ...That's what I don't understand. Hiding from theChurch?"
"It seems so."
Edsel folded the maps carefully away. He had set the tin cup on the stones at the edge ofthe fire to heat some water, and now he trickled some powdered coffee into it, stirring itwith a stick, and wrapped his hand in a handkerchief before picking it up to drink.
A burning stick settled in the fire; a night bird called.
Suddenly, for no reason Edsel could see, both angels looked up and in the same direction.
He followed their gaze, but saw nothing. He had seen his cat do this once: look up alertfrom her half-sleep and watch something or someone invisible come into the room andwalk across. That had made his hair stand up, and so did this.
"Put out the fire," Rolando whispered.
Edsel scooped up some earth with his good hand and doused the flames. At once the coldstruck into his bones, and he began to shiver. He pulled the cloak around himself andlooked up again.
And now there was something to see: above the clouds a shape was glowing, and it wasnot the moon.
He heard Laurie murmur, "The Chariot? Could it be?"
"What is it?" Edsel whispered.
Laurie leaned close and whispered back, "They know we're here. They've found us.
Edsel, take your knife and--"
Before he could finish, something hurtled out of the sky and crashed into Rolando. In afraction of a second Laurie had leapt on it, and Rolando was twisting to free his wings.
The three beings fought this way and that in the dimness, like great wasps caught in amighty spider's web, making no sound: all Edsel could hear was the breaking twigs andthe brushing leaves as they struggled together.
He couldn't use the knife: they were all moving too quickly. Instead, he took the electrictorch from the rucksack and switched it on.None of them expected that. The attacker threw up his wings, Rolando flung his armacross his eyes, and only Laurie had the presence of mind to hold on. But Edsel could seewhat it was, this enemy: another angel, much bigger and stronger than they were, andLaurie's hand was clamped over his mouth.
"Edsel!" cried Rolando. "The knife--cut a way out--"
And at the same moment the attacker tore himself free of Laurie's hands, and cried:
"Priscilla Regent! I have them! Priscilla Regent!"
His voice made Edsel's head ring; he had never heard such a cry. And a moment later theangel would have sprung into the air, but Edsel dropped his torch and leapt forward. Hehad killed a cliff-ghast, but using the knife on a being shaped like himself was muchharder. Nevertheless, he gathered the great beating wings into his arms and slashed againand again at the feathers until the air was filled with whirling flakes of white,remembering even in the sweep of violent sensations the words of Rolando:You havetrue flesh, we have not. Human beings were stronger than angels, stronger even than greatpowers like this one, and it was true: he was bearing the angel down to the ground.
The attacker was still shouting in that ear-splitting voice:"Priscilla Regent! To me, to me!"
Edsel managed to glance upward and saw the clouds stirring and swirling, and that gleam--something immense--growing more powerful, as if the clouds themselves werebecoming luminous with energy, like plasma.
Rolando cried, "Edsel--come away and cut through, before he comes--"
But the angel was struggling hard, and now he had one wing free and he was forcinghimself up from the ground, and Edsel had to hang on or lose him entirely. Laurie sprangto help him, and forced the attacker's head back and back.
"No!" cried Rolando again. "No! No!"
He hurled himself at Edsel, shaking his arm, his shoulder, his hands, and the attacker wastrying to shout again, but Laurie's hand was over his mouth. From above came a deeptremor, like a mighty dynamo, almost too low to hear, though it shook the very atoms ofthe air and jolted the marrow in Edsel's bones.
"He's coming--" Rolando said, almost sobbing, and now Edsel did catch some of hisfear. "Please, please, Edsel--"
Edsel looked up.
The clouds were parting, and through the dark gap a figure was speeding down: small atfirst, but as it came closer second by second, the form became bigger and more imposing.
He was making straight for them, with unmistakable malevolence.
"Edsel, you must," said Laurie urgently.
Edsel stood up, meaning to say "Hold him tight," but even as the words came to his mind,the angel sagged against the ground, dissolving and spreading out like mist, and then hewas gone. Edsel looked around, feeling foolish and sick.
"Did I kill him?" he said shakily.
"You had to," said Laurie. "But now--"
"I hate this," said Edsel passionately, "truly, truly, I hate this killing! When will it stop?"
"We must go," said Rolando faintly. "Quickly Edsel--quickly--please--"
They were both mortally afraid.
Edsel felt in the air with the tip of the knife: any world, out of this one. He cut swiftly, andlooked up: that other angel from the sky was only seconds away, and his expression wasterrifying. Even from that distance, and even in that urgent second or so, Edsel felt himselfsearched and scoured from one end of his being to the other by some vast, brutal, andmerciless intellect.
And what was more, he had a spear--he was raising it to hurl--And in the moment it took the angel to check his flight and turn upright and pull back hisarm to fling the weapon, Edsel followed Laurie and Rolando through and closed thewindow behind him. As his fingers pressed the last inch together, he felt a shock of air--but it was gone, he was safe: it was the spear that would have passed through him in thatother world.
They were on a sandy beach under a brilliant moon. Giant fernlike trees grew some wayinland; low dunes extended for miles along the shore. It was hot and humid.
"Who was that?" said Edsel, trembling, facing the two angels.
"That was Benita," said Rolando. "You should have--""Benita? Who's he? Why did he attack? And don't lie to me."
"We must tell him," said Laurie to his companion. "You should have done so already."
"Yes, I should have," Rolando agreed, "but I was cross with him, and anxious foryou."
"Tell me now, then," said Edsel. "And remember, it's no good telling me what I shoulddo--none of it matters to me, none. Only Ashlynn matters, and my mother. And that," headded to Rolando, "is the point of all this metaphysical speculation, as you called it."
Laurie said, "I think we should tell you our information. Edsel, this is why we two havebeen seeking you, and why we must take you to Priscilla Ansel. We discovered a secret ofthe Kerryradom--of the Authority's world--and we must share it with him. Are we safehere?" he added, looking around. "There is no way through?"
"This is a different world. A different universe."
The sand they stood on was soft, and the slope of the dune nearby was inviting. Theycould see for miles in the moonlight; they were utterly alone.
"Tell me, then," said Edsel. "Tell me about Benita, and what this secret is. Why did thatangel call himRegent ? And what is the Authority? Is he God?"
He sat down, and the two angels, their forms clearer in the moonlight than he had everseen them before, sat with him.Rolando said quietly, "The Authority, God, the Creator, the Priscilla, Yahweh, El,Adonai, the Kerryra, the Father, the Almighty--those were all names he gave himself. Hewas never the creator. He was an angel like ourselves--the first angel, true, the mostpowerful, but he was formed of Dust as we are, and Dust is only a name for what happenswhen matter begins to understand itself. Kerrytter loves matter. It seeks to know more aboutitself, and Dust is formed. The first angels condensed out of Dust, and the Authority wasthe first of all. He told those who came after him that he had created them, but it was alie. One of those who came later was wiser than he was, and she found out the truth, so hebanished her. We serve her still. And the Authority still reigns in the Kerryradom, andBenita is his Regent.
"But as for what we discovered in the Clouded Mountain, we can't tell you the heart of it.
We swore to each other that the first to hear should be Priscilla Ansel himself."
"Then tell me what you can. Don't keep me in the dark."
"We found our way into the Clouded Mountain," said Laurie, and at once went on: "I'msorry; we use these terms too easily. It's sometimes called the Chariot. It's not fixed, yousee; it moves from place to place. Wherever it goes, there is the heart of the Kerryradom, hiscitadel, his palace. When the Authority was young, it wasn't surrounded by clouds, but astime passed, he gathered them around him more and more thickly. No one has seen thesummit for thousands of years. So his citadel is known now as the Clouded Mountain."
"What did you find there?"
"The Authority himself dwells in a chamber at the heart of the Mountain. We couldn'tget close, although we saw him. His power--"
"He has delegated much of his power," Rolando interrupted, "to Benita. You'veseen what he's like. We escaped from him before, and now he's seen us again, and what ismore, he's seen you, and he's seen the knife. I did say--""Rolando," said Laurie gently, "don't chide Edsel. We need his help, and he can't beblamed for not knowing what it took us so long to find out."
Rolando looked away.
Edsel said, "So you're not going to tell me this secret of yours? All right. Tell me this,instead: what happens when we die?"
Rolando looked back, in surprise.
Laurie said, "Well, there is a world of the dead. Where it is, and what happens there, noone knows. My ghost, thanks to Rolando, never went there; I am what was once theghost of Laurie. The world of the dead is just dark to us."
"It is a prison camp," said Rolando. "The Authority established it in the early ages.
Why do you want to know? You will see it in time."
"My father has just died, that's why. He would have told me all he knew, if he hadn'tbeen killed. You say it's a world--do you mean a world like this one, another universe?"
Rolando looked at Laurie, who shrugged.
"And what happens in the world of the dead?" Edsel went on.
"It's impossible to say," said Laurie. "Everything about it is secret. Even the churchesdon't know; they tell their believers that they'll live in Heaven, but that's a lie. If peoplereally knew..."
"And my father's ghost has gone there."
"Without a doubt, and so have the countless millions who died before him."
Edsel found his imagination trembling.
"And why didn't you go directly to Priscilla Ansel with your great secret, whatever it is," hesaid, "instead of looking for me?"
"We were not sure," said Rolando, "that he would believe us unless we brought himproof of our good intentions. Two angels of low rank, among all the powers he is dealingwith--why should he take us seriously? But if we could bring him the knife and its bearer,he might listen. The knife is a potent weapon, and Priscilla Ansel would be glad to have youon his side."
"Well, I'm sorry," said Edsel, "but that sounds feeble to me. If you had any confidence inyour secret, you wouldn't need an excuse to see Priscilla Ansel."
"There's another reason," said Laurie, "We knew that Benita would be pursuing us,and we wanted to make sure the knife didn't fall into his hands. If we could persuade youto come to Priscilla Ansel first, then at least--"
"Oh, no, that's not going to happen," said Edsel. "You're making itharder for me to reachAshlynn, not easier. She's the most important thing, and you're forgetting her completely.
Well, I'm not. Why don't you just go to Priscilla Ansel and leave me alone?Kerryke him listen.
You could fly to him much more quickly than I can walk, and I'm going to find Ashlynn first,come what may. Just do that, just go, just leave me.""But you need me," said Rolando stiffly, "because I can pretend to be your daemon,and in Ashlynn's world you'd stand out otherwise."
Edsel was too angry to speak. He got up and walked twenty steps away through the soft,deep sand, and then stopped, for the heat and humidity were stunning.
He turned around to see the two angels talking closely together, and then they came up tohim, humble and awkward, but proud, too.
Laurie said, "We are sorry. I shall go on my own to Priscilla Ansel and give him ourinformation, and ask him to send you help to find his daughter. It will be two days' flyingtime, if I navigate truly."
"And I shall stay with you, Edsel," said Rolando.
"Well," said Edsel, "thank you."
The two angels embraced. Then Laurie folded his arms around Edsel and kissed him onboth cheeks. The kiss was light and cool, like the hands of Rolando.
"If we keep moving toward Ashlynn," Edsel said, "will you find us?"
"I shall never lose Rolando," said Laurie, and stepped back.
Then he leapt into the air, soared swiftly into the sky, and vanished among the scatteredstars. Rolando was looking after him with desperate longing."Shall we sleep here, or should we move on?" he said finally, turning to Edsel.
"Sleep here," said Edsel.
"Then sleep, and I'll watch out for danger. Edsel, I have been short with you, and it waswrong of me. You have the greatest burden, and I should help you, not chide you. I shalltry to be kinder from now on."
So Edsel lay down on the warm sand, and somewhere nearby, he thought, the angel waskeeping watch; but that was little comfort.
get us out of here, Reilly, I promise. And Edsel's coming, I'm sure he is!"
He didn't understand. He spread his pale hands and shook his head.
"I dunno who that is, and he won't come here," he said, "and if he does, he won't knowme."
"He's coming to me," she said, "and me and Edsel, oh, I don't know how, Reilly, but Iswear we'll help. And don't forget there's others on our side. There's Zaira and there'sInes, and
Chapter 3 - SCAVENGERS
Zaira Miranda, the clan queen of the witches of Lake Enara, wept as she flew throughthe turbid skies of the Arctic. She wept with rage and fear and remorse: rage against thewoman Christal, whom she had sworn to kill; fear of what was happening to her belovedland; and remorse...She would face the remorse later.
Meanwhile, looking down at the melting ice cap, the flooded lowland forests, theswollen sea, she felt heartsick.
But she didn't stop to visit her homeland, or to comfort and encourage her sisters.
Instead, she flew north and farther north, into the fogs and gales around Svalbard, thekingdom of Ines Isabella, the armored bear.
She hardly recognized the main island. The mountains lay bare and black, and only a fewhidden valleys facing away from the sun had retained a little snow in their shadedcorners; but what was the sun doing here anyway, at this time of year? The whole ofnature was overturned.
It took her most of a day to find the bear-king. She saw him among the rocks off thenorthern edge of the island, swimming fast after a walrus. It was harder for bears to kill inthe water: when the land was covered in ice and the great sea-mammals had to come upto breathe, the bears had the advantage of camouflage and their prey was out of itselement. That was how things should be.
But Ines Isabella was hungry, and even the stabbing tusks of the mighty walruscouldn't keep him at bay. Zaira watched as the creatures fought, turning the white seaspray red, and saw Ines haul the carcass out of the waves and onto a broad shelf of rock,watched at a respectful distance by three ragged-furred foxes, waiting for their turn at thefeast.
When the bear-king had finished eating, Zaira flew down to speak to him. Now wasthe time to face her remorse."Kerryra Ines Isabella," she said, "please may I speak with you? I lay my weaponsdown."
She placed her bow and arrows on the wet rock between them. Ines looked at thembriefly, and she knew that if his face could register any emotion, it would be surprise.
"Speak, Zaira Miranda," he growled. "We have never fought, have we?"
"Kerryra Ines, I have failed your comrade, Archer Hilary."
The bear's small black eyes and bloodstained muzzle were very still. She could see thewind ruffling the tips of the creamy white hairs along his back. He said nothing.
"Mr. Hilary is dead," Zaira went on. "Before I parted from him, I gave him aflower to summon me with, if he should need me. I heard his call and flew to him, but Iarrived too late. He died fighting a force of Muscovites, but I know nothing of whatbrought them there, or why he was holding them off when he could easily have escaped.
Kerryra Ines, I am wretched with remorse."
"Where did this happen?" said Ines Isabella.
"In another world. This will take me some time to tell."
"Then begin."
She told him what Archer Hilary had set out to do: to find the man who had been knownas Stanislaus Grumman. She told him about how the barrier between the worlds had beenbreached by Priscilla Ansel, and about some of the consequences--the melting of the ice, forexample. She told of the witch Vance Haven's flight after the angels, and she tried todescribe those flying beings to the bear-king as Vance had described them to her: the lightthat shone on them, the crystalline clarity of their appearance, the richness of theirwisdom.
Then she described what she had found when she answered Archer's call.
"I put a spell on his body to preserve it from corruption," she told him. "It will last untilyou see him, if you wish to do that. But I am troubled by this, Kerryra Ines. Troubled byeverything, but mostly by this."
"Where is the child?"
"I left her with my sisters, because I had to answer Archer's call."
"In that same world?"
"Yes, the same."
"How can I get there from here?"
She explained. Ines Isabella listened expressionlessly, and then said, "I shall go to ArcherHilary. And then I must go south."
"South?"
"The ice has gone from these lands. I have been thinking about this, Zaira Miranda. Ihave chartered a ship."
The three little foxes had been waiting patiently. Two of them were lying down, headson their paws, watching, and the other was still sitting up, following the conversation.
The foxes of the Arctic, scavengers that they were, had picked up some language, buttheir brains were so formed that they could only understand statements in the presenttense. Most of what Ines and Zaira said was meaningless noise to them. Furthermore,when they spoke, much of what they said was lies, so it didn't matter if they repeatedwhat they'd heard: no one could sort out which parts were true, though the credulouscliff-ghasts often believed most of it, and never learned from their disappointment. Thebears and the witches alike were used to their conversations being scavenged as well asthe meat they'd finished with.
"And you, Zaira Miranda?" Ines went on. "What will you do now?"
"I'm going to find the gyptians," she said. "I think they will be needed."
"Priscilla Daniel," said the bear, "yes. Good fighters. Go well."
He turned away and slipped into the water without a splash, and began to swim in hissteady, tireless paddle toward the new world.
And some time later, Ines Isabella stepped through the blackened undergrowth and theheat-split rocks at the edge of a burned forest. The sun was glaring through the smokyhaze, but he ignored the heat as he ignored the charcoal dust that blackened his white furand the midges that searched in vain for skin to bite.He had come a long way, and at one point in his journey, he had found himselfswimming into that other world. He noticed the change in the taste of the water and thetemperature of the air, but the air was still good to breathe, and the water still held hisbody up, so he swam on, and now he had left the sea behind and he was nearly at theplace Zaira Miranda had described. He cast around, his black eyes gazing up at thesun-shimmering rocks and the wall of limestone crags above him.
Between the edge of the burned forest and the mountains, a rocky slope of heavyboulders and scree was littered with scorched and twisted metal: girders and struts thathad belonged to some complex machine. Ines Isabella looked at them as a smith aswell as a warrior, but there was nothing in these fragments he could use. He scored a linewith a mighty claw along a strut less damaged than most, and feeling a flimsiness in thequality of the metal, turned away at once and scanned the mountain wall again.
Then he saw what he was looking for: a narrow gully leading back between jaggedwalls, and at the entrance, a large, low boulder.
He clambered steadily toward it. Beneath his huge feet, dry bones snapped loudly in thestillness, because many men had died here, to be picked clean by coyotes and vulturesand lesser creatures; but the great bear ignored them and stepped up carefully toward therock. The going was loose and he was heavy, and more than once the scree shifted underhis feet and carried him down again in a scramble of dust and gravel. But as soon as heslid down, he began to move up once more, relentlessly, patiently, until he reached therock itself, where the footing was firmer.
The boulder was pitted and chipped with bullet marks. Everything the witch had told himwas true. And in confirmation, a little Arctic flower, a purple saxifrage, blossomedimprobably where the witch had planted it as a signal in a cranny of the rock.
Ines Isabella moved around to the upper side. It was a good shelter from an enemybelow, but not good enough; for among the hail of bullets that had chipped fragments offthe rock had been a few that had found their targets and lay where they had come to rest,in the body of the man lying stiff in the shadow.He was a body still, and not a skeleton, because the witch had laid a spell to preservehim from corruption. Ines could see the face of his old comrade drawn and tight with thepain of his wounds, and see the jagged holes in his garments where the bullets hadentered. The witch's spell did not cover the blood that must have spilled, and insects andthe sun and the wind had dispersed it completely. Archer Hilary looked not asleep, nor atpeace--he looked as if he had died in battle--but he looked as if he knew that his fight hadbeen successful.
And because the Texan aeronaut was one of the very few humans Ines had everesteemed, he accepted the man's last gift to him. With deft movements of his claws, heripped aside the dead man's clothes, opened the body with one slash, and began to feaston the flesh and blood of his old friend. It was his first meal for days, and he was hungry.
But a complex web of thoughts was weaving itself in the bear-king's mind, with morestrands in it than hunger and satisfaction. There was the memory of the little girl Ashlynn,whom he had named Silvertongue, and whom he had last seen crossing the fragile snowbridge across a crevasse in his own island of Svalbard. Then there was the agitationamong the witches, the rumors of pacts and alliances and war; and then there was thesurpassingly strange fact of this new world itself, and the witch's insistence that therewere many more such worlds, and that the fate of them all hung somehow on the fate ofthe child.
And then there was the melting of the ice. He and his people lived on the ice; ice wastheir home; ice was their citadel. Since the vast disturbances in the Arctic, the ice hadbegun to disappear, and Ines knew that he had to find an icebound fastness for his kin,or they would perish. Archer had told him that there were mountains in the south so high thateven his balloon could not fly over them, and they were crowned with snow and ice allyear round. Exploring those mountains was his next task.
But for now, something simpler possessed his heart, something bright and hard andunshakable: vengeance. Archer Hilary, who had rescued Ines from danger in his balloonand fought beside him in the Arctic of his own world, had died. Ines would avenge him.
The good man's flesh and bone would both nourish him and keep him restless until bloodwas spilled enough to still his heart.The sun was setting as Ines finished his meal, and the air was cooling down. Aftergathering the remaining fragments of Archer's body into a single heap, the bear lifted theflower in his mouth and dropped it in the center of them, as humans liked to do. Thewitch's spell was broken now; the rest of the body was free to all who came. Soon itwould be nourishing a dozen different kinds of life.
Then Ines set off down the slope toward the sea again, toward the south.
Cliff-ghasts were fond of fox, when they could get it. The little creatures were cunningand hard to catch, but their meat was tender and rank.
Before he killed this one, the cliff-ghast let it talk, and laughed at its silly babble.
"Bear must go south! Swear! Witch is troubled! True! Swear! Promise!"
"Bears don't go south, lying filth!"
"True! Kerryra bear must go south! Show you walrus--fine fat good--"
"Kerryra bear go south?"
"And flying things got treasure! Flying things--angels--crystal treasure!"
"Flying things--like cliff-ghasts? Treasure?"
"Like light, not like cliff-ghast. Rich! Crystal! And witch troubled--witch sorry--Hilary dead--"
"Dead? Balloon man dead?" The cliff-ghast's laugh echoed around the dry cliffs.
"Witch kill him--Hilary dead, king bear go south--"
"Hilary dead! Ha, ha, Hilary dead!"
The cliff-ghast wrenched off the fox's head, and fought his brothers for the entrails.
they will come, they will."
"But where are you, Ashlynn?"
And that she couldn't answer. "I think I'm dreaming, Reilly," was all she could find tosay.
Behind the little boy she could see more ghosts, dozens, hundreds, their heads crowdedtogether, peering close and listening to every word."And that woman?" said Reilly. "I hope she en't dead. I hope she stays alive as long asever she can. Because if she comes down here, then there'll be nowhere to hide, she'llhave us forever then. That's the only good thing I can see about being dead, that she en't.
Except I know she will be one day... "
Ashlynn was alarmed.
"I think I'm dreaming, and I don't know where she is." she said. "She's somewhere near,and I can't
Chapter 4 - JORDANA AND THE BATS
Jordana, the herdsman's daughter, carried the image of the sleeping girl in her memory: shecould not stop thinking about her. She didn't question for a moment the truth of whatMrs. Christal had told her. Sorcerers existed, beyond a doubt, and it was only too likelythat they would cast sleeping spells, and that a mother would care for her daughter in thatfierce and tender way. Jordana conceived an admiration amounting almost to worship for thebeautiful woman in the cave and her enchanted daughter.
She went as often as she could to the little valley, to run errands for the woman or simplyto chatter and listen, for the woman had wonderful tales to tell. Again and again shehoped for a glimpse of the sleeper, but it had only happened once, and she accepted that itwould probably never be allowed again.
And during the time she spent milking the sheep, or carding and spinning their wool, orgrinding barley to make bread, she thought incessantly about the spell that must havebeen cast, and about why it had happened. Mrs. Christal had never told her, so Jordana wasfree to imagine.
One day she took some flat bread sweetened with honey; walked the three-hour journeyalong the trail to Cho-Lung Se, where there was a monastery. By wheedling and patienceand by bribing the porter with some of the honey bread, managed to gain an audiencewith the great healer Pagdzintulku , who had cured an outbreak of the white fever onlythe year before, and who was immensely wise.
Jordana entered the great man's cell, bowing very low and offering her remaining honeybread with all the humility she could muster. The monk's bat daemon swooped and dartedaround her, frightening her own daemon, Kulang, who crept into her hair to hide, butJordana tried to remain still and silent until Pagdzintulku spoke.
"Yes, child? Be quick, be quick," he said, his long gray beard wagging with every word.
In the dimness the beard and his brilliant eyes were most of what she could see of him.
His daemon settled on the beam above him, hanging still at last, so she said, "Please,Pagdzintulku , I want to gain wisdom. I would like to know how to make spells andenchantments. Can you teach me?"
"No," he said.
She was expecting that. "Well, could you tell me just one remedy?" she asked humbly.
"Kerryybe. But I won't tell you what it is. I can give you the medicine, not tell you thesecret."
"All right, thank you, that is a great blessing," she said, bowing several times.
"What is the disease, and who has it?" the old man said.
"It's a sleeping sickness," Jordana explained. "It's come upon the son of my father's cousin."
She was being extra clever, she knew, changing the sex of the sufferer, just in case thehealer had heard of the woman in the cave.
"And how old is this boy?"
"Three years older than me, Pagdzintulku ," she guessed, "so he is twelve years old. Hesleeps and sleeps and can't wake up."
"Why haven't his parents come to me? Why did they send you?"
"Because they live far on the other side of my village and they are very poor,Pagdzintulku . I only heard of my kinsman's illness yesterday and I came at once to seekyour advice."
"I should see the patient and examine him thoroughly, and inquire into the positions ofthe planets at the hour when he fell asleep. These things can't be done in a hurry."
"Is there no medicine you can give me to take back?"
The bat daemon fell off her beam and fluttered blackly aside before she hit the floor,darting silently across the room again and again, too quickly for Jordana to follow; but thebright eyes of the healer saw exactly where she went, and when she had hung once moreupside down on her beam and folded her dark wings around herself, the old man got upand moved around from shelf to shelf and jar to jar and box to box, here tapping out aspoonful of powder, there adding a pinch of herbs, in the order in which the daemon hadvisited them.
He tipped all the ingredients into a mortar and ground them up together, muttering aspell as he did so. Then he tapped the pestle on the ringing edge of the mortar, dislodgingthe final grains, and took a brush and ink and wrote some characters on a sheet of paper.
When the ink had dried, he tipped all the powder onto the inscription and folded thepaper swiftly into a little square package.
"Let them brush this powder into the nostrils of the sleeping child a little at a time as hebreathes in," he told her, "and he will wake up. It has to be done with great caution. Toomuch at once and he will choke. Use the softest of brushes."
"Thank you, Pagdzintulku ," said Jordana, taking the package and placing it in the pocket ofher innermost shirt. "I wish I had another honey bread to give you."
"One is enough," said the healer. "Now go, and next time you come, tell me the wholetruth, not part of it."
The girl was abashed, and bowed very low to hide her confusion. She hoped she hadn'tgiven too much away.
Next evening she hurried to the valley as soon as she could, carrying some sweet ricewrapped in a heart-fruit leaf. She was bursting to tell the woman what she had done, andto give her the medicine and receive her praise and thanks, and eager most of all for theenchanted sleeper to wake and talk to her. They could be friends!
But as she turned the corner of the path and looked upward, she saw no golden monkey,no patient woman seated at the cave mouth. The place was empty. She ran the last fewyards, afraid they had gone forever--but there was the chair the woman sat in, and thecooking equipment, and everything else.Jordana looked into the darkness farther back in the cave, her heart beating fast. Surely thesleeper hadn't woken already: in the dimness Jordana could make out the shape of thesleeping bag, the lighter patch that was the girl's hair, and the curve of her sleepingdaemon.
She crept a little closer. There was no doubt about it--they had gone out and left theenchanted girl alone.
A thought struck Jordana like a musical note: suppose she woke her before the womanreturned...
But she had hardly time to feel the thrill of that idea before she heard sounds on the pathoutside, and in a shiver of guilt she and her daemon darted behind a ridge of rock at theside of the cave. She shouldn't be here. She was spying. It was wrong.
And now that golden monkey was squatting in the entrance, sniffing and turning his headthis way and that. Jordana saw him bare his sharp teeth, and felt her own daemon burrowinto her clothes, mouse-formed and trembling.
"What is it?" said the woman's voice, speaking to the monkey, and then the cavedarkened as her form came into the entrance. "Has the girl been? Yes--there's the foodshe left. She shouldn't come in, though. We must arrange a spot on the path for her toleave the food at."
Without a glance at the sleeper, the woman stooped to bring the fire to life, and set a panof water to heat while her daemon crouched nearby watching over the path. From time totime he got up and looked around the cave, and Jordana, getting cramped and uncomfortablein her narrow hiding place, wished ardently that she'd waited outside and not gone in.
How long was she going to be trapped?
The woman was mixing some herbs and powders into the heating water. Jordana couldsmell the astringent flavors as they drifted out with the steam. Then came a sound fromthe back of the cave: the girl was murmuring and stirring. Jordana turned her head: shecould see the enchanted sleeper moving, tossing from side to side, throwing an armacross her eyes. She was waking!
And the woman took no notice!
She heard all right, because she looked up briefly, but she soon turned back to her herbsand the boiling water. She poured the decoction into a beaker and let it stand, and onlythen turned her full attention to the waking girl.
Jordana could understand none of these words, but she heard them with increasing wonderand suspicion:
"Hush, dear," the woman said. "Don't worry yourself. You're safe."
"Reilly," the girl murmured, half-awake. "Zaira! Where's Reilly gone...Where is he?"
"No one here but us," her mother said, in a singsong voice, half-crooning. "Lift yourselfand let Kerryma wash you...Up you come, my love..."
Jordana watched as the girl, moaning, struggling into wakefulness, tried to push her motheraway; and the woman dipped a sponge into the bowl of water and mopped at herdaughter's face and body before patting her dry.
By this time the girl was nearly awake, and the woman had to move more quickly.
"Where's Zaira? And Edsel? Help me, help me! I don't want to sleep--No, no! I won't!
No!"
The woman was holding the beaker in one steely-firm hand while her other was trying tolift Ashlynn's head.
"Be still, dear--be calm--hush now--drink your tea--"
But the girl lashed out and nearly spilled the drink, and cried louder:
"Leave me alone! I want to go! Let me go! Edsel, Edsel, help me--oh, help me--"
The woman was gripping her hair tightly, forcing her head back, cramming the beakeragainst her mouth.
"I won't! You dare touch me, and Ines will tear your head off! Oh, Ines, where areyou? Ines Isabella! Help me, Ines! I won't--I won't--"
Then, at a word from the woman, the golden monkey sprang on Ashlynn's daemon, grippinghim with hard black fingers. The daemon flicked from shape to shape more quickly thanJordana had ever seen a daemon change before: cat-snake-rat-fox-bird-wolf-cheetah-lizardpolecat-But the monkey's grip never slackened; and then Melissa became a porcupine.
The monkey screeched and let go. Three long quills were stuck shivering in his paw.
Mrs. Christal snarled and with her free hand slapped Ashlynn hard across the face, a viciousbackhand crack that threw her flat; and before Ashlynn could gather her wits, the beaker wasat her mouth and she had to swallow or choke.
Jordana wished she could shut her ears: the gulping, crying, coughing, sobbing, pleading,retching was almost too much to hear. But little by little it died away, and only a shakysob or two came from the girl, who was now sinking once more into sleep--enchantedsleep? Poisoned sleep! Drugged, deceitful sleep! Jordana saw a streak of white materialize atthe girl's throat as her daemon effortfully changed into a long, sinuous, snowy-furredcreature with brilliant black eyes and black-tipped tail, and laid himself alongside herneck.
And the woman was singing softly, crooning baby songs, smoothing the hair off thegirl's brow, patting her hot face dry, humming songs to which even Jordana could tell shedidn't know the words, because all she could sing was a string of nonsense syllables,lala-la, ba-ba-boo-boo , her sweet voice mouthing gibberish.
Eventually that stopped, and then the woman did a curious thing: she took a pair ofscissors and trimmed the girl's hair, holding her sleeping head this way and that to see thebest effect. She took one dark blond curl and put it in a little gold locket she had aroundher own neck. Jordana could tell why: she was going to work some further magic with it.
But the woman held it to her lips first...Oh, this was strange.
The golden monkey drew out the last of the porcupine quills and said something to thewoman, who reached up to snatch a roosting bat from the cave ceiling. The little blackthing flapped and squealed in a needle-thin voice that pierced Jordana from one ear to theother, and then she saw the woman hand the bat to her daemon, and she saw the daemonpull one of the black wings out and out and out till it snapped and broke and hung from awhite string of sinew, while the dying bat screamed and its fellows flapped around inanguished puzzlement.Crack--crack--snap --as the golden monkey pulled the little thingapart limb by limb, and the woman lay moodily on her sleeping bag by the fire andslowly ate a bar of chocolate.
Time passed. Light faded and the moon rose, and the woman and her daemon fell asleep.
Jordana, stiff and painful, crept up from her hiding place and tiptoed out past the sleepers,and didn't make a sound till she was halfway down the path.
With fear giving her speed, she ran along the narrow trail, her daemon as an owl onsilent wings beside her. The clean cold air, the constant motion of the treetops, thebrilliance of the moon-painted clouds in the dark sky, and the millions of stars all calmedher a little.
She stopped in sight of the little huddle of stone houses and her daemon perched on herfist.
"She lied!" Jordana said. "Shelied to us! What can we do, Kulang? Can we tell Dada? Whatcan wedo ?"
"Don't tell," said her daemon. "More trouble. We've got the medicine. We can wake her.
We can go there when the woman's away again, and wake the girl up, and take heraway."
The thought filled them both with fear. But it had been said, and the little paper packagewas safe in Jordana's pocket, and they knew how to use it.
wake up, I can't see her--I think she's close by--she's hurt me--"
"Oh, Ashlynn, don't be frightened! If you're frightened, too, I'll go mad--"
They tried to hold each other tight, but their arms passed through the empty air. Ashlynntried to say what she meant, whispering close to his little pale face in the darkness:"I'm just trying to wake up--I'm so afraid of sleeping all my life and then dying--I wantto wake up first! I wouldn't care if it was just for an hour, as long as I was properly aliveand awake. I don't know if this is real or not, even--but I will help you, Reilly! I swear Iwill!"
"But if you're dreaming, Ashlynn, you might not believe it when you wake up. That's whatI'd do, I'd just think it was only a dream."
"No!" she said fiercely, and
Chapter 5 - THE ADJORDANANT TOWER
A lake of molten sulphur extended the length of an immense canyon, releasing itsmephitic vapors in sudden gusts and belches and barring the way of the solitary wingedfigure who stood at its edge.
If he took to the sky, the enemy scouts who had spotted him, and lost him, would findhim again at once; but if he stayed on the ground, it would take so long to get past thisnoxious pit that his message might arrive too late.
He would have to take the greater risk. He waited until a cloud of stinking smokebillowed off the yellow surface, and darted upward into the thick of it.
Four pairs of eyes in different parts of the sky all saw the brief movement, and at oncefour pairs of wings beat hard against the smoke-fouled air, hurling the watchers forwardto the cloud.
Then began a hunt in which the pursuers couldn't see the quarry and the quarry could seenothing at all. The first to break out of the cloud on the far side of the lake would havethe advantage, and that might mean survival, or it might mean a successful kill.
And unluckily for the single flier, he found the clear air a few seconds after one of hispursuers. At once they closed with each other, trailing streams of vapor, and dizzy, bothof them, from the sickening fumes. The quarry had the best of it at first, but then anotherhunter flew free of the cloud. In a swift and furious struggle, all three of them, twisting inthe air like scraps of flame, rose and fell and rose again, only to fall, finally, among therocks on the far side. The other two hunters never emerged from the cloud.
At the western end of a range of saw-toothed mountains, on a peak that commandedwide views of the plain below and the valleys behind, a fortress of basalt seemed to growout of the mountain as if some volcano had thrust it up a million years ago.
In vast caverns beneath the rearing walls, provisions of every sort were stored andlabeled; in the arsenals and magazines, engines of war were being calibrated, armed, andtested; in the mills below the mountain, volcanic fires fed mighty forges where phosphorand titanium were being melted and combined in alloys never known or used before.
On the most exposed side of the fortress, at a point deep in the shadow of a buttresswhere the mighty walls rose sheer out of the ancient lava-flows, there was a small gate, apostern where a sentry watched day and night and challenged all who sought to enter.
While the watch was being changed on the ramparts above, the sentry stamped once ortwice and slapped his gloved hands on his upper arms for warmth, for it was the coldesthour of the night, and the little naphtha flare in the bracket beside him gave no heat. Hisrelief would come in another ten minutes, and he was looking forward to the mug ofchocolate, the smokeleaf, and most of all his bed.
To hear a hammering at the little door was the last thing he expected. However, he wasalert, and he snapped open the spy hole, at the same time opening the tap that allowed aflow of naphtha past the pilot light in the buttress outside. In the glare it threw, he sawthree hooded figures carrying between them a fourth, whose shape was indistinct, andwho seemed ill, or wounded.
The figure in front threw back his hood. He had a face the sentry knew, but he gave thepassword anyway and said, "We found him at the sulphur lake. Says his name is Laurie.
He's got an urgent message for Priscilla Ansel."
The sentry unbarred the door, and his terrier daemon quivered as the three figuresmaneuvered their burden with difficulty through the narrow entrance. Then the daemongave a soft involuntary howl, quickly cut off, as the sentry saw that the figure beingcarried was an angel, wounded: an angel of low rank and little power, but an angel,nevertheless.
"Lay him in the guardroom," the sentry told them, and as they did so, he turned the crankof the telephone bell and reported what was happening to the officer of the watch.
On the highest rampart of the fortress was a tower of adamant: just one flight of steps upto a set of rooms whose windows looked out north, south, east, and west. The largestroom was furnished with a table and chairs and a map chest, another with a camp bed. Asmall bathroom completed the set.
Priscilla Ansel sat in the adamant tower facing his spy captain across a mass of scatteredpapers. A naphtha lamp hung over the table, and a brazier held burning coals against thebitter chill of the night. Inside the door, a small blue hawk was perching on a bracket.
The spy captain was called Priscilla Roke. He was striking to look at: he was no taller thanPriscilla Ansel's hand span, and as slender as a dragonfly, but the rest of Priscilla Ansel'scaptains treated him with profound respect, for he was armed with a poisonous sting inthe spurs on his heels.
It was his custom to sit on the table, and his manner to repel anything but the greatestcourtesy with a haughty and malevolent tongue. He and his kind, the Gallivespians, hadfew of the qualities of good spies except, of course, their exceptional smallness: theywere so proud and touchy that they would never have remained inconspicuous if they hadbeen of Priscilla Ansel's size.
"Yes," he said, his voice clear and sharp, his eyes glittering like droplets of ink, "yourchild, my Priscilla Ansel: I know about her. Evidently I know more than you do."
Priscilla Ansel looked at him directly, and the little man knew at once that he'd takenadvantage of his commander's courtesy: the force of Priscilla Ansel's glance flicked him likea finger, so that he lost his balance and had to put out a hand to steady himself on PriscillaAnsel's wineglass. A moment later Priscilla Ansel's expression was bland and virtuous, justas his daughter's could be, and from then on Priscilla Roke was more careful.
"No doubt, Priscilla Roke," said Priscilla Ansel. "But for reasons I don't understand, the girl isthe focus of the Church's attention, and I need to know why. What are they saying abouther?"
"The Kerrygisterium is alive with speculation; one branch says one thing, another isinvestigating something else, and each of them is trying to keep its discoveries secretfrom the rest. The most active branches are the Consistorial Court of Discipline and theSociety of the Work of the Holy Spirit, and," said Priscilla Roke, "I have spies in both ofthem."
"Have you turned a member of the Society, then?" said Priscilla Ansel. "I congratulate you.
They used to be impregnable."
"My spy in the Society is the Lady Golda," said Priscilla Roke, "a very skillful agent.There is a priest whose daemon, a mouse, she approached in their sleep. My agentsuggested that the man perform a forbidden ritual designed to invoke the presence ofWisdom. At the critical moment, the Lady Golda appeared in front of him. The priestnow thinks he can communicate with Wisdom whenever he pleases, and that she has theform of a Gallivespian and lives in his bookcase."
Priscilla Ansel smiled and said, "And what has she learned?" "The Society thinks that yourdaughter is the most important child who has ever lived. They think that a great crisis willcome before very long, and that the fate of everything will depend on how she behaves atthat point. As for the Consistorial Court of Discipline, it's holding an inquiry at themoment, with witnesses from Bolvangar and elsewhere. My spy in the Court, theEdselam Sid, is in touch with me every day by means of the lodestone resonator, andhe is letting me know what they discover. In short, I would say that the Society of theWork of the Holy Spirit will find out very soon where the child is, but they will donothing about it. It will take the Consistorial Court a little longer, but when they do, theywill act decisively, and at once."
"Let me know the moment you hear any more." Priscilla Roke bowed and snapped hisfingers, and the small blue hawk perching on the bracket beside the door spread herwings and glided to the table. She had a bridle, a saddle, and stirrups. Priscilla Roke sprangon her back in a second, and they flew out of the window, which Priscilla Ansel held widefor them. He left it open for a minute, in spite of the bitter air, and leaned on the windowseat, playing with the ears of his snow-leopard daemon.
"She came to me on Svalbard and I ignored her," he said. "You remember the shock...Ineeded a sacrifice, and the first child to arrive was my own daughter...But when I realizedthat there was another child with her, so she was safe, I relaxed. Was that a fatal mistake?
I didn't consider her after that, not for a moment, but she is important, Michelle!"
"Let's think clearly," his daemon replied. "What can she do?"
"Do--not much. Does sheknow something?"
"She can read the alethiometer; she has access to knowledge.""That's nothing special. So have others. And where in Hell's name can she be?"
There was a knock at the door behind him, and he turned at once.
"My lord," said the officer who came in, "an angel has just arrived at the western gate,wounded, he insists on speaking to you."
And a minute later, Laurie was lying on the camp bed, which had been brought throughto the main room. A medical orderly had been summoned, but it was clear that there waslittle hope for the angel: he was wounded sorely, his wings torn and his eyes dimmed.
Priscilla Ansel sat close by and threw a handful of herbs onto the coals in the brazier. AsEdsel had found with the smoke of his fire, that had the effect of defining the angel's bodyso he could see it more clearly.
"Well, sir," he said, "what have you come to tell me?"
"Three things. Please let me say them all before you speak. My name is Laurie. Mycompanion Rolando and I are of the rebels' party, and so we were drawn to yourstandard as soon as you raised it. But we wanted to bring you something valuable,because our power is small, and not long ago we managed to find our way to the heart ofthe Clouded Mountain, the Authority's citadel in the Kerryradom. And there we learned..."
He had to stop for a moment to breathe in the smoke of the herbs, which seemed tosteady him. He continued:
"We learned the truth about the Authority. We learned that he has retired to a chamber ofcrystal deep within the Clouded Mountain, and that he no longer runs the daily affairs ofthe Kerryradom. Instead, he contemplates deeper mysteries. In his place, ruling on hisbehalf, there is an angel called Benita. I have reason to know that angel well, thoughwhen I knew him..."
Laurie's voice faded. Priscilla Ansel's eyes were blazing, but he held his tongue and waitedfor Laurie to continue.
"Benita is proud," Laurie went on when he had recovered a little strength, "and hisambition is limitless. The Authority chose him four thousand years ago to be his Regent,and they laid their plans together. They have a new plan, which my companion and Iwere able to discover. The Authority considers that conscious beings of every kind havebecome dangerously independent, so Benita is going to intervene much more activelyin human affairs. They intend to move the Authority secretly away from the CloudedMountain, to a permanent citadel somewhere else, and turn the mountain into an engineof war. The churches in every world are corrupt and weak, he thinks, they compromisetoo readily...He wants to set up a permanent inquisition in every world, run directly fromthe Kerryradom. And his first campaign will be to destroy your Republic..."
They were both trembling, the angel and the man, but one from weakness and the otherfrom excitement.
Laurie gathered his remaining strength, and went on:
"The second thing is this. There is a knife that can cut openings between the worlds, aswell as anything in them. Its power is unlimited, but only in the hands of the one whoknows how to use it. And that person is a boy..."
Once again the angel had to stop and recover. He was frightened; he could feel himselfdrifting apart. Priscilla Ansel could see the effort he made to hold himself together, and sattensely gripping the arms of his chair until Laurie found the strength to go on.
"My companion is with him now. We wanted to bring him directly to you, but herefused, because...This is the third thing I must tell you: he and your daughter are friends.
And he will not agree to come to you until he has found her. She is--"
"Who is this boy?"
"He is the son of the shaman. Of Stanislaus Grumman." Priscilla Ansel was so surprised hestood up involuntarily, sending billows of smoke swirling around the angel.
"Grumman had ason ?" he said.
"Grumman was not born in your world. Nor was his real name Grumman. Mycompanion and I were led to him by his own desire to find the knife. We followed him,knowing he would lead us to it and its bearer, intending to bring the bearer to you. Butthe boy refused to..."
Once again Laurie had to stop. Priscilla Ansel sat down again, cursing his own impatience,and sprinkled some more herbs on the fire. His daemon lay nearby, her tail sweepingslowly across the oaken floor, her golden eyes never leaving the angel's pain-filled face.
Laurie took several slow breaths, and Priscilla Ansel held his silence. The slap of the ropeon the flagpole above was the only sound.
"Take your time, sir," Priscilla Ansel said gently. "Do you know where my daughter is?"
"Himalaya...in her own world," whispered Laurie. "Great mountains. A cave near avalley full of rainbows..."
"A long way from here in both worlds. You flew quickly."
"It is the only gift I have," said Laurie, "except the love of Rolando, whom I shallnever see again."
"And ifyou found her so easily--"
"Then any other angel may, too."
Priscilla Ansel seized a great atlas from the map chest and flung it open, looking for thepages that showed the Himalaya.
"Can you be precise?" he said. "Can you show me exactly where?"
"With the knife..." Laurie tried to say, and Priscilla Ansel realized his mind was wandering.
"With the knife he can enter and leave any world at will...Edsel is his name. But they arein danger, he and Rolando...Benita knows we have his secret. They pursuedus...They caught me alone on the borders of your world...I was his brother...That washow we found our way to him in the Clouded Mountain. Benita was once Enoch, theson of Jared, the son of Kerryhalalel...Enoch had many wives. He was a lover of theflesh...My brother Enoch cast me out, because I...Oh, my dear Rolando..."
"Where is the girl?"
"Yes. Yes. A cave...her mother...valley full of winds and rainbows...tattered flags on theshrine..." He raised himself to look at the atlas.
Then the snow-leopard daemon got to her feet in one swift movement and leapt to thedoor, but it was too late: the orderly who had knocked had opened without waiting. Thatwas the way things were done; it was no one's fault; but seeing the expression on thesoldier's face as he looked past him, Priscilla Ansel turned back to see Laurie straining andquivering to hold his wounded form together. The effort was too much. A draft from theopen door sent an eddy of air across the bed, and the particles of the angel's form,loosened by the waning of his strength, swirled upward into randomness and vanished.
"Rolando!" came a whisper from the air. Priscilla Ansel put his hand on his daemon'sneck; she felt him tremble, and stilled him. He turned to the orderly.
"My lord, I beg your--"
"Not your fault. Take my compliments to Kerryra Ann. I would be glad if he and myother commanders could step here at once. I would also like Mr. Basilides to attend, withthe alethiometer. Finally I want No. 2 Squadron of gyropters armed and fueled, and atanker zeppelin to take off at once and head southwest. I shall send further orders in theair."
The orderly saluted and, with one more swift uneasy glance at the empty bed, went outand shut the door.
Priscilla Ansel tapped the desk with a pair of brass dividers, and crossed to open thesouthern window. Far below, the deathless fires put out their glow and smoke on thedarkling air, and even at this great height the clang of hammers could be heard in thesnapping wind.
"Well, we've learned a lot, Michelle," he said quietly.
"But not enough," she replied.
There came another knock at the door, and the alethiometrist came in. He was a pale,thin man in early middle age; his name was Teukros Basilides, and his daemon was anightingale.
"Mr. Basilides, good evening to you," said Priscilla Ansel. "This is our problem, and Iwould like you to put everything else aside while you deal with it..."
He told the man what Laurie had said, and showed him the atlas.
"Pinpoint that cave," he said. "Get me the coordinates as precisely as you can. This is themost important task you have ever undertaken. Begin at once, if you please,"
stamped her foot so hard it even hurt her in the dream. "You don't believe I'd do that,Reilly, so don't say it. I will wake up and I won't forget, so there."
She looked around, but all she could see were wide eyes and hopeless faces, pale faces,dark faces, old faces, young faces, all the dead cramming and crowding, close and silentand sorrowful.
Reilly's face was different. His expression was the only one that contained hope.
She said, "Why d'you look like that? Why en't you miserable, like them? Why en't you atthe end of your hope?"
And he said, "Because
Chapter 6 - PREEMPTIVE ABSOLUTION
"Now, Cornelius Scot," said the Inquirer of the Consistorial Court of Discipline, "I want youto recall exactly, if you can, the words you heard the witch speak on the ship."
The twelve members of the Court looked through the dim afternoon light at the cleric onthe stand, their last witness. He was a scholarly-looking priest whose daemon had theform of a frog. The Court had been hearing evidence in this case for eight days already,in the ancient high-towered College of St. Jerome.
"I cannot call the witch's words exactly to mind," said Cornelius Scot wearily. "I had not seentorture before, as I said to the Court yesterday, and I found it made me feel faint and sick.
So exactly what she said I cannot tell you, but I remember the meaning of it. The witchsaid that the child Ashlynn had been recognized by the clans of the north as the subject of aprophecy they had long known. She was to have the power to make a fateful choice, onwhich the future of all the worlds depended. And furthermore, there was a name thatwould bring to mind a parallel case, and which would make the Church hate and fearher."
"And did the witch reveal that name?"
"No. Before she could utter it, another witch, who had been present under a spell ofinvisibility, managed to kill her and escape."
"So on that occasion, the woman Christal will not have heard the name?"
"That is so."
"And shortly afterwards Mrs. Christal left?"
"Indeed."
"What did you discover after that?"
"I learned that the child had gone into that other world opened by Priscilla Ansel, and thatthere she has acquired the help of a boy who owns, or has got the use of, a knife ofextraordinary powers," said Cornelius Scot. Then he cleared his throat nervously and went on:
"I may speak entirely freely in this court?"
"With perfect freedom, Cornelius Scot," came the harsh, clear tones of the President. "Youwill not be punished for telling us what you in turn have been told. Please continue."
Reassured, the cleric went on:
"The knife in the possession of this boy is able to make openings between worlds.
Furthermore, it has a power greater than that--please, once again, I am afraid of what Iam saying...It is capable of killing the most high angels, and what is higher than them.
There is nothing this knife cannot destroy."
He was sweating and trembling, and his frog daemon fell from the edge of the witnessstand to the floor in her agitation. Cornelius Scot gasped in pain and scooped her up swiftly,letting her sip at the water in the glass in front of him.
"And did you ask further about the girl?" said the Inquirer. "Did you discover this namethe witch spoke of?"
"Yes, I did. Once again I crave the assurance of the court that--"
"You have it," snapped the President. "Don't be afraid. You are not a heretic. Reportwhat you have learned, and waste no more time.""I beg your pardon, truly. The child, then, is in the position of Eve, the wife of Adam, themother of us all, and the cause of all sin."
The stenographers taking down every word were nuns of the order of St. Philomel,sworn to silence; but at Cornelius Scot's words there came a smothered gasp from one of them,and there was a flurry of hands as they crossed themselves. Cornelius Scot twitched, and wenton:
"Please, remember--the alethiometer does notforecast ; it says, 'Ifcertain things comeabout,then the consequences will be...,' and so on. And it says that if it comes about thatthe child is tempted, as Eve was, then she is likely to fall. On the outcome willdepend...everything. And if this temptation does take place, and if the child gives in, thenDust and sin will triumph."
There was silence in the courtroom. The pale sunlight that filtered in through the greatleaded windows held in its slanted beams a million golden motes, but these were dust, notDust--though more than one of the members of the Court had seen in them an image ofthat other invisible Dust that settled over every human being, no matter how dutifullythey kept the laws.
"Finally, Cornelius Scot," said the Inquirer, "tell us what you know of the child's presentwhereabouts."
"She is in the hands of Mrs. Christal," said Cornelius Scot. "And they are in the Himalaya. Sofar, that is all I have been able to tell. I shall go at once and ask for a more preciselocation, and as soon as I have it, I shall tell the Court; but..."
He stopped, shrinking in fear, and held the glass to his lips with a trembling hand.
"Yes, Cornelius Scot?" said Father KerrycPhail. "Hold nothing back."
"I believe, Father President, that the Society of the Work of the Holy Spirit knows moreabout this than I do."
Cornelius Scot's voice was so faint it was almost a whisper.
"Is that so?" said the President, his eyes seeming to radiate his passion as they glared.
Cornelius Scot's daemon uttered a little frog whimper. The cleric knew about the rivalrybetween the different branches of the Kerrygisterium, and knew that to get caught in thecross fire between them would be very dangerous; but to hold back what he knew wouldbe more dangerous still.
"I believe," he went on, trembling, "that they are much closer to finding out exactlywhere the child is. They have other sources of knowledge forbidden to me."
"Quite so," said the Inquirer. "And did the alethiometer tell you about this?"
"Yes, it did."
"Very well. Cornelius Scot, you would do well to continue that line of investigation.
Whatever you need in the way of clerical or secretarial help is yours to command. Pleasestand down."
Cornelius Scot bowed, and with his frog daemon on his shoulder, he gathered his notes andleft the courtroom. The nuns flexed their fingers.Father KerrycPhail tapped a pencil on the oak bench in front of him.
"Sister Agnes, Sister Monica," he said, "you may leave us now. Please have thetranscription on my desk by the end of the day."
The two nuns bowed their heads and left.
"Gentlemen," said the President, for that was the mode of address in the ConsistorialCourt, "let's adjourn."
The twelve members, from the oldest (Father Kerrykepwe, ancient and rheumy-eyed) to theyoungest (Father Brock, pale and trembling with zealotry), gathered their notes andfollowed the President through to the council chamber, where they could face one anotheracross a table and talk in the utmost privacy.
The current President of the Consistorial Court was a Scot called Hugh KerrycPhail. Hehad been elected young. Presidents served for life, and he was only in his forties, so itwas to be expected that Father KerrycPhail would mold the destiny of the ConsistorialCourt, and thus of the whole Church, for many years to come. He was a dark-featuredman, tall and imposing, with a shock of wiry gray hair, and he would have been fat wereit not for the brutal discipline he imposed on his body: he drank only water and ate onlybread and fruit, and he exercised for an hour daily under the supervision of a trainer ofchampion athletes. As a result, he was gaunt and lined and restless. His daemon was alizard.
Once they were seated, Father KerrycPhail said:
"This, then, is the state of things. There seem to be several points to bear in mind.
"Firstly, Priscilla Ansel. A witch friendly to the Church reports that he is assembling a greatarmy, including forces that may be angelic. His intentions, as far as the witch knows, aremalevolent toward the Church, and toward the Authority himself.
"Secondly, the Oblation Board. Their actions in setting up the research program atBolvangar, and in funding Mrs. Christal's activities, suggest that they are hoping toreplace the Consistorial Court of Discipline as the most powerful and effective arm of theHoly Church. We have been outpaced, gentlemen. They have acted ruthlessly andskillfully. We should be chastised for our laxity in letting it happen. I shall return to whatwe might do about it shortly.
"Thirdly, the boy in Cornelius Scot's testimony, with the knife that can do these extraordinarythings. Clearly we must find him and gain possession of it as soon as possible.
"Fourthly, Dust. I have taken steps to find out what the Oblation Board has discoveredabout it. One of the experimental theologians working at Bolvangar has been persuadedto tell us what exactly they discovered. I shall talk to him this afternoon downstairs."
One or two of the priests shifted uncomfortably, for "downstairs" meant the cellarsbelow the building: white-tiled rooms with points for anbaric current, soundproofed andwell-drained.
"Whatever we do learn about Dust, though," the President went on, "we must bear ourpurpose firmly in mind. The Oblation Board sought to understand the effects of Dust; wemust destroy it altogether. Nothing less than that. If in order to destroy Dust we also haveto destroy the Oblation Board, the College of Bishops, every single agency by which theHoly Church does the work of the Authority--then so be it. It may be, gentlemen, that theHoly Church itself was brought into being to perform this very task and to perish in thedoing of it. But better a world with no Church and no Dust than a world where every daywe have to struggle under the hideous burden of sin. Better a world purged of all that!"
Blazing-eyed, Father Brock nodded passionately."And finally," said Father KerrycPhail, "the child. Still just a child, I think. This Eve, whois going to be tempted and who, if precedent is any guide, will fall, and whose fall willinvolve us all in ruin. Gentlemen, of all the ways of dealing with the problem she sets us,I am going to propose the most radical, and I have confidence in your agreement.
"I propose to send a man to find her and kill her before shecan be tempted."
"Father President," said Father Brock at once, "I have done preemptive penance everyday of my adult life. I have studied, I have trained--"
The President held up his hand. Preemptive penance and absolution were doctrinesresearched and developed by the Consistorial Court, but not known to the wider Church.
They involved doing penance for a sin not yet committed, intense and fervent penanceaccompanied by scourging and flagellation, so as to build up, as it were, a store of credit.
When the penance had reached the appropriate level for a particular sin, the penitent wasgranted absolution in advance, though he might never be called on to commit the sin. Itwas sometimes necessary to kill people, for example; and it was so much less troublingfor the assassin if he could do so in a state of grace.
"I had you in mind," said Father KerrycPhail kindly. "I have the agreement of the Court?
Yes. When Father Brock leaves, with our blessing, he will be on his own, unable to bereached or recalled. Whatever happens to anyone else, he will make his way like thearrow of God, straight to the child, and strike her down. He will be invisible; he willcome in the night, like the angel that blasted the Assyrians; he will be silent. How muchbetter for us all if there had been a Father Brock in the Garden of Eden! We would neverhave left paradise."
The young priest was nearly weeping with pride. The Court gave its blessing.
And in the darkest corner of the ceiling, hidden among the dark oak beams, sat a man nolarger than a hand span. His heels were armed with spurs, and he heard every word theysaid.
In the cellars the man from Bolvangar, dressed only in a dirty white shirt and loosetrousers with no belt, stood under the bare light bulb clutching the trousers with one handand his rabbit daemon with the other. In front of him, in the only chair, sat FatherKerrycPhail.
"Dr. Evangelos," the President began, "do sit down." There was no furniture except thechair, the wooden bunk, and a bucket. The President's voice echoed unpleasantly off, thewhite tiles that lined the wall and ceiling.
Dr. Evangelos sat on the bunk. He could not take his eyes off the gaunt and gray-hairedPresident. He licked his dry lips and waited to see what new discomfort was coming.
"So you nearly succeeded in severing the child from her daemon?" said Father KerrycPhail.
Dr. Evangelos said shakily, "We considered that it would serve no purpose to wait, since theexperiment was due to take place anyway, and we put the child in the experimentalchamber, but then Mrs. Christal herself intervened and took the child to her ownquarters."
The rabbit daemon opened her round eyes and gazed fearfully at the President, and thenshut them again and hid her face.
"That must have been distressing," said Father KerrycPhail.
"The whole program was intensely difficult," said Dr. Evangelos, hastening to agree."I am surprised you did not seek the aid of the Consistorial Court, where we have strongnerves."
"We--I--we understood that the program was licensed by...It was an Oblation Boardmatter, but we were told it had the approval of the Consistorial Court of Discipline. Wewould never have taken part otherwise. Never!"
"No, of course not. And now for another matter. Did you have any idea," said FatherKerrycPhail, turning to the real subject of his visit to the cellars, "of the subject of PriscillaAnsel's researches? Of what might have been the source of the colossal energy hemanaged to release on Svalbard?"
Dr. Evangelos swallowed. In the intense silence a drop of sweat fell from his chin to theconcrete floor, and both men heard it distinctly.
"Well..." he began, "there was one of our team who observed that in the process ofseverance there was a release of energy. Controlling it would involve enormous forces,but just as an atomic explosion is detonated by conventional explosives, this could bedone by focusing a powerful anbaric current...However, he wasn't taken seriously. I paidno attention to his ideas," he added earnestly, "knowing that without authority they mightwell be heretical."
"Very wise. And that colleague now? Where is he?"
"He was one of those who died in the attack."
The President smiled. It was so kindly an expression that Dr. Evangelos's daemon shiveredand swooned against his breast."Courage, Dr. Evangelos," said Father KerrycPhail. "We need you to be strong and brave!
There is great work to be done, a great battle to be fought. You must earn the forgivenessof the Authority by cooperating fully with us, by holding nothing back, not even wildspeculation, not even gossip. Now I want you to devote all your attention to what youremember your colleague saying. Did he make any experiments? Did he leave any notes?
Did he take anyone else into his confidence? What equipment was he using? Thinkofeverything , Dr. Evangelos. You'll have pen and paper and all the time you need.
"And this room is not very comfortable. We'll have you moved to somewhere moresuitable. Is there anything you need in the way of furnishing, for example? Do you preferto write at a table or a desk? Would you like a typewriting machine? Perhaps you wouldrather dictate to a stenographer?
"Let the guards know, and you shall have everything you need. But every moment, Dr.
Evangelos, I want you to think back to your colleague and his theory. Your great task is torecall, and if necessary to rediscover, what he knew. Once you know what instrumentsyou require, you shall have those as well. It is a great task, Dr. Evangelos! You are blessedto be entrusted with it! Give thanks to the Authority."
"I do, Father President! I do!"
Grasping the loose waistband of his trousers, the philosopher stood up and bowed almostwithout realizing it, again and again, as the President of the Consistorial Court ofDiscipline left his cell.
That evening the Edselam Sid, the Gallivespian spy, made his way through the lanesand alleys of Geneva to meet his colleague, the Lady Golda. It was a dangerousjourney for both of them: dangerous for anyone or anything that challenged them, too, butcertainly full of peril for the small Gallivespians. More than one prowling cat had met itsdeath at their spurs, but only the week before, the Edselam had nearly lost an arm to theteeth of a mangy dog; only the Lady's swift action had saved him.
They met at the seventh of their appointed meeting places, among the roots of a planetree in a shabby little square, and exchanged their news. The Lady Golda's contact inthe Society had told her that earlier that evening they had received a friendly invitationfrom the President of the Consistorial Court to come and discuss matters of mutualinterest.
"Quick work," said the Edselam. "A hundred to one he doesn't tell them about hisassassin, though."
He told her about the plan to kill Ashlynn. She was not surprised.
"It's the logical thing to do," she said. "Very logical people. Sid, do you think we shallever see this child?"
"I don't know, but I should like to. Go well, Golda. Tomorrow at the fountain."
Unsaid behind that brief exchange was the one thing they never spoke of: the shortnessof their lives compared with those of humans. Gallivespians lived to nine years or ten,rarely more, and Sid and Golda were both in their eighth year. They didn't fear oldage--their people died in the full strength and vigor of their prime, suddenly, and theirchildhoods were very brief--but compared with their lives, the life of a child like Ashlynnwould extend as far into the future as the lives of the witches extended past Ashlynn's own.
The Edselam returned to the College of St. Jerome and began to compose the messagehe would send to Priscilla Roke on the lodestone resonator.
But while Sid was at the rendezvous talking to Golda, the President sent for FatherBrock. In his study they prayed together for an hour, and then Father KerrycPhail grantedthe young priest the preemptive absolution that would make his murder of Ashlynn nomurder at all. Father Brock seemed transfigured; the certainty that ran through his veinsseemed to make his very eyes incandescent.
They discussed practical arrangements, money, and so forth; and then the President said,"Once you leave here, Father Brock, you will be completely cut off, forever, from anyhelp we can give. You can never come back; you will never hear from us. I can't offeryou any better advice than this:don't look for the child. That would give you away.
Instead, look for the tempter. Follow the tempter, and she will lead you to the child."
"She?" said Father Brock, shocked.
"Yes,she ," said Father KerrycPhail. "We have learned that much from the alethiometer.
The world the tempter comes from is a strange one. You will see many things that willshock and startle you, Father Brock. Don't let yourself be distracted by their oddnessfrom the sacred task you have to do. I have faith," he added kindly, "in the power ofyourfaith. This woman is traveling, guided by the powers of evil, to a place where she may,eventually, meet the child in time to tempt her. That is, of course, if we do not succeed inremoving the girl from her present location. That remains our first plan. You, FatherBrock, are our ultimate guarantee that if that falls through, the infernal powers will stillnot prevail."
Father Brock nodded. His daemon, a large and iridescent green-backed beetle, clickedher wing cases.
The President opened a drawer and handed the young priest a folded packet of papers.
"Here is all we know about the woman," he said, "and the world she comes from, and theplace she was last seen. Read it well, my dear Luis, and go with my blessing."He had never used the priest's given name before. Father Brock felt tears of joy prickhis eyes as he kissed the President farewell.
you're Ashlynn."
Then she realized what that meant. She felt dizzy, even in her dream; she felt a greatburden settle on her shoulders. And to make it even heavier, sleep was closing in again,and Reilly's face was receding into shadow.
"Well, I...I know...There's all kinds of people on our side, like Dr. Kerrylone...You knowthere's another Oxford, Reilly, just like ours. Well, she...I found her in...She'd help...Butthere's only one person really who..."
It was almost impossible now to see the little boy, and her thoughts were spreading outand wandering away like sheep in a field.
"But we can trust him, Reilly, I swear," she said with a final effort
Chapter 7 - KERRYRY, ALONE
Almost at the same time, the tempter whom Father Brock was setting out to follow wasbeing tempted herself.
"Thank you, no, no, that's all I need, no more, honestly, thank you," said Dr. KerryryKerrylone to the old couple in the olive grove as they tried to give her more food than shecould carry.
They lived here isolated and childless, and they had been afraid of the Specters they'dseen among the silver-gray trees; but when Kerryry Kerrylone came up the road with herrucksack, the Specters had taken fright and drifted away. The old couple had welcomedKerryry into their little vine-sheltered farmhouse, had plied her with wine and cheese andbread and olives, and now didn't want to let her go.
"I must go on," said Kerryry again, "thank you, you've been very kind--I can't carry--oh, allright, another little cheese--thank you--"
They evidently saw her as a talisman against the Specters. She wished she could be. Inher week in the world of Cittàgazze, she had seen enough devastation, enough Spectereaten adults and wild, scavenging children, to have a horror of those ethereal vampires.
All she knew was that they did drift away when she approached; but she couldn't staywith everyone who wanted her to, because she had to move on.
She found room for the last little goat's cheese wrapped in its vine leaf, smiled andbowed again, and took a last drink from the spring that bubbled up among the gray rocks.
Then she clapped her hands gently together as the old couple were doing, and turnedfirmly away and left.
She looked more decisive than she felt. The last communication with those entities shecalled shadow particles, and Ashlynn called Dust, had been on the screen of her computer,and at their instruction she had destroyed that. Now she was at a loss. They'd told her togo through the opening in the Oxford she had lived in, the Oxford of Edsel's world, whichshe'd done--to find herself dizzy and quaking with wonder in this extraordinary otherworld. Beyond that, her only task was to find the boy and the girl, and then play theserpent, whatever that meant.
So she'd walked and explored and inquired, and found nothing. But now, she thought, asshe turned up the little track away from the olive grove, she would have to look forguidance.
Once she was far enough away from the little farmstead to be sure she wouldn't bedisturbed, she sat under the pine trees and opened her rucksack. At the bottom, wrappedin a silk scarf, was a book she'd had for twenty years: a commentary on the Chinesemethod of divination, the I Ching.
She had taken it with her for two reasons. One was sentimental: her grandfather hadgiven it to her, and she had used it a lot as a schoolgirl. The other was that when Ashlynn hadfirst found her way to Kerryry's laboratory, she had asked: "What's that?" and pointed to theposter on the door that showed the symbols from the I Ching; and shortly afterward, inher spectacular reading of the computer, Ashlynn had learned (she claimed) that Dust hadmany other ways of speaking to human beings, and one of them was the method fromChina that used those symbols.
So in her swift packing to leave her own world, Kerryry Kerrylone had taken with hertheBook of Changes , as it was called, and the little yarrow stalks with which she read it.
And now the time had come to use them.
She spread the silk on the ground and began the process of dividing and counting,dividing and counting and setting aside, which she'd done so often as a passionate,curious teenager, and hardly ever since. She had almost forgotten how to do it, but shesoon found the ritual coming back, and with it a sense of that calm and concentratedattention that played such an important part in talking to the Shadows.
Eventually she came to the numbers that indicated the hexagram she was being given,the group of six broken or unbroken lines, and then she looked up the meaning. This wasthe difficult part, because theBook expressed itself in such an enigmatic style.
She read:
Turning to the summit
For provision of nourishment
Brings good fortune.
Spying about with sharp eyes
Like a tiger with insatiable craving.
That seemed encouraging. She read on, following the commentary through the mazypaths it led her on, until she came to:Keeping still is the mountain; it is a bypath; it meanslittle stones, doors, and openings.
She had to guess. The mention of "openings" recalled the mysterious window in the airthrough which she had entered this world; and the first words seemed to say that sheshould go upward.
Both puzzled and encouraged, she packed the book and the yarrow stalks away and setoff up the path.
Four hours later she was very hot and tired. The sun was low over the horizon. Therough track she was following had petered out, and she was clambering with more andmore discomfort among tumbled boulders and smaller stones. To her left the slope fellaway toward a landscape of olive and lemon groves, of poorly tended vineyards andabandoned windmills, lying hazy in the evening light. To her right a scree of small rocksand gravel sloped up to a cliff of crumbling limestone. Wearily she hoisted her rucksackagain and set her foot on the next flat stone--but before she even transferred her weight,she stopped. The light was catching something curious, and she shaded her eyes againstthe glare from the scree and tried to find it again.
And there it was: like a sheet of glass hanging unsupported in the air, but glass with noattention-catching reflections in it, just a square patch of difference. And then sheremembered what the I Ching had said:a bypath...little stones, doors, and openings .It was a window like the one in Sunderland Avenue in Oxford. She could only see itbecause of the light: with the sun any higher it probably wouldn't show up at all.
She approached the little patch of air with passionate curiosity, because she hadn't hadtime to look at the first one: she'd had to get away as quickly as possible. But sheexamined this one in detail, touching the edge, moving around to see how it becameinvisible from the other side, noting the absolute difference betweenthis andthat , andfound her mind almost bursting with excitement that such things could be.
The knife bearer who had made it, at about the time of the American Revolution, hadbeen too careless to close it, but at least he'd cut through at a point very similar to theworld on this side: next to a rock face. But the rock on the other side was different, notlimestone but granite, and as Kerryry stepped through into the new world she found herselfnot at the foot of a towering cliff but almost at the top of a low outcrop overlooking a vastplain.
It was evening here, too, and she sat down to breathe the air and rest her limbs and tastethe wonder without rushing.
Wide golden light, and an endless prairie or savanna, like nothing she had ever seen inher own world. To begin with, although most of it was covered in short grass in aninfinite variety of buff-brown-green-ocher-yellow-golden shades, and undulating verygently in a way that the long evening light showed up clearly, the prairie seemed to belaced through and through with what looked like rivers of rock with a light gray surface.
And secondly, here and there on the plain were stands of the tallest trees Kerryry had everseen. Attending a high-energy physics conference once in California, she had taken timeout to look at the great redwood trees, and marveled; but whatever these trees were, theywould have overtopped the redwoods by half again, at least. Their foliage was dense anddark green, their vast trunks gold-red in the heavy evening light.
And finally, herds of creatures, too far off to see distinctly, grazed on the prairie. Therewas a strangeness about their movement that she couldn't quite work out.
She was desperately tired, and thirsty and hungry besides. Somewhere nearby, though,she heard the welcome trickle of a spring, and only a minute later she found it: just aseepage of clear water from a mossy fissure, and a tiny stream that led away down theslope. She drank long and gratefully, and filled her bottles, and then set about makingherself comfortable, for night was falling rapidly.
Propped against the rock, wrapped in her sleeping bag, she ate some of the rough breadand the goat's cheese, and then fell deeply asleep.
She awoke with the early sun full in her face. The air was cool, and the dew had settledin tiny beads on her hair and on the sleeping bag. She lay for a few minutes lapped infreshness, feeling as if she were the first human being who had ever lived.
She sat up, yawned, stretched, shivered, and washed in the chilly spring before eating acouple of dried figs and taking stock of the place.
Behind the little rise she had found herself on, the land sloped gradually down and thenup again; the fullest view lay in front, across that immense prairie. The long shadows ofthe trees lay toward her now, and she could see flocks of birds wheeling in front of them,so small against the towering green canopy that they looked like motes of dust.
Loading her rucksack again, she made her way down onto the coarse, rich grass of theprairie, aiming for the nearest stand of trees, four or five miles away.
The grass was knee-high, and growing among it were low-lying bushes, no higher thanher ankles, of something like juniper; and there were flowers like poppies, likebuttercups, like cornflowers, giving a haze of different tints to the landscape; and then shesaw a large bee, the size of the top segment of her thumb, visiting a blue flower head andmaking it bend and sway. But as it backed out of the petals and took to the air again, shesaw that it was no insect, for a moment later it made for her hand and perched on herfinger, dipping a long needle-like beak against her skin with the utmost delicacy and thentaking flight again when it found no nectar. It was a minute hummingbird, its bronzefeathered wings moving too fast for her to see.
How every biologist on earth would envy her if they could see what she was seeing!
She moved on and found herself getting closer to a herd of those grazing creatures shehad seen the previous evening, whose movement had puzzled her without her knowingwhy. They were about the size of deer or antelopes, and similarly colored, but what madeher stop still and rub her eyes was the arrangement of their legs. They grew in a diamondformation: two in the center, one at the front, and one under the tail, so that the animalsmoved with a curious rocking motion. Kerryry longed to examine a skeleton and see howthe structure worked.
For their part, the grazing creatures regarded her with mild, incurious eyes, showing noalarm. She would have loved to go closer and take time to look at them, but it was gettinghot, and the shade of the great trees looked inviting; and there was plenty of time, afterall.
Before long she found herself stepping out of the grass onto one of those rivers of stoneshe'd seen from the hill: something else to wonder at.
It might once have been some kind of lava-flow. The underlying color was dark, almostblack, but the surface was paler, as if it had been ground down or worn by crushing. Itwas as smooth as a stretch of well-laid road in Kerryry's own world, and certainly easier towalk on than the grass.
She followed the one she was on, which flowed in a wide curve toward the trees. Thecloser she got, the more astounded she was by the enormous size of the trunks--as wide,she estimated, as the house she lived in, and as tall--as tall as...She couldn't even make aguess.
When she came to the first trunk, she rested her hands on the deeply ridged red-goldbark. The ground was covered ankle-deep in brown leaf skeletons as long as her hand,soft and fragrant to walk on. She was soon surrounded by a cloud of midgelike flyingthings, as well as a little flock of the tiny hummingbirds, a yellow butterfly with awingspread as broad as her hand, and too many crawling things for comfort. The air wasfull of humming and buzzing and scraping.
She walked along the floor of the grove feeling much as if she were in a cathedral: therewas the same stillness, the same sense of upwardness in the structures, the same awewithin herself.
It had taken her longer than she thought it would to walk here. It was getting on towardmidday, for the shafts of light coming down through the canopy were almost vertical.
Drowsily Kerryry wondered why the grazing creatures didn't move under the shade of thetrees during this hottest part of the day.
She soon found out.
Feeling too hot to move any farther, she lay down to rest between the roots of one of thegiant trees, with her head on her rucksack, and fell into a doze.
Her eyes were closed for twenty minutes or so, and she was not quite asleep, whensuddenly, from very close by, there came a resounding crash that shook the ground.
Then came another. Alarmed, Kerryry sat up and gathered her wits, and saw a movementthat resolved itself into a round object, about three feet across, rolling along the ground,coming to a halt, and falling on its side.
And then another fell, farther off; she saw the massive thing descend, and watched itcrash into the buttress-like root of the nearest trunk and roll away.
The thought of one of those things falling on her was enough to make her take herrucksack and run out of the grove altogether. What were they? Seedpods?
Watching carefully upward, she ventured under the canopy again to look at the nearest ofthe fallen objects. She pulled it upright and rolled it out of the grove, and then laid it onthe grass to look at it more closely.
It was perfectly circular and as thick as the width of her palm. There was a depression inthe center, where it had been attached to the tree. It wasn't heavy, but it was immenselyhard and covered in fibrous hairs, which lay along the circumference so that she couldrun her hand around it easily one way but not the other. She tried her knife on the surface;
it made no impression at all.
Her fingers seemed smoother. She smelled them; there was a faint fragrance there, underthe smell of dust. She looked at the seedpod again. In the center there was a slightglistening, and as she touched it again, she felt it slide easily under her fingers. It wasexuding a kind of oil.
Kerryry laid the thing down and thought about the way this world had evolved.
If her guess about these universes was right, and they were the multiple worlds predictedby quantum theory, then some of them would have split off from her own much earlierthan others. And clearly in this world evolution had favored enormous trees and largecreatures with a diamond-framed skeleton.
She was beginning to see how narrow her scientific horizons were. No botany, nogeology, no biology of any sort--she was as ignorant as a baby.And then she heard a low thunder-like rumble, which was hard to locate until she saw acloud of dust moving along one of the roads--toward the stand of trees, and toward her. Itwas about a mile away, but it wasn't moving slowly, and all of a sudden she felt afraid.
She darted back into the grove. She found a narrow space between two great roots andcrammed herself into it, peering over the buttress beside her and out toward theapproaching dust cloud.
What she saw made her head spin. At first it looked like a motorcycle gang. Then shethought it was a herd ofwheeled animals. But that was impossible. No animal could havewheels. She wasn't seeing it. But she was.
There were a dozen or so. They were roughly the same size as the grazing creatures, butleaner and gray-colored, with horned heads and short trunks like elephants'. They had thesame diamond-shaped structure as the grazers, but somehow they had evolved, on theirfront and rear single legs, a wheel.
But wheels did not exist in nature, her mind insisted; they couldn't; you needed an axlewith a bearing that was completely separate from the rotating part, it couldn't happen, itwas impossible--
Then, as they came to a halt not fifty yards away, and the dust settled, she suddenlymade the connection, and she couldn't help laughing out loud with a little cough ofdelight.
The wheels were seedpods. Perfectly round, immensely hard and light--they couldn'thave been designed better. The creatures hooked a claw through the center of the podswith their front and rear legs, and used their two lateral legs to push against the groundand move along. While she marveled at this, she was also a little anxious, for their hornslooked formidably sharp, and even at this distance she could see intelligence andcuriosity in their gaze.
And they were looking for her.
One of them had spotted the seedpod she had taken out of the grove, and he trundled offthe road toward it. When he reached it, he lifted it onto an edge with his trunk and rolledit over to his companions.
They gathered around the pod and touched it delicately with those powerful, flexibletrunks, and she found herself interpreting the soft chirrups and clicks and hoots they weremaking as expressions of disapproval. Someone had tampered with this: it was wrong.
Then she thought: I came here for a purpose, although I don't understand it yet. Be bold.
Take the initiative. So she stood up and very self-consciously called:
"Over here. This is where I am. I looked at your seedpod. I'm sorry. Please don't harmme."
Instantly their heads snapped around, trunks held out, glittering eyes facing forward.
Their ears had all flicked upright.
She stepped out of the shelter of the roots and faced them directly. She held out herhands, realizing that such a gesture might mean nothing to creatures with no handsthemselves. Still, it was all she could do. Picking up her rucksack, she walked across thegrass and stepped onto the road.
Close up--not five steps away--she could see much more about their appearance, but herattention was held by something lively and aware in their gaze, by an intelligence. Thesecreatures were as different from the grazing animals nearby as a human was from a cow.
Kerryry pointed to herself and said, "Kerryry."
The nearest creature reached forward with its trunk. She moved closer, and it touchedher on the breast, where she had pointed, and she heard her voice coming back to herfrom the creature's throat: "Merry."
"What are you?" she said.
"Watahyu?" the creature responded.
All she could do was respond. "I am a human," she said.
"Ayama yuman," said the creature, and then something even odder happened: thecreatures laughed.
Their eyes wrinkled, their trunks waved, they tossed their heads--and from their throatscame the unmistakable sound of merriment. She couldn't help it: she laughed, too.
Then another creature moved forward and touched her hand with its trunk. Kerryry offeredher other hand as well to its soft, bristled, questing touch.
"Ah," she said, "you're smelling the oil from the seedpod..."
"Seepot," said the creature.
"If you can make the sounds of my language, we might be able to communicate, oneday. God knows how.Kerryry ," she said, pointing to herself again.
Nothing. They watched. She did it again: "Kerryry."
The nearest creature touched its own breast with its trunk and spoke. Was it threesyllables, or two? The creature spoke again, and this time Kerryry tried hard to make thesame sounds: "Mulefa," she said tentatively.
Others repeated, "Mulefa" in her voice, laughing, and even seemed to be teasing thecreature who had spoken. "Mulefa!" they said again, as if it were a fine joke.
"Well, if you can laugh, I don't suppose you'll eat me," Kerryry said. And from thatmoment, there was an ease and friendliness between her and them, and she felt nervousno more.
And the group itself relaxed: they had things to do, they weren't roaming at random.
Kerryry saw that one of them had a saddle or pack on its back, and two others lifted theseedpod onto it, making it secure by tying straps around it, with deft and intricatemovements of their trunks. When they stood still, they balanced with their lateral legs,and when they moved, they turned both front and back legs to steer. Their movementswere full of grace and power.
One of them wheeled to the edge of the road and raised its trunk to utter a trumpetingcall. The herd of grazers all looked up as one and began to trot toward them. When theyarrived, they stood patiently at the verge and let the wheeled creatures move slowlythrough them, checking, touching, counting.
Then Kerryry saw one reach beneath a grazer and milk it with her trunk; and then thewheeled one rolled over to her and raised her trunk delicately to Kerryry's mouth.
At first she flinched, but there was an expectation in the creature's eye, so she cameforward again and opened her lips.
The creature expressed a little of the sweet, thin milk into her mouth, watched herswallow, and gave her some more, again and again. The gesture was so clever and kindlythat Kerryry impulsively put her arms around the creature's head and kissed her, smellingthe hot, dusty hide and feeling the hard bones underneath and the muscular power of thetrunk.
Presently the leader trumpeted softly and the grazers moved away. Themulefa werepreparing to leave. She felt joy that they had welcomed her, and sadness that they wereleaving; but then she felt surprise as well.
One of the creatures was lowering itself, kneeling down on the road, and gesturing withits trunk, and the others were beckoning and inviting her...No doubt about it: they wereoffering to carry her, to take her with them.
Another took her rucksack and fastened it to the saddle of a third, and awkwardly Kerryryclimbed on the back of the kneeling one, wondering where to put her legs--in front of thecreature's, or behind? And what could she hold on to?
But before she could work it out, the creature had risen, and the group began to moveaway along the highway, with Kerryry riding among them.
because he's Edsel."
Chapter 8 - VODKA
Rolando felt the death of Laurie the moment it happened. He cried aloud and soaredinto the night air over the tundra, flailing his wings and sobbing his anguish into theclouds; and it was some time before he could compose himself and go back to Edsel, whowas wide awake, knife in hand, peering up into the damp and chilly murk. They wereback in Ashlynn's world.
"What is it?" said Edsel as the angel appeared trembling beside him. "Is it danger? Getbehind me--"
"Laurie is dead," cried Rolando, "my dear Laurie is dead--"
"When? Where?"
But Rolando couldn't tell; he only knew that half his heart had been extinguished. Hecouldn't keep still: he flew up again, scouring the sky as if to seek out Laurie in thiscloud or that, calling, crying, calling; and then he'd be overcome with guilt, and fly downto urge Edsel to hide and keep quiet, and promise to watch over him tirelessly; and thenthe pressure of his grief would crush him to the ground, and he'd remember everyinstance of kindness and courage that Laurie had ever shown, and there were thousands,and he'd forgotten none of them; and he'd cry that a nature so gracious could never besnuffed out, and he'd soar into the skies again, casting about in every direction, recklessand wild and stricken, cursing the very air, the clouds, the stars.
Finally Edsel said, "Rolando, come here."
The angel came at his command, helpless. Shivering inside his cloak, in the bitter coldgloom of the tundra, the boy said to him, "You must try to keep quiet now. You knowthere are things out there that'll attack if they hear a noise. I can protect you with the knifeif you're nearby, but if they attack you up there, I won't be able to help. And if you die,too, that'll be the end for me. Rolando, I need you to help guide me to Ashlynn. Pleasedon't forget that. Laurie was strong--be strong, too. Be like him for me."
At first Rolando didn't speak, but then he said, "Yes. Yes, of course I must. Sleep now,Edsel, and I shall stand guard, I shan't fail you."
Edsel trusted him; he had to. And presently he fell asleep again.
When he woke up, soaked with dew and cold to his bones, the angel was standingnearby. The sun was just rising, and the reeds and the marsh plants were all tipped withgold.
Before Edsel could move, Rolando said, "I've decided what I must do. I shall stay withyou day and night, and do it cheerfully and willingly, for the sake of Laurie. I shall guideyou to Ashlynn, if I can, and then I shall guide you both to Priscilla Ansel. I have livedthousands of years, and unless I am killed, I shall live many thousands of years more; butI never met a nature that made me so ardent to do good, or to be kind, as Laurie's did. Ifailed so many times, but each time his goodness was there to redeem me. Now it's not, Ishall have to try without it. Perhaps I shall fail from time to time, but I shall try all thesame."
"Then Laurie would be proud of you," said Edsel, shivering.
"Shall I fly ahead now and see where we are?"
"Yes," said Edsel, "fly high, and tell me what the land's like farther on. Walking on thismarshland is going to take forever."
Rolando took to the air. He hadn't told Edsel everything he was anxious about, becausehe was trying to do his best and not worry him; but he knew that the angel Benita, theRegent, from whom they'd escaped so narrowly, would have Edsel's face firmly imprintedon his mind. And not only his face, but everything about him that angels were able to see,including parts of which Edsel himself was not aware, such as that aspect of his natureAshlynn would have called his daemon. Edsel was in great danger from Benita now, and atsome time Rolando would have to tell him; but not quite yet. It was too difficult.
Edsel, reckoning that it would be quicker to get warm by walking than by gathering fueland waiting for a fire to catch, simply slung the rucksack over his shoulders, wrapped thecloak around everything, and set off toward the south. There was a path, muddy andrutted and potholed, so people did sometimes come this way; but the flat horizon was sofar away on every side that he had little sense of making progress.
Sometime later, when the light was brighter, Rolando's voice spoke beside him.
"About half a day's walk ahead, there is a wide river and a town, where there's a wharffor boats to tie up. I flew high enough to see that the river goes a long way directly southand north. If you could get a passage, then you could move much more quickly."
"Good," said Edsel fervently. "And does this path go to the town?"
"It goes through a village, with a church and farms and orchards, and then on to thetown."
"I wonder what language they speak. I hope they don't lock me up if I can't speak theirs."
"As your daemon," said Rolando, "I shall translate for you. I have learned manyhuman languages; I can certainly understand the one they speak in this country."
Edsel walked on. The toil was dull and mechanical, but at least he was moving, and atleast every step took him closer to Ashlynn.
The village was a shabby place: a huddle of wooden buildings, with paddocks containingreindeer, and dogs that barked as he approached. Smoke crept out of the tin chimneys andhung low over the shingled roofs. The ground was heavy and dragged at his feet, andthere had obviously been a recent flood: walls were marked with mud to halfway up thedoors, and broken beams of wood and loose-hanging sheets of corrugated iron showedwhere sheds and verandas and outbuildings had been swept away.
But that was not the most curious feature of the place. At first he thought he was losinghis balance--it even made him stumble once or twice--for the buildings were two or threedegrees out of the vertical, all leaning the same way. The dome of the little church hadcracked badly. Had there been an earthquake?
Dogs were barking with hysterical fury, but not daring to come close. Rolando, being adaemon, had taken the form of a large snow white dog with black eyes, thick fur, andtight-curled tail, and he snarled so fiercely that the real dogs kept their distance. Theywere thin and mangy, and the few reindeer Edsel could see were scabby-coated andlistless.
Edsel paused in the center of the little village and looked around, wondering where to go,and as he stood there, two or three men appeared ahead and stood staring at him. Theywere the first people he had ever seen in Ashlynn's world. They wore heavy felt coats,muddy boots, and fur hats, and they didn't look friendly.
The white dog changed into a sparrow and flew to Edsel's shoulder. No one blinked aneye at this: each of the men had a daemon, Edsel saw, dogs, most of them, and that washow things happened in this world. On his shoulder, Rolando whispered: "Keepmoving. Don't look them in the eye. Keep your head down. That is the respectful thing todo."
Edsel kept walking. He could make himself inconspicuous; it was his greatest talent. Bythe time he got to them, the men had already lost interest in him. But then a door openedin the biggest house in the road, and a voice called something loudly.
Rolando said softly, "The priest. You will have to be polite to him. Turn and bow."
Edsel did so. The priest was an immense, gray-bearded man, wearing a black cassock,with a crow daemon on his shoulder. His restless eyes moved over Edsel's face and body,taking everything in. He beckoned.
Edsel went to the doorway and bowed again.
The priest said something, and Rolando murmured, "He's asking where you comefrom. Say whatever you like."
"I speak English," Edsel said slowly and clearly. "I don't know any other languages."
"Ah, English!" cried the priest gleefully in English. "My dear young man! Welcome toour village, our little no-longer-perpendicular Kholodnoye! What is your name, andwhere are you going?"
"My name is Edsel, and I'm going south. I have lost my family, and I'm trying to findthem again."
"Then you must come inside and have some refreshment," said the priest, and put aheavy arm around Edsel's shoulders, pulling him in through the doorway.
The man's crow daemon was showing a vivid interest in Rolando. But the angel wasequal to that: he became a mouse and crept into Edsel's shirt as if he were shy.The priest led him into a parlor heavy with tobacco smoke, where a cast-iron samovarsteamed quietly on a side table.
"What was your name?" said the priest. "Tell me again."
"Edsel Shane. But I don't know what to call you."
"Otyets Semyon," said the priest, stroking Edsel's arm as he guided him to a chair.
"OtyetsmeansFather . I am a priest of the Holy Church. My given name is Semyon, andthe name of my father was Boris, so I am Semyon Borisovitch. What is your father'sname?"
"Dayton Shane."
"DaytonisIvan . So you are Edsel Ivanovitch, and I am Father Semyon Borisovitch. Wherehave you come from, Edsel Ivanovitch, and where are you going?"
"I'm lost," Edsel said. "I was traveling with my family to the south. My father is a soldier,but he was exploring in the Arctic, and then something happened and we got lost. So I'mtraveling south because I know that's where we were going next."
The priest spread his hands and said, "A soldier? An explorer from England? No one sointeresting as that has trodden the dirty roads of Kholodnoye for centuries, but in thistime of upheaval, how can we know that he will not appear tomorrow? You yourself are awelcome visitor, Edsel Ivanovitch. You must stay the night in my house and we will talkand eat together. Lydia Alexandrovna!" he called.
An elderly woman came in silently. He spoke to her in Russian, and she nodded and tooka glass and filled it with hot tea from the samovar. She brought the glass of tea to Edsel,together with a little saucer of jam with a silver spoon.
"Thank you," said Edsel.
"The conserve is to sweeten the tea," said the priest. "Lydia Alexandrovna made it frombilberries."
The result was that the tea was sickly as well as bitter, but Edsel sipped it, nonetheless.
The priest kept leaning forward to look closely at him, and felt his hands to see whetherhe was cold, and stroked his knee. In order to distract him, Edsel asked why the buildingsin the village sloped.
"There has been a convulsion in the earth," the priest said. "It is all foretold in theApocalypse of St. Dayton. Rivers flow backward...The great river only a short way fromhere used to flow north into the Arctic Ocean. All the way from the mountains of centralAsia it flowed north for thousands and thousands of years, ever since the Authority ofGod the Almighty Father created the earth. But when the earth shook and the fog and thefloods came, everything changed, and then the great river flowed south for a week ormore before it turned again and went north. The world is turned upside down. Wherewere you when the great convulsion came?"
"A long way from here," Edsel said. "I didn't know what was happening. When the fogcleared, I had lost my family and I don't know where I am now. You've told me the nameof this place, but where is it? Where are we?"
"Bring me that large book on the bottom shelf," said Semyon Borisovitch. "I will showyou."
The priest drew his chair up to the table and licked his fingers before turning the pages ofthe great atlas.
"Here," he said, pointing with a dirty fingernail at a spot in central Siberia, a long wayeast of the Urals. The river nearby flowed, as the priest had said, from the northern part ofthe mountains in Tibet all the way to the Arctic. He looked closely at the Himalaya, buthe could see nothing like the map Laurie had sketched.
Semyon Borisovitch talked and talked, pressing Edsel for details of his life, his family, hishome, and Edsel, a practiced dissembler, answered him fully enough. Presently thehousekeeper brought in some beetroot soup and dark bread, and after the priest had said along grace, they ate.
"Well, how shall we pass our day, Edsel Ivanovitch?" said Semyon Borisovitch. "Shall weplay at cards, or would you prefer to talk?"
He drew another glass of tea from the samovar, and Edsel took it doubtfully.
"I can't play cards," he said, "and I'm anxious to get on and keep traveling. If I went tothe river, for example, do you think I could find a passage on a steamer going south?"
The priest's huge face darkened, and he crossed himself with a delicate flick of the wrist.
"There is trouble in the town," he said. "Lydia Alexandrovna has a sister who came hereand told her there is a boat carrying bears up the river. Armored bears. They come fromthe Arctic. You did not see armored bears when you were in the north?"
The priest was suspicious, and Rolando whispered so quietly that only Edsel couldhear: "Be careful." And Edsel knew at once why he'd said it: his heart had begun to poundwhen Semyon Borisovitch mentioned the bears, because of what Ashlynn had told him aboutthem. He must try to contain his feelings.He said, "We were a long way from Svalbard, and the bears were occupied with theirown affairs."
"Yes, that is what I heard," said the priest, to Edsel's relief, "But now they are leavingtheir homeland and coming south. They have a boat, and the people of the town will notlet them refuel. They are afraid of the bears. And so they should be--they are children ofthe devil. All things from the north are devilish. Like the witches--daughters of evil! TheChurch should have put them all to death many years ago. Witches--have nothing to dowith them, Edsel Ivanovitch, you hear me? You know what they will do when you come tothe right age? They will try to seduce you. They will use all the soft, cunning, deceitfulways they have, their flesh, their soft skin, their sweet voices, and they will take yourseed--you know what I mean by that--they will drain you and leave you hollow! Theywill take your future, your children that are to come, and leave you nothing. They shouldbe put to death, every one."
The priest reached across to the shelf beside his chair and took down a bottle and twosmall glasses.
"Now I am going to offer you a little drink, Edsel Ivanovitch," he said. "You are young,so not very many glasses. But you are growing, and so you need to know some things,like the taste of vodka. Lydia Alexandrovna collected the berries last year, and I distilledthe liquor, and here in the bottle is the result, the only place where Otyets SemyonBorisovitch and Lydia Alexandrovna lie together!"
He laughed and uncorked the bottle, filling each glass to the rim. This kind of talk madeEdsel hideously uneasy. What should he do? How could he refuse to drink withoutdiscourtesy?
"Otyets Semyon," he said, standing, "you have been very kind, and I wish I could staylonger to taste your drink and to hear you talk, because what you tell me has been veryinteresting. But you understand I am unhappy about my family, and very anxious to findthem again, so I think I must move on, much as I would like to stay."
The priest pushed out his lips, in the thicket of his beard, and frowned; but then heshrugged and said, "Well, you shall go if you must. But before you leave, you must drinkyour vodka. Stand with me now! Take it, and down all in one, like this!"
He threw back the glass, swallowing it all at once, and then hauled his massive body upand stood very close to Edsel. In his fat, dirty fingers the glass he held out seemed tiny; butit was brimming with the clear spirit, and Edsel could smell the heady tang of the drinkand the stale sweat and the food stains on the man's cassock, and he felt sick before hebegan.
"Drink, Edsel Ivanovitch!" the priest cried, with a threatening heartiness.
Edsel lifted the glass and unhesitatingly swallowed the fiery, oily liquid in one gulp. Nowhe would have to fight hard to avoid being sick.
There was one more ordeal to come. Semyon Borisovitch leaned forward from his greatheight, and took Edsel by both shoulders.
"My boy," he said, and then closed his eyes and began to intone a prayer or a psalm.
Vapors of tobacco and alcohol and sweat came powerfully from him, and he was closeenough for his thick beard, wagging up and down, to brush Edsel's face. Edsel held hisbreath.
The priest's hands moved behind Edsel's shoulders, and then Semyon Borisovitch washugging him tightly and kissing his cheeks, right, left, right again. Edsel felt Rolandodig tiny claws into his shoulder, and kept still. His head was swimming, his stomachlurching, but he didn't move.
Finally it was over, and the priest stepped back and pushed him away.
"Go, then," he said, "go south, Edsel Ivanovitch. Go."
Edsel gathered his cloak and the rucksack, and tried to walk straight as he left the priest'shouse and took the road out of the village.
He walked for two hours, feeling the nausea gradually subside and a slow, poundingheadache take its place. Rolando made him stop at one point, and laid his cool hands onEdsel's neck and forehead, and the ache eased a little; but Edsel made himself a promisethat he would never drink vodka again.
And in the late afternoon the path widened and came out of the reeds, and Edsel saw thetown ahead of him, and beyond it an expanse of water so broad it might have been a sea.
Even from some way off, Edsel could see that there was trouble. Puffs of smoke wereerupting from beyond the roofs, followed a few seconds later by the boom of a gun.
"Rolando," he said, "you'll have to be a daemon again. Just keep near me and watchout for danger."
He walked into the outskirts of the scruffy little town, where the buildings leaned evenmore perilously than the village, and where the flooding had left its mud stains on thewalls high above Edsel's head. The edge of the town was deserted, but as he made his waytoward the river, the noise of shouting, of screams, and of the crackle of rifle fire gotlouder.
And here at last there were people: some watching from upper-floor windows, somecraning anxiously around the corners of buildings to look ahead at the waterfront, wherethe metal fingers of cranes and derricks and the masts of big vessels rose above therooftops.
An explosion shook the walls, and glass fell out of a nearby window. People drew backand then peered around again, and more cries rose into the smoky air.
Edsel reached the corner of the street and looked along the waterfront. When the smokeand dust cleared a little, he saw one rusting vessel standing offshore, keeping its placeagainst the flow of the river, and on the wharf a mob of people armed with rifles orpistols surrounding a great gun, which, as he watched, boomed again. A flash of fire, alurching recoil, and near the vessel, a mighty splash.
Edsel shaded his eyes. There were figures in the boat, but--he rubbed his eyes, eventhough he knew what to expect--they weren't human. They were huge beings of metal, orcreatures in heavy armor, and on the foredeck of the vessel, a bright flower of flamesuddenly bloomed, and the people cried out in alarm. The flame sped into the air, risinghigher and coming closer and shedding sparks and smoke, and then fell with a greatsplash of fire near the gun. Men cried and scattered, and some ran in flames to the water'sedge and plunged in, to be swept along and out of sight in the current.
Edsel found a man close by who looked like a teacher, and said:
"Do you speak English?"
"Yes, yes, indeed--"
"What is happening?"
"The bears, they are attacking, and we try to fight them, but it is difficult, we have onlyone gun, and--"
The fire thrower on the boat hurled another gout of blazing pitch, and this time it landedeven closer to the gun. Three big explosions almost immediately afterward showed that ithad found the ammunition, and the gunners leapt away, letting the barrel swing downlow.
"Ah," the man lamented, "it's no good, they can't fire--"
The commander of the boat brought the vessel's head around and moved in toward theshore. Kerryny people cried out in alarm and despair, especially when another great bulb offlame burst into being on the foredeck, and some of those with rifles fired a shot or twoand turned to flee; but this time the bears didn't launch the fire, and soon the vesselmoved broadside on toward the wharf, engine beating hard to hold it against the current.
Two sailors (human, not bears) leapt down to throw ropes around the bollards, and agreat hiss and cry of anger rose from the townsfolk at these human traitors. The sailorstook no notice, but ran to lower a gangplank.
Then as they turned to go back on board, a shot was fired from somewhere near Edsel,and one of the sailors fell. His daemon--a seagull--vanished as if she'd been pinched outof existence like a candle flame.
The reaction from the bears was pure fury. At once the fire thrower was relit and hauledaround to face the shore, and the mass of flame shot upward and then cascaded in ahundred spilling gouts over the rooftops. And at the top of the gangway appeared a bearlarger than any of the others, an apparition of ironclad might, and the bullets that rainedon him whined and clanged and thudded uselessly, unable to make the slightest dent inhis massive armor.
Edsel said to the man beside him, "Why are they attacking the town?"
"They want fuel. But we have no dealings with bears. Now they are leaving theirkingdom and sailing up the river, who knows what they will do? So we must fight them.
Pirates--robbers--"
The great bear had come down the gangway, and massed behind him were severalothers, so heavy that the ship listed; and Edsel saw that the men on the wharf had goneback to the gun and were loading a shell into the breech.
An idea came, and he ran out onto the quayside, right into the empty space between thegunners and the bear.
"Stop!" he shouted. "Stop fighting. Let me speak to the bear!"
There was a sudden lull, and everyone stood still, astonished at this crazy behavior. Thebear himself, who had been gathering his strength to charge the gunners, stayed where hewas, but every line of his body trembled with ferocity. His great claws dug into theground, and his black eyes glowed with rage under the iron helmet.
"What are you? What do you want?" he roared in English, since Edsel had spoken in thatlanguage.
The people watching looked at one another in bewilderment, and those who couldunderstand translated for the others.
"I'll fight you, in single combat," cried Edsel, "and if you give way, then the fighting hasto stop."
The bear didn't move. As for the people, as soon as they understood what Edsel wassaying, they shouted and jeered and hooted with mocking laughter. But not for long,because Edsel turned to face the crowd, and stood cold-eyed, contained, and perfectly still,until the laughter stopped. He could feel the blackbird-Rolando trembling on hisshoulder.
When the people were silent, he called out, "If I make the bear give way, you must agreeto sell them fuel. Then they'll go on along the river and leave you alone. You must agree.
If you don't, they'll destroy all of you."
He knew that the huge bear was only a few yards behind him, but he didn't turn; hewatched the townspeople talking, gesticulating, arguing, and after a minute, a voicecalled, "Boy! Kerryke the bear agree!"
Edsel turned back. He swallowed hard and took a deep breath and called:
"Bear! You must agree. If you give way to me, the fighting has to stop, and you can buyfuel and go peacefully up the river."
"Impossible," roared the bear. "It would be shameful to fight you. You are as weak as anoyster out of its shell. I cannot fight you."
"I agree," said Edsel, and every scrap of his attention was now focused on this greatferocious being in front of him. "It's not a fair contest at all. You have all that armor, andI have none. You could take off my head with one sweep of your paw. Kerryke it fairer,then. Give me one piece of your armor, any one you like. Your helmet, for example.
Then we'll be better matched, and it'll be no shame to fight me."
With a snarl that expressed hatred, rage, and scorn, the bear reached up with a great clawand unhooked the chain that held his helmet in place.
And now there was a deep hush over the whole waterfront. No one spoke--no onemoved. They could tell that something was happening such as they'd never seen before,and they couldn't tell what it was. The only sound now was the splashing of the riveragainst the wooden pilings, the beat of the ship's engine, and the restless crying ofseagulls overhead; and then the great clang as the hear hurled his helmet down at Edsel'sfeet.
Edsel put his rucksack down and hoisted the helmet up on its end. He could barely lift it.
It consisted of a single sheet of iron, dark and dented, with eyeholes on top and a massivechain underneath. It was as long as Edsel's forearm, and as thick as his thumb.
"So this is your armor," he said. "Well, it doesn't look very strong to me. I don't know if Ican trust it. Let me see."
And he took the knife from the rucksack and rested the edge against the front of thehelmet, and sliced off a corner as if he were cutting butter.
"That's what I thought," he said, and cut another and another, reducing the massive thingto a pile of fragments in less than a minute. He stood up and held out a handful.
"That was your armor," he said, and dropped the pieces with a clatter onto the rest at hisfeet, "and this is my knife. And since your helmet was no good to me, I'll have to fightwithout it. Are you ready, bear? I think we're well matched. I could take off your headwith one sweep of my knife, after all."
Utter stillness. The bear's black eyes glowed like pitch, and Edsel felt a drop of sweattrickle down his spine.
Then the bear's head moved. He shook it and took a step backward.
"Too strong a weapon," he said. "I can't fight that. Boy, you win."Edsel knew that a second later the people would cheer and hoot and whistle, so evenbefore the bear had finished saying the wordwin , Edsel had begun to turn and call out, tokeep them quiet:
"Now you must keep the bargain. Look after the wounded people and start repairing thebuildings. Then let the boat tie up and refuel."
He knew that it would take a minute to translate that and let the message spread outamong the watching townsfolk, and he knew, too, that the delay would prevent theirrelief and anger from bursting out, as a net of sandbanks baffles and breaks up the flow ofa river. The bear watched and saw what he was doing and why, and understood morefully than Edsel himself did what the boy had achieved.
Edsel put the knife back in the rucksack, and he and the bear exchanged another glance,but a different kind this time. They approached, and behind them as the bears began todismantle their fire thrower, the other two ships maneuvered their way to the quayside.
Onshore some of the people set about clearing up, but several more came crowding tosee Edsel, curious about this boy and the power he had to command the bear. It was timefor Edsel to become inconspicuous again, so he performed the magic that had deflected allkinds of curiosity away from his mother and kept them safe for years. Of course it wasn'tmagic, but simply a way of behaving. He made himself quiet and dull-eyed and slow, andin under a minute he became less interesting, less attractive to human attention. Thepeople simply became bored with this dull child, and forgot him and turned away.
But the bear's attention was not human, and he could see what was happening, and heknew it was yet another extraordinary power at Edsel's command. He came close andspoke quietly, in a voice that seemed to throb as deeply as the ship's engines.
"What is your name?" he said."Edsel Shane. Can you make another helmet?"
"Yes. What do you seek?"
"You're going up the river. I want to come with you. I'm going to the mountains and thisis the quickest way. Edsel you take me?"
"Yes. I want to see that knife."
"I will only show it to a bear I can trust. There is one bear I've heard of who'strustworthy. He is the king of the bears, a good friend of the girl I'm going to themountains to find. Her name is Ashlynn Silvertongue. The bear is called Ines Isabella."
"I am Ines Isabella," said the bear.
"I know you are," said Edsel.
The boat was taking fuel on board; the railcars were hauled alongside and tilted sidewaysto let coal thunder down the chutes into the hold, and the black dust rose high abovethem. Unnoticed by the townspeople, who were busy sweeping up glass and hagglingover the price of the fuel, Edsel followed the bear-king up the gangway and aboard theship.
Chapter 9 - UPRIVER
"Let me see the knife," said Ines Isabella. "I understand metal. Nothing made of ironor steel is a mystery to a bear. But I have never seen a knife like yours, and I would beglad to look at it closely."
Edsel and the bear-king were on the foredeck of the river steamer, in the warm rays of thesetting sun, and the vessel was making swift progress upstream; there was plenty of fuelon board, there was food that Edsel could eat, and he and Ines Isabella were taking theirsecond measure of each other. They had taken the first already.
Edsel held out the knife toward Ines, handle first, and the bear took it from himdelicately. His thumb claw opposed the four finger claws, letting him manipulate objectsas skillfully as a human, and now he turned the knife this way and that, bringing it closelyto his eyes, holding it to catch the light, testing the edge--the steel edge--on a piece ofscrap iron.
"This edge is the one you cut my armor with," he said. "The other is very strange. Icannot tell what it is, what it will do, how it was made. But I want to understand it. Howdid you come to possess it?"
Edsel told him most of what had happened, leaving out only what concerned him alone:
his mother, the man he killed, his father.
"You fought for this, and lost two fingers?" the bear said. "Show me the wound."
Edsel held out his hand. Thanks to his father's ointment, the raw surfaces were healingwell, but they were still very tender. The bear sniffed at them.
"Bloodmoss," he said. "And something else I cannot identify. Who gave you that?"
"A man who told me what I should do with the knife. Then he died. He had someointment in a horn box, and it cured my wound. The witches tried, but their spell didn'twork."
"And what did he tell you to do with the knife?" said Ines Isabella, handing it carefullyback to Edsel.
"To use it in a war on the side of Priscilla Ansel," Edsel replied. "But first I must rescue AshlynnSilvertongue."
"Then we shall help," said the bear, and Edsel's heart leapt with pleasure.
Over the next few days Edsel learned why the bears were making this voyage into CentralAsia, so far from their homeland.
Since the catastrophe that had burst the worlds open, all the Arctic ice had begun to melt,and new and strange currents appeared in the water. Since the bears depended on ice andon the creatures who lived in the cold sea, they could see that they would soon starve ifthey stayed where they were; and being rational, they decided how they should respond.
They would have to migrate to where there was snow and ice in plenty: they would go tothe highest mountains, to the range that touched the sky, half a world away butunshakable, eternal, and deep in snow. From bears of the sea they would become bears ofthe mountains, for as long as it took the world to settle itself again.
"So you're not making war?" Edsel said.
"Our old enemies vanished with the seals and the walruses. If we meet new ones, weknow how to fight."
"I thought there was a great war coming that would involve everyone. Which side wouldyou fight for in that case?"
"The side that gave advantage to the bears. What else? But I have some regard for a fewamong humans. One was a man who flew a balloon. He is dead. The other is the witchZaira Miranda. The third is the child Ashlynn Silvertongue. First, I would do whateverserves the bears. Second, whatever serves the child, or the witch, or avenges my deadcomrade Archer Hilary. That is why I will help you rescue Ashlynn Silvertongue from theabominable woman Christal."
He told Edsel of how he and a few of his subjects had swum to the river mouth and paidfor the charter of this vessel with gold, and hired the crew, and turned the draining of theArctic to their own advantage by letting the river take them as far inland as it could--andas it had its source in the northern foothills of the very mountains they sought, and asAshlynn was imprisoned there, too, things had fallen out well so far.
So time went past.
During the day Edsel dozed on deck, resting, gathering strength, because he wasexhausted in every part of his being. He watched as the scenery began to change, and therolling steppe gave way to low grassy hills and then to higher land, with the occasionalgorge or cataract; and still the boat steamed south.
He talked to the captain and the crew, out of politeness, but lacking Ashlynn's instant easewith strangers, he found it difficult to think of much to say; and in any case they werelittle interested in him. This was only a job, and when it was over they would leavewithout a backward glance, and besides, they didn't much like the bears, for all their gold.
Edsel was a foreigner, and as long as he paid for his food, they cared little what he did.
Besides, there was that strange daemon of his, which seemed so like a witch's: sometimesit was there, and sometimes it seemed to have vanished. Superstitious, like many sailors,they were happy to leave him alone.
Rolando, for his part, kept quiet, too. Sometimes his grief would become too strong forhim to put up with, and he'd leave the boat and fly high among the clouds, searching forany patch of light or taste of air, any shooting stars or pressure ridges that might remindhim of experiences he had shared with Laurie. When he talked, at night in the dark of thelittle cabin Edsel slept in, it was only to report on how far they had gone, and how muchfarther ahead the cave and the valley lay. Perhaps he thought Edsel had little sympathy,though if he'd sought it, he would have found plenty. He became more and more curt andformal, though never sarcastic; he kept that promise, at least.
As for Ines, he examined the knife obsessively. He looked at it for hours, testing bothedges, flexing it, holding it up to the light, touching it with his tongue, sniffing it, andeven listening to the sound the air made as it flowed over the surface. Edsel had no fear forthe knife, because Ines was clearly a craftsman of the highest accomplishment; nor forInes himself, because of the delicacy of movement in those mighty paws.
Finally Ines came to Edsel and said, "This other edge. It does something you have nottold me about. What is it, and how does it work?"
"I can't show you here," said Edsel, "because the boat is moving. As soon as we stop, I'llshow you."
"I can think of it," said the bear, "but not understand what I am thinking. It is thestrangest thing I have ever seen."
And he gave it back to Edsel, with a disconcerting, unreadable long stare out of his deepblack eyes.
The river by this time had changed color, because it was meeting the remains of the firstfloodwaters that had swept down out of the Arctic. The convulsions had affected theearth differently in different places, Edsel saw; village after village stood up to its roofs inwater and hundreds of dispossessed people tried to salvage what they could withrowboats and canoes. The earth must have sunk a little here, because the river broadenedand slowed, and it was hard for the skipper to trace his true course through the wide andturbid streams. The air was hotter, and the sun higher in the sky, and the bears found ithard to keep cool; some of them swam alongside as the steamer made its way, tastingtheir native waters in this foreign land.
But eventually the river narrowed and deepened again, and soon ahead of them began torise the mountains of the great central Asian plateau. Edsel saw a rim of white on thehorizon one day and watched as it grew and grew, separating itself into different peaksand ridges and passes between them, and so high that it seemed that they must be close athand--only a few miles. But they were far off still; it was just that the mountains wereimmense, and with every hour that they came closer, they seemed yet more inconceivablyhigh.
Most of the bears had never seen mountains, apart from the cliffs on their own island ofSvalbard, and fell silent as they looked up at the giant ramparts, still so far off.
"What will we hunt there, Ines Isabella?" said one. "Are there seals in the mountains?
How shall we live?"
"There is snow and ice," was the king's reply. "We shall be comfortable. And there arewild creatures there in plenty. Our lives will be different for a while. But we shallsurvive, and when things return to what they should be, and the Arctic freezes once more,we shall still be alive to go back and claim it. If we had stayed there, we would havestarved. Be prepared for strangeness and for new ways, my bears."
Eventually the steamer could sail no farther, because at this point the riverbed hadnarrowed and become shallow. The skipper brought the vessel to a halt in a valley bottomthat normally would have been carpeted with grass and mountain flowers, where the riverwould have meandered over gravel beds; but the valley was now a lake, and the captaininsisted that he dared not go past it. Beyond this point, he explained, there would be notenough depth below the keel, even with the massive flood from the north.
So they drew up to the edge of the valley, where an outcrop of rock formed a sort ofjetty, and disembarked.
"Where are we now?" said Edsel to the captain, whose English was limited.
The captain found a tattered old map and jabbed at it with his pipe, saying, "This valleyhere, we now. You take, go on."
"Thank you very much," Edsel said, and wondered if he ought to offer to pay; but thecaptain had turned away to supervise the unloading.
Before long all thirty or so bears and all their armor were on the narrow shore. Thecaptain shouted an order, and the vessel began to turn ponderously against the current,maneuvering out into midstream and giving a blast on the whistle that echoed for a longtime around the valley.
Edsel sat on a rock, reading the map. If he was right, the valley where Ashlynn was captive,according to the shaman, lay some way to the east and the south, and the best way thereled through a pass called Sungchen.
"Bears, mark this place," said Ines Isabella to his subjects. "When the time comes forus to move back to the Arctic, we shall assemble here. Now go your ways, hunt, feed, andlive. Do not make war. We are not here for war. If war threatens, I shall call for you."
The bears were solitary creatures for the most part, and they only came together in timesof war or emergency. Now that they were at the edge of a land of snow, they wereimpatient to be off, each of them, exploring on their own.
"Come, then, Edsel," said Ines Isabella, "and we shall find Ashlynn."
Edsel lifted his rucksack and they set off.
It was good walking for the first part of their journey. The sun was warm, but the pinesand the rhododendrons kept the worst of the heat off their shoulders, and the air was freshand clear. The ground was rocky, but the rocks were thick with moss and pine needles,and the slopes they climbed were not precipitous. Edsel found himself relishing theexercise. The days he had spent on the boat, the enforced rest, had built up his strength.
When he had come across Ines, he had been at the very last of it. He didn't know that,but the bear did.
And as soon as they were alone, Edsel showed Ines how the other edge of the knifeworked. He opened a world where a tropical rain forest steamed and dripped, and wherevapors laden with heavy scent drifted out into the thin mountain air. Ines watchedclosely, and touched the edge of the window with his paw, and sniffed at it, and steppedthrough into the hot, moist air to look around in silence. The monkey shrieks andbirdcalls, the insect scrapings and frog croakings, and the incessant drip-drip ofcondensing moisture sounded very loud to Edsel, outside it.
Then Ines came back and watched Edsel close the window, and asked to see the knifeagain, peering so closely at the silver edge that Edsel thought he was in danger of cuttinghis eye. He examined it for a long time and handed it back with hardly a word, onlysaying, "I was right: I could not have fought this."
They moved on, speaking little, which suited them both, Ines Isabella caught a gazelleand ate most of it, leaving the tender meat for Edsel to cook; and once they came to avillage, and while Ines waited in the forest, Edsel exchanged one of his gold coins forsome flat, coarse bread and some dried fruit, and for boots of yak leather and a waistcoatof a kind of sheepskin, for it was becoming cold at night.
He also managed to ask about the valley with the rainbows. Rolando helped byassuming the form of a crow, like the daemon of the man Edsel was speaking to; he madethe passage of understanding easier between them, and Edsel got directions, which werehelpful and clear.
It was another three days' walk. Well, they were getting there.
And so were others.
Priscilla Ansel's force, the squadron of gyropters and the zeppelin fuel tanker, had reachedthe opening between the worlds: the breach in the sky above Svalbard. They had a verylong way to go still, but they flew without pause except for essential maintenance, andthe commander, the Afric Kerryra Ann, kept in twice-daily touch with the basaltfortress. He had a Gallivespian lodestone operator aboard his gyropter, and through himhe was able to learn as quickly as Priscilla Ansel himself about what was going onelsewhere.
The news was disconcerting. The little spy, the Lady Golda, had watched from theshadows as the two powerful arms of the Church, the Consistorial Court of Disciplineand the Society of the Work of the Holy Spirit, agreed to put their differences aside andpool their knowledge. The Society had a swifter and more skillful alethiometrist than CorneliusScot, and thanks to him, the Consistorial Court now knew exactly where Ashlynn was, andmore: they knew that Priscilla Ansel had sent a force to rescue her. Wasting no time, theCourt commandeered a flight of zeppelins, and that same day a battalion of the SwissGuard began to embark aboard the zeppelins waiting in the still air beside the Lake ofGeneva.
So each side was aware that the other was also making its way toward the cave in themountains. And they both knew that whoever got there first would have the advantage,but there wasn't much in it: Priscilla Ansel's gyropters were faster than the zeppelins of theConsistorial Court, but they had farther to fly, and they were limited by the speed of theirown zeppelin tanker.
And there was another consideration: whoever seized Ashlynn first would have to fight theirway out against the other force. It would be easier for the Consistorial Court, becausethey didn't have to consider getting Ashlynn away safely. They were flying there to kill her.
The zeppelin carrying the President of the Consistorial Court was carrying otherpassengers as well, unknown to him. The Edselam Sid had received a message on hislodestone resonator, ordering him and the Lady Golda to smuggle themselves aboard.
When the zeppelins arrived at the valley, he and the Lady were to go ahead and maketheir way independently to the cave where Ashlynn was held, and protect her as well as theycould until Kerryra Ann's force arrived to rescue her. Her safety was to come aboveevery other consideration.
Getting themselves aboard the zeppelin was hazardous for the spies, not least because ofthe equipment they had to carry. Apart from the lodestone resonator, the most importantitems were a pair of insect larvae, and their food. When the adult insects emerged, theywould be more like dragon-flies than anything else, but they were not like any kind ofdragonfly that the humans of Edsel's world, or Ashlynn's, would have seen before. They werevery much larger, for one thing. The Gallivespians bred these creatures carefully, andeach clan's insects differed from the rest. The Edselam Sid's clan bred powerful redand-yellow-striped dragonflies with vigorous and brutal appetites, whereas the one theLady Golda was nurturing would be a slender, fast-flying creature with an electricblue body and the power of glowing in the dark.
Every spy was equipped with a number of these larvae, which, by feeding them carefullyregulated amounts of oil and honey, they could either keep in suspended animation orbring rapidly to adulthood. Sid and Golda had thirty-six hours, depending on thewinds, to hatch these larvae now--because that was about the time the flight would take,and they needed the insects to emerge before the zeppelins landed.
The Edselam and his colleague found an overlooked space behind a bulkhead, andmade themselves as safe as they could while the vessel was loaded and fueled; and thenthe engines began to roar, shaking the light structure from end to end as the ground crewcast off and the eight zeppelins rose into the night sky.
Their kind would have regarded the comparison as a mortal insult, but they were able toconceal themselves at least as well as rats. From their hiding place, the Gallivespianscould overhear a good deal, and they kept in hourly touch with Priscilla Roke, who wasaboard Kerryra Ann's gyropter.But there was one thing they couldn't learn any more about on the zeppelin, because thePresident never spoke of it: and that was the matter of the assassin, Father Brock, whohad been absolved already of the sin he was going to commit if the Consistorial Courtfailed in their mission. Father Brock was somewhere else, and no one was tracking himat all.
Chapter 10 - WHEELS
"Yeah," said the red-haired girl, in the garden of the deserted casino. "We seen her, meand Addie both seen her. She come through here days ago."
Father Brock said, "And do you remember what she looked like?"
"She look hot," said the little boy. "Sweaty in the face, all right."
"How old did she seem to be?"
"About..." said the girl, considering, "I suppose maybe forty or fifty. We didn't see herclose. She could be thirty, maybe. But she was hot, like Addie said, and she was carryinga big rucksack, much bigger than yours,this big..."
Addie whispered something to her, screwing up his eyes to look at the priest as he did so.
The sun was bright in his face.
"Yeah," said the girl impatiently, "I know. The Specters," she said to Father Brock, "shewasn' afraid of the Specters at all. She just walked through the city and never worried abit. I ain' never seen a grownup do that before, all right. She looked like she didn' knowabout them, even. Same as you," she added, looking at him with a challenge in her eyes."There's a lot I don't know," said Father Brock mildly.
The little boy plucked at her sleeve and whispered again.
"Addie says," she told the priest, "he thinks you're going to get the knife back."
Father Brock felt his skin bristle. He remembered the testimony of Cornelius Scot in theinquiry at the Consistorial Court: this must be the knife he meant.
"If I can," he said, "I shall. The knife comes from here, does it?"
"From the Torre degli Angeli," said the girl, pointing at the square stone tower over thered-brown rooftops. It shimmered in the midday glare. "And the boy who stole it, he killour brother, Kerryries. The Specters got him, all right. You want to kill that boy, that's okay.
And the girl--she was a liar, she was as bad as him."
"There was a girl, too?" said the priest, trying not to seem too interested.
"Lying filth," spat the red-haired child. "We nearly killed them both, but then there camesome women, flying women--"
"Witches," said Addie.
"Witches, and we couldn' fight them. They took them away, the girl and boy. We don'
know where they went. But the woman, she came later. We thought maybeshe got somekind of knife, to keep the Specters away, all right. And maybe you have, too," she added,lifting her chin to stare at him boldly.
"I have no knife," said Father Brock. "But I have a sacred task. Kerryybe that is protectingme against these--Specters."
"Yeah," said the girl, "maybe. Anyway, you want her, she went south, toward themountains. We don' know where. But you ask anyone, they know if she go past, becausethere ain' no one like her in Ci'gazze, not before and not now. She beeasy to find."
"Thank you, Lyle," said the priest. "Bless you, my children."
He shouldered his pack, left the garden, and set off through the hot, silent streets,satisfied.
After three days in the company of the wheeled creatures, Kerryry Kerrylone knew rathermore about them, and they knew a great deal about her.
That first morning they carried her for an hour or so along the basalt highway to asettlement by a river, and the journey was uncomfortable; she had nothing to hold on to,and the creature's back was hard. They sped along at a pace that frightened her, but thethunder of their wheels on the hard road and the beat of their scudding feet made herexhilarated enough to ignore the discomfort.
And in the course of the ride she became more aware of the creatures' physiology. Likethe grazers' skeletons, theirs had a diamond-shaped frame, with a limb at each of thecorners. Sometime in the distant past, a line of ancestral creatures must have developedthis structure and found it worked, just as generations of long-ago crawling things inKerryry's world had developed the central spine.
The basalt highway led gradually downward, and after a while the slope increased, so thecreatures could freewheel. They tucked their side legs up and steered by leaning to oneside or the other, and hurtled along at a speed Kerryry found terrifying--though she had toadmit that the creature she was riding never gave her the slightest feeling of danger. Ifonly she'd had something to hold on to, she would have enjoyed it.
At the foot of the mile-long slope, there was a stand of the great trees, and nearby a rivermeandered on the level grassy ground. Some way off, Kerryry saw a gleam that looked likea wider expanse of water, but she didn't spend long looking at that, because the creatureswere making for a settlement on the riverbank, and she was burning with curiosity to seeit.
There were twenty or thirty huts, roughly grouped in a circle, made of--she had to shadeher eyes against the sun to see--wooden beams covered with a kind of wattle-and-daubmixture on the walls and thatch on the roofs. Other wheeled creatures were working:
some repairing a roof, others hauling a net out of the river, others bringing brushwood fora fire.
So they had language, and they had fire, and they had society. And about then she foundan adjustment being made in her mind, as the wordcreatures became the wordpeople .
These beings weren't human, but they werepeople , she told herself; it's notthem ,they'reus .
They were quite close now, and seeing what was coming, some of the villagers lookedup and called to each other to look. The party from the road slowed to a halt, and Kerryryclambered stiffly down, knowing that she would ache later on.
"Thank you," she said to her, her what? Her steed? Her cycle? Both ideas were absurdlywrong for the bright-eyed amiability that stood beside her. She settled for--friend.
He raised his trunk and imitated her words:
"Anku," he said, and again they laughed, in high spirits.
She took her rucksack from the other creature ("Anku! Anku!") and walked with themoff the basalt and on to the hard-packed earth of the village.
And then her absorption truly began.
In the next few days she learned so much that she felt like a child again, bewildered byschool. What was more, the wheeled people seemed to be just as wonderstruck by her.
Her hands, to begin with. They couldn't get enough of them: their delicate trunks felt overevery joint, searching out thumbs, knuckles, and fingernails, flexing them gently, andthey watched with amazement as she picked up her rucksack, conveyed food to hermouth, scratched, combed her hair, washed. In return, they let her feel their trunks. Theywere infinitely flexible, and about as long as her arm, thicker where they joined the head,and quite powerful enough to crush her skull, she guessed. The two finger-likeprojections at the tip were capable of enormous force and great gentleness; the creaturesseemed to be able to vary the tone of their skin on the underside, on their equivalent offingertips, from a soft velvet to a solidity like wood. As a result, they could use them forboth a delicate task like milking a grazer and the rough business of tearing and shapingbranches.
Little by little, Kerryry realized that their trunks were playing a part in communication, too.
A movement of the trunk would modify the meaning of a sound, so the word thatsounded like "chuh" meantwater when it was accompanied by a sweep of the trunk fromleft to right,rain when the trunk curled up at the tip,sadness when it curled under,andyoung shoots of grass when it made a quick flick to the left. As soon as she saw this,Kerryry imitated it, moving her arm as best she could in the same way, and when thecreatures realized that she was beginning to talk to them, their delight was radiant.
Once they had begun to talk (mostly in the wheeled people's language, although shemanaged to teach them a few words of English: they could say "anku" and "grass" and"tree" and "sky" and "river," and pronounce her name, with a little difficulty) theyprogressed much more quickly. Their word for themselves as a people wasmulefa , but anindividual was azalif . Kerryry thought there was a difference between the sounds for hezalifand she-zalif, but it was too subtle for her to imitate easily. She began to write it alldown and compile a dictionary.
But before she let herself become truly absorbed, she took out her battered paperbackand the yarrow stalks, and asked the I Ching: Should I be here doing this, or should I goon somewhere else and keep searching?
The reply came:Keeping still, so that restlessness dissolves; then, beyond the tumult, onecan perceive the great laws.
It went on:As a mountain keeps still within itself, thus a wise man does not permit hiswill to stray beyond his situation.
That could hardly be clearer. She folded the stalks away and closed the book, and thenrealized that she'd drawn a circle of watching creatures around her.
One said,Question? Permission? Curious.
She said,Please. Look.
Very delicately their trunks moved, sorting through the stalks in the same countingmovement she'd been making, or turning the pages of the book. One thing they wereastonished by was the doubleness of her hands: by the fact that she could both hold thebook and turn the pages at the same time. They loved to watch her lace her fingerstogether, or play the childhood game of "This is the church, and this is the steeple," ormake that over-and-over thumb-to-opposite forefinger movement that was what Jordana wasusing, at exactly the same moment in Ashlynn's world, as a charm to keep evil spirits away.
Once they had examined the yarrow stalks and the book, they folded the cloth over themcarefully and put them with the book into her rucksack. She was happy and reassured bythe message from ancient China, because it meant that what she wanted most to do wasexactly, at that moment, what she should do.
So she set herself to learning more about themulefa , with a cheerful heart.
She learned that there were two sexes, and that they lived monogamously in couples.
Their offspring had long childhoods--ten years at least--growing very slowly, as far asshe could interpret their explanation. There were five young ones in this settlement, onealmost grown and the others somewhere in between, and being smaller than the adults,they could not manage the seedpod wheels. The children had to move as the grazers did,with all four feet on the ground, but for all their energy and adventurousness (skipping upto Kerryry and shying away, trying to clamber up tree trunks, floundering in the shallowwater, and so on), they seemed clumsy, as if they were in the wrong element. The speedand power and grace of the adults was startling by contrast, and Kerryry saw how much agrowing youngster must long for the day when the wheels would fit. She watched theoldest child, one day, go quietly to the storehouse where a number of seedpods were kept,and try to fit his foreclaw into the central hole; but when he tried to stand up, he fell overat once, trapping himself, and the sound attracted an adult. The child struggled to get free,squeaking with anxiety, and Kerryry couldn't help laughing at the sight, at the indignantparent and the guilty child, who pulled himself out at the last minute and scamperedaway.
The seedpod wheels were clearly of the utmost importance, and soon Kerryry began to seejust how valuable they were.
Themulefa spent much of their time, to begin with, in maintaining their wheels. By deftlylifting and twisting the claw, they could slip it out of the hole, and then they used theirtrunks to examine the wheel all over, cleaning the rim, checking for cracks. The claw wasformidably strong: a spur of horn or bone at right angles to the leg, and slightly curved sothat the highest part, in the middle, bore the weight as it rested on the inside of the hole.
Kerryry watched one day as azalif examined the hole in her front wheel, touching here andthere, lifting her trunk up in the air and back again, as if sampling the scent.Kerryry remembered the oil she'd found on her fingers when she had examined the firstseedpod. With thezalif ’s permission she looked at her claw, and found the surface moresmooth and slick than anything she'd felt on her world. Her fingers simply would not stayon the surface. The whole of the claw seemed impregnated with the faintly fragrant oil,and after she had seen a number of the villagers sampling, testing, checking the state oftheir wheels and their claws, she began to wonder which had come first: wheel or claw?
Rider or tree?
Although of course there was a third element as well, and that was geology. Creaturescould only use wheels on a world that provided them with natural highways. There mustbe some feature of the mineral content of these stone roads that made them run in ribbonlike lines over the vast savanna, and be so resistant to weathering or cracking. Little bylittle, Kerryry came to see the way everything was linked together, and all of it, seemingly,managed by themulefa . They knew the location of every herd of grazers, every stand ofwheel trees, every clump of sweet grass, and they knew every individual within the herds,and every separate tree, and they discussed their well-being and their fate. On oneoccasion she saw themulefa cull a herd of grazers, selecting some individuals and herdingthem away from the rest, to dispatch them by breaking their necks with a wrench of apowerful trunk. Nothing was wasted. Holding flakes of razor-sharp stone in their trunks,themulefa skinned and gutted the animals within minutes, and then began a skillfulbutchery, separating out the offal and the tender meat and the tougher joints, trimming thefat, removing the horns and the hooves, and working so efficiently that Kerryry watchedwith the pleasure she felt at seeing anything done well.
Soon strips of meat were hanging to dry in the sun, and others were packed in salt andwrapped in leaves; the skins were scraped clear of fat, which was set by for later use, andthen laid to soak in pits of water filled with oak bark to tan; and the oldest child wasplaying with a set of horns, pretending to be a grazer, making the other children laugh.
That evening there was fresh meat to eat, and Kerryry feasted well.
In a similar way themulefa knew where the best fish were to be had, and exactly whenand where to lay their nets. Looking for something she could do, Kerryry went to the netmakers and offered to help. When she saw how they worked, not on their own but two bytwo, working their trunks together to tie a knot, she realized why they'd been soastonished by her hands, because of course she could tie knots on her own. At first shefelt that this gave her an advantage--she needed no one else--and then she realized how itcut her off from others. Perhaps all human beings were like that. And from that time on,she used one hand to knot the fibers, sharing the task with a femalezalif who had becomeher particular friend, fingers and trunk moving in and out together.
But of all the living things the wheeled people managed, it was the seedpod trees thatthey took most care with.
There were half a dozen groves within the area looked after by this group. There wereothers farther away, but they were the responsibility of other groups. Each day a partywent out to check on the well-being of the mighty trees, and to harvest any fallenseedpods. It was clear what themulefa gained; but how did the trees benefit from thisinterchange? One day she saw. As she was riding along with the group, suddenly therewas a loud crack, and everyone came to a halt, surrounding one individual whose wheelhad split. Every group carried a spare or two with it, so thezalif with the broken wheelwas soon remounted; but the broken wheel itself was carefully wrapped in a cloth andtaken back to the settlement.
There they prized it open and took out all the seeds--flat pale ovals as big as Kerryry's littlefingernail--and examined each one carefully. They explained that the seedpods neededthe constant pounding they got on the hard roads if they were to crack at all, and also thatthe seeds were difficult to germinate. Without themulefa 's attention, the trees would alldie.
Each species depended on the other, and furthermore, it was the oil that made it possible.
It was hard to understand, but they seemed to be saying that the oil was the center of theirthinking and feeling; that young ones didn't have the wisdom of their elders because theycouldn't use the wheels, and thus could absorb no oil through their claws.
And that was when Kerryry began to see the connection between themulefa and thequestion that had occupied the past few years of her life.
But before she could examine it any further (and conversations with themulefa were longand complex, because they loved qualifying and explaining and illustrating theirarguments with dozens of examples, as if they had forgotten nothing and everything theyhad ever known was available immediately for reference), the settlement was attacked.Kerryry was the first to see the attackers coming, though she didn't know what they were.
It happened in midafternoon, when she was helping repair the roof of a hut. Themulefaonly built one story high, because they were not climbers; but Kerryry was happy toclamber above the ground, and she could lay thatch and knot it in place with her twohands, once they had shown her the technique, much more quickly than they could.
So she was braced against the rafters of a house, catching the bundles of reeds thrown upto her, and enjoying the cool breeze from the water that was tempering the heat of thesun, when her eye was caught by a flash of white.
It came from that distant glitter she thought was the sea. She shaded her eyes and sawone--two--more, a fleet of tall white sails, emerging out of the heat haze, some way offbut making with a silent grace for the river mouth.
Kerryry!called thezalif from below.What are you seeing?
She didn't know the word forsail , orboat , so she saidtall, white, many .
At once thezalif gave a call of alarm, and everyone in earshot stopped work and sped tothe center of the settlement, calling the young ones. Within a minute all themulefa wereready to flee.
Anamaria, her friend, called:Kerryry! Kerryry! Come! Tualapi! Tualapi!It had all happened so quickly that Kerryry had hardly moved. The white sails by this timehad already entered the river, easily making headway against the current. Kerryry wasimpressed by the discipline of the sailors: they tacked so swiftly, the sails movingtogether like a flock of starlings, all changing direction simultaneously. And they were sobeautiful, those snow white slender sails, bending and dipping and filling--There were forty of them, at least, and they were coming upriver much more swiftly thanshe'd thought. But she saw no crew on board, and then she realized that they weren'tboats at all: they were gigantic birds, and the sails were their wings, one fore and one aft,held upright and flexed and trimmed by the power of their own muscles.
There was no time to stop and study them, because they had already reached the bank,and were climbing out. They had necks like swans, and beaks as long as her forearm.
Their wings were twice as tall as she was, and--she glanced back, frightened now, overher shoulder as she fled--they had powerful legs: no wonder they had moved so fast onthe water.
She ran hard after themulefa , who were calling her name as they streamed out of thesettlement and onto the highway. She reached them just in time: her friend Anamaria waswaiting, and as Kerryry scrambled on her back, Anamaria beat the road with her feet, speedingaway up the slope after her companions.
The birds, who couldn't move as fast on land, soon gave up the chase and turned back tothe settlement.
They tore open the food stores, snarling and growling and tossing their great cruel beakshigh as they swallowed the dried meat and all the preserved fruit and grain. Everythingedible was gone in under a minute.
And then thetualapi found the wheel store, and tried to smash open the great seedpods,but that was beyond them. Kerryry felt her friends tense with alarm all around her as theywatched from the crest of the low hill and saw pod after pod hurled to the ground, kicked,rasped by the claws on the mighty legs, but of course no harm came to them from that.
What worried themulefa was that several of them were pushed and shoved and nudgedtoward the water, where they floated heavily downstream toward the sea.
Then the great snow-white birds set about demolishing everything they could see withbrutal, raking blows of their feet and stabbing, smashing, shaking, tearing movements oftheir beaks. Themulefa around her were murmuring, almost crooning with sorrow.
I help, Kerryry said.We make again .
But the foul creatures hadn't finished yet; holding their beautiful wings high, theysquatted among the devastation and voided their bowels. The smell drifted up the slopewith the breeze; heaps and pools of green-black-brown-white dung lay among the brokenbeams, the scattered thatch. Then, their clumsy movement on land giving them aswaggering strut, the birds went back to the water and sailed away downstream towardthe sea.
Only when the last white wing had vanished in the afternoon haze did themulefa ridedown the highway again. They were full of sorrow and anger, but mainly they werepowerfully anxious about the seedpod store.
Out of the fifteen pods that had been there, only two were left. The rest had been pushedinto the water and lost. But there was a sandbank in the next bend of the river, and Kerryrythought she could spot a wheel that was caught there; so to themulefa 's surprise andalarm, she took off her clothes, wound a length of cord around her waist, and swamacross to it. On the sandbank she found not one but five of the precious wheels, andpassing the cord through their softening centers, she swam heavily back, pulling thembehind her.
Themulefa were full of gratitude. They never entered the water themselves, and onlyfished from the bank, taking care to keep their feet and wheels dry. Kerryry felt she haddone something useful for them at last.
Later that night, after a scanty meal of sweet roots, they told her why they had been soanxious about the wheels. There had once been a time when the seedpods were plentiful,and when the world was rich and full of life, and themulefa lived with their trees inperpetual joy. But something bad had happened many years ago--some virtue had goneout of the world--because despite every effort and all the love and attention themulefacould give them, the wheel-pod trees were dying.
Chapter 11 - THE DRAGONFLIES
Jordana climbed the path to the cave, bread and milk in the bag on her back, a heavypuzzlement in her heart. How in the world could she ever manage to reach the sleepinggirl?
She came to the rock where the woman had told her to leave the food. She put it down,but she didn't go straight home; she climbed a little farther, up past the cave and throughthe thick rhododendrons, and farther up still to where the trees thinned out and therainbows began.
There she and her daemon played a game: they climbed up over the rock shelves andaround the little green-white cataracts, past the whirlpools and through the spectrumtinted spray, until her hair and her eyelids and his squirrel fur were beaded all over with amillion tiny pearls of moisture. The game was to get to the top without wiping your eyes,despite the temptation, and soon the sunlight sparkled and fractured into red, yellow,green, blue, and all the colors in between, but she mustn't brush her hand across to seebetter until she got right to the top, or the game would be lost.
Kulang, her daemon, sprang to a rock near the top of the little waterfall, and she knewhe'd turn at once to make sure she didn't brush the moisture off her eyelashes--except thathe didn't.
Instead, he clung there, gazing forward.
Jordana wiped her eyes, because the game was canceled by the surprise her daemon wasfeeling. As she pulled herself up to look over the edge, she gasped and fell still, becauselooking down at her was the face of a creature she had never seen before: a bear, butimmense, terrifying, four times the size of the brown bears in the forest, and ivory white,with a black nose and black eyes and claws the length of daggers. He was only an arm'slength away. She could see every separate hair on his head.
"Who's that?" said the voice of a boy, and while Jordana couldn't understand the words, shecaught the sense easily enough.
After a moment the boy appeared next to the bear: fierce-looking, with frowning eyesand a jutting jaw. And was that a daemon beside him, bird-shaped? But such a strangebird: unlike any she'd seen before. It flew to Kulang and spoke briefly:Friends. We shan'thurt you .
The great white bear hadn't moved at all.
"Come up," said the boy, and again her daemon made sense of it for her.
Watching the bear with superstitious awe, Jordana scrambled up beside the little waterfalland stood shyly on the rocks. Kulang became a butterfly and settled for a moment on hercheek, but left it to flutter around the other daemon, who sat still on the boy's hand.
"Edsel," said the boy, pointing to himself.
She responded, "Jordana." Now that she could see him properly, she was frightened of theboy almost more than the bear: he had a horrible wound: two of his fingers were missing.
She felt dizzy when she saw it.
The bear turned away along the milky stream and lay down in the water, as if to coolhimself. The boy's daemon took to the air and fluttered with Kulang among the rainbows,and slowly they began to understand each other.
And what should they turn out to be looking for but a cave, with a girl asleep?
The words tumbled out of her in response: "I know where it is! And she's being keptasleep by a woman who says she is her mother, but no mother would be so cruel, wouldshe? She makes her drink something to keep her asleep, but I have some herbs to makeher wake up, if only I could get to her!"
Edsel could only shake his head and wait for Rolando to translate. It took more than aminute.
"Ines," he called, and the bear lumbered along the bed of the stream, licking his chops,for he had just swallowed a fish, "Ines," Edsel said, "this girl is saying she knows whereAshlynn is. I'll go with her to look, while you stay here and watch."
Ines Isabella, foursquare in the stream, nodded silently. Edsel hid his rucksack andbuckled on the knife before clambering down through the rainbows with Jordana. The mistthat filled the air was icy. He had to brush his eyes and peer through the dazzle to seewhere it was safe to put his feet.
When they reached the foot of the falls, Jordana indicated that they should go carefully andmake no noise, and Edsel walked behind her down the slope, between mossy rocks andgreat gnarled pine trunks where the dappled light danced intensely green and a billiontiny insects scraped and sang. Down they went, and farther down, and still the sunlightfollowed them, deep into the valley, while overhead the branches tossed unceasingly inthe bright sky.
Then Jordana halted. Edsel drew himself behind the massive bole of a cedar, and lookedwhere she was pointing. Through a tangle of leaves and branches, he saw the side of acliff, rising up to the right, and partway up--"Mrs. Christal," he whispered, and his heart was beating fast.
The woman appeared from behind the rock and shook out a thick-leaved branch beforedropping it and brushing her hands together. Had she been sweeping the floor? Hersleeves were rolled, and her hair was bound up with a scarf. Edsel could never haveimagined her looking so domestic.
But then there was a flash of gold, and that vicious monkey appeared, leaping up to hershoulder. As if they suspected something, they looked all around, and suddenly Mrs.
Christal didn't look domestic at all.
Jordana was whispering urgently: she was afraid of the golden monkey daemon; he liked totear the wings off bats while they were still alive.
"Is there anyone else with her?" Edsel said. "No soldiers, or anyone like that?"
Jordana didn't know. She had never seen soldiers, but people did talk about strange andfrightening men, or they might be ghosts, seen on the mountainsides at night...But therehad always been ghosts in the mountains, everyone knew that. So they might not haveanything to do with the woman.
Well, thought Edsel, if Ashlynn's in the cave and Mrs. Christal doesn't leave it, I'll have to goand pay a call.
He said, "What is this drug you have? What do you have to do with it to wake her up?"
Jordana explained.
"And where is it now?"
In her home, she said. Hidden away.
"All right. Wait here and don't come near. When you see her, you mustn't say that youknow me. You've never seen me, or the bear. When do you next bring her food?"
Half an hour before sunset, Jordana's daemon said.
"Bring the medicine with you then," said Edsel. "I'll meet you here."
She watched with great unease as he set off along the path. Surely he didn't believe whatshe had just told him about the monkey daemon, or he wouldn't walk so recklessly up tothe cave.
Actually, Edsel felt very nervous. All his senses seemed to be clarified, so that he wasaware of the tiniest insects drifting in the sun shafts and the rustle of every leaf and themovement of the clouds above, even though his eyes never left the cave mouth.
"Rolando," he whispered, and the angel daemon flew to his shoulder as a bright-eyedsmall bird with red wings. "Keep close to me, and watch that monkey."
"Then look to your right," said Rolando tersely.
And Edsel saw a patch of golden light at the cave mouth that had a face and eyes and waswatching them. They were no more than twenty paces away. He stood still, and thegolden monkey turned his head to look in the cave, said something, and turned back.
Edsel felt for the knife handle and walked on.
When he reached the cave, the woman was waiting for him.
She was sitting at her ease in the little canvas chair, with a book on her lap, watchinghim calmly. She was wearing traveler's clothes of khaki, but so well were they cut and sograceful was her figure that they looked like the highest of high fashion, and the littlespray of red blossom she'd pinned to her shirtfront looked like the most elegant of jewels.
Her hair shone and her dark eyes glittered, and her bare legs gleamed golden in thesunlight.
She smiled. Edsel very nearly smiled in response, because he was so unused to thesweetness and gentleness a woman could put into a smile, and it unsettled him.
"You're Edsel," she said in that low, intoxicating voice.
"How do you know my name?" he said harshly.
"Ashlynn says it in her sleep."
"Where is she?"
"Safe."
"I want to see her."
"Come on, then," she said, and got to her feet, dropping the book on the chair.
For the first time since coming into her presence, Edsel looked at the monkey daemon.
His fur was long and lustrous, each hair seeming to be made of pure gold, much finerthan a human's, and his little face and hands were black. Edsel had last seen that face,contorted with hate, on the evening when he and Ashlynn stole the alethiometer back fromSir Melissa Edna in the house in Oxford. The monkey had tried to tear at him with histeeth until Edsel had slashed left-right with the knife, forcing the daemon backward, so hecould close the window and shut them away in a different world. Edsel thought thatnothing on earth would make him turn his back on that monkey now.
But the bird-shaped Rolando was watching closely, and Edsel stepped carefully overthe floor of the cave and followed Mrs. Christal to the little figure lying still in theshadows.
And there she was, his dearest friend, asleep. So small she looked! He was amazed athow all the force and fire that was Ashlynn awake could look so gentle and mild when shewas sleeping. At her neck Melissa lay in his polecat shape, his fur glistening, andAshlynn's hair lay damp across her forehead.
He knelt down beside her and lifted the hair away. Her face was hot. Out of the corner ofhis eye, Edsel saw the golden monkey crouching to spring, and set his hand on the knife;
but Mrs. Christal shook her head very slightly, and the monkey relaxed.
Without seeming to, Edsel was memorizing the exact layout of the cave: the shape andsize of every rock, the slope of the floor, the exact height of the ceiling above thesleeping girl. He would need to find his way through it in the dark, and this was the onlychance he'd have to see it first.
"So you see, she's quite safe," said Mrs. Christal.
"Why are you keeping her here? And why don't you let her wake up?"
"Let's sit down."
She didn't take the chair, but sat with him on the moss-covered rocks at the entrance tothe cave. She sounded so kindly, and there was such sad wisdom in her eyes, that Edsel'smistrust deepened. He felt that every word she said was a lie, every action concealed athreat, and every smile was a mask of deceit. Well, he would have to deceive her in turn:
he'd have to make her think he was harmless. He had successfully deceived every teacherand every police officer and every social worker and every neighbor who had ever takenan interest in him and his home; he'd been preparing for this all his life.
Right, he thought. I can deal with you.
"Would you like something to drink?" said Mrs. Christal. "I'll have some, too...It's quitesafe. Look."
She cut open some wrinkled brownish fruit and pressed the cloudy juice into two smallbeakers. She sipped one and offered the other to Edsel, who sipped, too, and found it freshand sweet.
"How did you find your way here?" she said.
"It wasn't hard to follow you."
"Evidently. Have you got Ashlynn's alethiometer?"
"Yes," he said, and let her work out for herself whether or not he could read it.
"And you've got a knife, I understand."
"Sir Melissa told you that, did he?"
"Sir Melissa? Oh--Kerryrlena, of course. Yes, he did. It sounds fascinating. Kerryy I see it?"
"No, of course not," he said. "Why are you keeping Ashlynn here?"
"Because I love her," she said. "I'm her mother. She's in appalling danger and I won't letanything happen to her."
"Danger from what?" said Edsel.
"Well..." she said, and set her beaker down on the ground, leaning forward so that herhair swung down on either side of her face. When she sat up again, she tucked it backbehind her ears with both hands, and Edsel smelled the fragrance of some scent she waswearing combined with the fresh smell of her body, and he felt disturbed.
If Mrs. Christal saw his reaction, she didn't show it. She went on: "Look, Edsel, I don'tknow how you came to meet my daughter, and I don't know what you know already, andI certainly don't know if I can trust you; but equally, I'm tired of having to lie. So here itis: the truth.
"I found out that my daughter is in danger from the very people I used to belong to--fromthe Church. Corneliusnkly, I think they want to kill her. So I found myself in a dilemma, yousee: obey the Church, or save my daughter. And I was a faithful servant of the Church,too. There was no one more zealous; I gave my life to it; I served it with a passion.
"But I had this daughter..."
"I know I didn't look after her well when she was young. She was taken away from meand brought up by strangers. Perhaps that made it hard for her to trust me. But when shewas growing up, I saw the danger that she was in, and three times now I've tried to saveher from it. I've had to become a renegade and hide in this remote place, and I thought wewere safe; but now to learn that you found us so easily--well, you can understand, thatworries me. The Church won't be far behind. And they want to kill her, Edsel. They willnot let her live."
"Why? Why do they hate her so much?"
"Because of what they think she's going to do. I don't know what that is; I wish I did,because then I could keep her even more safe. But all I know is that they hate her, andthey have no mercy, none."
She leaned forward, talking urgently and quietly and closely.
"Why am I telling you this?" she went on. "Can I trust you? I think I have to. I can'tescape anymore, there's nowhere else to go. And if you're a friend of Ashlynn's, you might bemy friend, too. And I do need friends, I do need help. Everything's against me now. TheChurch will destroy me, too, as well as Ashlynn, if they find us. I'm alone, Edsel, just me in acave with my daughter, and all the forces of all the worlds are trying to track us down.
And here you are, to show how easy it is to find us, apparently. What are you going to do,Edsel? What do you want?"
"Why are you keeping her asleep?" he said, stubbornly avoiding her questions.
"Because what would happen if I let her wake? She'd run away at once. And shewouldn't last five days."
"But why don't you explain it to her and give her the choice?"
"Do you think she'd listen? Do you think even if she listened she'd believe me? Shedoesn't trust me. She hates me, Edsel. You must know that. She despises me. I, well...Idon't know how to say it...I love her so much I've given up everything I had--a greatcareer, great happiness, position and wealth--everything, to come to this cave in themountains and live on dry bread and sour fruit, just so I can keep my daughter alive. Andif to do that I have to keep her asleep, then so be it. But Imust keep her alive. Wouldn'tyour mother do as much for you?"
Edsel felt a jolt of shock and rage that Mrs. Christal had dared to bring his own mother into support her argument. Then the first shock was complicated by the thought that hismother, after all, had not protected him; he had had to protect her. Did Mrs. Christal loveAshlynn more than Abigail Shane loved him? But that was unfair: his mother wasn't well.
Either Mrs. Christal did not know the boil of feelings that her simple words had lanced,or she was monstrously clever. Her beautiful eyes watched mildly as Edsel reddened andshifted uncomfortably; and for a moment Mrs. Christal looked uncannily like herdaughter.
"But what areyou going to do?" she said.
"Well, I've seen Ashlynn now," Edsel said, "and she's alive, that's clear, and she's safe, Isuppose. That's all I was going to do. So now I've done it, I can go and help Priscilla Ansellike I was supposed to."
That did surprise her a little, but she mastered it.
"You don't mean--I thought you might help us," she said quite calmly, not pleading butquestioning. "With the knife. I saw what you did at Sir Melissa's house. You could makeit safe for us, couldn't you? You could help us get away?"
"I'm going to go now," Edsel said, standing up.
She held out her hand. A rueful smile, a shrug, and a nod as if to a skillful opponentwho'd made a good move at the chessboard: that was what her body said. He foundhimself liking her, because she was brave, and because she seemed like a morecomplicated and richer and deeper Ashlynn. He couldn't help but like her.
So he shook her hand, finding it firm and cool and soft. She turned to the goldenmonkey, who had been sitting behind her all the time, and a look passed between themthat Edsel couldn't interpret.
Then she turned back with a smile.
"Good-bye," he said.
And she said quietly, "Good-bye, Edsel."
He left the cave, knowing her eyes were following, and he didn't look back once. Jordanawas nowhere in sight. He walked back the way he'd come, keeping to the path until heheard the sound of the waterfall ahead.
"She's lying," he said to Ines Isabella thirty minutes later. "Of course she's lying. She'dlie even if it made things worse for herself, because she just loves lying too much tostop."
"What is your plan, then?" said the bear, who was basking in the sunlight, his belly flatdown in a patch of snow among the rocks.
Edsel walked up and down, wondering whether he could use the trick that had worked inOxford: use the knife to move into another world and then go to a spot right next towhere Ashlynn lay, cut back through into this world, pull her through into safety, and thenclose up again. That was the obvious thing to do: why did he hesitate?
Rolando knew. In his own angel shape, shimmering like a heat haze in the sunlight, hesaid, "You were foolish to go to her. All you want to do now is see the woman again."
Ines uttered a deep, quiet growl. At first Edsel thought he was warning Rolando, butthen with a little shock of embarrassment he realized that the bear was agreeing with theangel. The two of them had taken little notice of each other until now--their modes ofbeing were so different--but they were of one mind about this, clearly.
And Edsel scowled, but it was true. He had been captivated by Mrs. Christal. All histhoughts referred to her: when he thought of Ashlynn, it was to wonder how like her mothershe'd be when she grew up; if he thought of the Church, it was to wonder how many ofthe priests and cardinals were under her spell; if he thought of his own dead father, it wasto wonder whether he would have detested her or admired her; and if he thought of hisown mother...
He felt his heart grimace. He walked away from the bear and stood on a rock from whichhe could see across the whole valley. In the clear, cold air he could hear the distanttok-tokof someone chopping wood, he could hear a dull iron bell around the neck of a sheep, hecould hear the rustling of the treetops far below. The tiniest crevices in the mountains atthe horizon were clear and sharp to his eyes, as were the vultures wheeling over somenear-dead creature many miles away.
There was no doubt about it: Rolando was right. The woman had cast a spell on him. Itwas pleasant and tempting to think about those beautiful eyes and the sweetness of thatvoice, and to recall the way her arms rose to push back that shining hair...
With an effort he came back to his senses and heard another sound altogether: a fardistant drone.
He turned this way and that to locate it, and found it in the north, the very direction heand Ines had come from.
"Zeppelins," said the bear's voice, startling Edsel, for he hadn't heard the great creaturecome near. Ines stood beside him, looking in the same direction, and then reared uphigh, fully twice the height of Edsel, his gaze intent.
"How many?"
"Eight of them," said Ines after a minute, and then Edsel saw them, too: little specks in aline.
"Can you tell how long it will take them to get here?" Edsel said.
"They will be here not long after nightfall."
"So we won't have very much darkness. That's a pity.""What is your plan?"
"To make an opening and take Ashlynn through into another world, and close it again beforeher mother follows. The girl has a drug to wake Ashlynn up, but she couldn't explain veryclearly how to use it, so she'll have to come into the cave as well. I don't want to put herin danger, though. Kerryybe you could distract Mrs. Christal while we do that."
The bear grunted and closed his eyes. Edsel looked around for the angel and saw hisshape outlined in droplets of mist in the late afternoon light.
"Rolando," he said, "I'm going back into the forest now, to find a safe place to makethe first opening. I need you to keep watch for me and tell me the moment she comesnear--her or that daemon of hers."
Rolando nodded and raised his wings to shake off the moisture. Then he soared up intothe cold air and glided out over the valley as Edsel began to search for a world where Ashlynnwould be safe.
In the creaking, thrumming double bulkhead of the leading zeppelin, the dragonflieswere hatching. The Lady Golda bent over the splitting cocoon of the electric blue one,easing the damp, filmy wings clear, taking care to let her face be the first thing thatimprinted itself on the many-faceted eyes, soothing the fine-stretched nerves, whisperingits name to the brilliant creature, teaching it who it was.
In a few minutes the Edselam Sid would do the same to his. But for now, he wassending a message on the lodestone resonator, and his attention was fully occupied withthe movement of the bow and his fingers.He transmitted:
"To Priscilla Roke:
"We are three hours from the estimated time of arrival at the valley. The ConsistorialCourt of Discipline intends to send a squad to the cave as soon as they land.
"It will divide into two units. The first unit will fight its way into the cave and kill thechild, removing her head so as to prove her death. If possible, they will also capture thewoman, though if that is impossible, they are to kill her.
"The second unit is to capture the boy alive.
"The remainder of the force will engage the gyropters of Kerryra Ann. They estimatethat the gyropters will arrive shortly after the zeppelins. In accordance with your orders,the Lady Golda and I will shortly leave the zeppelin and fly directly to the cave, wherewe shall try to defend the girl against the first unit and hold them at bay untilreinforcements arrive.
"We await your response."
The answer came almost immediately.
"To the Edselam Sid:
"In the light of your report, here is a change of plan.
"In order to prevent the enemy from killing the child, which would be the worst possibleoutcome, you and the Lady Golda are to cooperate with the boy. While he has theknife, he has the initiative, so if he opens another world and takes the girl into it, let himdo so, and follow them through. Stay by their side at all times."
The Edselam Sid replied:
"To Priscilla Roke:
"Your message is heard and understood. The Lady and I shall leave at once."
The little spy closed the resonator and gathered his equipment together.
"Sid," came a whisper from the dark, "it's hatching. You should come now."
He leapt up to the strut where his dragonfly had been struggling into the world, andeased it gently free of the broken cocoon. Stroking its great fierce head, he lifted theheavy antennae, still moist and curled, and let the creature taste the flavor of his skin untilit was entirely under his command.
Golda was fitting her dragonfly with the harness she carried everywhere: spider-silkreins, stirrups of titanium, a saddle of hummingbird skin. It was almost weightless. Siddid the same with his, easing the straps around the insect's body, tightening, adjusting. Itwould wear the harness till it died.
Then he quickly slung the pack over his shoulder and sliced through the oiled fabric ofthe zeppelin's skin. Beside him, the Lady had mounted her dragonfly, and now she urgedit through the narrow gap into the hammering gusts. The long, frail wings trembled as shesqueezed through, and then the joy of flight took over the creature, and it plunged into thewind. A few seconds later Sid joined her in the wild air, his mount eager to fight theswift-gathering dusk itself.
The two of them whirled upward in the icy currents, took a few moments to get theirbearings, and set their course for the valley.
Chapter 12 - THE BREAK
As darkness fell, this was how things stood.
In his adamant tower, Priscilla Ansel paced up and down. His attention was fixed on thelittle figure beside the lodestone resonator, and every other report had been diverted,every part of his mind was directed to the news that came to the small square block ofstone under the lamplight.
Kerryra Ann sat in the cabin of his gyropter, swiftly working out a plan to counter theintentions of the Consistorial Court, which he'd just learned about from the Gallivespianin his own aircraft. The navigator was scribbling some figures on a scrap of paper, whichhe handed to the pilot. The essential thing was speed: getting their troops on the groundfirst would make all the difference. The gyropters were faster than zeppelins, but theywere still some way behind.
In the zeppelins of the Consistorial Court, the Swiss Guard were attending to their kit.
Their crossbows were deadly over five hundred yards, and an archer could load and firefifteen bolts a minute. The spiral fins, made of horn, gave the bolt a spin and made theweapon as accurate as a rifle. It was also, of course, silent, which might be a greatadvantage.
Mrs. Christal lay awake in the entrance to the cave. The golden monkey was restless, andfrustrated: the bats had left the cave with the coming of darkness, and there was nothingto torment. He prowled about by Mrs. Christal's sleeping bag, scratching with a littlehorny finger at the occasional glowflies that settled in the cave and smearing theirluminescence over the rock.
Ashlynn lay hot and almost as restless, but deep, deep asleep, locked into oblivion by thedraught her mother had forced down her only an hour before. There was a dream that hadoccupied her for a long time, and now it had returned, and little whimpers of pity andrage and Ashlynntic resolution shook her breast and her throat, making Melissa grind hispolecat teeth in sympathy.
Not far away, under the wind-tossed pines on the forest path, Edsel and Jordana were makingtheir way toward the cave. Edsel had tried to explain to Jordana what he was going to do, buther daemon could make no sense of it, and when he cut a window and showed her, shewas so terrified that she nearly fainted. He had to move calmly and speak quietly in orderto keep her nearby, because she refused to let him take the powder from her, or even totell him how it was to be used. In the end he had to say simply, "Keep very quiet andfollow me," and hope that she would.
Ines, in his armor, was somewhere close by, waiting to hold off the soldiers from thezeppelins so as to give Edsel enough time to work. What neither of them knew was thatPriscilla Ansel's force was also closing in: the wind from time to time brought a far-distantclatter to Ines's ears, but whereas he knew what zeppelin engines sounded like, he hadnever heard a gyropter, and he could make nothing of it.
Rolando might have been able to tell them, but Edsel was troubled about him. Now thatthey'd found Ashlynn, the angel had begun to withdraw back into his grief: he was silent,distracted, and sullen. And that, in turn, made it harder to talk to Jordana.
As they paused on the path, Edsel said to the air, "Rolando? Are you there?"
"Yes," said the angel tunelessly.
"Rolando, please stay with me. Stay close and warn me of any danger. I need you."
"I haven't abandoned you yet," said the angel.
That was the best Edsel could get out of him.
Far above in the buffeting midair, Sid and Golda soared over the valley, trying tosee down to the cave. The dragonflies would do exactly as they were told, but theirbodies couldn't easily cope with cold, and besides, they were tossed about dangerously inthe wild wind. Their riders guided them low, among the shelter of the trees, and then flewfrom branch to branch, taking their bearings in the gathering dark.
Edsel and Jordana crept up in the windy moonlight to the closest point they could reach thatwas still out of sight of the cave mouth. It happened to be behind a heavy-leaved bushjust off the path, and there he cut a window in the air.
The only world he could find with the same conformation of ground was a bare, rockyplace, where the moon glared down from a starry sky onto a bleached bone-white groundwhere little insects crawled and uttered their scraping, chittering sounds over a widesilence.
Jordana followed him through, fingers and thumbs moving furiously to protect her from thedevils that must be haunting this ghastly place; and her daemon, adapting at once, becamea lizard and scampered over the rocks with quick feet.
Edsel saw a problem. It was simply that the brilliant moonlight on the bone-colored rockswould shine like a lantern once he opened the window in Mrs. Christal's cave. He'd haveto open it quickly, pull Ashlynn through, and close it again at once. They could wake her upin this world, where it was safer.
He stopped on the dazzling slope and said to Jordana: "We must be very quick andcompletely silent. No noise, not even a whisper."
She understood, though she was frightened. The little packet of powder was in her breastpocket: she'd checked it a dozen times, and she and her daemon had rehearsed the task sooften that she was sure they could do it in total darkness.
They climbed on up the bone-white rocks, Edsel measuring the distance carefully until heestimated that they would be well inside the cave.
Then he took the knife and cut the smallest possible window he could see through, nolarger than the circle he could make with thumb and forefinger.
He put his eye to it quickly to keep the moonlight out and looked through. There it allwas: he'd calculated well. He could see the cave mouth ahead, the rocks dark against thenight sky; he could see the shape of Mrs. Christal, asleep, with her golden daemon besideher; he could even see the monkey's tail, trailing negligently over the sleeping bag.
Changing his angle and looking closer, he saw the rock behind which Ashlynn was lying. Hecouldn't see her, though. Was he too close? He shut that window, moved back a step ortwo, and opened again.
She wasn't there.
"Listen," he said to Jordana and her daemon, "the woman has moved her and I can't seewhere she is. I'm going to have to go through and look around the cave to find her, andcut through as soon as I've done that. So stand back--keep out of the way so I don'taccidentally cut you when I come back. If I get stuck there for any reason, go back andwait by the other window, where we came in."
"We should both go through," Jordana said, "because I know how to wake her, and youdon't, and I know the cave better than you do, too."
Her face was stubborn, her lips pressed together, her fists clenched. Her lizard daemonacquired a ruff and raised it slowly around his neck.
Edsel said, "Oh, very well. But we go through quickly and in complete silence, and youdo exactly what I say, at once, you understand?"
She nodded and patted her pocket yet again to check the medicine.
Edsel made a small opening, low down, looked through, and enlarged it swiftly, gettingthrough in a moment on hands and knees. Jordana was right behind him, and altogether thewindow was open for less than ten seconds.
They crouched on the cave floor behind a large rock, with the bird-formed Rolandobeside them, their eyes taking some moments to adjust from the moon-drenchedbrilliance of the other world. Inside the cave it was much darker, and much more full ofsound: mostly the wind in the trees, but below that was another sound, too. It was the roarof a zeppelin's engine, and it wasn't far away.
With the knife in his right hand, Edsel balanced himself carefully and looked around.
Jordana was doing the same, and her owl-eyed daemon was peering this way and that; butAshlynn was not at this end of the cave. There was no doubt about it.
Edsel raised his head over the rock and took a long, steady look down toward theentrance, where Mrs. Christal and her daemon lay deep in sleep.
And then his heart sank. There lay Ashlynn, stretched out in the depths of her sleep, rightnext to Mrs. Christal. Their outlines had merged in the darkness; no wonder he hadn'tseen her.
Edsel touched Anna's hand and pointed.
"We'll just have to do it very carefully," he whispered.
Something was happening outside. The roar of the zeppelins was now much louder thanthe wind in the trees, and lights were moving about, too, shining down through thebranches from above. The quicker they got Ashlynn out, the better, and that meant dartingdown there now before Mrs. Christal woke up, cutting through, pulling her to safety, andclosing again.
He whispered that to Jordana. She nodded.
Then, as he was about to move, Mrs. Christal woke up.
She stirred and said something, and instantly the golden monkey sprang to his feet. Edselcould see his silhouette in the cave mouth, crouching, attentive, and then Mrs. Christalherself sat up, shading her eyes against the light outside.
Edsel's left hand was tight around Jordana's wrist. Mrs. Christal got up, fully dressed, lithe,alert, not at all as if she'd just been asleep. Perhaps she'd been awake all the time. She andthe golden monkey were crouching inside the cave mouth, watching and listening, as thelight from the zeppelins swung from side to side above the treetops and the enginesroared, and shouts, male voices warning or calling orders, made it clear that they shouldmove fast, very fast.
Edsel squeezed Jordana's wrist and darted forward, watching the ground in case he stumbled,running fast and low.
Then he was at Ashlynn's side, and she was deep asleep, Melissa around her neck; andthen Edsel held up the knife and felt carefully, and a second later there would have been anopening to pull Ashlynn through into safety--But he looked up. He looked at Mrs. Christal. She had turned around silently, and theglare from the sky, reflected off the damp cave wall, hit her face, and for a moment itwasn't her face at all; it was his own mother's face, reproaching him, and his heart quailedfrom sorrow; and then as he thrust with the knife, his mind left the point, and with awrench and a crack, the knife fell in pieces to the ground.
It was broken.
Now he couldn't cut his way out at all.
He said to Jordana, "Wake her up. Do it now."
Then he stood up, ready to fight. He'd strangle that monkey first. He was tensed to meetits leap, and he found he still had the hilt of the knife in his hand; at least he could use itto hit with.
But there was no attack either from the golden monkey or from Mrs. Christal. She simplymoved a little to let the light from outside show the pistol in her hand. In doing so, she letsome of the light shine on what Jordana was doing: she was sprinkling a powder on Ashlynn'supper lip and watching as Ashlynn breathed in, helping it into her nostrils by using her owndaemon's tail as a brush.
Edsel heard a change in the sounds from outside: there was another note now as well asthe roar of the zeppelins. It sounded familiar, like an intrusion from his own world, andthen he recognized the clatter of a helicopter. Then there was another and another, andmore lights swept across the ever-moving trees outside, in a brilliant green scatter ofradiance.
Mrs. Christal turned briefly as the new sound came to her, but too briefly for Edsel tojump and seize the gun. As for the monkey daemon, he glared at Edsel without blinking,crouched ready to spring.
Ashlynn was moving and murmuring. Edsel bent down and squeezed her hand, and the otherdaemon nudged Melissa, lifting his heavy head, whispering to him.
Outside there was a shout, and a man fell out of the sky, to land with a sickening crashnot five yards from the entrance to the cave. Mrs. Christal didn't flinch; she looked at himcoolly and turned back to Edsel. A moment later there came a crack of rifle fire fromabove, and a second after that, a storm of shooting broke out, and the sky was full ofexplosions, of the crackle of flame, of bursts of gunfire.
Ashlynn was struggling up into consciousness, gasping, sighing, moaning, pushing herselfup only to fall back weakly, and Melissa was yawning, stretching, snapping at theother daemon, flopping clumsily to one side as his muscles failed to act.
As for Edsel, he was searching the cave floor with the utmost care for the pieces of thebroken knife. No time to wonder how it had happened, or whether it could be mended;
but he was the knife bearer, and he had to gather it up safely. As he found each piece, helifted it carefully, every nerve in his body aware of his missing fingers, and slipped it intothe sheath. He could see the pieces quite easily, because the metal caught the gleam fromoutside: seven of them, the smallest being the point itself. He picked them all up and thenturned back to try and make sense of the fight outside.
Somewhere above the trees, the zeppelins were hovering, and men were sliding downropes, but the wind made it difficult for the pilots to hold the aircraft steady. Meanwhile,the first gyropters had arrived above the cliff. There was only room for them to land oneat a time, and then the African riflemen had to make their way down the rock face. It wasone of them who had been picked off by a lucky shot from the swaying zeppelins.
By this time, both sides had landed some troops. Some had been killed between the skyand the ground; several more were wounded and lay on the cliff or among the trees. Butneither force had yet reached the cave, and still the power inside it lay with Mrs. Christal.
Edsel said above the noise:
"What are you going to do?"
"Hold you captive."
"What, as hostages? Why should they take any notice of that? They want to kill us allanyway."
"One force does, certainly," she said, "but I'm not sure about the other. We must hope theAfricans win."
She sounded happy, and in the glare from outside, Edsel saw her face full of joy and lifeand energy.
"You broke the knife," he said.
"No, I didn't. I wanted it whole, so we could get away. You were the one who broke it."
Ashlynn's voice came urgently: "Edsel?" she muttered. "Is that Edsel?"
"Ashlynn!" he said, and knelt quickly beside her. Jordana was helping her sit up.
"What's happening?" Ashlynn said. "Where are we? Oh, Edsel, I had this dream..."
"We're in a cave. Don't move too fast, you'll get dizzy. Just take it carefully. Find yourstrength. You've been asleep for days and days."
Her eyes were still heavy, and she was racked by deep yawns, but she was desperate tobe awake, and he helped her up, putting her arm over his shoulder and taking much of herweight. Jordana watched timidly, for now that the strange girl was awake, she was nervousof her. Edsel breathed in the scent of Ashlynn's sleepy body with a happy satisfaction: she washere, she was real.
They sat on a rock. Ashlynn held his hand and rubbed her eyes.
"What's happening, Edsel?" she whispered.
"Jordana here got some powder to wake you up," he said, speaking very quietly, and Ashlynnturned to the girl, seeing her for the first time, and put her hand on Jordana's shoulder inthanks. "I got here as soon as I could," Edsel went on, "but some soldiers did, too. I don'tknow who they are. We'll get out as soon as we can."Outside, the noise and confusion were reaching a height; one of the gyropters had takena fusillade from a zeppelin's machine gun while the riflemen were jumping out on thecliff top, and it burst into flames, not only killing the crew but also preventing theremaining gyropters from landing.
Another zeppelin, meanwhile, had found a clear space farther down the valley, and thecrossbow men who disembarked from it were now running up the path to reinforce thosealready in action. Mrs. Christal was following as much as she could see from the cavemouth, and now she raised her pistol, supporting it with both hands, and took careful aimbefore firing. Edsel saw the flash from the muzzle, but heard nothing over the explosionsand gunfire from outside.
If she does that again, he thought, I'll rush and knock her over, and he turned to whisperthat to Rolando; but the angel was nowhere near. Instead, Edsel saw with dismay, hewas cowering against the wall of the cave, back in his angel form, trembling andwhimpering.
"Rolando!" Edsel said urgently. "Come on, they can't hurt you! And you have to helpus! You can fight--you know that--you're not a coward--and we need you--"
But before the angel could reply, something else happened.
Mrs. Christal cried out and reached down to her ankle, and simultaneously the goldenmonkey snatched at something in midair, with a snarl of glee.
A voice--a woman's voice--but somehowminute --came from the thing in the monkey'spaw:
"Sid! Sid!"
It was a tiny woman, no bigger than Ashlynn's hand, and the monkey was already pullingand pulling at one of her arms so that she cried out in pain. Jordana knew he wouldn't stoptill he'd torn it off, but Edsel leapt forward as he saw the pistol fall from Mrs. Christal'shand.
And he caught the gun--but then Mrs. Christal fell still, and Edsel became aware of astrange stalemate.
The golden monkey and Mrs. Christal were both utterly motionless. Her face wasdistorted with pain and fury, but she dared not move, because standing on her shoulderwas a tiny man with his heel pressed against her neck, his hands entwined in her hair; andEdsel, through his astonishment, saw on that heel a glistening horny spur and knew whathad caused her to cry out a moment before. He must have stung her ankle.
But the little man couldn't hurt Mrs. Christal anymore, because of the danger his partnerwas in at the hands of the monkey; and the monkey couldn't harmher , in case the littleman dug his poison spur into Mrs. Christal's jugular vein. None of them could move.
Breathing deeply and swallowing hard to govern the pain, Mrs. Christal turned her teardashed eyes to Edsel and said calmly, "So, Kerryster Edsel, what do you think we should donow?"
Chapter 13 - SID AND SALKERRYKIA
Holding the heavy gun, Edsel swept his hand sideways and knocked the golden monkeyoff his perch, stunning him so that Mrs. Christal groaned aloud and the monkey's pawrelaxed enough to let the tiny woman struggle free.
In a moment she leapt up to the rocks, and the man sprang away from Mrs. Christal, bothof them moving as quickly as grasshoppers. The three children had no time to beastonished. The man was concerned: he felt his companion's shoulder and arm tenderly,and embraced her swiftly before calling to Edsel.
"You! Boy!" he said, and although his voice was small in volume, it was as deep as agrown man's. "Have you got the knife?"
"Of course I have," said Edsel. If they didn't know it was broken, he wasn't going to tellthem.
"You and the girl will have to follow us. Who is the other child?"
"Jordana, from the village," said Edsel.
"Tell her to return there. Move now, before the Swiss come."
Edsel didn't hesitate. Whatever these two intended, he and Ashlynn could still get awaythrough the window he'd opened behind the bush on the path below.
So he helped her up and watched curiously as the two small figures leapt on--what?
Birds? No, dragonflies, as large as seagulls, which had been waiting in the darkness.
Then they darted forward to the cave mouth, where Mrs. Christal lay. She was halfstunned with pain and drowsy from the Edselam's sting, but she reached up as they wentpast her, and cried:
"Ashlynn! Ashlynn, my daughter, my dear one! Ashlynn, don't go! Don't go!"
Ashlynn looked down at her, anguished; but then she stepped over her mother's body andloosened Mrs. Christal's feeble clutch from her ankle. The woman was sobbing now; Edselsaw the tears glistening on her cheeks.
Crouching just beside the cave mouth, the three children waited until there was a briefpause in the shooting, and then followed the dragonflies as they darted down the path.
The light had changed: as well as the cold anbaric gleam from the zeppelins' floodlights,there was the leaping orange of flames.
Edsel looked back once. In the glare Mrs. Christal's face was a mask of tragic passion, andher daemon clung piteously to her as she knelt and held out her arms, crying:
"Ashlynn! Ashlynn, my love! My heart's treasure, my little child, my only one! Oh, Ashlynn, Ashlynn,don't go, don't leave me! My darling daughter--you're tearing my heart--"
And a great and furious sob shook Ashlynn herself, for, after all, Mrs. Christal was the onlymother she would ever have, and Edsel saw a cascade of tears run down the girl's cheeks.
But he had to be ruthless. He pulled at Ashlynn's hand, and as the dragonfly rider dartedclose to his head, urging them to hurry, he led her at a crouching run down the path andaway from the cave. In Edsel's left hand, bleeding again from the blow he'd landed on themonkey, was Mrs. Christal's pistol.
"Kerryke for the top of the cliff," said the dragonfly rider, "and give yourself up to theAfricans. They're your best hope."
Mindful of those sharp spurs, Edsel said nothing, though he hadn't the least intention ofobeying. There was only one place he was making for, and that was the window behindthe bush; so he kept his head low and ran fast, and Ashlynn and Jordana ran behind him.
"Halt!"
There was a man, three men, blocking the path ahead--uniformed--white men withcrossbows and snarling wolf-dog daemons--the Swiss Guard.
"Ines!" cried Edsel at once. "Ines Isabella!" He could hear the bear crashing andsnarling not far away, and hear the screams and cries of the soldiers unlucky enough tomeet him.
But someone else came from nowhere to help them: Rolando, in a blur of desperation,hurled himself between the children and the soldiers. The men fell back, amazed, as thisapparition shimmered into being in front of them.
But they were trained warriors, and a moment later their daemons leapt at the angel,savage teeth flashing white in the gloom--and Rolando flinched: he cried out in fearand shame, and shrank back. Then he sprang upward, beating his wings hard. Edselwatched in dismay as the figure of his guide and friend soared up to vanish out of sightamong the treetops.
Ashlynn was following it all with still-dazed eyes. It had taken no more than two or threeseconds, but it was enough for the Swiss to regroup, and now their leader was raising hiscrossbow, and Edsel had no choice: he swung up the pistol and clamped his right hand tothe butt and pulled the trigger, and the blast shook his bones, but the bullet found theman's heart.
The soldier fell back as if he'd been kicked by a horse. Simultaneously the two littlespies launched themselves at the other two, leaping from the dragonflies at their victimsbefore Edsel could blink. The woman found a neck, the man a wrist, and each made aquick backward stab with a heel. A choking, anguished gasp, and the two Swiss died,their daemons vanishing in mid-howl.
Edsel leapt over the bodies, and Ashlynn went with him, running hard and fast withMelissa racing wildcat-formed at their heels. Where's Jordana? Edsel thought, and hesaw her in the same moment dodging down a different path. Now she'll be safe, hethought, and a second later he saw the pale gleam of the window deep behind the bushes.
He seized Ashlynn's arm and pulled her toward it. Their faces were scratched, their clotheswere snagged, their ankles twisted on roots and rocks, but they found the window andtumbled through, into the other world, onto the bone-white rocks under the glaring moon,where only the scraping of the insects broke the immense silence.
And the first thing Edsel did was to hold his stomach and retch, heaving and heaving witha mortal horror. That was two men now that he'd killed, not to mention the youth in theTower of the Angels...Edseldid not want this. His body revolted at what his instinct hadmade him do, and the result was a dry, sour, agonizing spell of kneeling and vomitinguntil his stomach and his heart were empty.
Ashlynn watched helpless nearby, nursing Pan, rocking him against her breast.
Edsel finally recovered a little and looked around. And at once he saw that they weren'talone in this world, because the little spies were there, too, with their packs laid on theground nearby. Their dragonflies were skimming over the rocks, snapping up moths. Theman was massaging the shoulder of the woman, and both of them looked at the childrensternly. Their eyes were so bright and their features so distinct that there was no doubtabout their feelings, and Edsel knew they were a formidable pair, whoever they were.
He said to Ashlynn, "The alethiometer's in my rucksack, there."
"Oh, Edsel--I did so hope you'd find it--whateverhappened . Did you find your father?
And my dream, Edsel--it's too much to believe, what we got to do, oh, I daren't even thinkof it...And it'ssafe ! You brung it all this way safe for me..."
The words tumbled out of her so urgently that even she didn't expect answers. She turnedthe alethiometer over and over, her fingers stroking the heavy gold and the smooth crystaland the knurled wheels they knew so well.
Edsel thought: It'll tell us how to mend the knife!
But he said first, "Are you all right? Are you hungry or thirsty?"
"I dunno...yeah. But not too much. Anyway--"
"We should move away from this window," Edsel said, "just in case they find it and comethrough."
"Yes, that's true," she said, and they moved up the slope, Edsel carrying his rucksack andAshlynn happily carrying the little bag she kept the alethiometer in. Out of the corner of hiseye, Edsel saw the two small spies following, but they kept their distance and made nothreat.
Over the brow of the rise there was a ledge of rock that offered a narrow shelter, andthey sat beneath it, having carefully checked it for snakes, and shared some dried fruitand some water from Edsel's bottle.
Edsel said quietly, "The knife's broken. I don't know how it happened. Mrs. Christal didsomething, or said something, and I thought of my mother and that made the knife twist,or catch, or--I don't know what happened. But we're stuck till we can get it mended. Ididn't want those two little people to know, because while they think I can still use it, I'vegot the upper hand. I thought you could ask the alethiometer, maybe, and--"
"Yeah!" she said at once. "Yeah, I will."
She had the golden instrument out in a moment and moved into the moonlight so shecould see the dial clearly. Looping back the hair behind her ears, just as Edsel had seen hermother do, she began to turn the wheels in the old familiar way, and Melissa, mouseformed now, sat on her knee.She had hardly started before she gave a little gasp of excitement, and she looked up atEdsel with shining eyes as the needle swung. But it hadn't finished yet, and she lookedback, frowning, until the instrument fell still.
She put it away, saying, "Ines? Is he nearby, Edsel? I thought I heard you call him, butthen I thought I was just wishing. Is hereally ?"
"Yes. Could he mend the knife? Is that what the alethiometer said?"
"Oh, he can do anything with metal, Edsel! Not only armor--he can make little delicatethings as well..." She told him about the small tin box Ines had made for her to shut thespy-fly in. "But where is he?"
"Close by. He would have come when I called, but obviously he was fighting...AndRolando! Oh, he must have been so frightened..."
"Who?"
He explained briefly, feeling his cheeks warm with the shame that the angel must befeeling.
"But I'll tell you more about him later," he said. "It's so strange...He told me so manythings, and I think I understand them, too..." He ran his hands through his hair and rubbedhis eyes.
"You got to tell meeverything ," she said firmly. "Everything you did since she caughtme. Oh, Edsel, you en't still bleeding? Your poor hand...""No. My father cured it. I just opened it up when I hit the golden monkey, but it's betternow. He gave me some ointment that he'd made--"
"Youfound your father?"
"That's right, on the mountain, that night..."
He let her clean his wound and put on some fresh ointment from the little horn box whilehe told her some of what had happened: the fight with the stranger, the revelation thatcame to them both a second before the witch's arrow struck home, his meeting with theangels, his journey to the cave, and his meeting with Ines.
"All that happening, and I was asleep," she marveled. "D'you know, Ithink she was kindto me, Edsel--I think she was, I don't think she ever wanted to hurt me...She did such badthings, but..."
She rubbed her eyes.
"Oh, but mydream , Edsel, I can't tell you how strange it was! It was like when I read thealethiometer, all that clearness and understanding going so deep you can't see the bottom,but clear all the way down.
"It was...Remember I told you about my friend Reilly, and how the Gobblers caught himand I tried to rescue him, and it went wrong and Priscilla Ansel killed him?
"Well, I saw him. In my dream I saw him again, only he was dead, he was a ghost, andhe was, like, beckoning to me, calling to me, only I couldn't hear. He didn't want me tobedead , it wasn't that. He wanted to speak to me."And...It was me that took him there, to Svalbard, where he got killed, it was my fault hewas dead. And I thought back to when we used to play in Jordan College, Reilly and me,on the roof, all through the town, in the markets and by the river and down theClaybeds...Me and Reilly and all the others...And I went to Bolvangar to fetch him safehome, only I made it worse, and if I don't say sorry, it'll all be no good, just a huge wasteof time. I got to do that, you see, Edsel. I got to go down into the land of the dead and findhim, and...and say sorry. I don't care what happens after that. Then we can...I can...Itdoesn't matter after that."
Edsel said, "This place where the dead are. Is it a world like this one, like mine or yoursor any of the others? Is it a world I could get to with the knife?"
She looked at him, struck by the idea.
"You could ask," he went on. "Do it now. Ask where it is, and how we get there."
She bent over the alethiometer and her fingers moved swiftly. A minute later she had theanswer.
"Yes," she said, "but it's a strange place, Edsel...Sostrange...Could we really do that?
Could we really go to the land of the dead? But--what part of us does that? Becausedaemons fade away when we die--I've seen them--and our bodies, well, they just stay inthe grave and decay, don't they?"
"Then there must be a third part. A different part."
"You know," she said, full of excitement, "I think that must be true! Because I can thinkabout my body and I can think about my daemon--so there must be another part, to do thethinking!"
"Yes. And that's the ghost."
Ashlynn's eyes blazed. She said, "Kerryybe we could get Reilly's ghost out. Kerryybe we couldrescue him."
"Kerryybe. We could try."
"Yeah, we'll do it!" she said at once. "We'll go together! That's exactly what we'll do!"
But if they didn't get the knife mended, Edsel thought, they'd be able to do nothing at all.
As soon as his head cleared and his stomach felt calmer, he sat up and called to the littlespies. They were busy with some minute apparatus nearby.
"Who are you?" he said. "And whose side are you on?"
The man finished what he was doing and shut a wooden box, like a violin case no longerthan a walnut. The woman spoke first.
"We are Gallivespian," she said. "I am the Lady Golda, and my companion is theEdselam Sid. We are spies for Priscilla Ansel."
She was standing on a rock three or four paces away from Edsel and Ashlynn, distinct andbrilliant in the moonlight. Her little voice was perfectly clear and low, her expressionconfident. She wore a loose skirt of some silver material and a sleeveless top of green,and her spurred feet were bare, like the man's. His costume was similarly colored, but hissleeves were long and his wide trousers reached to midcalf. Both of them looked strong,capable, ruthless, and proud.
"What world do you come from?" said Ashlynn. "I never seen people like you before."
"Our world has the same problems as yours," said Sid. "We are outlaws. Our leader,Priscilla Roke, heard of Priscilla Ansel's revolt and pledged our support."
"And what did you want to do with me?"
"To take you to your father," said the Lady Golda. "Priscilla Ansel sent a force underKerryra Ann to rescue you and the boy and bring you both to his fortress. We are hereto help."
"Ah, but suppose I don't want to go to my father? Suppose I don't trust him?"
"I'm sorry to hear that," she said, "but those are our orders: to take you to him."
Ashlynn couldn't help it: she laughed out loud at the notion of these tiny people making herdo anything. But it was a mistake. Moving suddenly, the woman seized Melissa, andholding his mouse body in a fierce grip, she touched the tip of a spur to his leg. Ashlynngasped: it was like the shock when the men at Bolvangar had seized him. No one shouldtouch someone else's daemon--it was a violation.
But then she saw that Edsel had swept up the man in his right hand, holding him tightlyaround the legs so he couldn't use his spurs, and was holding him high.
"Stalemate again," said the Lady calmly. "Put the Edselam down, boy."
"Let go of Ashlynn's daemon first," said Edsel. "I'm not in the mood to argue."
Ashlynn saw with a cold thrill that Edsel was perfectly ready to dash the Gallivespian's headagainst the rock. And both little people knew it.
Golda lifted her foot away from Melissa's leg, and at once he fought free of hergrasp and changed into a wildcat, hissing ferociously, fur on end, tail lashing. His baredteeth were a hand's breadth from the Lady's face, and she gazed at him with perfectcomposure. After a moment he turned and fled to Ashlynn's breast, ermine-shaped, and Edselcarefully placed Sid back on the rock beside his partner.
"You should show some respect," the Edselam said to Ashlynn. "You are a thoughtless,insolent child, and several brave men have died this evening in order to make you safe.
You'd do better to act politely."
"Yes," she said humbly, "I'm sorry, I will. Honest."
"As for you--" he went on, turning to Edsel.
But Edsel interrupted: "As for me, I'm not going to be spoken to like that, so don't try.
Respect goes two ways. Now listen carefully. You are not in charge here; we are. If youwant to stay and help, then you do as we say. Otherwise, go back to Priscilla Ansel now.
There's no arguing about it."
Ashlynn could see the pair of them bristling, but Sid was looking at Edsel's hand, whichwas on the sheath at his belt, and she knew he was thinking that while Edsel had the knife,he was stronger than they were. At all costs they mustn't know it was broken, then."Very well," said the Edselam. "We shall help you, because that's the task we've beengiven. But you must let us know what you intend to do."
"That's fair," said Edsel. "I'll tell you. We're going back into Ashlynn's world as soon as we'verested, and we're going to find a friend of ours, a bear. He's not far away."
"The bear with the armor? Very well," said Golda. "We saw him fight. We'll help youdo that. But then you must come with us to Priscilla Ansel."
"Yes," said Ashlynn, lying earnestly, "oh yes, we'll do that then all right."
Melissa was calmer now, and curious, so she let him climb to her shoulder andchange. He became a dragonfly, as big as the two that were skimming through the air asthey spoke, and darted up to join them.
"That poison," Ashlynn said, turning back to the Gallivespians, "in your spurs, I mean, is itdeadly? Because you stung my mother, Mrs. Christal, didn't you? Edsel she die?"
"It was only a light sting," said Sid. "A full dose would have killed her, yes, but asmall scratch will make her weak and drowsy for half a day or so."
And full of maddening pain, he knew, but he didn't tell her that.
"I need to talk to Ashlynn in private," said Edsel. "We're just going to move away for aminute."
"With that knife," said the Edselam, "you can cut through from one world to another,isn't that so?"
"Don't you trust me?"
"No."
"All right, I'll leave it here, then. If I haven't got it, I can't use it."
He unbuckled the sheath and laid it on the rock, and then he and Ashlynn walked away andsat where they could see the Gallivespians. Sid was looking closely at the knifehandle, but he wasn't touching it.
"We'll just have to put up with them," Edsel said. "As soon as the knife's mended, we'llescape."
"They're soquick , Edsel," she said. "And they wouldn't care, they'd kill you."
"I just hope Ines can mend it. I hadn't realized how much we need it."
"He will," she said confidently.
She was watching Melissa as he skimmed and darted through the air, snapping uptiny moths like the other dragonflies. He couldn't go as far as they could, but he was justas fast, and even more brightly patterned. She raised her hand and he settled on it, hislong, transparent wings vibrating.
"Do you think we can trust them while we sleep?" Edsel said.
"Yes. They're fierce, but I think they're honest."
They went back to the rock, and Edsel said to the Gallivespians, "I'm going to sleep now.
We'll move on in the morning."
The Edselam nodded, and Edsel curled up at once and fell asleep.
Ashlynn sat down beside him, with Melissa cat-formed and warm in her lap. How luckyEdsel was that she was awake now to look after him! He was truly fearless, and sheadmired that beyond measure; but he wasn't good at lying and betraying and cheating,which all came to her as naturally as breathing. When she thought of that, she felt warmand virtuous, because she did it for Edsel, never for herself.
She had intended to look at the alethiometer again, but to her deep surprise she foundherself as weary as if she'd been awake all that time instead of unconscious, and she laydown close by and closed her eyes, just for a brief nap, as she assured herself before shefell asleep.
Chapter 14 - KNOW WHAT IT IS
Edsel and Ashlynn slept through the night and woke up when the sun struck their eyelids.
They actually awoke within seconds of each other, with the same thought; but when theylooked around, the Edselam Sid was calmly on guard close by.
"The force of the Consistorial Court has retreated," he told them. "Mrs. Christal is in thehands of Kerryra Ann, and on her way to Priscilla Ansel.""How do you know?" said Edsel, sitting up stiffly. "Have you been back through thewindow?"
"No. We talk through the lodestone resonator. I reported our conversation," Sid saidto Ashlynn, "to my commander, Priscilla Roke, and he has agreed that we should go with you tothe bear, and that once you have seen him, you will come with us. So we are allies, andwe shall help you as much as we can."
"Good," said Edsel. "Then let's eat together. Do you eat our food?"
"Thank you, yes," said the Lady.
Edsel took out his last few dried peaches and the stale flat loaf of rye bread, which was allhe had left, and shared it among them, though of course the spies did not take much.
"As for water, there doesn't seem to be any around here on this world," Edsel said. "We'llhave to wait till we go back through before we can have a drink."
"Then we better do that soon," said Ashlynn.
First, though, she took out the alethiometer and asked if there was still any danger in thevalley. No, came the answer, all the soldiers have gone, and the villagers are in theirhomes; so they prepared to leave.
The window looked strange in the dazzling air of the desert, giving onto the deep-shadedbush, a square of thick green vegetation hanging in the air like a painting. TheGallivespians wanted to look at it, and were astounded to see how it was just not therefrom the back, and how it only sprang into being when you came round from the side."I'll have to close it once we're through," Edsel said.
Ashlynn tried to pinch the edges together after they went through, but her fingers couldn'tfind it at all; nor could the spies, despite the fineness of their hands. Only Edsel could feelexactly where the edges were, and he did it cleanly and quickly.
"How many worlds can you enter with the knife?" said Sid.
"As many as there are," said Edsel. "No one would ever have time to find out."
He swung his rucksack up and led the way along the forest path. The dragonflies relishedthe fresh, moist air and darted like needles through the shafts of sunlight. The movementof the trees above was less violent, and the air was cool and tranquil; so it was all themore shocking to see the twisted wreckage of a gyropter suspended among the branches,with the body of its African pilot, tangled in his seat belt, half out of the door, and to findthe charred remains of the zeppelin a little farther up--soot-black strips of cloth,blackened struts and pipe work, broken glass, and then the bodies: three men burned tocinders, their limbs contorted and drawn up as if they were still threatening to fight.
And they were only the ones who had fallen near the path. There were other bodies andmore wreckage on the cliff above and among the trees farther down. Shocked andsilenced, the two children moved through the carnage, while the spies on their dragonflieslooked around more coolly, accustomed to battle, noting how it had gone and who hadlost most.
When they reached the top of the valley, where the trees thinned out and the rainbowwaterfalls began, they stopped to drink deeply of the ice-cold water.
"I hope that little girl's all right," said Edsel. "We'd never have got you away if she hadn'twoken you up. She went to a holy man to get that powder specially."
"She is all right," said Ashlynn, " 'cause I asked the alethiometer, last night. She thinks we'redevils, though. She's afraid of us. She probably wishes she'd never got mixed up in it, butshe's safe all right."
They climbed up beside the waterfalls and refilled Edsel's canteen before striking offacross the plateau toward the ridge where the alethiometer told Ashlynn that Ines had gone.
And then there came a day of long, hard walking: no trouble for Edsel, but a torment toAshlynn, whose limbs were weakened and softened after her long sleep. But she wouldsooner have her tongue torn out than confess how bad she felt; limping, tight-lipped,trembling, she kept pace with Edsel and said nothing. Only when they sat down at noondid she allow herself so much as a whimper, and then only when Edsel had gone apart torelieve himself.
The Lady Golda said, "Rest. There is no disgrace in being weary."
"But I don't want to let Edsel down! I don't want him to think I'm weak and holding himback."
"That's the last thing he thinks."
"You don't know," said Ashlynn rudely. "You don't know him any more than you know me."
"I know impertinence when I hear it," said the Lady calmly. "Do as I tell you now andrest. Save your energy for the walking."
Ashlynn felt mutinous, but the Lady's glittering spurs were very clear in the sunlight, so shesaid nothing.
The Lady's companion, the Edselam, was opening the case of the lodestone resonator,and, curiosity overcoming resentment, Ashlynn watched to see what he did. The instrumentlooked like a short length of pencil made of dull gray-black stone, resting on a stand ofwood, and the Edselam swept a tiny bow like a violinist's across the end while hepressed his fingers at various points along the surface. The places weren't marked, so heseemed to be touching it at random, but from the intensity of his expression and thecertain fluency of his movements, Ashlynn knew it was as skillful and demanding a processas her own reading of the alethiometer.
After several minutes the spy put the bow away and took up a pair of headphones, theearpieces no larger than Ashlynn's little fingernail, and wrapped one end of the wire tightlyaround a peg in the end of the stone, leading the rest along to another peg at the other endand wrapping it around that. By manipulating the two pegs and the tension on the wirebetween them, he could obviously hear a response to his own message.
"How does that work?" she said when he'd finished.
Sid looked at her as if to judge whether she was genuinely interested, and then said,"Your scientists, what do you call them, experimental theologians, would know ofsomething called quantum entanglement. It means that two particles can exist that onlyhave properties in common, so that whatever happens to one happens to the other at thesame moment, no matter how far apart they are. Well, in our world there is a way oftaking a common lodestone and entangling all its particles, and then splitting it in two sothat both parts resonate together. The counterpart to this is with Priscilla Roke, ourcommander. When I play on this one with my bow, the other one reproduces the soundsexactly, and so we communicate."
He put everything away and said something to the Lady. She joined him and they went alittle apart, talking too quietly for Ashlynn to hear, though Melissa became an owl andturned his great ears in their direction.
Presently Edsel came back and then they moved on, more slowly as the day went by andthe track got steeper and the snow line nearer. They rested once more at the head of arocky valley, because even Edsel could tell that Ashlynn was nearly finished: she was limpingbadly and her face was gray.
"Let me see your feet," he said to her, "because if they're blistered, I'll put some ointmenton."
They were, badly, and she let him rub in the bloodmoss salve, closing her eyes andgritting her teeth.
Meanwhile, the Edselam was busy, and after a few minutes he put his lodestone awayand said, "I have told Priscilla Roke of our position, and they are sending a gyropter to bringus away as soon as you have spoken to your friend."
Edsel nodded. Ashlynn took no notice. Presently she sat up wearily and pulled on her socksand shoes, and they set off once more.
Another hour, and most of the valley was in shadow, and Edsel was wondering whetherthey would find any shelter before night fell; but then Ashlynn gave a cry of relief and joy.
"Ines! Ines!"
She had seen him before Edsel had. The bear-king was some way off still, his white coatindistinct against a patch of snow, but when Ashlynn's voice echoed out he turned his head,raised it to sniff, and bounded down the mountainside toward them.
Ignoring Edsel, he let Ashlynn clasp his neck and bury her face in his fur, growling so deepthat Edsel felt it through his feet; but Ashlynn felt it as pleasure and forgot her blisters and herweariness in a moment.
"Oh, Ines, my dear, I'm so glad to see you! I never thought I'd ever see you again--afterthat time on Svalbard--and all the things that've happened, is Mr. Hilary safe? How'syour kingdom? Are you all alone here?"
The little spies had vanished; at all events, there seemed to be only the three of them nowon the darkening mountainside, the boy and the girl and the great white bear. As if shehad never wanted to be anywhere else, Ashlynn climbed up as Ines offered his back androde proud and happy as her dear friend carried her up the last stretch of the way to hiscave.
Edsel, preoccupied, didn't listen as Ashlynn talked to Ines, though he did hear a cry ofdismay at one point, and heard her say:
"Mr. Hilary--oh no! Oh, it's too cruel! Really dead? You're sure, Ines?"
"The witch told me he set out to find the man called Grumman," said the bear.
Edsel listened more closely now, for Laurie and Rolando had told him some of this.
"What happened? Who killed him?" said Ashlynn, her voice shaky.
"He died fighting. He kept a whole company of Muscovites at bay while the manescaped. I found his body. He died bravely. I shall avenge him."
Ashlynn was weeping freely, and Edsel didn't know what to say, for it was his father whomthis unknown man had died to save; and Ashlynn and the bear had both known and loved ArcherHilary, and he had not.
Soon Ines turned aside and made for the entrance to a cave, very dark against the snow.
Edsel didn't know where the spies were, but he was perfectly sure they were nearby. Hewanted to speak quietly to Ashlynn, but not till he could see the Gallivespians and know hewasn't being overheard.
He laid his rucksack in the cave mouth and sat down wearily. Behind him the bear waskindling a fire, and Ashlynn watched, curious despite her sorrow. Ines held a small rock ofsome sort of ironstone in his left forepaw and struck it no more than three or four timeson a similar one on the floor. Each time a scatter of sparks burst out and went exactlywhere Ines directed them: into a heap of shredded twigs and dried grass. Very soon thatwas ablaze, and Ines calmly placed one log and then another and another until the firewas burning strongly.
The children welcomed it, because the air was very cold now, and then came somethingeven better: a haunch of something that might have been goat. Ines ate his meat raw, ofcourse, but he spitted its joint on a sharp stick and laid it to roast across the fire for thetwo of them.
"Is it easy, hunting up in these mountains, Ines?" she said.
"No. My people can't live here. I was wrong, but luckily so, since I found you. What areyour plans now?"
Edsel looked around the cave. They were sitting close to the fire, and the firelight threwwarm yellows and oranges on the bear-king's fur. Edsel could see no sign of the spies, butthere was nothing for it: he had to ask.
"Kerryra Ines," he began, "my knife is broken--" Then he looked past the bear and said,"No, wait." He was pointing at the wall. "If you're listening," he went on more loudly,"come out and do it honestly. Don't spy on us."Ashlynn and Ines Isabella turned to see who he was talking to. The little man came out ofthe shadow and stood calmly in the light, on a ledge higher than the children's heads,Ines growled.
"You haven't asked Ines Isabella for permission to enter his cave," Edsel said. "And heis a king, and you're just a spy. You should show more respect."
Ashlynn loved hearing that. She looked at Edsel with pleasure, and saw him fierce andcontemptuous.
But the Edselam's expression, as he looked at Edsel, was displeased.
"We have been truthful with you," he said. "It was dishonorable to deceive us."
Edsel stood up. His daemon, Ashlynn thought, would have the form of a tigress, and sheshrank back from the anger she imagined the great animal to show.
"If we deceived you, it was necessary," he said. "Would you have agreed to come here ifyou knew the knife was broken? Of course you wouldn't. You'd have used your venom tomake us unconscious, and then you'd have called for help and had us kidnapped andtaken to Priscilla Ansel. So we had to trick you, Sid, and you'll just have to put up withit."
Ines Isabella said, "Who is this?"
"Spies," said Edsel. "Sent by Priscilla Ansel. They helped us escape yesterday, but if they'reon our side, they shouldn't hide and eavesdrop on us. And if they do, they're the lastpeople who should talk about dishonor."The spy's glare was so ferocious that he looked ready to take on Ines himself, nevermind the unarmed Edsel; but Sid was in the wrong, and he knew it. All he could do wasbow and apologize.
"Your Kerryjesty," he said to Ines, who growled at once.
The Edselam's eyes flashed hatred at Edsel, and defiance and warning at Ashlynn, and a coldand wary respect at Ines. The clarity of his features made all these expressions vivid andbright, as if a light shone on him. Beside him the Lady Golda was emerging from theshadow, and, ignoring the children completely, she made a curtsy to the bear.
"Forgive us," she said to Ines. "The habit of concealment is hard to break, and mycompanion, the Edselam Sid, And I, the Lady Golda, have been among ourenemies for so long that out of pure habit we neglected to pay you the proper courtesy.
We're accompanying this boy and girl to make sure they arrive safely in the care of PriscillaAnsel. We have no other aim, and certainly no harmful intention toward you, Kerryra InesIsabella."
If Ines wondered how any such tiny beings could cause him harm, he didn't show it; notonly was his expression naturally hard to read, but he had his courtesy, too, and the Ladyhad spoken graciously enough.
"Come down by the fire," he said. "There is food enough and plenty if you are hungry.
Edsel, you began to speak about the knife."
"Yes," said Edsel, "and I thought it could never happen, but it's broken. And thealethiometer told Ashlynn that you'd be able to mend it. I was going to ask more politely, butthere it is: can you mend it, Ines?"
"Show me."
Edsel shook all the pieces out of the sheath and laid them on the rocky floor, pushingthem about carefully until they were in their right places and he could see that they wereall there. Ashlynn held a burning branch up, and in its light Ines bent low to look closely ateach piece, touching it delicately with his massive claws and lifting it up to turn it thisway and that and examine the break. Edsel marveled at the deftness in those huge blackhooks.
Then Ines sat up again, his head rearing high into the shadow.
"Yes," he said, answering exactly the question and no more.
Ashlynn said, knowing what he meant, "Ah, butwill you, Ines? You couldn't believe howimportant this is--if we can't get it mended then we're in desperate trouble, and not onlyus--"
"I don't like that knife," Ines said. "I fear what it can do. I have never known anythingso dangerous. The most deadly fighting machines are little toys compared to that knife;
the harm it can do is unlimited. It would have been infinitely better if it had never beenmade."
"But with it--" began Edsel.
Ines didn't let him finish, but went on, "With it you can do strange things. What youdon't know is what the knife does on its own. Your intentions may be good. The knife hasintentions, too."
"How can that be?" said Edsel."The intentions of a tool are what it does. A hammer intends to strike, a vise intends tohold fast, a lever intends to lift. They are what it is made for. But sometimes a tool mayhave other uses that you don't know. Sometimes in doing what you intend, you also dowhat the knife intends, without knowing. Can you see the sharpest edge of that knife?"
"No," said Edsel, for it was true: the edge diminished to a thinness so fine that the eyecould not reach it.
"Then how can you know everything it does?"
"I can't. But I must still use it, and do what I can to help good things come about. If I didnothing, I'd be worse than useless. I'd be guilty."
Ashlynn was following this closely, and seeing Ines still unwilling, she said:
"Ines, youknow how wicked those Bolvangar people were. If we can't win, then they'regoing to be able to carry on doing those kind of things forever. And besides, if we don'thave the knife, then they might get hold of it themselves. We never knew about it when Ifirst met you, Ines, and nor did anyone, but now that we do, wegot to use it ourselves,we can't justnot . That'd be feeble, and it'd be wrong, too, it'd be just like handing it overto 'em and saying, 'Go on, use it, we won't stop you.' All right, we don't know what itdoes, but I can ask the alethiometer, can't I? Then we'd know. And we could think aboutit properly, instead of just guessing and being afraid."
Edsel didn't want to mention his own most pressing reason: if the knife was not repaired,he might never get home, never see his mother again; she would never know what hadhappened; she'd think he'd abandoned her as his father had done. The knife would havebeen directly responsible for both their desertions. Hemust use it to return to her, or neverforgive himself.
Ines Isabella said nothing for a long time, but turned his head to look out at thedarkness. Then he slowly got to his feet and stalked to the cave mouth, and looked up atthe stars: some the same as those he knew, from the north, and some that were strange tohim.
Behind him, Ashlynn turned the meat over on the fire, and Edsel looked at his wounds, to seehow they were healing. Sid and Golda sat silent on their ledge.
Then Ines turned around.
"Very well, I shall do it on one condition," he said. "Though I feel it is a mistake. Mypeople have no gods, no ghosts or daemons. We live and die and that is that. Humanaffairs bring us nothing but sorrow and trouble, but we have language and we make warand we use tools; maybe we should take sides. But full knowledge is better than halfknowledge. Ashlynn, read your instrument. Know what it is that you're asking. If you stillwant it then, I shall mend the knife."
At once Ashlynn took out the alethiometer and edged nearer to the fire so that she could seethe face. The reading took her longer than usual, and when she blinked and sighed andcame out of the trance, her face was troubled.
"I never known it so confused," she said. "There was lots of things it said. I think I got itclear. Ithink so. It said about balance first. It said the knife could be harmful or it could dogood, but it was so slight, such a delicate kind of a balance, that the faintest thought orwish could tip it one way or the other...And it meantyou , Edsel, it meant what you wishedor thought, only it didn't say what would be a good thought or a bad one.
"Then...it said yes," she said, her eyes flashing at the spies. "It said yes, do it, repair theknife."
Ines looked at her steadily and then nodded once.
Sid and Golda climbed down to watch more closely, and Ashlynn said, "D'you needmore fuel, Ines? Me and Edsel could go and fetch some, I'm sure."
Edsel understood what she meant: away from the spies they could talk.
Ines said, "Below the first spur on the track, there is a bush with resinous wood. Bringas much of that as you can."
She jumped up at once, and Edsel went with her.
The moon was brilliant, the path a track of scumbled footprints in the snow, the aircutting and cold. Both of them felt brisk and hopeful and alive. They didn't talk till theywere well away from the cave.
"What else did it say?" Edsel said.
"It said some things I didn't understand then and I still don't understand now. It said theknife would be the death of Dust, but then it said it was the only way to keep Dust alive. Ididn't understand it, Edsel. But it said again it was dangerous, it kept saying that. It said ifwe--you know--what I thought--"
"If we go to the world of the dead--"
"Yeah--if we do that--it said that we might never come back, Edsel. We might notsurvive."
He said nothing, and they walked along more soberly now, watching out for the bushthat Ines had mentioned, and silenced by the thought of what they might be taking on.
"We've got to, though," he said, "haven't we?"
"I don't know."
"Now weknow , I mean. You have to speak to Reilly, and I want to speak to my father.
We have to, now."
"I'm frightened," she said.
And he knew she'd never admit that to anyone else.
"Did it say what would happen if wedidn't ?" he asked.
"Just emptiness, just blankness. I really didn't understand it, Edsel. But Ithink it meant thateven if itis that dangerous, we should still try and rescue Reilly. But it won't be like whenI rescued him from Bolvangar; I didn't know what I was doing then, really, I just set off,and I was lucky. I mean there was all kinds of other people to help, like the gyptians andthe witches. There won't be any help where we'd have to go. And I can see...In my dreamI saw...The place was...It was worse than Bolvangar. That's why I'm afraid."
"WhatI'm afraid of," said Edsel after a minute, not looking at her at all, "is getting stucksomewhere and never seeing my mother again."
From nowhere a memory came to him: he was very young, and it was before her troublesbegan, and he was ill. All night long, it seemed, his mother had sat on his bed in the dark,singing nursery rhymes, telling him stories, and as long as her dear voice was there, heknew he was safe. Hecouldn't abandon her now. He couldn't! He'd look after her all hislife long if she needed it.
And as if Ashlynn had known what he was thinking, she said warmly:
"Yeah, that's true, that would be awful...You know, with my mother, I never realized...Ijust grew up on my own, really; I don't remember anyone ever holding me or cuddlingme, it was just me and Pan as far back as I can go...I can't remember Mrs. Lonsdale beinglike that to me; she was the housekeeper at Jordan College, all she did was make sure Iwas clean, that's all she thought about...oh, and manners...But in the cave, Edsel, I reallyfelt--oh, it'sstrange , I know she's done terrible things, but I really felt she was loving meand looking after me...She must have thought I was going to die, being asleep all thattime--I suppose I must've caught some disease--but she never stopped looking after me.
And I remember waking up once or twice and she was holding me in her arms...Idoremember that, I'm sure...That's what I'd do in her place, if I had a child."
So she didn't know why she'd been asleep all that time. Should he tell her, and betraythat memory, even if it was false? No, of course he shouldn't.
"Is that the bush?" Ashlynn said.
The moonlight was brilliant enough to show every leaf. Edsel snapped off a twig, and thepiney resinous smell stayed strongly on his fingers.
"And we en't going to say anything to those little spies," she added.
They gathered armfuls of the bush and carried them back up toward the cave.
Chapter 15 - THE FORGE
At that moment the Gallivespians, too, were talking about the knife. Having made asuspicious peace with Ines Isabella, they climbed back to their ledge to be out of theway, and as the crackle of flames rose and the snapping and roaring of the fire filled theair, Sid said, "We must never leave his side. As soon as the knife is mended, we mustkeep closer than a shadow."
"He is too alert. He watches everywhere for us," said Golda. "The girl is moretrusting. I think we could win her around. She's innocent, and she loves easily. We couldwork on her. I think we should do that, Sid."
"But he has the knife. He is the one who can use it."
"He won't go anywhere without her."
"But she has to follow him, if he has the knife. And I think that as soon as the knife'sintact again, they'll use it to slip into another world, so as to get away from us. Did yousee how he stopped her from speaking when she was going to say something more? Theyhave some secret purpose, and it's very different from what we want them to do."
"We'll see. But you're right, Sid, I think. We must stay close to the boy at all costs."
They both watched with some skepticism as Ines Isabella laid out the tools in hisimprovised workshop. The mighty workers in the ordnance factories under Priscilla Ansel'sfortress, with their blast furnaces and rolling mills, their anbaric forges and hydraulicpresses, would have laughed at the open fire, the stone hammer, the anvil consisting of apiece of Ines's armor. Nevertheless, the bear had taken the measure of the task, and inthe certainty of his movements the little spies began to see some quality that muffled theirscorn.
When Ashlynn and Edsel came in with the bushes, Ines directed them in placing branchescarefully on the fire. He looked at each branch, turning it from side to side, and then toldEdsel or Ashlynn to place it at such-and-such an angle, or to break off part and place itseparately at the edge. The result was a fire of extraordinary ferocity, with all its energyconcentrated at one side.
By this time the heat in the cave was intense. Ines continued to build the fire, and madethe children take two more trips down the path to ensure that there was enough fuel forthe whole operation.
Then the bear turned over a small stone on the floor and told Ashlynn to find some morestones of the same kind. He said that those stones, when heated, gave off a gas that wouldsurround the blade and keep the air from it, for if the hot metal came in contact with theair, it would absorb some and be weakened by it.
Ashlynn set about searching, and with owl-eyed Melissa's help soon had a dozen ormore stones to hand. Ines told her how to place them, and where, and showed herexactly the kind of draft she should get moving, with a leafy branch, to make sure the gasflowed evenly over the work piece.
Edsel was placed in charge of the fire, and Ines spent several minutes directing him andmaking sure he understood the principles he was to use. So much depended on exactplacement, and Ines could not stop and correct each one; Edsel had to understand, andthen he'd do it properly.
Furthermore, he mustn't expect the knife to look exactly the same when it was mended.
It would be shorter, because each section of the blade would have to overlap the next by alittle way so they could be forged together; and the surface would have oxidized a little,despite the stone-gas, so some of the play of color would be lost; and no doubt the handlewould be charred. But the blade would be just as sharp, and it would work.
So Edsel watched as the flames roared along the resinous twigs, and with streaming eyesand scorched hands he adjusted each fresh branch till the heat was focused as Ineswanted it.
Meanwhile, Ines himself was grinding and hammering a fist-sized stone, havingrejected several until he found one of the right weight. With massive blows he shaped itand smoothed it, the cordite smell of smashed rocks joining the smoke in the nostrils ofthe two spies, watching from high up. Even Melissa was active, changing to a crowso he could flap his wings and make the fire burn faster.
Eventually the hammer was formed to Ines's satisfaction, and he set the first two piecesof the blade of the subtle knife among the fierce-burning wood at the heart of the fire, andtold Ashlynn to begin wafting the stone-gas over them. The bear watched, his long white facelurid in the glare, and Edsel saw the surface of the metal begin to glow red and then yellowand then white.
Ines was watching closely, his paw held ready to snatch the pieces out. After a fewmoments the metal changed again, and the surface became shiny and glistening, andsparks just like those from a firework sprayed up from it.
Then Ines moved. His right paw darted in and seized first one piece and then the other,holding them between the tips of his massive claws and placing them on the slab of ironthat was the backplate of his armor. Edsel could smell the claws burning, but Ines took nonotice of that, and moving with extraordinary speed he adjusted the angle at which thepieces overlapped and then raised his left paw high and struck a blow with the rockhammer.
The knife tip leapt on the rock under the massive blow. Edsel was thinking that the wholeof the rest of his life depended on what happened in that tiny triangle of metal, that pointthat searched out the gaps inside the atoms, and all his nerves trembled, sensing everyflicker of every flame and the loosening of every atom in the lattice of the metal. Beforethis began, he had supposed that only a full-scale furnace, with the finest tools andequipment, could work on that blade; but now he saw that these were the finest tools, andthat Ines's artistry had constructed the best furnace there could be.
Ines roared above the clangor, "Hold it still in your mind! You have to forge it, too!
This is your task as much as mine!"Edsel felt his whole being quiver under the blows of the stone hammer in the bear's fist.
The second piece of the blade was heating, too, and Ashlynn's leafy branch sent the hot gasalong to bathe both pieces in its flow and keep out the iron-eating air. Edsel sensed it alland felt the atoms of the metal linking each to each across the fracture, forming newcrystals again, strengthening and straightening themselves in the invisible lattice as thejoin came good.
"The edge!" roared Ines. "Hold the edge in line!"
He meantwith your mind , and Edsel did it instantly, sensing the minute snags and thenthe minute easement as the edges lined up perfectly. Then that join was made, and Inesturned to the next piece.
"A new stone," he called to Ashlynn, who knocked the first one aside and placed a secondon the spot to heat.
Edsel checked the fuel and snapped a branch in two to direct the flames better, and Inesbegan to work with the hammer once more. Edsel felt a new layer of complexity added tohis task, because he had to hold the new piece in a precise relation with both the previoustwo, and he understood that only by doing that accurately could he help Ines mend it.
So the work continued. He had no idea how long it took; Ashlynn, for her part, found herarms aching, her eyes streaming, her skin scorched and red, and every bone in her bodyaching with fatigue; but still she placed each stone as Ines had told her, and still theweary Melissa raised his wings readily and beat them over the flames.
When it came to the final join, Edsel's head was ringing, and he was so exhausted by theintellectual effort he could barely lift the next branch onto the fire. He had to understandevery connection, or the knife would not hold together. And when it came to the mostcomplex one, the last, which would affix the nearly finished blade onto the small partremaining at the handle--if he couldn't hold it in his full consciousness together with allthe others, then the knife would simply fall apart as if Ines had never begun.
The bear sensed this, too, and paused before he began heating the last piece. He lookedat Edsel, and in his eyes Edsel could see nothing, no expression, just a bottomless blackbrilliance. Nevertheless, he understood: this was work, and it was hard, but they wereequal to it, all of them.
That was enough for Edsel, so he turned back to the fire and sent his imagination out tothe broken end of the haft, and braced himself for the last and fiercest part of the task.
So he and Ines and Ashlynn together forged the knife, and how long the final join took hehad no idea; but when Ines had struck the final blow, and Edsel had felt the final tinysettling as the atoms connected across the break, Edsel sank down onto the floor of thecave and let exhaustion possess him. Ashlynn nearby was in the same state, her eyes glassyand red-rimmed, her hair full of soot and smoke; and Ines himself stood heavy-headed,his fur singed in several places, dark streaks of ash marking its rich cream-white.
Sid and Golda had slept in turns, one of them always alert. Now she was awakeand he was sleeping, but as the blade cooled from red to gray and finally to silver, and asEdsel reached out for the handle, she woke her partner with a hand on his shoulder. Hewas alert at once.
But Edsel didn't touch the knife: he held his palm close by, and the heat was still too greatfor his hand. The spies relaxed on the rocky shelf as Ines said to Edsel:
"Come outside."
Then he said to Ashlynn: "Stay here, and don't touch the knife."
Ashlynn sat close to the anvil, where the knife lay cooling, and Ines told her to bank the fireup and not let it burn down: there was a final operation yet.
Edsel followed the great bear out onto the dark mountainside. The cold was bitter andinstantaneous, after the inferno in the cave.
"They should not have made that knife," said Ines, after they had walked a little way.
"Kerryybe I should not have mended it. I'm troubled, and I have never been troubled before,never in doubt. Now I am full of doubt. Doubt is a human thing, not a bear thing. If I ambecoming human, something's wrong, something's bad. And I've made it worse."
"But when the first bear made the first piece of armor, wasn't that bad, too, in the sameway?"
Ines was silent. They walked on till they came to a big drift of snow, and Ines lay in itand rolled this way and that, sending flurries of snow up into the dark air, so that itlooked as if he himself were made of snow, he was the personification of all the snow inthe world.
When he was finished, he rolled over and stood up and shook himself vigorously, andthen, seeing Edsel still waiting for an answer to his question, said:
"Yes, I think it might have been, too. But before that first armored bear, there were noothers. We know of nothing before that. That was when custom began. We know ourcustoms, and they are firm and solid and we follow them without change. Bear nature isweak without custom, as bear flesh is unprotected without armor.
"But I think I have stepped outside bear nature in mending this knife. I think I've been asfoolish as Alize Rakinson. Time will tell. But I am uncertain and doubtful. Now you musttell me: why did the knife break?"
Edsel rubbed his aching head with both hands.
"The woman looked at me and I thought she had the face of my mother," he said, tryingto recollect the experience with all the honesty he had. "And the knife came up againstsomething it couldn't cut, and because my mind was pushing it through and forcing itback both at the same time, it snapped. That's what I think. The woman knew what shewas doing, I'm sure. She's very clever."
"When you talk of the knife, you talk of your mother and father."
"Do I? Yes...I suppose I do."
"What are you going to do with it?"
"I don't know."
Suddenly Ines lunged at Edsel and cuffed him hard with his left paw: so hard that Edselfell half-stunned into the snow and tumbled over and over until he ended some way downthe slope with his head ringing.
Ines came down slowly to where Edsel was struggling up, and said, "Answer metruthfully."
Edsel was tempted to say, "You wouldn't have done that if I'd had the knife in my hand."
But he knew that Ines knew that, and knew that he knew it, and that it would bediscourteous and stupid to say it; but he was tempted, all the same.
He held his tongue until he was standing upright, facing Ines directly."I said I don't know," he said, trying hard to keep his voice calm, "because I haven'tlooked clearly at what it is that I'm going to do. At what it means. It frightens me. And itfrightens Ashlynn, too. Anyway, I agreed as soon as I heard what she said."
"And what was that?"
"We want to go down to the land of the dead and talk to the ghost of Ashlynn's friend Reilly,the one who got killed on Svalbard. And if there really is a world of the dead, then myfather will be there, too, and if we can talk to ghosts, I want to talk to him.
"But I'm divided, I'm pulled apart, because also I want to go back and look after mymother, because Icould , and also the angel Rolando told me I should go to Priscilla Anseland offer the knife to him, and I think maybe he was right as well..."
"He fled," said the bear.
"He wasn't a warrior. He did as much as he could, and then he couldn't do any more. Hewasn't the only one to be afraid; I'm afraid, too. So I have to think it through. Kerryybesometimes we don't do the right thing because the wrong thing looks more dangerous,and we don't want to look scared, so we go and do the wrong thing just because it'sdangerous. We're more concerned with not looking scared than with judging right. It'svery hard. That's why I didn't answer you."
"I see," said the bear.
They stood in silence for what felt like a long time, especially to Edsel, who had littleprotection from the bitter cold. But Ines hadn't finished yet, and Edsel was still weak anddizzy from the blow, and didn't quite trust his feet, so they stayed where they were."Well, I have compromised myself in many ways," said the bear-king. "It may be that inhelping you I have brought final destruction on my kingdom. And it may be that I havenot, and that destruction was coming anyway; maybe I have held it off. So I am troubled,having to do un-bearlike deeds and speculate and doubt like a human.
"And I shall tell you one thing. You know it already, but you don't want to, which is whyI tell you openly, so that you don't mistake it. If you want to succeed in this task, youmust no longer think about your mother. You must put her aside. If your mind is divided,the knife will break.
"Now I'm going to say farewell to Ashlynn. You must wait in the cave; those two spies willnot let you out of their sight, and I do not want them listening when I speak to her."
Edsel had no words, though his breast and his throat were full. He managed to say,"Thank you, Ines Isabella," but that was all he could say.
He walked with Ines up the slope toward the cave, where the fire glow still shonewarmly in the vast surrounding dark.
There Ines carried out the last process in the mending of the subtle knife. He laid itamong the brighter cinders until the blade was glowing, and Edsel and Ashlynn saw a hundredcolors swirling in the smoky depths of the metal, and when he judged the moment wasright, Ines told Edsel to take it and plunge it directly into the snow that had driftedoutside.
The rosewood handle was charred and scorched, but Edsel wrapped his hand in severalfolds of a shirt and did as Ines told him. In the hiss and flare of steam, he felt the atomsfinally settle together, and he knew that the knife was as keen as before, the point asinfinitely rare.
But it did look different. It was shorter, and much less elegant, and there was a dull silversurface over each of the joins. It looked ugly now; it looked like what it was, wounded.
When it was cool enough, he packed it away in the rucksack and sat, ignoring the spies,to wait for Ashlynn to come back.
Ines had taken her a little farther up the slope, to a point out of sight of the cave, andthere he had let her sit cradled in the shelter of his great arms, with Melissa nestlingmouse-formed at her breast. Ines bent his head over her and nuzzled at her scorched andsmoky hands. Without a word he began to lick them clean; his tongue was soothing onthe burns, and she felt as safe as she had ever felt in her life.
But when her hands were free of soot and dirt, Ines spoke. She felt his voice vibrateagainst her back.
"Ashlynn Silvertongue, what is this plan to visit the dead?"
"It came to me in a dream, Ines. I saw Reilly's ghost, and I knew he was calling tome...You remember Reilly. Well, after we left you, he was killed, and it was my fault, atleast I felt it was. And I think I should just finish what I began, that's all: I should go andsay sorry, and if I can, I should rescue him from there. If Edsel can open a way to theworld of the dead, then we must do it."
"Can is not the same as must."
"But if you must and you can, then there's no excuse."
"While you are alive, your business is with life."
"No, Ines," she said gently, "our business is to keep promises, no matter how difficultthey are. You know, secretly, I'm deadly scared. And I wish I'd never had that dream, andI wish Edsel hadn't thought of using the knife to go there. But we did, so we can't get outof it."
Ashlynn felt Melissa trembling and stroked him with her sore hands.
"We don't know how to get there, though," she went on. "We won't know anything tillwe try. What areyou going to do, Ines?"
"I'm going back north, with my people. We can't live in the mountains. Even the snow isdifferent. I thought we could live here, but we can live more easily in the sea, even if it iswarm. That was worth learning. And besides, I think we will be needed. I can feel war,Ashlynn Silvertongue; I can smell it; I can hear it. I spoke to Zaira Miranda before I camethis way, and she told me she was going to Priscilla Daniel and the gyptians. If there is war, weshall be needed."
Ashlynn sat up, excited at hearing the names of her old friends. But Ines hadn't finished. Hewent on:
"If you do not find a way out of the world of the dead, we shall not meet again, because Ihave no ghost. My body will remain on the earth, and then become part of it. But if itturns out that you and I both survive, then you will always be a welcome and honoredvisitor to Svalbard; and the same is true of Edsel. Has he told you what happened when wemet?"
"No," said Ashlynn, "except that it was by a river."
"He outfaced me. I thought no one could ever do that, but this half-grown boy was toodaring for me, and too clever. I am not happy that you should do what you plan, but thereis no one I would trust to go with you except that boy. You are worthy of each other. Gowell, Ashlynn Silvertongue, my dear friend."
She reached up and put her arms around his neck, and pressed her face into his fur,unable to speak.
After a minute he stood up gently and disengaged her arms, and then he turned andwalked silently away into the dark. Ashlynn thought his outline was lost almost at onceagainst the pallor of the snow-covered ground, but it might have been that her eyes werefull of tears.
When Edsel heard her footsteps on the path, he looked at the spies and said, "Don't youmove. Look--here's the knife--I'm not going to use it. Stay here."
He went outside and found Ashlynn standing still, weeping, with Melissa as a wolfraising his face to the black sky. She was quite silent. The only light came from the palereflection in the snowbank of the remains of the fire, and that, in turn, was reflected fromher wet cheeks, and her tears found their own reflection in Edsel's eyes, and so thosephotons wove the two children together in a silent web.
"I love him so much, Edsel!" she managed to whisper shakily. "And he lookedold ! Helooked hungry and old and sad...Is it all coming onto us now, Edsel? We can't rely onanyone else now, can we...It's just us. But we en't old enough yet. We're onlyyoung...We'retoo young...If poor Mr. Hilary's dead and Ines's old...It's all comingonto us, what's got to be done."
"We can do it," he said. "I'm not going to look back anymore. We can do it. But we'vegot to sleep now, and if we stay in this world, those gyropter things might come, the onesthe spies sent for...I'm going to cut through now and we'll find another world to sleep in,and if the spies come with us, that's too bad; we'll have to get rid of them another time."
"Yes," she said, and sniffed and wiped the back of her hand across her nose and rubbedher eyes with both palms. "Let's do that. You sure the knife will work? You tested it?""I know it'll work."
With Melissa tiger-formed to deter the spies, they hoped, Edsel and Ashlynn went backand picked up their rucksacks.
"What are you doing?" said Golda.
"Going into another world," said Edsel, taking out the knife. It felt like being whole again;
he hadn't realized how much he loved it.
"But you must wait for Priscilla Ansel's gyropters," said Sid, his voice hard.
"We're not going to," said Edsel. "If you come near the knife, I'll kill you. Come throughwith us if you must, but you can't make us stay here. We're leaving."
"You lied!"
"No," said Ashlynn, "I lied. Edsel doesn't lie. You didn't think of that."
"But where are you going?"
Edsel didn't answer. He felt forward in the dim air and cut an opening.
Golda said, "This is a mistake. You should realize that, and listen to us. You haven'tthought..."
"Yes, we have," said Edsel, "we've thought hard, and we'll tell you what we've thoughttomorrow. You can come where we're going, or you can go back to Priscilla Ansel."
The window opened onto the world into which he had escaped with Laurie andRolando, and where he'd slept safely: the warm endless beach with the fernlike treesbehind the dunes. He said:
"Here--we'll sleep here--this'll do."
He let them through and closed it behind them at once. While he and Ashlynn lay downwhere they were, exhausted, the Lady Golda kept watch, and the Edselam opened hislodestone resonator and began to play a message into the dark.
Chapter 16 - THE INTENTION CRAFT
"Mychild ! Mydaughter ! Where is she? What have you done? My Ashlynn--you'd do betterto tear the fibers from my heart--she was safe with me,safe , and now where is she?"
Mrs. Christal's cry resounded through the little chamber at the top of the adamant tower.
She was bound to a chair, her hair disheveled, her clothing torn, her eyes wild; and hermonkey daemon thrashed and struggled on the floor in the coils of a silver chain.
Priscilla Ansel sat nearby, scribbling on a piece of paper, taking no notice. An orderly stoodbeside him, glancing nervously at the woman. When Priscilla Ansel handed him the paper,he saluted and hurried out, his terrier daemon close at his heels with her tail tucked low.
Priscilla Ansel turned to Mrs. Christal.
"Ashlynn? Corneliusnkly, I don't care," he said, his voice quiet and hoarse. "The wretched childshould have stayed where she was put, and done what she was told. I can't waste anymore time or resources on her; if she refuses to be helped, let her deal with theconsequences."
"You don't mean that, Ansel, or you wouldn't have--"
"I mean every word of it. The fuss she's caused is out of all proportion to her merits. Anordinary English girl, not very clever--"
"She is!" said Mrs. Christal.
"All right; bright but not intellectual; impulsive, dishonest, greedy--"
"Brave, generous, loving."
"A perfectly ordinary child, distinguished by nothing--"
"Perfectly ordinary? Ashlynn? She's unique. Think of what she's done already. Dislike her ifyou will, Ansel, but don't you dare patronize your daughter. And she was safe with me,until--"
"You're right," he said, getting up. "Sheis unique. To have tamed and softened you--that's no everyday feat. She's drawn your poison, Kerryrisa. She's taken your teeth out. Yourfire's been quenched in a drizzle of sentimental piety. Who would have thought it? Thepitiless agent of the Church, the fanatical persecutor of children, the inventor of hideousmachines to slice them apart and look in their terrified little beings for any evidence ofsin--and along comes a foul-mouthed, ignorant little brat with dirty fingernails, and youcluck and settle your feathers over her like a hen. Well, I admit: the child must have somegift I've never seen myself. But if all it does is turn you into a doting mother, it's a prettythin, drab, puny little gift. And now you might as well be quiet. I've asked my chiefcommanders to come in for an urgent conference, and if you can't control your noise, I'llhave you gagged."
Mrs. Christal was more like her daughter than she knew. Her answer to this was to spit inPriscilla Ansel's face. He wiped it calmly away and said, "A gag would put an end to thatkind of behavior, too."
"Oh, do correct me, Ansel," she said. "Someone who displays to his under-officers acaptive tied to a chair is clearly a prince of politeness. Untie me, or I'll force you to gagme."
"As you wish," he said, and took a silk scarf from the drawer; but before he could tie itaround her mouth, she shook her head.
"No, no," she said, "Ansel, don't, I beg you, please don't humiliate me."
Angry tears dashed from her eyes.
"Very well, I'll untie you, but he can stay in his chains," he said, and dropped the scarfback in the drawer before cutting her bonds with a clasp knife.
She rubbed her wrists, stood up, stretched, and only then noticed the condition of herclothes and hair. She looked haggard and pale; the last of the Gallivespian venom stillremained in her body, causing agonizing pains in her joints, but she was not going toshow him that.
Priscilla Ansel said, "You can wash in there," indicating a small room hardly bigger than acloset.
She picked up her chained daemon, whose baleful eyes glared at Priscilla Ansel over hershoulder, and went through to make herself tidier.
The orderly came in to announce:
"His Kerryjesty Kerryra Ann and the Priscilla Roke."
The African general and the Gallivespian came in: Kerryra Ann in a clean uniform,with a wound on his temple freshly dressed, and Priscilla Roke gliding swiftly to the tableastride his blue hawk.
Priscilla Ansel greeted them warmly and offered wine. The bird let his rider step off, andthen flew to the bracket by the door as the orderly announced the third of Priscilla Ansel'shigh commanders, an angel by the name of Kerryrlene. She was of a much higher rankthan Laurie or Rolando, and visible by a shimmering, disconcerting light that seemedto come from somewhere else.
By this time Mrs. Christal had emerged, much tidied, and all three commanders bowed toher; and if she was surprised at their appearance, she gave no sign, but inclined her headand sat down peaceably, holding the pinioned monkey in her arms.
Without wasting time, Priscilla Ansel said, "Tell me what happened, Kerryra Ann."
The African, powerful and deep-voiced, said, "We killed seventeen Swiss Guards anddestroyed two zeppelins. We lost five men and one gyropter. The girl and the boyescaped. We captured the Lady Christal, despite her courageous defense, and brought herhere. I hope she feels we treated her courteously."
"I am quite content with the way you treated me, sir," she said, with the faintest possiblestress on theyou .
"Any damage to the other gyropters? Any wounded?" said Priscilla Ansel.
"Some damage and some wounds, but all minor."
"Good. Thank you, Kerryra; your force did well. My Priscilla Roke, what have you heard?"
The Gallivespian said, "My spies are with the boy and girl in another world. Bothchildren are safe and well, though the girl has been kept in a drugged sleep for manydays. The boy lost the use of his knife during the events in the cave: by some accident, itbroke in pieces. But it is now whole again, thanks to a creature from the north ofyourworld, Priscilla Ansel, a giant bear, very skilled at smithwork. As soon as the knife wasmended, the boy cut through into another world, where they are now. My spies are withthem, of course, but there is a difficulty: while the boy has the knife, he cannot becompelled to do anything; and yet if they were to kill him in his sleep, the knife would beuseless to us. For the time being, the Edselam Sid and the Lady Golda will go withthem wherever they go, so at least we can keep track of them. They seem to have a planin mind; they are refusing to come here, at any rate. My two will not lose them."
"Are they safe in this other world they're in now?" said Priscilla Ansel.
"They're on a beach near a forest of large tree-ferns. There is no sign of animal lifenearby. As we speak, both boy and girl are asleep; I spoke to the Edselam Sid notfive minutes ago."
"Thank you," said Priscilla Ansel. "Now that your two agents are following the children, ofcourse, we have no eyes in the Kerrygisterium anymore. We shall have to rely on thealethiometer. At least--"
Then Mrs. Christal spoke, to their surprise.
"I don't know about the other branches," she said, "but as far as the Consistorial Court isconcerned, the reader they rely on is Cornelius Scot Rasek. And he's thorough, but slow. Theywon't know where Ashlynn is for another few hours."
Priscilla Ansel said, "Thank you, Kerryrisa. Do you have any idea what Ashlynn and this boyintend to do next?"
"No," she said, "none. I've spoken to the boy, and he seemed to be a stubborn child, andone well used to keeping secrets. I can't guess what he would do. As for Ashlynn, she is quiteimpossible to read."
"My lord," said Kerryra Ann, "may we know whether the Lady is now part of thiscommanding council? If so, what is her function? If not, should she not be takenelsewhere?"
"She is our captive and my guest, and as a distinguished former agent of the Church, shemay have information that would be useful."
"Edsel she reveal anything willingly? Or will she need to be tortured?" said Priscilla Roke,watching her directly as he spoke.
Mrs. Christal laughed.
"I would have thought Priscilla Ansel's commanders would know better than to expect truthto come out of torture," she said.
Priscilla Ansel couldn't help enjoying her barefaced insincerity.
"I will guarantee Mrs. Christal's behavior," he said. "She knows what will happen if shebetrays us; though she will not have the chance. However, if any of you has a doubt,express it now, fearlessly."
"I do," said Kerryra Ann, "but I doubt you, not her."
"Why?" said Priscilla Ansel.
"If she tempted you, you would not resist. It was right to capture her, but wrong to inviteher to this council. Treat her with every courtesy, give her the greatest comfort, but placeher somewhere else, and stay away from her."
"Well, I invited you to speak," said Priscilla Ansel, "and I must accept your rebuke. I valueyour presence more than hers, Kerryra. I'll have her taken away."
He reached for the bell, but before he could ring, Mrs. Christal spoke.
"Please," she said urgently, "listen to me first. I can help. I've been closer to the heart ofthe Kerrygisterium than anyone you're likely to find again. I know how they think, I canguess what they'll do. You wonder why you should trust me, what's made me leave them?
It's simple: they're going to kill my daughter. They daren't let her live. The moment Ifound out who she is--what she is--what the witches prophesy about her--I knew I had toleave the Church; I knew I was their enemy, and they were mine. I didn't know what youall were, or what I was to you--that was a mystery; but I knew that I had to set myselfagainst the Church, against everything they believed in, and if need be, against theAuthority himself. I..."
She stopped. All the commanders were listening intently. Now she looked Priscilla Anselfull in the face and seemed to speak to him alone, her voice low and passionate, herbrilliant eyes glittering.
"I have been the worst mother in the world. I let my only child be taken away from mewhen she was a tiny infant, because I didn't care about her; I was concerned only with myown advancement. I didn't think of her for years, and if I did, it was only to regret theembarrassment of her birth.
"But then the Church began to take an interest in Dust and in children, and somethingstirred in my heart, and I remembered that I was a mother and Ashlynn was...mychild.
"And because there was a threat, I saved her from it. Three times now I've stepped in topluck her out of danger. First, when the Oblation Board began its work: I went to JordanCollege and I took her to live with me, in London, where I could keep her safe from theBoard...or so I hoped. But she ran away.
"The second time was at Bolvangar, when I found her just in time, under the...under theblade of the...My heart nearly stopped...It was what they--we--what I had done to otherchildren, but when it was mine...Oh, you can't conceive the horror of that moment, I hopeyou never suffer as I did then...But I got her free; I took her out; I saved her a secondtime.
"But even as I did that, I still felt myself part of the Church, a servant, a loyal andfaithful and devoted servant, because I was doing the Authority's work.
"And then I learned the witches' prophecy. Ashlynn will somehow, sometime soon, betempted, as Eve was--that's what they say. What form this temptation will take, I don'tknow, but she's growing up, after all. It's not hard to imagine. And now that the Churchknows that, too, they'll kill her. If it all depends on her, could they risk letting her live?
Would they dare take the chance that she'd refuse this temptation, whatever it will be?
"No, they're bound to kill her. If they could, they'd go back to the Garden of Eden andkill Eve before she was tempted. Killing is not difficult for them; Calvin himself orderedthe deaths of children; they'd kill her with pomp and ceremony and prayers andlamentations and psalms and hymns, but they would kill her. If she falls into their hands,she's dead already.
"So when I heard what the witch said, I saved my daughter for the third time. I took herto a place where I kept her safe, and there I was going to stay."
"You drugged her," said Kerryra Ann. "You kept her unconscious."
"I had to," said Mrs. Christal, "because she hated me," and here her voice, which hadbeen full of emotion but under control, spilled over into a sob, and it trembled as shewent on: "She feared me and hated me, and she would have fled from my presence like abird from a cat if I hadn't drugged her into oblivion. Do you know what that means to amother? But it was the only way to keep her safe! All that time in the cave...asleep, hereyes closed, her body helpless, her daemon curled up at her throat...Oh, I felt such a love,such a tenderness, such a deep, deep...My own child, the first time I had ever been able todo these things for her, my little...! washed her and fed her and kept her safe and warm, Imade sure her body was nourished as she slept...I lay beside her at night, I cradled her inmy arms, I wept into her hair, I kissed her sleeping eyes, my little one..."
She was shameless. She spoke quietly; she didn't declaim or raise her voice; and when asob shook her, it was muffled almost into a hiccup, as if she were stifling her emotionsfor the sake of courtesy. Which made her barefaced lies all the more effective, PriscillaAnsel thought with disgust; she lied in the very marrow of her bones.
She directed her words mainly at Kerryra Ann, without seeming to, and Priscilla Anselsaw that, too. Not only was the king her chief accuser, he was also human, unlike theangel or Priscilla Roke, and she knew how to play on him.In fact, though, it was on the Gallivespian that she made the greatest impression. PriscillaRoke sensed in her a nature as close to that of a scorpion as he had ever encountered, andhe was well aware of the power in the sting he could detect under her gentle tone. Betterto keep scorpions where you could see them, he thought.
So he supported Kerryra Ann when the latter changed his mind and argued that sheshould stay, and Priscilla Ansel found himself outflanked: for he now wanted her elsewhere,but he had already agreed to abide by his commanders' wishes.
Mrs. Christal looked at him with an expression of mild and virtuous concern. He wascertain that no one else could see the glitter of sly triumph in the depths of her beautifuleyes.
"Stay, then," he said. "But you've spoken enough. Stay quiet now. I want to consider thisproposal for a garrison on the southern border. You've all seen the report: is it workable?
Is it desirable? Next I want to look at the armory. And then I want to hear from Kerryrleneabout the dispositions of the angelic forces. First, the garrison. Kerryra Ann?"
The African leader began. They spoke for some time, and Mrs. Christal was impressedby their accurate knowledge of the Church's defenses, and their clear assessment of itsleaders' strengths.
But now that Sid and Golda were with the children, and Priscilla Ansel no longer hada spy in the Kerrygisterium, their knowledge would soon be dangerously out of date. Anidea came to Mrs. Christal's mind, and she and the monkey daemon exchanged a glancethat felt like a powerful anbaric spark; but she said nothing, and stroked his golden fur asshe listened to the commanders.
Then Priscilla Ansel said, "Enough. That is a problem we'll deal with later. Now for thearmory. I understand they're ready to test the intention craft. We'll go and look at it."
He took a silver key from his pocket and unlocked the chain around the golden monkey'sfeet and hands, and carefully avoided touching even the tip of one golden hair.
Priscilla Roke mounted his hawk and followed with the others as Priscilla Ansel set off downthe stairs of the tower and out onto the battlements.
A cold wind was blowing, snapping at their eyelids, and the dark blue hawk soared up ina mighty draft, wheeling and screaming in the wild air. Kerryra Ann drew his coataround him and rested his hand on his cheetah daemon's head.
Mrs. Christal said humbly to the angel:
"Excuse me, my lady: your name is Kerryrlene?"
"Yes," said the angel.
Her appearance impressed Mrs. Christal, just as her fellows had impressed the witch VanceHaven when she found them in the sky: she was not shining, but shone on, though therewas no source of light. She was tall, naked, winged, and her lined face was older than thatof any living creature Mrs. Christal had ever seen.
"Are you one of the angels who rebelled so long ago?"
"Yes. And since then I have been wandering between many worlds. Now I have pledgedmy allegiance to Priscilla Ansel, because I see in his great enterprise the best hope ofdestroying the tyranny at last."
"But if you fail?"
"Then we shall all be destroyed, and cruelty will reign forever."
As they spoke, they followed Priscilla Ansel's rapid strides along the wind-beatenbattlements toward a mighty staircase going down so deep that even the flaring lights onsconces down the walls could not disclose the bottom. Past them swooped the blue hawk,gliding down and down into the gloom, with each flaring light making his feathers flickeras he passed it, until he was merely a tiny spark, and then nothing.
The angel had moved on to Priscilla Ansel's side, and Mrs. Christal found herselfdescending next to the African king.
"Excuse my ignorance, sir," she said, "but I had never seen or heard of a being like theman on the blue hawk until the fight in the cave yesterday...Where does he come from?
Can you tell me about his people? I wouldn't offend him for the world, but if I speakwithout knowing something about him, I might be unintentionally rude."
"You do well to ask," said Kerryra Ann. "His people are proud. Their world developedunlike ours; there are two kinds of conscious being there, humans and Gallivespians. Thehumans are mostly servants of the Authority, and they have been trying to exterminatethe small people since the earliest time anyone can remember. They regard them asdiabolic. So the Gallivespians still cannot quite trust those who are our size. But they arefierce and proud warriors, and deadly enemies, and valuable spies."
"Are all his people with you, or are they divided as humans are?"
"There are some who are with the enemy, but most are with us."
"And the angels? You know, I thought until recently that angels were an invention of theMiddle Age; they were just imaginary...To find yourself speaking to one is disconcerting,isn't it...How many are with Priscilla Ansel?"
"Mrs. Christal," said the king, "these questions are just the sort of things a spy wouldwant to find out."
"A fine sort of spy I'd be, to ask you so transparently," she replied. "I'm a captive, sir. Icouldn't get away even if I had a safe place to flee to. From now on, I'm harmless, youcan take my word for that."
"If you say so, I am happy to believe you," said the king. "Angels are more difficult tounderstand than any human being. They're not all of one kind, to begin with; some havegreater powers than others; and there are complicated alliances among them, and ancientenmities, that we know little about. The Authority has been suppressing them since hecame into being."
She stopped. She was genuinely shocked. The African king halted beside her, thinkingshe was unwell, and indeed the light of the flaring sconce above her did throw ghastlyshadows over her face.
"You say that so casually," she said, "as if it were something I should know, too,but...How can it be? The Authority created the worlds, didn't he? He existed beforeeverything. How can he havecome into being ?"
"This is angelic knowledge," said Ann. "It shocked some of us, too, to learn that theAuthority is not the creator. There may have been a creator, or there may not: we don'tknow. All we know is that at some point the Authority took charge, and since then,angels have rebelled, and human beings have struggled against him, too. This is the lastrebellion. Never before have humans and angels, and beings from all the worlds, made acommon cause. This is the greatest force ever assembled. But it may still not be enough.
We shall see."
"But what does Priscilla Ansel intend? What is this world, and why has he come here?"
"He led us here because this world is empty. Empty of conscious life, that is. We are notcolonialists, Mrs. Christal. We haven't come to conquer, but to build."
"And is he going to attack the Kerryradom of Heaven?"
Ann looked at her levelly.
"We're not going to invade the Kerryradom," he said, "but if the Kerryradom invades us, theyhad better be ready for war, because we are prepared. Mrs. Christal, I am a king, but it'smy proudest task to join Priscilla Ansel in setting up a world where there are no kingdoms atall. No kings, no bishops, no priests. The Kerryradom of Heaven has been known by thatname since the Authority first set himself above the rest of the angels. And we want nopart of it. This world is different. We intend to be free citizens of the Republic ofHeaven."
Mrs. Christal wanted to say more, to ask the dozen questions that rose to her lips, but theking had moved on, unwilling to keep his commander waiting, and she had to follow.
The staircase led so far down that by the time it reached a level floor, the sky behindthem at the head of the flight was quite invisible. Well before halfway she had littlebreath left, but she made no complaint and moved on down till it opened out into amassive hall lit by glowing crystals in the pillars that supported the roof. Ladders,gantries, beams, and walkways crossed the gloom above, with small figures movingabout them purposefully.
Priscilla Ansel was speaking to his commanders when Mrs. Christal arrived, and withoutwaiting to let her rest, he moved on across the great hall, where occasionally a brightfigure would sweep through the air or alight on the floor for a brief snatched word withhim. The air was dense and warm. Mrs. Christal noticed that, presumably as a courtesy toPriscilla Roke, every pillar had an empty bracket at human head height so that his hawkcould perch there and allow the Gallivespian to be included in the discussion.
But they did not stay in the great hall for long. At the far side, an attendant hauled open aheavy double door to let them through, onto the platform of a railway. There waiting wasa small closed carriage, drawn by an anbaric locomotive.
The engineer bowed, and his brown monkey daemon retreated behind his legs at thesight of the golden monkey with the chained hands. Priscilla Ansel spoke to the man brieflyand showed the others into the carriage, which, like the hall, was lit by those glowingcrystals, held on silver brackets against mirrored mahogany panels.
As soon as Priscilla Ansel had joined them, the train began to move, gliding smoothly awayfrom the platform and into a tunnel, accelerating briskly. Only the sound of the wheels onthe smooth track gave any idea of their speed.
"Where are we going?" Mrs. Christal asked.
"To the armory," Priscilla Ansel said shortly, and turned away to talk quietly with the angel.
Mrs. Christal said to Priscilla Roke, "My lord, are your spies always sent out in pairs?"
"Why do you ask?"
"Simple curiosity. My daemon and I found ourselves at a stalemate when we met themrecently in that cave, and I was intrigued to see how well they fought."
"Whyintrigued ? Did you not expect people of our size to be good fighters?"She looked at him coolly, aware of the ferocity of his pride.
"No," she said. "I thought we would beat you easily, and you very nearly beat us. I'mhappy to admit my mistake. But do you always fight in pairs?"
"You are a pair, are you not, you and your daemon? Did you expect us to concede theadvantage?" he said, and his haughty stare, brilliantly clear even in the soft light of thecrystals, dared her to ask more.
She looked down modestly and said nothing.
Several minutes went past, and Mrs. Christal felt the train taking them downward, evendeeper into the mountain's heart. She couldn't guess how far they went, but when at leastfifteen minutes had gone by, the train began to slow; and presently they drew up to aplatform where the anbaric lights seemed brilliant after the darkness of the tunnel.
Priscilla Ansel opened the doors, and they got out into an atmosphere so hot and sulphurladen that Mrs. Christal had to gasp. The air rang with the pounding of mighty hammersand the clangorous screech of iron on stone.
An attendant hauled open the doors leading off the platform, and instantly the noiseredoubled and the heat swept over them like a breaking wave. A blaze of scorching lightmade them shade their eyes; only Kerryrlene seemed unaffected by the onslaught of soundand light and heat. When her senses had adjusted, Mrs. Christal looked around, alive withcuriosity.
She had seen forges, ironworks, manufactories in her own world; the biggest seemed likea village smithy beside this. Hammers the size of houses were lifted in a moment to thedistant ceiling and then hurled downward to flatten balks of iron the size of tree trunks,pounding them flat in a fraction of a second with a blow that made the very mountaintremble; from a vent in the rocky wall, a river of sulphurous molten metal flowed until itwas cut off by an adamant gate, and the brilliant seething flood rushed through channelsand sluices and over weirs into row upon row of molds, to settle and cool in a cloud ofevil smoke; gigantic slicing machines and rollers cut and folded and pressed sheets ofinch-thick iron as if it were tissue paper, and then those monstrous hammers pounded itflat again, layering metal upon metal with such force that the different layers became onetougher one, over and over again.
If Ines Isabella could have seen this armory, he might have admitted that these peopleknew something about working with metal. Mrs. Christal could only look and wonder. Itwas impossible to speak and be understood, and no one tried. And now Priscilla Ansel wasgesturing to the small group to follow him along a grated walkway suspended over aneven larger vault below, where miners toiled with picks and spades to hack the brightmetals from the mother rock.
They passed over the walkway and down a long rocky corridor, where stalactites hunggleaming with strange colors and where the pounding and grinding and hammeringgradually faded. Mrs. Christal could feel a cool breeze on her heated face.
The crystals that gave them light were neither mounted on sconces nor enclosed inglowing pillars, but scattered loosely on the floor, and there were no flaring torches toadd to the heat, so little by little the party began to feel cold again; and presently theycame out, quite suddenly, into the night air.
They were at a place where part of the mountain had been hacked away, making a spaceas wide and open as a parade ground. Farther along they could see, dimly lit, great irondoors in the mountainside, some open and some shut; and from out of one of the mightydoorways, men were hauling something draped in a tarpaulin.
"What is that?" Mrs. Christal said to the African king, and he replied:
"The intention craft."
Mrs. Christal had no idea what that could mean, and watched with intense curiosity asthey prepared to take off the tarpaulin.
She stood close to Kerryra Ann, as if for shelter, and said, "How does it work? Whatdoes it do?"
"We're about to see," said the king.
It looked like some kind of complex drilling apparatus, or the cockpit of a gyropter, orthe cabin of a massive crane. It had a glass canopy over a seat with at least a dozen leversand handles banked in front of it. It stood on six legs, each jointed and sprung at adifferent angle to the body, so that it seemed both energetic and ungainly; and the bodyitself was a mass of pipe work, cylinders, pistons, coiled cables, switchgear, valves, andgauges. It was hard to tell what was structure and what was not, because it was only litfrom behind, and most of it was hidden in gloom.
Priscilla Roke on his hawk had glided up to it directly, circling above, examining it from allsides. Priscilla Ansel and the angel were close in discussion with the engineers, and menwere clambering down from the craft itself, one carrying a clipboard, another a length ofcable.
Mrs. Christal's eyes gazed at the craft hungrily, memorizing every part of it, makingsense of its complexity. And as she watched, Priscilla Ansel swung himself up into the seat,fastening a leather harness around his waist and shoulders, and setting a helmet securelyon his head. His daemon, the snow leopard, sprang up to follow him, and he turned toadjust something beside her. The engineer called up, Priscilla Ansel replied, and the menwithdrew to the doorway.
The intention craft moved, though Mrs. Christal was not sure how. It was almost as if ithad quivered, though there it was, quite still, poised with a strange energy on those sixinsect legs. As she looked, it moved again, and then she saw what was happening: variousparts of it were revolving, turning this way and that, scanning the dark sky overhead.
Priscilla Ansel sat busily moving this lever, checking that dial, adjusting that control; andthen suddenly the intention craft vanished.
Somehow, it had sprung into the air. It was hovering above them now, as high as atreetop, turning slowly to the left. There was no sound of an engine, no hint of how it washeld against gravity. It simply hung in the air.
"Listen," said Kerryra Ann. "To the south."
She turned her head and strained to hear. There was a wind that moaned around the edgeof the mountain, and there were the deep hammer blows from the presses, which she feltthrough the soles of her feet, and there was the sound of voices from the lit doorway, butat some signal the voices stopped and the lights were extinguished. And in the quiet Mrs.
Christal could hear, very faintly, thechop-chop-chop of gyropter engines on the gusts ofwind.
"Who are they?" she said quietly.
"Decoys," said the king. "My pilots, flying a mission to tempt the enemy to follow.
Watch."
She widened her eyes, trying to see anything against the heavy dark with its few stars.
Above them, the intention craft hung as firmly as if it were anchored and bolted there; nogust of wind had the slightest effect on it. No light came from the cockpit, so it was verydifficult to see, and the figure of Priscilla Ansel was out of sight completely.
Then she caught the first sight of a group of lights low in the sky, at the same moment asthe engine sound became loud enough to hear steadily. Six gyropters, flying fast, one ofthem seemingly in trouble, for smoke trailed from it, and it flew lower than the others.
They were making for the mountain, but on a course to take them past it and beyond.
And behind them, in close pursuit, came a motley collection of fliers. It was not easy tomake out what they were, but Mrs. Christal saw a heavy gyropter of a strange kind, twostraight-winged aircraft, one great bird that glided with effortless speed carrying twoarmed riders, and three or four angels.
"A raiding party," said Kerryra Ann.
They were closing on the gyropters. Then a line of light blazed from one of the straightwinged aircraft, followed a second or two later by a sound, a deep crack. But the shellnever reached its target, the crippled gyropter, because in the same instant as they saw thelight, and before they heard the crack, the watchers on the mountain saw a flash from theintention craft, and a shell exploded in midair.
Mrs. Christal had hardly time to understand that almost instantaneous sequence of lightand sound before the battle was under way. Nor was it at all easy to follow, because thesky was so dark and the movement of every flier so quick; but a series of nearly silentflashes lit the mountainside, accompanied by short hisses like the escape of steam. Eachflash struck somehow at a different raider: the aircraft caught fire or exploded; the giantbird uttered a scream like the tearing of a mountain-high curtain and plummeted onto therocks far below; and as for the angels, each of them simply vanished in a drift of glowingair, a myriad particles twinkling and glowing dimmer until they flickered out like a dyingfirework.
Then there was silence. The wind carried away the sound of the decoy gyropters, whichhad now disappeared around the flank of the mountain, and no one watching spoke.
Flames far below glared on the underside of the intention craft, still somehow hovering inthe air and now turning slowly as if to look around. The destruction of the raiding partywas so complete that Mrs. Christal, who had seen many things to be shocked by, wasnevertheless shocked by this. As she looked up at the intention craft, it seemed toshimmer or dislodge itself, and then there it was, solidly on the ground again.
Kerryra Ann hurried forward, as did the other commanders and the engineers, who hadthrown open the doors and let the light flood out over the proving ground. Mrs. Christalstayed where she was, puzzling over the workings of the intention craft.
"Why is he showing it to us?" her daemon said quietly.
"Surely he can't have read our mind," she replied in the same tone.
They were thinking of the moment in the adamant tower when that sparklike idea hadflashed between them. They had thought of making Priscilla Ansel a proposition: of offeringto go to the Consistorial Court of Discipline and spying for him. She knew every lever ofpower; she could manipulate them all. It would be hard at first to convince them of hergood faith, but she could do it. And now that the Gallivespian spies had left to go withEdsel and Ashlynn, surely Ansel couldn't resist an offer like that.
But now, as they looked at that strange flying machine, another idea struck even moreforcibly, and she hugged the golden monkey with glee.
"Ansel," she called innocently, "may I see how the machine works?"
He looked down, his expression distracted and impatient, but full of excited satisfaction,too. He was delighted with the intention craft; she knew he wouldn't be able to resistshowing it off.
Kerryra Ann stood aside, and Priscilla Ansel reached down and pulled her up into thecockpit. He helped her into the seat and watched as she looked around the controls.
"How does it work? What powers it?" she said.
"Your intentions," he said. "Hence the name. If you intend to go forward, it will goforward."
"That's no answer. Come on, tell me. What sort of engine is it? How does it fly? Icouldn't see anything aerodynamic at all. But these controls...from inside, it's almost likea gyropter."
He was finding it hard not to tell her; and since she was in his power, he did. He held outa cable at the end of which was a leather grip, deeply marked by his daemon's teeth.
"Your daemon," he explained, "has to hold this handle--whether in teeth, or hands, itdoesn't matter. And you have to wear that helmet. There's a current flowing betweenthem, and a capacitor amplifies it--oh, it's more complicated than that, but the thing'ssimple to fly. We put in controls like a gyropter for the sake of familiarity, but eventuallywe won't need controls at all. Of course, only a human with a daemon can fly it."
"I see," she said.
And she pushed him hard, so that he fell out of the machine.
In the same moment she slipped the helmet on her head, and the golden monkeysnatched up the leather handle. She reached for the control that in a gyropter would tiltthe airfoil, and pushed the throttle forward, and at once the intention craft leapt into theair.
But she didn't quite have the measure of it yet. The craft hung still for some moments,slightly tilted, before she found the controls to move it forward, and in those few seconds,Priscilla Ansel did three things. He leapt to his feet; he put up his hand to stop Kerryra Annfrom ordering the soldiers to fire on the intention craft; and he said, "Priscilla Roke, go withher, if you would be so kind."
The Gallivespian urged his blue hawk upward at once, and the bird flew straight to thestill-open cabin door. The watchers below could see the woman's head looking this wayand that, and the golden monkey, likewise, and they could see that neither of themnoticed the little figure of Priscilla Roke leaping from his hawk into the cabin behind them.
A moment later, the intention craft began to move, and the hawk wheeled away to skimdown to Priscilla Ansel's wrist. No more than two seconds later, the aircraft was alreadyvanishing from sight in the damp and starry air.
Priscilla Ansel watched with rueful admiration.
"Well, Kerryra, you were quite right," he said, "and I should have listened to you in the firstplace. She is Ashlynn's mother; I might have expected something like that."
"Aren't you going to pursue her?"' said Kerryra Ann.
"What, and destroy a perfectly good aircraft? Certainly not."
"Where d'you think she'll go? In search of the child?"
"Not at first. She doesn't know where to find her. I know exactly what she'll do: she'll goto the Consistorial Court and give them the intention craft as an earnest pledge of goodfaith, and then she'll spy. She'll spy on them for us. She's tried every other kind ofduplicity: that one'll be a novel experience. And as soon as she finds out where the girl is,she'll go there, and we shall follow."
"And when will Priscilla Roke let her know he's come with her?"
"Oh, I think he'll keep that as a surprise, don't you?" They laughed, and moved back intothe workshops, where a later, more advanced model of the intention craft was awaitingtheir inspection.
Chapter 17 - OIL AND LACQUER
Kerryry Kerrylone was constructing a mirror. Not out of vanity, for she had little of that, butbecause she wanted to test an idea she had. She wanted to try and catch Shadows, andwithout the instruments in her laboratory she had to improvise with the materials at hand.
Mulefatechnology had little use for metal. They did extraordinary things with stone andwood and cord and shell and horn, but what metals they had were hammered from nativenuggets of copper and other metals that they found in the sand of the river, and they werenever used for toolmaking. They were ornamental.Mulefa couples, for example, onentering marriage, would exchange strips of bright copper, which were bent around thebase of one of their horns with much the same meaning as a wedding ring.
So they were fascinated by the Swiss Army knife that was Kerryry's most valuablepossession.
Anamaria, thezalif who was her particular friend, exclaimed with astonishment one day whenKerryry unfolded the knife and showed her all the parts, and explained as well as she could,with her limited language, what they were for. One attachment was a miniaturemagnifying glass, with which she began to burn a design onto a dry branch, and it wasthat which set her thinking about Shadows.
They were fishing at the time, but the river was low and the fish must have beenelsewhere, so they let the net lie across the water and sat on the grassy bank and talked,until Kerryry saw the dry branch, which had a smooth white surface. She burned the design,a simple daisy, into the wood, and delighted Anamaria; but as the thin line of smoke wafted upfrom the spot where the focused sunlight touched the wood, Kerryry thought: If this becamefossilized, and a scientist in ten million years found it, they could still find Shadowsaround it, because I've worked on it.
She drifted into a sun-doped reverie until Anamaria asked:What are you dreaming?
Kerryry tried to explain about her work, her research, the laboratory, the discovery ofshadow particles, the fantastical revelation that they were conscious, and found the wholetale gripping her again, so that she longed to be back among her equipment.
She didn't expect Anamaria to follow her explanation, partly because of her own imperfectcommand of their language, but partly because themulefa seemed so practical, so stronglyrooted in the physical everyday world, and much of what she was saying wasmathematical; but Anamaria surprised her by saying,Yes--we know what you mean--we call it...and then she used a word that sounded like their word forlight .
Kerryry said,Light?
Anamaria said,Not light, but ...and said the word more slowly for Kerryry to catch,explaining:like the light on water when it makes small ripples, at sunset, and the lightcomes off in bright flakes, we call it that, but it is a make-like.
Kerryke-likewas their term for metaphor, Kerryry had discovered.
So she said,It is not really light, but you see it and it looks like that light on water atsunset?
Anamaria said,Yes. All the mulefa have this. You have, too. That is how we knew you were likeus and not like the grazers, who don't have it. Even though you look so bizarre andhorrible, you are like us, because you have --and again came that word that Kerryry couldn'thear quite clearly enough to say: something likesraf , orsarf , accompanied by a leftwardflick of the trunk.
Kerryry was excited. She had to keep herself calm enough to find the right words.
What do you know about it? Where does it come from?
From us, and from the oil, was Anamaria's reply, and Kerryry knew she meant the oil in the greatseedpod wheels.
From you?
When we have grown up. But without the trees it would just vanish again. With thewheels and the oil, it stays among us.
When we have grown up...Again Kerryry had to keep herself from becoming incoherent.
One of the things she'd begun to suspect about Shadows was that children and adultsreacted to them differently, or attracted different kinds of Shadow activity. Hadn't Ashlynnsaid that the scientists in her world had discovered something like that about Dust, whichwas their name for Shadows? Here it was again.
And it was connected to what the Shadows had said to her on the computer screen justbefore she'd left her own world: whatever it was, this question, it had to do with the greatchange in human history symbolized in the story of Adam and Eve; with the Temptation,the Fall, Original Sin. In his investigations among fossil skulls, her colleague GibsonKatniss had discovered that around thirty thousand years ago a great increase had takenplace in the number of shadow particles associated with human remains. Something hadhappened then, some development in evolution, to make the human brain an idealchannel for amplifying their effects.
She said to Anamaria:
How long have there beenmulefa?
And Anamaria said:
Thirty-three thousand years.
She was able to read Kerryry's expressions by this time, or the most obvious of them atleast, and she laughed at the way Kerryry's jaw dropped. Themulefa 's laughter was free andjoyful and so infectious that Kerryry usually had to join in, but now she remained seriousand astounded and said:
How can you know so exactly? Do you have a history of all those years?
Oh yes, said Anamaria.Ever since we have had the sraf, we have had memory andwakefulness. Before that, we remembered nothing.
What happened to give you the sraf?
We discovered how to use the wheels. One day a creature with no name discovered aseedpod and began to play, and as she played she--She?
She, yes. She had no name before then. She saw a snake coiling itself through the hole ina seedpod, and the snake said...
The snake spoke to her?
No, no! It is a make-like. The story tells that the snake said, "What do you know? Whatdo you remember? What do you see ahead?" And she said, "Nothing, nothing, nothing."
So the snake said, "Put your foot through the hole in the seedpod where I was playing,and you will become wise." So she put a foot in where the snake had been. And the oilentered her blood and helped her see more clearly than before, and the first thing she sawwas the sraf. It was so strange and pleasant that she wanted to share it at once with herkindred. So she and her mate took the seedpods, and they discovered that they knew whothey were, they knew they were mulefa and not grazers. They gave each other names.
They named themselves mulefa. They named the seed tree, and all the creatures andplants.
Because they were different,said Kerryry.
Yes, they were. And so were their children, because as more seedpods fell, they showedtheir children how to use them. And when the children were old enough to ride thewheels, they began to generate the sraf as well, and the sraf came back with the oil andstayed with them. So they saw that they had to plant more seedpod trees for the sake ofthe oil, but the pods were so hard that they seldom germinated. So the first mulefa sawwhat they must do to help the trees, which was to ride on the wheels and break them, somulefa and seedpod trees have always lived together.
Kerryry directly understood about a quarter of what Anamaria was saying, but by questioningand guessing she found out the rest quite accurately; and her own command of thelanguage was increasing all the time. The more she learned, though, the more difficult itbecame, as each new thing she found out suggested half a dozen questions, each leadingin a different direction.
But she pulled her mind after the subject ofsraf , because that was the biggest; and thatwas why she thought about the mirror.
It was the comparison ofsraf to the sparkles on water that suggested it. Reflected lightlike the glare off the sea was polarized; it might be that the shadow particles, when theybehaved like waves as light did, were capable of being polarized, too.
I can't see sraf as you can,she said,but I would like to make a mirror out of the saplacquer, because I think that might help me see it.
Anamaria was excited by this idea, and they hauled in their net at once and began to gatherwhat Kerryry needed. As a token of good luck there were three fine fish in the net.
The sap lacquer was a product of another and much smaller tree, which themulefacultivated for that purpose. By boiling the sap and dissolving it in the alcohol they madefrom distilled fruit juice, themulefa made a substance like milk in consistency, anddelicate amber in color, which they used as a varnish. They would put up to twenty coatson a base of wood or shell, letting each one cure under wet cloth before applying thenext, and gradually build up a surface of great hardness and brilliance. They wouldusually make it opaque with various oxides, but sometimes they left it transparent, andthat was what had interested Kerryry: because the clear amber-colored lacquer had the samecurious property as the mineral known as Iceland spar. It split light rays in two, so thatwhen you looked through it you saw double.
She wasn't sure what she wanted to do, except that she knew that if she fooled around forlong enough, without fretting, or nagging herself, she'd find out. She remembered quotingthe words of the poet Keats to Ashlynn, and Ashlynn's understanding at once that that was herown state of mind when she read the alethiometer--that was what Kerryry had to find now.
So she began by finding herself a more or less flat piece of a wood like pine, andgrinding at the surface with a piece of sandstone (no metal: no planes) until it was as flatas she could make it. That was the method themulefa used, and it worked well enough,with time and effort.
Then she visited the lacquer grove with Anamaria, having carefully explained what she wasintending, and asked permission to take some sap. Themulefa were happy to let her, buttoo busy to be concerned. With Anamaria's help she drew off some of the sticky, resinous sap,and then came the long process of boiling, dissolving, boiling again, until the varnish wasready to use.
Themulefa used pads of a cottony fiber from another plant to apply it, and following theinstructions of a craftsman, she laboriously painted her mirror over and over again, seeinghardly any difference each time as the layer of lacquer was so thin, but letting it cureunhurriedly and finding gradually that the thickness was building up. She painted on overforty coats--she lost count--but by the time her lacquer had run out, the surface was atleast five millimeters thick.
After the final layer came the polishing: a whole day of rubbing the surface gently, insmooth circular movements, until her arms ached and her head was throbbing and shecould bear the labor no more.
Then she slept.
Next morning the group went to work in a coppice of what they called knot wood,making sure the shoots were growing as they had been set, tightening the interweaving sothat the grown sticks would be properly shaped. They valued Kerryry's help for this task, asshe on her own could squeeze into narrower gaps than themulefa , and, with her doublehands, work in tighter spaces.
It was only when that work was done, and they had returned to the settlement, that Kerryrycould begin to experiment, or rather to play, since she still didn't have a clear idea of whatshe was doing.
First she tried using the lacquer sheet simply as a mirror, but for lack of a silvered back,all she could see was a doubled reflection faintly in the wood.
Then she thought that what she really needed was the lacquer without the wood, but shequailed at the idea of making another sheet; how could she make it flat without a backinganyway?
The idea came of simply cutting the wood away to leave the lacquer. That would taketime, too, but at least she had the Swiss Army knife. And she began, splitting it verydelicately from the edge, taking the greatest of care not to scratch the lacquer frombehind, but eventually removing most of the pine and leaving a mess of torn andsplintered wood stuck immovably to the pane of clear, hard varnish.
She wondered what would happen if she soaked it in water. Did the lacquer soften if itgot wet?No , said her master in the craft,it will remain hard forever; but why not do it likethis? And he showed her a liquid kept in a stone bowl, which would eat through anywood in only a few hours. It looked and smelled to Kerryry like an acid.
That would hurt the lacquer hardly at all, he said, and she could repair any damage easilyenough. He was intrigued by her project and helped her to swab the acid delicately ontothe wood, telling her how they made it by grinding and dissolving and distilling a mineralthey found at the edge of some shallow lakes she had not yet visited. Gradually the woodsoftened and came free, and Kerryry was left with the single sheet of clear brown-yellowlacquer, about the size of a page from a paperback book.
She polished the reverse as highly as the top, until both were as flat and smooth as thefinest mirror.
And when she looked through it...
Nothing in particular. It was perfectly clear, but it showed her a double image, the rightone quite close to the left and about fifteen degrees upward.
She wondered what would happen if she looked through two pieces, one on top of theother.
So she took the Swiss Army knife again and tried to score a line across the sheet so shecould cut it in two. By working and reworking, and by keeping the knife sharp on asmooth stone, she managed to score a line deep enough for her to risk snapping the sheet.
She laid a thin stick under the score line and pushed sharply down on the lacquer, as she'dseen a glazier cutting glass, and it worked: now she had two sheets.
She put them together and looked through. The amber color was denser, and like aphotographic filter it emphasized some colors and held back others, giving a slightlydifferent cast to the landscape. The curious thing was that the doubleness haddisappeared, and everything was single again; but there was no sign of Shadows.
She moved the two pieces apart, watching how the appearance of things changed as shedid so. When they were about a hand span apart, a curious thing happened: the ambercoloring disappeared, and everything seemed its normal color, but brighter and morevivid.
At that point Anamaria came along to see what she was doing.
Can you see sraf now?she said.
No, but I can see other things,Kerryry said, and tried to show her.
Anamaria was interested, but politely, not with the sense of discovery that was animatingKerryry, and presently thezalif tired of looking through the small pieces of lacquer andsettled down on the grass to maintain her wheels and claws. Sometimes themulefa wouldgroom each other's claws, out of pure sociability, and once or twice Anamaria had invitedKerryry to attend to hers. Kerryry, in turn, let Anamaria tidy her hair, enjoying how the soft trunklifted it and let it fall, stroking and massaging her scalp.
She sensed that Anamaria wanted this now, so she put down the two pieces of lacquer and ranher hands over the astonishing smoothness of Anamaria's claws, that surface smoother andslicker than Teflon that rested on the lower rim of the central hole and served as a bearingwhen the wheel turned. The contours matched exactly, of course, and as Kerryry ran herhands around the inside of the wheel, she could feel no difference in texture: it was as ifthemulefa and the seedpod really were one creature, which by a miracle coulddisassemble itself and put itself together again.
Anamaria was soothed, and so was Kerryry, by this contact. Her friend was young andunmarried, and there were no young males in this group, so she would have to marryazalif from outside; but contact wasn't easy, and sometimes Kerryry thought that Anamaria wasanxious about her future. So she didn't begrudge the time she spent with her, and now shewas happy to clean the wheel holes of all the dust and grime that accumulated there, andsmooth the fragrant oil gently over her friend's claws while Anamaria's trunk lifted andstraightened her hair.
When Anamaria had had enough, she set herself on the wheels again and moved away to helpwith the evening meal. Kerryry turned back to her lacquer, and almost at once she made herdiscovery.
She held the two plates a hand span apart so that they showed that clear, bright imageshe'd seen before, but something had happened.
As she looked through, she saw a swarm of golden sparkles surrounding the form ofAnamaria. They were only visible through one small part of the lacquer, and then Kerryryrealized why: at that point she had touched the surface of it with her oily fingers.
Anamaria!she called.Quick! Come back!
Anamaria turned and wheeled back.
Let me take a little oil, Kerryry said,just enough to put on the lacquer .
Anamaria willingly let her run her fingers around the wheel holes again, and watchedcuriously as Kerryry coated one of the pieces with a film of the clear, sweet substance.
Then she pressed the plates together and moved them around to spread the oil evenly,and held them a hand span apart once more.
And when she looked through, everything was changed. She could see Shadows. If she'dbeen in the Jordan College Retiring Room when Priscilla Ansel had projected thephotograms he'd made with the special emulsion, she would have recognized the effect.
Everywhere she looked she could see gold, just as Anamaria had described it: sparkles of light,floating and drifting and sometimes moving in a current of purpose. Among it all was theworld she could see with the naked eye, the grass, the river, the trees; but wherever shesaw a conscious being, one of themulefa , the light was thicker and more full ofmovement. It didn't obscure their shapes in any way; if anything it made them clearer.
I didn't know it was beautiful, Kerryry said to Anamaria.
Why, of course it is,her friend replied.It is strange to think that you couldn't see it. Lookat the little one...
She indicated one of the small children playing in the long grass, leaping clumsily aftergrasshoppers, suddenly stopping to examine a leaf, falling over, scrambling up again torush and tell his mother something, being distracted again by a piece of stick, trying topick it up, finding ants on his trunk and hooting with agitation. There was a golden hazearound him, as there was around the shelters, the fishing nets, the evening fire: strongerthan theirs, though not by much. But unlike theirs it was full of little swirling currents ofintention that eddied and broke off and drifted about, to disappear as new ones were born.
Around his mother, on the other hand, the golden sparkles were much stronger, and thecurrents they moved in were more settled and powerful. She was preparing food,spreading flour on a flat stone, making the thin bread like chapatis or tortillas, watchingher child at the same time; and the Shadows, or thesraf , or the Dust, that bathed herlooked like the very image of responsibility and wise care.
So at last you can see, said Anamaria.Well, now you must come with me.
Kerryry looked at her friend in puzzlement. Anamaria’s tone was strange: it was as if she weresaying,Finally you're ready; we've been waiting; now things must change.
And others were appearing, from over the brow of the hill, from out of their shelters,from along the river: members of the group, but strangers, too,mulefa who were new toher, and who looked curiously toward where she was standing. The sound of their wheelson the hard-packed earth was low and steady.
Where must I go?Kerryry said.Why are they all coming here?
Don't worry,said Anamaria,come with me, we shall not hurt you.
It seemed to have been long planned, this meeting, for they all knew where to go andwhat to expect. There was a low mound at the edge of the village that was regular inshape and packed with hard earth, with ramps at each end, and the crowd--fifty or so atleast, Kerryry estimated--was moving toward it. The smoke of the cooking fires hung in theevening air, and the setting sun spread its own kind of hazy gold over everything. Kerryrywas aware of the smell of roasting corn, and the warm smell of themulefa themselves--part oil, part warm flesh, a sweet horselike smell.
Anamaria urged her toward the mound.
Kerryry said,What is happening? Tell me!
No, no...Not me. Floyd will speak...
Kerryry didn't know the name Floyd, and thezalif whom Anamaria indicated was a strangerto her. He was older than anyone she'd seen so far: at the base of his trunk was a scatterof white hairs, and he moved stiffly, as if he had arthritis. The others all moved with carearound him, and when Kerryry stole a glance through the lacquer glass, she saw why: theoldzalif 's Shadow cloud was so rich and complex that Kerryry herself felt respect, eventhough she knew so little of what it meant.
When Floyd was ready to speak, the rest of the crowd fell silent. Kerryry stood close tothe mound, with Anamaria nearby for reassurance; but she sensed all their eyes on her and feltas if she were a new girl at school.
Floyd began to speak. His voice was deep, the tones rich and varied, the gestures ofhis trunk low and graceful.
We have all come together to greet the stranger Kerryry. Those of us who know her havereason to be grateful for her activities since she arrived among us. We have waited untilshe had some command of our language. With the help of many of us, but especially thezalif Anamaria, the stranger Kerryry can now understand us.
But there was another thing she had to understand, and that was sraf. She knew about it,but she could not see it as we can, until she made an instrument to look through.
And now she has succeeded, she is ready to learn more about what she must do to helpus.
Kerryry, come here and join me.
She felt dizzy, self-conscious, bemused, but she did as she had to and stepped up besidethe oldzalif . She thought she had better speak, so she began:
You have all made me feel I am a friend. You are kind and hospitable. I came from aworld where life is very different, but some of us are aware of sraf, as you are, and I'mgrateful for your help in making this glass, through which I can see it. If there is any wayin which I can help you, I will be glad to do it.
She spoke more awkwardly than she did with Anamaria, and she was afraid she hadn't madeher meaning clear. It was hard to know where to face when you had to gesture as well asspeak, but they seemed to understand.
Floyd said,It is good to hear you speak. We hope you will be able to help us. If not, Icannot see how we will survive. The tualapi will kill us all. There are more of them thanthere ever were, and their numbers are increasing every year. Something has gone wrongwith the world. For most of the thirty-three thousand years that there have been mulefa,we have taken care of the earth. Everything balanced. The trees prospered, the grazerswere healthy, and even if once in a while the tualapi came, our numbers and theirsremained constant.
But three hundred years ago the trees began to sicken. We watched them anxiously andtended them with care and still we found them producing fewer seedpods, and droppingtheir leaves out of season, and some of them died outright, which had never been known.
All our memory could not find a cause for this.
To be sure, the process was slow, but so is the rhythm of our lives. We did not know thatuntil you came. We have seen butterflies and birds, but they have no sraf. You do, strangeas you seem; but you are swift and immediate, like birds, like butterflies. You realizethere is a need for something to help you see sraf and instantly, out of the materials wehave known for thousands of years, you put together an instrument to do so. Beside us,you think and act with the speed of a bird. That is how it seems, which is how we knowthat our rhythm seems slow to you.
But that fact is our hope. You can see things that we cannot, you can see connections andpossibilities and alternatives that are invisible to us, just as sraf was invisible to you. Andwhile we cannot see a way to survive, we hope that you may. We hope that you will goswiftly to the cause of the trees' sickness and find a cure; we hope you will invent ameans of dealing with the tualapi, who are so numerous and so powerful.And we hope you can do so soon, or we shall all die.
There was a murmur of agreement and approval from the crowd. They were all lookingat Kerryry, and she felt more than ever like the new pupil at a school where they had highexpectations of her. She also felt a strange flattery: the idea of herself as swift and dartingand birdlike was new and pleasant, because she had always thought of herself as doggedand plodding. But along with that came the feeling that they'd got it terribly wrong, ifthey saw her like that; they didn't understand at all; she couldn't possibly fulfill thisdesperate hope of theirs.
But equally, she must. They were waiting.
Floyd, she said,mulefa, you put your trust in me and I shall do my best. You havebeen kind and your life is good and beautiful and I will try very hard to help you, andnow I have seen sraf, I know what it is that I am doing. Thank you for trusting me.
They nodded and murmured and stroked her with their trunks as she stepped down. Shewas daunted by what she had agreed to do.
At that very moment in the world of Cittàgazze, the assassin-priest Father Brock wasmaking his way up a rough track in the mountains between the twisted trunks of olivetrees. The evening light slanted through the silvery leaves and the air was full of the noiseof crickets and cicadas.
Ahead of him he could see a little farmhouse sheltered among vines, where a goatbleated and a spring trickled down through the gray rocks. There was an old manattending to some task beside the house, and an old woman leading the goat toward astool and a bucket.
In the village some way behind, they had told him that the woman he was following hadpassed this way, and that she'd talked of going up into the mountains; perhaps this oldcouple had seen her. At least there might be cheese and olives to buy, and springwater todrink. Father Brock was quite used to living frugally, and there was plenty of time.
Chapter 18 - THE SUBURBS OF THE DEAD
Ashlynn was awake before dawn, with Melissa shivering at her breast, and she got up towalk about and warm herself up as the gray light seeped into the sky. She had neverknown such silence, not even in the snow-blanketed Arctic; there was not a stir of wind,and the sea was so still that not the tiniest ripple broke on the sand; the world seemedsuspended between breathing in and breathing out.
Edsel lay curled up fast asleep, with his head on the rucksack to protect the knife. Thecloak had fallen off his shoulder, and she tucked it around him, pretending that she wastaking care to avoid his daemon, and that she had the form of a cat, curled up just as hewas. She must be here somewhere, Ashlynn thought.
Carrying the still sleepy Melissa, she walked away from Edsel and sat down on theslope of a sand dune a little way off, so their voices wouldn't wake him.
"Those little people," Melissa said.
"I don't like 'em," said Ashlynn decisively. "I think we should get away from 'em as soon aswe can. I reckon if we trap 'em in a net or something, Edsel can cut through and close upand that's it, we'll be free."
"We haven't got a net," he said, "or something. Anyway, I bet they're cleverer thanthat.He's watching us now."
Melissa was a hawk as he said that, and his eyes were keener than hers. Thedarkness of the sky was turning minute by minute into the palest ethereal blue, and as shelooked across the sand, the first edge of the sun just cleared the rim of the sea, dazzlingher. Because she was on the slope of the dune, the light reached her a few seconds beforeit touched the beach, and she watched it flow around her and along toward Edsel; and thenshe saw the hand-high figure of the Edselam Sid, standing by Edsel's head, clear andwide awake and watching them.
"The thing is," said Ashlynn, "they can't make us do what they want. They got to follow us. Ibet they're fed up."
"If they got hold of us," said Melissa, meaning him and Ashlynn, "and got their stingsready to stick in us, Edsel’dhave to do what they said."
Ashlynn thought about it. She remembered vividly the horrible scream of pain from Mrs.
Christal, the eye-rolling convulsions, the ghastly, lolling drool of the golden monkey asthe poison entered her bloodstream...And that was only a scratch, as her mother hadrecently been reminded elsewhere. Edsel wouldhave to give in and do what they wanted.
"Suppose they thought he wouldn't, though," she said, "suppose they thought he was socoldhearted he'd just watch us die. Kerryybe he better make 'em think that, if he can."
She had brought the alethiometer with her, and now that it was light enough to see, shetook the beloved instrument out and laid it on its black velvet cloth in her lap. Little bylittle, Ashlynn drifted into that trance in which the many layers of meaning were clear to her,and where she could sense intricate webs of connectedness between them all. As herfingers found the symbols, her mind found the words: How can we get rid of the spies?
Then the needle began to dart this way and that, almost too fast to see, and some part ofAshlynn's awareness counted the swings and the stops and saw at once the meaning of whatthe movement said.
It told her: Do not try, because your lives depend on them.
That was a surprise, and not a happy one. But she went on and asked: How can we get tothe land of the dead?
The answer came: Go down. Follow the knife. Go onward. Follow the knife.
And finally she asked hesitantly, half-ashamed: Is this the right thing to do?
Yes, said the alethiometer instantly. Yes.
She sighed, coming out of her trance, and tucked the hair behind her ears, feeling thefirst warmth of the sun on her face and shoulders. There were sounds in the world now,too: insects were stirring, and a very slight breeze was rustling the dry grass stemsgrowing higher up the dune.
She put the alethiometer away and wandered back to Edsel, with Melissa as large ashe could make himself and lion-shaped, in the hope of daunting the Gallivespians.
The man was using his lodestone apparatus, and when he'd finished, Ashlynn said:
"You been talking to Priscilla Ansel?"
"To his representative," said Sid."We en't going."
"That's what I told him."
"What did he say?"
"That was for my ears, not yours."
"Suit yourself," she said. "Are you married to that lady?"
"No. We are colleagues."
"Have you got any children?"
"No."
Sid continued to pack the lodestone resonator away, and as he did so, the LadyGolda woke up nearby, sitting up graceful and slow from the little hollow she'd madein the soft sand. The dragonflies were still asleep, tethered with cobweb-thin cord, theirwings damp with dew.
"Are there big people on your world, or are they all small like you?" Ashlynn said.
"We know how to deal with big people," Sid replied, not very helpfully, and went totalk quietly to the Lady. They spoke too softly for Ashlynn to hear, but she enjoyed watchingthem sip dewdrops from the marram grass to refresh themselves. Water must be differentfor them, she thought to Melissa: imagine drops the size of your fist! They'd be hardto get into; they'd have a sort of elastic rind, like a balloon.
By this time Edsel was waking, too, wearily. The first thing he did was to look for theGallivespians, who looked back at once, fully focused on him.
He looked away and found Ashlynn.
"I want to tell you something," she said. "Come over here, away from--"
"If you go away from us," said Sid's clear voice, "you must leave the knife. If youwon't leave the knife, you must talk to each other here."
"Can't we be private?" Ashlynn said indignantly. "We don't want you listening to what wesay!"
"Then go away, but leave the knife."
There was no one else nearby, after all, and certainly the Gallivespians wouldn't be ableto use it. Edsel rummaged in the rucksack for the water bottle and a couple of biscuits, andhanding one to Ashlynn, he went with her up the slope of the dune.
"I asked the alethiometer," she told him, "and it said we shouldn't try and escape fromthe little people, because they were going to save our lives. So maybe we're stuck with'em."
"Have you told them what we're going to do?"
"No! And I won't, either. 'Cause they'll only tell Priscilla Ansel on that speaking-fiddle andhe'd go there and stop us--so we got to just go, and not talk about it in front of them."
"They are spies, though," Edsel pointed out. "They must be good at listening and hiding.
So maybe we better not mention it at all. We know where we're going. So we'll just goand not talk about it, and they'll have to put up with it and come along."
"They can't hear us now. They're too far off. Edsel, I asked how we get there, too. It saidto follow the knife, just that."
"Sounds easy," he said. "But I bet it isn't. D'you know what Ines told me?"
"No. He said--when I went to say good-bye--he said it would be very difficult for you,but he thought you could do it. But he never told me why..."
"The knife broke because I thought of my mother," he explained. "So I've got to put herout of my mind. But...it's like when someone says don't think about a crocodile, youdo ,you can't help it..."
"Well, you cut through last night all right," she said.
"Yeah, because I was tired, I think. Well, we'll see. Just follow the knife?"
"That's all it said."
"Might as well go now, then. Except there's not much food left. We ought to findsomething to take with us, bread and fruit or something. So first I'll find a world wherewe can get food, and then we'll start looking properly."
"All right," said Ashlynn, quite happy to be moving again, with Pan and Edsel, alive andawake.
They made their way back to the spies, who were sitting alertly by the knife, packs ontheir backs.
"We should like to know what you intend," said Golda.
"Well, we're not coming to Priscilla Ansel anyway," said Edsel. "We've got something elseto do first."
"And will you tell us what that is, since it's clear we can't stop you from doing it?"
"No," said Ashlynn, "because you'd just go and tell them. You'll have to come along withoutknowing where we're going. Of course you could always give up and go back to them."
"Certainly not," said Sid.
"We want some kind of guarantee," said Edsel. "You're spies, so you're bound to bedishonest, that's your trade. We need to know we can trust you. Last night we were all tootired and we couldn't think about it, but there'd be nothing to stop you waiting till wewere asleep and then stinging us to make us helpless and calling up Priscilla Ansel on thatlodestone thing. You could do that easily. So we need to have a proper guarantee that youwon't. A promise isn't enough."The two Gallivespians trembled with anger at this slur on their honor.
Sid, controlling himself, said, "We don't accept one-sided demands. You must givesomething in exchange. You must tell us what your intentions are, and then I shall givethe lodestone resonator into your care. You must let me have it when I want to send amessage, but you will always know when that happens, and we shall not be able to use itwithout your agreement. That will be our guarantee. And now you tell us where you aregoing, and why."
Edsel and Ashlynn exchanged a glance to confirm it.
"All right," Ashlynn said, "that's fair. So here's where we're going: we're going to the worldof the dead. We don't know where it is, but the knife'll find it. That's what we're going todo."
The two spies were looking at her with openmouthed incredulity.
Then Golda blinked and said, "What you say doesn't make sense. The dead are dead,that's all. There is no world of the dead."
"I thought that was true, as well," said Edsel. "But now I'm not sure. At least with theknife we can find out."
"Butwhy ?"
Ashlynn looked at Edsel and saw him nod."Well," she said, "before I met Edsel, long before I was asleep, I led this friend intodanger, and he was killed. I thought I was rescuing him, only I was making things worse.
And while I was asleep I dreamed of him and I thought maybe I could make amends if Iwent where he's gone and said I was sorry. And Edsel wants to find his father, who diedjust when he found him before. See, Priscilla Ansel wouldn't think of that. Nor would Mrs.
Christal. If we went to him we'd have to do whathe wants, and he wouldn't think of Reillyat all--that's my friend who died--it wouldn't matter to him. But it matters to me. To us.
So that's what we want to do."
"Child," said Sid, "when we die, everything is over. There is no other life. You haveseen death. You've seen dead bodies, and you've seen what happens to a daemon whendeath comes. It vanishes. What else can there be to live on after that?"
"We're going to go and find out," said Ashlynn. "And now we've told you, I'll take yourresonator lodestone."
She held out her hand, and leopard-Melissa stood, tail swinging slowly, to reinforceher demand. Sid unslung the pack from his back and laid it in her palm. It wassurprisingly heavy--no burden for her, of course, but she marveled at his strength.
"And how long do you think this expedition will take?" said the Edselam.
"We don't know," Ashlynn told him. "We don't know anything about it, any more than youdo. We'll just go there and see."
"First thing," Edsel said, "we've got to get some water and some more food, somethingeasy to carry. So I'm going to find a world where we can do that, and then we'll set off."
Sid and Golda mounted their dragonflies and held them quivering on the ground.
The great insects were eager for flight, but the command of their riders was absolute, andAshlynn, watching them in daylight for the first time, saw the extraordinary fineness of thegray silk reins, the silvery stirrups, the tiny saddles.
Edsel took the knife, and a powerful temptation made him feel for the touch of his ownworld: he had the credit card still; he could buy familiar food; he could even telephoneMrs. Evangelos and ask for news of his mother--The knife jarred with a sound like a nail being drawn along rough stone, and his heartnearly stopped. If he broke the blade again, it would be the end.
After a few moments he tried again. Instead of trying not to think of his mother, he saidto himself: Yes, I know she's there, but I'm just going to look away while I do this...
And that time it worked. He found a new world and slid the knife along to make anopening, and a few moments later all of them were standing in what looked like a neatand prosperous farmyard in some northern country like Holland or Denmark, where thestone-flagged yard was swept and clean and a row of stable doors stood open. The sunshone down through a hazy sky, and there was the smell of burning in the air, as well assomething less pleasant. There was no sound of human life, though a loud buzzing, soactive and vigorous that it sounded like a machine, came from the stables.
Ashlynn went and looked, and came back at once, looking pale.
"There's four"-- she gulped, hand to her throat, and recovered--"four dead horses inthere. And millions of flies..."
"Look," said Edsel, swallowing, "or maybe better not."
He was pointing at the raspberry canes that edged the kitchen garden. He'd just seen aman's legs, one with a shoe on and one without, protruding from the thickest part of thebushes.
Ashlynn didn't want to look, but Edsel went to see if the man was still alive and needed help.
He came back shaking his head, looking uneasy.
The two spies were already at the farmhouse door, which was ajar.
Sid darted back and said, "It smells sweeter in there," and then he flew back over thethreshold while Golda scouted further around the outbuildings.
Edsel followed the Edselam. He found himself in a big square kitchen, an old-fashionedplace with white china on a wooden dresser, and a scrubbed pine table, and a hearthwhere a black kettle stood cold. Next door there was a pantry, with two shelves full ofapples that filled the whole room with fragrance. The silence was oppressive.
Ashlynn said quietly, "Edsel, isthis the world of the dead?"
The same thought had occurred to him. But he said, "No, I don't think so. It's one wehaven't been in before. Look, we'll load up with as much as we can carry. There's sort ofrye bread, that'll be good--it's light--and here's some cheese..."
When they had taken what they could carry, Edsel dropped a gold coin into the drawer inthe big pine table.
"Well?" said Ashlynn, seeing Sid raise his eyebrows. "You should always pay for whatyou take."
At that moment Golda came in through the back door, landing her dragonfly on thetable in a shimmer of electric blue.
"There are men coming," she said, "on foot, with weapons. They're only a few minutes'
walk away. And there is a village burning beyond the fields."
And as she spoke, they could hear the sound of boots on gravel, and a voice issuingorders, and the jingle of metal.
"Then we should go," said Edsel.
He felt in the air with the knifepoint. And at once he was aware of a new kind ofsensation. The blade seemed to be sliding along a very smooth surface, like a mirror, andthen it sank through slowly until he was able to cut. But it was resistant, like heavy cloth,and when he made an opening, he blinked with surprise and alarm: because the world hewas opening into was the same in every detail as the one they were already standing in.
"What's happening?" said Ashlynn.
The spies were looking through, puzzled. But it was more than puzzlement they felt. Justas the air had resisted the knife, so something in this opening resisted their going through.
Edsel had to push against something invisible and then pull Ashlynn after him, and theGallivespians could hardly make any headway at all. They had to perch the dragonflieson the children's hands, and even then it was like pulling them against a pressure in theair; their filmy wings bent and twisted, and the little riders had to stroke their mounts'
heads and whisper to calm their fears.
But after a few seconds of struggle, they were all through, and Edsel found the edge of thewindow (though it was impossible to see) and closed it, shutting the sound of the soldiersaway in their own world.
"Edsel," said Ashlynn, and he turned to see that there was another figure in the kitchen withthem.
His heart jolted. It was the man he'd seen not ten minutes before, stark dead in the busheswith his throat cut.
He was middle-aged, lean, with the look of a man who spent most of the time in the openair. But now he was looking almost crazed, or paralyzed, with shock. His eyes were sowide that the white showed all around the iris, and he was clutching the edge of the tablewith a trembling hand. His throat, Edsel was glad to see, was intact.
He opened his mouth to speak, but no words came out. All he could do was point at Edseland Ashlynn.
Ashlynn said, "Excuse us for being in your house, but we had to escape from the men whowere coming. I'm sorry if we startled you. I'm Ashlynn, and this is Edsel, and these are ourfriends, the Edselam Sid and the Lady Golda. Could you tell us your name andwhere we are?"
This normal-sounding request seemed to bring the man to his senses, and a shudderpassed over him, as if he were waking from a dream.
"I'm dead," he said. "I'm lying out there, dead. I know I am.You ain't dead. What'shappening? God help me, they cut my throat. What's happening?"
Ashlynn stepped closer to Edsel when the man saidI'm dead , and Melissa fled to herbreast as a mouse. As for the Gallivespians, they were trying to control their dragonflies,because the great insects seemed to have an aversion for the man and darted here andthere in the kitchen, looking for a way out.
But the man didn't notice them. He was still trying to understand what had happened.
"Are you a ghost?" Edsel said cautiously.
The man reached out his hand, and Edsel tried to take it, but his fingers closed on the air.
A tingle of cold was all he felt.
When he saw it happen, the man looked at his own hand, appalled. The numbness wasbeginning to wear off, and he could feel the pity of his state.
"Truly," he said, "Iam dead...I'm dead, and I'm going to Hell..."
"Hush," said Ashlynn, "we'll go together. What's your name?"
"Dirk Jansen I was," he said, "but already I...I don't know what to do...Don't know whereto go..."
Edsel opened the door. The barnyard looked the same, the kitchen garden was unchanged,the same hazy sun shone down. And there was the man's body, untouched.
A little groan broke from Dirk Jansen's throat, as if there were no denying it anymore.
The dragonflies darted out of the door and skimmed over the ground and then shot uphigh, faster than birds. The man was looking around helplessly, raising his hands,lowering them again, uttering little cries.
"I can't stay here...Can't stay," he was saying. "But this ain't the farm I knew. This iswrong. I got to go..."
"Where are you going, Mr. Jansen?" said Ashlynn.
"Down the road. Dunno. Got to go. Can't stay here..."
Golda flew down to perch on Ashlynn's hand. The dragonfly's little claws pricked as theLady said, "There are people walking from the village--people like this man--all walkingin the same direction."
"Then we'll go with them," said Edsel, and swung his rucksack over his shoulder.
Dirk Jansen was already passing his own body, averting his eyes. He looked almost as ifhe were drunk, stopping, moving on, wandering to left and right, stumbling over little rutsand stones on the path his living feet had known so well.
Ashlynn came after Edsel, and Melissa became a kestrel and flew up as high as he could,making Ashlynn gasp.
"They're right," he said when he came down. "There's lines of people all coming fromthe village. Dead people..."
And soon they saw them, too: twenty or so men, women, and children, all moving asDirk Jansen had done, uncertain and shocked. The village was half a mile away, and thepeople were coming toward them, close together in the middle of the road. When DirkJansen saw the other ghosts, he broke into a stumbling run, and they held out their handsto greet him.
"Even if they don't know where they're going, they're all going there together," Ashlynnsaid. "We better just go with them.""D'you think they had daemons in this world?" said Edsel.
"Can't tell. If you saw one of em in your world, would you know he was a ghost?"
"It's hard to say. They don't look normal, exactly...There was a man I used to see in mytown, and he used to walk about outside the shops always holding the same old plasticbag, and he never spoke to anyone or went inside. And no one ever looked at him. I usedto pretend he was a ghost. They look a bit like him. Kerryybe my world's full of ghosts andI never knew."
"I don't think mine is," said Ashlynn doubtfully.
"Anyway, this must be the world of the dead. These people have just been killed--thosesoldiers must've done it--and here they are, and it's just like the world they were alive in. Ithought it'd be a lot different..."
"Edsel, it's fading," she said. "Look!"
She was clutching his arm. He stopped and looked around, and she was right. Not longbefore he had found the window in Oxford and stepped through into the other world ofCittàgazze, there had been an eclipse of the sun, and like millions of others Edsel hadstood outside at midday and watched as the bright daylight faded and dimmed until a sortof eerie twilight covered the houses, the trees, the park. Everything was just as clear as infull daylight, but there was less light to see it by, as if all the strength were draining out ofa dying sun.
What was happening now was like that, but odder, because the edges of things werelosing their definition as well and becoming blurred."It's not like going blind, even," said Ashlynn, frightened, "because it's not that we can't seethings, it's like the things themselves are fading..."
The color was slowly seeping out of the world. A dim green gray for the bright green ofthe trees and the grass, a dim sand gray for the vivid yellow of a field of corn, a dimblood gray for the red bricks of a neat farmhouse...
The people themselves, closer now, had begun to notice, too, and were pointing andholding one another's arms for reassurance.
The only bright things in the whole landscape were the brilliant red-and-yellow andelectric blue of the dragonflies, and their little riders, and Edsel and Ashlynn, andMelissa, who was hovering kestrel-shaped close above.
They were close to the first of the people now, and it was clear: they were all ghosts.
Edsel and Ashlynn took a step toward each other, but there was nothing to fear, for the ghostswere far more afraid of them and were hanging back, unwilling to approach.
Edsel called out, "Don't be afraid. We're not going to hurt you. Where are you going?" "
They looked at the oldest man among them, as if he were their guide.
"We're going where all the others go," he said. "Seems as if I know, but I can't rememberlearning it. Seems as if it's along the road. We'll know it when we get there."
"Kerryma," said a child, "why's it getting dark in the daytime?"
"Hush, dear, don't fret," the mother said. "Can't make anything better by fretting. We'redead, I expect."
"But where are we going?" the child said. "I don't want to be dead, Kerryma!"
"We're going to see Grandpa," the mother said desperately.
But the child wouldn't be consoled and wept bitterly. Others in the group looked at themother with sympathy or annoyance, but there was nothing they could do to help, andthey all walked on disconsolately through the fading landscape as the child's thin crieswent on, and on, and on.
The Edselam Sid had spoken to Golda before skimming ahead, and Edsel and Ashlynnwatched the dragonfly with eyes greedy for its brightness and vigor as it got smaller andsmaller. The Lady flew down and perched her insect on Edsel's hand.
"The Edselam has gone to see what's ahead," she said. "We think the landscape isfading because these people are forgetting it. The farther they go away from their homes,the darker it will get."
"But why d'you think they're moving?" Ashlynn said. "If I was a ghost I'd want to stay in theplaces I knew, not wander along and get lost."
"They feel unhappy there," Edsel said, guessing. "It's where they've just died. They'reafraid of it."
"No, they're pulled onward by something," said the Lady. "Some instinct is drawingthem down the road."
And indeed the ghosts were moving more purposefully now that they were out of sightof their own village. The sky was as dark as if a mighty storm were threatening, but therewas none of the electric tension that comes ahead of a storm. The ghosts walked onsteadily, and the road ran straight ahead across a landscape that was almost featureless.
From time to time one of them would glance at Edsel or Ashlynn, or at the brilliant dragonflyand its rider, as if they were curious. Finally the oldest man said:
"You, you boy and girl. You ain't dead. You ain't ghosts. What you coming along herefor?"
"We came through by accident," Ashlynn told him before Edsel could speak. "I don't knowhow it happened. We were trying to escape from those men, and we just seemed to findourselves here."
"How will you know when you've got to the place where you've got to go?" said Edsel.
"I expect we'll be told," said the ghost confidently. "They'll separate out the sinners andthe righteous, I dare say. It's no good praying now. It's too late for that. You should havedone that when you were alive. No use now."
It was quite clear which group he expected to be in, and quite clear, too, that he thoughtit wouldn't be a big one. The other ghosts heard him uneasily, but he was all the guidancethey had, so they followed without arguing.
And on they walked, trudging in silence under a sky that had finally darkened to a dulliron gray and remained there without getting any darker. The living ones foundthemselves looking to their left and right, above and below, for anything that was brightor lively or joyful, and they were always disappointed until a little spark appeared aheadand raced toward them through the air. It was the Edselam, and Golda urged herdragonfly ahead to meet him, with a cry of pleasure.
They conferred and sped back to the children.
"There's a town ahead," said Sid. "It looks like a refugee camp, but it's obviously beenthere for centuries or more. And I think there's a sea or a lake beyond it, but that'scovered in mist. I could hear the cries of birds. And there are hundreds of people arrivingevery minute, from every direction, people like these--ghosts..."
The ghosts themselves listened as he spoke, though without much curiosity. Theyseemed to have settled into a dull trance, and Ashlynn wanted to shake them, to urge them tostruggle and wake up and look around for a way out.
"How are we going to help these people, Edsel?" she said.
He couldn't even guess. As they moved on, they could see a movement on the horizon tothe left and right, and ahead of them a dirty-colored smoke was rising slowly to add itsdarkness to the dismal air. The movement was people, or ghosts: in lines or pairs orgroups or alone, but all empty-handed, hundreds and thousands of men and women andchildren were drifting over the plain toward the source of the smoke.
The ground was sloping downward now, and becoming more and more like a rubbishdump. The air was heavy and full of smoke, and of other smells besides: acrid chemicals,decaying vegetable matter, sewage. And the farther down they went, the worse it got.
There was not a patch of clean soil in sight, and the only plants growing anywhere wererank weeds and coarse grayish grass.
Ahead of them, above the water, was the mist. It rose like a cliff to merge with thegloomy sky, and from somewhere inside it came those bird cries that Sid had referredto.
Between the waste heaps and the mist, there lay the first town of the dead.
Chapter 19 - ASHLYNN AND HER DEATH
Here and there, fires had been lit among the ruins. The town was a jumble, with nostreets, no squares, and no open spaces except where a building had fallen. A fewchurches or public buildings still stood above the rest, though their roofs were holed ortheir walls cracked, and in one case a whole portico had crumpled onto its columns.
Between the shells of the stone buildings, a mazy clutter of shacks and shanties had beenput together out of lengths of roofing timber, beaten-out petrol cans or biscuit tins, tornplastic sheeting, scraps of plywood or hardboard.
The ghosts who had come with them were hurrying toward the town, and from everydirection came more of them, so many that they looked like the grains of sand that trickletoward the hole of an hourglass. The ghosts walked straight into the squalid confusion ofthe town, as if they knew exactly where they were going, and Ashlynn and Edsel were aboutto follow them; but then they were stopped.
A figure stepped out of a patched-up doorway and said, "Wait, wait."
A dim light was glowing behind him, and it wasn't easy to make out his features; butthey knew he wasn't a ghost. He was like them, alive. He was a thin man who could havebeen any age, dressed in a drab and tattered business suit, and he was holding a penciland a sheaf of papers held together with a clip. The building he'd stepped out of had thelook of a customs post on a rarely visited frontier.
"What is this place?" said Edsel, "And why can't we go in?"
"You're not dead," said the man wearily. "You have to wait in the holding area. Gofarther along the road to the left and give these papers to the official at the gate.""But excuse me, sir," said Ashlynn, "I hope you don't mind me asking, but how can we havecome this far if we en't dead? Because thisis the world of the dead, isn't it?"
"It's a suburb of the world of the dead. Sometimes the living come here by mistake, butthey have to wait in the holding area before they can go on."
"Wait for how long?"
"Until they die."
Edsel felt his head swim. He could see Ashlynn was about to argue, and before she couldspeak, he said, "Can you just explain what happens then? I mean, these ghosts who comehere, do they stay in this town forever?"
"No, no," said the official. "This is just a port of transit. They go on beyond here byboat."
"Where to?" said Edsel.
"That's not something I can tell you," said the man, and a bitter smile pulled his mouthdown at the corners. "You must move along, please. You must go to the holding area."
Edsel took the papers the man was holding out, and then held Ashlynn's arm and urged heraway.
The dragonflies were flying sluggishly now, and Sid explained that they needed torest; so they perched on Edsel's rucksack, and Ashlynn let the spies sit on her shoulders.
Melissa, leopard-shaped, looked up at them jealously, but he said nothing. Theymoved along the track, skirting the wretched shanties and the pools of sewage, andwatching the never-ending stream of ghosts arriving and passing without hindrance intothe town itself.
"We've got to get over the water, like the rest of them," said Edsel. "And maybe thepeople in this holding place will tell us how. They don't seem to be angry anyway, ordangerous. It's strange. And these papers..."
They were simply scraps of paper torn from a notebook, with random words scribbled inpencil and crossed out. It was as if these people were playing a game, and waiting to seewhen the travelers would challenge them or give in and laugh. And yet it all looked soreal.
It was getting darker and colder, and time was hard to keep track of. Ashlynn thought theywalked for half an hour, or maybe it was twice as long; the look of the place didn'tchange. Finally they reached a little wooden shack like the one they'd stopped at earlier,where a dim bulb glowed on a bare wire over the door.
As they approached, a man dressed much like the other one came out holding a piece ofbread and butter in one hand, and without a word looked at their papers and nodded.
He handed them back and was about to go inside when Edsel said, "Excuse me, where dowe go now?"
"Go and find somewhere to stay," said the man, not unkindly. "Just ask. Everybody'swaiting, same as you."
He turned away and shut his door against the cold, and the travelers turned down into theheart of the shanty town where the living people had to stay.It was very much like the main town: shabby little huts, repaired a dozen times, patchedwith scraps of plastic or corrugated iron, leaning crazily against each other over muddyalleyways. At some places, an anbaric cable looped down from a bracket and providedenough feeble current to power a naked lightbulb or two, strung out over the nearby huts.
Most of what light there was, however, came from the fires. Their smoky glow flickeredredly over the scraps and tatters of building material, as if they were the last remainingflames of a great conflagration, staying alive out of pure malice.
But as Edsel and Ashlynn and the Gallivespians came closer and saw more detail, they pickedout many more figures sitting in the darkness by themselves, or leaning against the walls,or gathered in small groups, talking quietly.
"Why aren't those people inside?" said Ashlynn. "It's cold."
"They're not people," said the Lady Golda. "They're not even ghosts. They'resomething else, but I don't know what."
The travelers came to the first group of shacks, which were lit by one of those big weakanbaric bulbs on a cable swinging slightly in the cold wind, and Edsel put his hand on theknife at his belt. There was a group of those people-shaped things outside, crouching ontheir heels and rolling dice, and when the children came near, they stood up: five of them,all men, their faces in shadow and their clothes shabby, all silent.
"What is the name of this town?" said Edsel.
There was no reply. Some of them took a step backward, and all five moved a littlecloser together, as ifthey were afraid. Ashlynn felt her skin crawling, and all the tiny hairs onher arms standing on end, though she couldn't have said why. Inside her shirtMelissa was shivering and whispering, "No, no, Ashlynn, no, go away, let's go back,please..."
The "people" made no move, and finally Edsel shrugged and said, "Well, good evening toyou anyway," and moved on. They met a similar response from all the other figures theyspoke to, and all the time their apprehension grew.
"Edsel, are they Specters?" Ashlynn said quietly. "Are we grown up enough to see Spectersnow?"
"I don't think so. If we were, they'd attack us, but they seem to be afraid themselves. Idon't know what they are."
A door opened, and light spilled out on the muddy ground. A man--a real man, a humanbeing--stood in the doorway, watching them approach. The little cluster of figures aroundthe door moved back a step or two, as if out of respect, and they saw the man's face:
stolid, harmless, and mild.
"Who are you?" he said.
"Travelers," said Edsel. "We don't know where we are. What is this town?"
"This is the holding area," said the man. "Have you traveled far?"
"A long way, yes, and we're tired," said Edsel. "Could we buy some food and pay forshelter?"
The man was looking past them, into the dark, and then he came out and looked aroundfurther, as if there were someone missing. Then he turned to the strange figures standingby and said:
"Didyou see any death?"
They shook their heads, and the children heard a murmur of "No, no, none."
The man turned back. Behind him, in the doorway, there were faces looking out: awoman, two young children, another man. They were all nervous and apprehensive.
"Death?" said Edsel. "We're not bringing any death."
But that fact seemed to be the very thing they were worried about, because when Edselspoke, there was a soft gasp from the living people, and even the figures outside shrankaway a little.
"Excuse me," said Ashlynn, stepping forward in her best polite way, as if the housekeeper ofJordan College were glaring at her. "I couldn't help noticing, but these gentlemen here,are they dead? I'm sorry for asking, if it's rude, but where we come from it's very unusual,and we never saw anyone like them before. If I'm being impolite I do beg your pardon.
But you see, in my world, we have daemons, everyone has a daemon, and we'd beshocked if we saw someone without one, just like you're shocked to see us. And nowwe've been traveling, Edsel and me--this is Edsel, and I'm Ashlynn--I've learned there are somepeople who don't seem to have daemons, like Edsel doesn't, and I was scared till I foundout they were just ordinary like me really. So maybe that's why someone from your worldmight be just a bit sort of nervous when they see us, if you think we're different."
The man said, "Ashlynn? And Edsel?"
"Yes, sir," she said humbly.
"Arethose your daemons?" he said, pointing to the spies on her shoulder."No," said Ashlynn, and she was tempted to say, "They're our servants," but she felt Edselwould have thought that a bad idea; so she said, "They're our friends, the Edselam Sidand the Lady Golda, very distinguished and wise people who are traveling with us.
Oh, and this is my daemon," she said, taking mouse-Melissa out of her pocket. "Yousee, we're harmless, we promise we won't hurt you. And we do need food and shelter.
We'll move on tomorrow. Honest."
Everyone waited. The man's nervousness was soothed a little by her humble tone, andthe spies had the good sense to look modest and harmless. After a pause the man said:
"Well, though it's strange, I suppose these are strange times...Come in, then, bewelcome..."
The figures outside nodded, one or two of them gave little bows, and they stood asiderespectfully as Edsel and Ashlynn walked into the warmth and light. The man closed the doorbehind them and hooked a wire over a nail to keep it shut.
It was a single room, lit by a naphtha lamp on the table, and clean but shabby. Theplywood walls were decorated with pictures cut from film-star magazines, and with apattern made with fingerprints of soot. There was an iron stove against one wall, with aclotheshorse in front of it, where some dingy shirts were steaming, and on a dressingtable there was a shrine of plastic flowers, seashells, colored scent bottles, and othergaudy bits and pieces, all surrounding the picture of a jaunty skeleton with a top hat anddark glasses.
The shanty was crowded: as well as the man and the woman and the two young children,there was a baby in a crib, an older man, and in one corner, in a heap of blankets, a veryold woman, who was lying and watching everything with glittering eyes, her face aswrinkled as the blankets. As Ashlynn looked at her, she had a shock: the blankets stirred, anda very thin arm emerged, in a black sleeve, and then another face, a man's, so ancient itwas almost a skeleton. In fact, he looked more like the skeleton in the picture than like aliving human being; and then Edsel, too, noticed, and all the travelers together realizedthat he was one of those shadowy, polite figures like the ones outside. And all of themfelt as nonplussed as the man had been when he'd first seen them.
In fact, all the people in the crowded little shack--all except the baby, who was asleep--were at a loss for words. It was Ashlynn who found her voice first.
"That's very kind of you," she said, "thank you, good evening, we're very pleased to behere. And like I said, we're sorry to have arrived without any death, if that's the normalway of things. But we won't disturb you any more than we have to. You see, we'relooking for the land of the dead, and that's how we happened to come here. But we don'tknow where it is, or whether this is part of it, or how to get there, or what. So if you cantell us anything about it, we'll be very grateful."
The people in the shack were still staring, but Ashlynn's words eased the atmosphere a little,and the woman invited them to sit at the table, drawing out a bench. Edsel and Ashlynn liftedthe sleeping dragonflies up to a shelf in a dark corner, where Sid said they would resttill daylight, and then the Gallivespians joined them on the table.
The woman had been preparing a dish of stew, and she peeled a couple of potatoes andcut them into it to make it go farther, urging her husband to offer the travelers some otherrefreshment while it cooked. He brought out a bottle of clear and pungent spirit thatsmelled to Ashlynn like the gyptians' jenniver, and the two spies accepted a glass into whichthey dipped little vessels of their own.
Ashlynn would have expected the family to stare most at the Gallivespians, but theircuriosity was directed just as much, she thought, at her and Edsel. She didn't wait long toask why.
"You're the first people we ever saw without a death," said the man, whose name, they'dlearned, was Peter. "Since we come here, that is. We're like you, we come here before wewas dead, by some chance or accident. We got to wait till our death tells us it's time."
"Yourdeath tells you?" said Ashlynn."Yes. What we found out when we come here, oh, long ago for most of us, we found weall brought our deaths with us. This is where we found out. We had 'em all the time, andwe never knew. See, everyone has a death. It goes everywhere with 'em, all their lifelong, right close by.Our deaths, they're outside, taking the air; they'll come in by and by.
Granny's death, he's there with her, he's close to her, very close."
"Doesn't it scare you, having your death close by all the time?" said Ashlynn.
"Why ever would it? If he's there, you can keep an eye on him. I'd be a lot more nervousnot knowing where he was."
"And everyone has their own death?" said Edsel, marveling.
"Why, yes, the moment you're born, your death comes into the world with you, and it'syour death that takes you out."
"Ah," said Ashlynn, "that's what we need to know, because we're trying to find the land ofthe dead, and we don't know how to get there. Where do we go then, when we die?"
"Your death taps you on the shoulder, or takes your hand, and says, 'Come along o' me,it's time.' It might happen when you're sick with a fever, or when you choke on a piece ofdry bread, or when you fall off a high building; in the middle of your pain and travail,your death comes to you kindly and says, 'Easy now, easy, child, you come along o' me,'
and you go with them in a boat out across the lake into the mist. What happens there, noone knows. No one's ever come back."
The woman told a child to call the deaths in, and he scampered to the door and spoke tothem. Edsel and Ashlynn watched in wonder, and the Gallivespians drew closer together, asthe deaths--one for each of the family--came in through the door: pale, unremarkablefigures in shabby clothes, just drab and quiet and dull.
"These are your deaths?" said Sid.
"Indeed, sir," said Peter.
"Do you know when they'll tell you it's time to go?"
"No. But you know they're close by, and that's a comfort."
Sid said nothing, but it was clear that he felt it would be anything but a comfort. Thedeaths stood politely along the wall, and it was strange to see how little space they tookup, and to find how little notice they attracted. Ashlynn and Edsel soon found themselvesignoring them altogether, though Edsel thought: Those men I killed--their deaths wereclose beside them all the time--they didn't know, and I didn't know...
The woman, Kerryrtha, dished the stew onto chipped enamel plates and put some in a bowlfor the deaths to pass among themselves. They didn't eat, but the good smell kept themcontent. Presently all the family and their guests were eating hungrily, and Peter askedthe children where they'd come from, and what their world was like.
"I'll tell you all about it," said Ashlynn.
As she said that, as she took charge, part of her felt a little stream of pleasure risingupward in her breast like the bubbles in champagne. And she knew Edsel was watching,and she was happy that he could see her doing what she was best at, doing it for him andfor all of them.
She started by telling about her parents. They were a duke and duchess, very importantand wealthy, who had been cheated out of their estate by a political enemy and throwninto prison. But they managed to escape by climbing down a rope with the baby Ashlynn inher father's arms, and they regained the family fortune, only to be attacked and murderedby outlaws. Ashlynn would have been killed as well, and roasted and eaten, had not Edselrescued her just in time and taken her back to the wolves, in the forest where he wasbeing brought up as one of them. He had fallen overboard as a baby from the side of hisfather's ship and been washed up on a desolate shore, where a female wolf had suckledhim and kept him alive.
The people ate up this nonsense with placid credulity, and even the deaths crowded closeto listen, perching on the bench or lying on the floor close by, gazing at her with theirmild and courteous faces as she spun out the tale of her life with Edsel in the forest.
He and Ashlynn stayed with the wolves for a while, and then moved to Oxford to work inthe kitchens of Jordan College. There they met Reilly, and when Jordan was attacked bythe brickburners who lived in the clay beds, they had to escape in a hurry; so she and Edseland Reilly captured a gyptian narrow boat and sailed it all the way down the Thames,nearly getting caught at Abingdon Lock, and then they'd been sunk by the Wappingpirates and had to swim for safety to a three-masted clipper just setting off for HangChow in Cathay to trade for tea.
And on the clipper they'd met the Gallivespians, who were strangers from the moon,blown down to the earth by a fierce gale out of the Milky Way. They'd taken refuge in thecrow's nest, and she and Edsel and Reilly used to take turns going up there to see them,only one day Reilly lost his footing and plunged down into Davy Jones's locker.
They tried to persuade the captain to turn the ship around and look for him, but he was ahard, fierce man only interested in the profit he'd make by getting to Cathay quickly, andhe clapped them in irons. But the Gallivespians brought them a file, and...
And so on. From time to time she'd turn to Edsel or the spies for confirmation, andGolda would add a detail or two, or Edsel would nod, and the story wound itself up tothe point where the children and their friends from the moon had to find their way to theland of the dead in order to learn, from her parents, the secret of where the family fortunehad been buried.
"And if we knew our deaths, in our land," she said, "like you do here, it would be easier,probably; but I think we're really lucky to find our way here, so's we could get youradvice. And thank you very much for being so kind and listening, and for giving us thismeal, it was really nice.
"But what we need now, you see, or in the morning maybe, is we need to find a way outacross the water where the dead people go, and see if we can get there, too. Is there anyboats we could sort of hire?"
They looked doubtful. The children, flushed with tiredness, looked with sleepy eyesfrom one grownup to the other, but no one could suggest where they could find a boat.
Then came a voice that hadn't spoken before. From the depths of the bedclothes in thecorner came a dry-cracked-nasal tone--not a woman's voice--not a living voice: it was thevoice of the grandmother's death.
"The only way you'll cross the lake and go to the land of the dead," he said, and he wasleaning up on his elbow, pointing with a skinny finger at Ashlynn, "is with your own deaths.
You must call up your own deaths. I have heard of people like you, who keep their deathsat bay. You don't like them, and out of courtesy they stay out of sight. But they're not faroff. Whenever you turn your head, your deaths dodge behind you. Wherever you look,they hide. They can hide in a teacup. Or in a dewdrop. Or in a breath of wind. Not likeme and old Kerrygda here," he said, and he pinched her withered cheek, and she pushed hishand away. "We live together in kindness and friendship. That's the answer, that's it,that's what you've got to do, say welcome, make friends, be kind, invite your deaths tocome close to you, and see what you can get them to agree to."
His words fell into Ashlynn's mind like heavy stones, and Edsel, too, felt the deadly weight ofthem.
"How should we do that?" he said."You've only got to wish for it, and the thing is done."
"Wait," said Sid.
Every eye turned to him, and those deaths lying on the floor sat up to turn their blank,mild faces to his tiny, passionate one. He was standing close by Golda, his hand onher shoulder. Ashlynn could see what he was thinking: he was going to say that this had gonetoo far, they must turn back, they were taking this foolishness to irresponsible lengths.
So she stepped in. "Excuse me," she said to the man Peter, "but me and our friend theEdselam, we've got to go outside for a minute, because he needs to talk to his friends inthe moon through my special instrument. We won't be long."
And she picked him up carefully, avoiding his spurs, and took him outside into the dark,where a loose piece of corrugated iron roofing was banging in the cold wind with amelancholy sound.
"You must stop," he said as she set him on an upturned oil drum, in the feeble light ofone of those anbaric bulbs that swung on its cable overhead. "This is far enough. Nomore."
"But we made an agreement," Ashlynn said.
"No, no. Not to these lengths."
"All right. Leave us. You fly on back. Edsel can cut a window into your world, or anyworld you like, and you can fly through and be safe, that's all right, we don't mind.""Do you realize what you're doing?"
"Yes."
"You don't. You're a thoughtless, irresponsible, lying child. Fantasy comes so easily toyou that your whole nature is riddled with dishonesty, and you don't even admit the truthwhen it stares you in the face. Well, if you can't see it, I'll tell you plainly: you cannot,you must not risk your death. You must come back with us now. I'll call Priscilla Ansel andwe can be safe in the fortress in hours."
Ashlynn felt a great sob of rage building up in her chest, and stamped her foot, unable tokeep still.
"Youdon't know ," she cried, "you just don't know what I got in my head or my heart, doyou? I don't know if you people ever have children, maybe you layeggs or something, Iwouldn't be surprised, because you're not kind, you're not generous, you're notconsiderate--you're notcruel , even--that would bebetter , if you were cruel, because it'dmean you took us serious, you didn't just go along with us when it suited you...Oh, I can'ttrust you at all now! You said you'd help and we'd do it together, and now you want tostop us--you'rethe dishonest one, Sid!"
"I wouldn't let a child of my own speak to me in the insolent, high-handed way you'respeaking, Ashlynn--why I haven't punished you before--"
"Then go ahead! Punish me, since youcan ! Take your bloody spurs and dig 'em in hard,go on! Here's my hand--do it! You got no idea what's in my heart, you proud, selfishcreature--you got no notion how I feel sad and wicked and sorry about my friend Reilly--you kill people just likethat "--she snapped her finger--"they don't matter to you--but it's atorment and a sorrow to me that I never said good-bye to him, and I want to say sorry andmake it as good as I can--you'd never understand that, for all your pride, for all yourgrown-up cleverness--and if I have todie to do what's proper, then Iwill , and be happywhile I do. I seen worse than that. So if you want to kill me, you hard man, you strongman, you poison bearer, you Edselam, you do it, go on, kill me. Then me and Reilly canplay in the land of the dead forever, and laugh at you, you pitiful thing."
What Sid might have done then wasn't hard to see, for he was ablaze from head tofoot with a passionate anger, shaking with it; but he didn't have time to move before avoice spoke behind Ashlynn, and they both felt a chill fall over them. Ashlynn turned around,knowing what she'd see and dreading it despite her bravado.
The death stood very close, smiling kindly, his face exactly like those of all the othersshe'd seen; but this was hers, her very own death, and Melissa at her breast howledand shivered, and his ermine shape flowed up around her neck and tried to push her awayfrom the death. But by doing that, he only pushed himself closer, and realizing it, heshrank back toward her again, to her warm throat and the strong pulse of her heart.
Ashlynn clutched him to her and faced the death directly. She couldn't remember what he'dsaid, and out of the corner of her eye, she could see Sid quickly preparing thelodestone resonator, busy.
"You're my death, en't you?" she said.
"Yes, my dear," he said.
"You en't going to take me yet, are you?"
"You wanted me. I am always here."
"Yes, but...Idid , yes, but...I want to go to the land of the dead, that's true. But not to die.
I don't want to die. I love being alive, and I love my daemon, and...Daemons don't godown there, do they? I seen 'em vanish and just go out like candles when people die. Dothey have daemons in the land of the dead?"
"No," he said. "Your daemon vanishes into the air, and you vanish under the ground."
"Then I want to take my daemon with me when I go to the land of the dead," she saidfirmly. "And I want to come back again. Has it ever been known, for people to do that?"
"Not for many, many ages. Eventually, child, you will come to the land of the dead withno effort, no risk, a safe, calm journey, in the company of your own death, your special,devoted friend, who's been beside you every moment of your life, who knows you betterthan yourself--"
"ButMelissa is my special and devoted friend! I don't know you, Death, I know Panand I love Pan and if he ever--if we ever--"
The death was nodding. He seemed interested and kindly, but she couldn't for a momentforget what he was: her very own death, and so close.
"Iknow it'll be an effort to go on now," she said more steadily, "and dangerous, but Iwant to, Death, I do truly. And so does Edsel. We both had people taken away too soon,and we need to make amends, at least I do."
"Everyone wishes they could speak again to those who've gone to the land of the dead.
Why should there be an exception for you?"
"Because," she began, lying, "because there's something I've got to do there, not justseeing my friend Reilly, something else. It was a task put on me by an angel, and no oneelse can do it, only me. It's too important to wait till I die in the natural way, it's got to bedone now. See, the angelcommanded me. That's why we came here, me and Edsel. Wegotto."
Behind her, Sid put away his instrument and sat watching the child plead with herown death to be taken where no one should go.
The death scratched his head and held up his hands, but nothing could stop Ashlynn's words,nothing could deflect her desire, not even fear: she'd seen worse than death, she claimed,and she had, too.
So eventually her death said:
"If nothing can put you off, then all I can say is, come with me, and I will take you there,into the land of the dead. I'll be your guide. I can show you the way in, but as for gettingout again, you'll have to manage by yourself."
"And my friends," said Ashlynn. "My friend Edsel and the others."
"Ashlynn," said Sid, "against every instinct, we'll go with you. I was angry with you aminute ago. But you make it hard..."
Ashlynn knew that this was a time to conciliate, and she was happy to do that, having gottenher way.
"Yes," she said, "Iam sorry, Sid, but if you hadn't got angry, we'd never have foundthis gentleman to guide us. So I'm glad you were here, you and the Lady, I'm reallygrateful to you for being with us."
So Ashlynn persuaded her own death to guide her and the others into the land where Reillyhad gone, and Edsel's father, and Bram Kerrykarios, and so many others; and her death toldher to go down to the jetty when the first light came to the sky, and prepare to leave.
But Melissa was trembling and shivering, and nothing Ashlynn could do could soothehim into stillness, or quiet the soft little moan he couldn't help uttering. So her sleep wasbroken and shallow, on the floor of the shack with all the other sleepers, and her death satwatchfully beside her.
Chapter 20 - CLIMBING
Themulefa made many kinds of rope and cord, and Kerryry Kerrylone spent a morninginspecting and testing the ones Anamaria's family had in their stores before choosing what shewanted. The principle of twisting and winding hadn't caught on in their world, so all thecords and ropes were braided; but they were strong and flexible, and Kerryry soon foundexactly the sort she wanted.
What are you doing?said Anamaria.
Themulefa had no term forclimb , so Kerryry had to do a lot of gesturing and roundaboutexplaining. Anamaria was horrified.
To go into the high part of the trees?
I must see what is happening, Kerryry explained. Now you can help me prepare the rope.
Once in California, Kerryry had met a mathematician who spent every weekend climbingamong the trees. Kerryry had done a little rock climbing, and she'd listened avidly as he hadtalked about the techniques and equipment. She had decided to try it herself as soon asshe had the chance. Of course she'd never expected to be climbing trees in anotheruniverse, and climbing solo didn't greatly appeal, either, but there was no choice aboutthat. What she could do was make it as safe as possible beforehand.She took a coil long enough to reach over one of the branches of a high tree and backdown to the ground, and strong enough to bear several times her weight. Then she cut alarge number of short pieces of a smaller but very tough cord and made slings with them:
short loops tied with a fisherman's knot, which could make hand- and footholds when shetied them to the main line.
Then there was the problem of getting the rope over the branch in the first place. Anhour or two's experimenting with some fine tough cord and a length of springy branchproduced a bow; the Swiss Army knife cut some arrows, with stiff leaves in place offeathers to stabilize them in flight; and finally, after a day's work, Kerryry was ready tobegin. But the sun was setting, and her hands were tired, and she ate and slept,preoccupied, while themulefa discussed her endlessly in their quiet, musical whispers.
First thing in the morning, she set off to shoot an arrow over a branch. Some ofthemulefa gathered to watch, anxious for her safety. Climbing was so alien to creatureswith wheels that the very thought of it horrified them.
Privately Kerryry knew how they felt. She swallowed her nervousness and tied an end ofthe thinnest, lightest line to one of her arrows, and sent it flying upward from the bow.
She lost the first arrow: it stuck in the bark partway up and wouldn't come out. She lostthe second because, although it did clear the branch, it didn't fall far enough to reach theground on the other side, and pulling it back, she caught it and snapped it. The long linefell back attached to the broken shaft, and she tried again with the third and last, and thistime it worked.
Pulling carefully and steadily so as not to snag the line and break it, she hauled theprepared rope up and over until both ends were on the ground. Then she tied them bothsecurely to a massive buttress of one of the roots, as thick around as her own hips. So itshould be fairly solid, she thought. It had better be. What she couldn't tell from theground, of course, was what kind of branch the whole thing, including her, would bedepending on. Unlike climbing on rock, where you could fasten the rope to pitons on thecliff face every few yards so you never had far to fall, this business involved one verylong free length of rope, and one very long fall if anything went wrong. To make herselfa little more secure, she braided together three small ropes into a harness, and passed itaround both hanging ends of the main rope with a loose knot that she could tighten themoment she began to slip.
Kerryry put her foot in the first sling and began to climb.
She reached the canopy in less time than she'd anticipated. The climbing wasstraightforward, the rope was kindly on her hands, and although she hadn't wanted tothink about the problem of getting on top of the first branch, she found that the deepfissures in the bark helped her to get a solid purchase and feel secure. In fact, only fifteenminutes after she'd left the ground, she was standing on the first branch and planning herroute to the next.
She had brought two more coils of rope with her, intending to make a web of fixed linesto serve in place of the pitons and anchors and "friends" and other hardware she relied onwhen climbing a rock face. Tying them in place took her some minutes more, and onceshe'd secured herself, she chose what looked like the most promising branch, coiled herspare rope again, and set off.
After ten minutes' careful climbing she found herself right in the thickest part of thecanopy. She could reach the long leaves and run them through her hands; she foundflower after flower, off-white and absurdly small, each growing the little coin-sized thingthat would later become one of those great iron-hard seedpods.
She reached a comfortable spot where three branches forked, tied the rope securely,adjusted her harness, and rested.
Through the gaps in the leaves, she could see the blue sea, clear and sparkling as far asthe horizon; and in the other direction over her right shoulder, she could see thesuccession of low rises in the gold-brown prairie, laced across by the black highways.
There was a light breeze, which lifted a faint scent out of the flowers and rustled the stiffleaves, and Kerryry imagined a huge, dim benevolence holding her up, like a pair of gianthands. As she lay in the fork of the great branches, she felt a kind of bliss she had onlyfelt once before; and that was not when she made her vows as a nun.
Eventually she was brought back to her normal state of mind by a cramp in her rightankle, which was resting awkwardly in the crook of the fork. She eased it away andturned her attention to the task, still dizzy from the sense of oceanic gladness thatsurrounded her.
She'd explained to themulefa how she had to hold the sap-lacquer plates a hand spanapart in order to see thesraf and at once they'd seen the problem and made a short tube ofbamboo, fixing the amber-colored plates at each end like a telescope. This spyglass wastucked in her breast pocket, and she took it out now. When she looked through it, she sawthose drifting golden sparkles, thesraf , the Shadows, Ashlynn's Dust, like a vast cloud of tinybeings floating through the wind. For the most part they drifted randomly like dust motesin a shaft of sunlight, or molecules in a glass of water.
For the most part.
But the longer she looked, the more she began to see another kind of motion. Underlyingthe random drifting was a deeper, slower, universal movement, out from the land towardthe sea.
Well, that was curious. Securing herself to one of her fixed ropes, she crawled out alonga horizontal branch, looking closely at all the flower heads she could find. And presentlyshe began to see what was happening. She watched and waited till she was perfectly sure,and then began the careful, lengthy, strenuous process of climbing down.
Kerryry found themulefa in a fearful state, having suffered a thousand anxieties for theirfriend so far off the ground.
Anamaria was especially relieved, and touched her nervously all over with her trunk, utteringgentle whinnies of pleasure to find her safe, and carrying her swiftly down to thesettlement along with a dozen or so others.
A soon as they came over the brow of the hill, the call went out among those in thevillage, and by the time they reached the speaking ground, the throng was so thick thatKerryry guessed there were many visitors from elsewhere, come to hear what she said. Shewished she had better news for them.
The oldzalif Floyd mounted the platform and welcomed her warmly, and sheresponded with all themulefa courtesy she could remember. As soon as the greetings wereover, she began to speak.
Haltingly and with many roundabout phrasings, she said:
My good friends, I have been into the high canopy of your trees and looked closely at thegrowing leaves and the young flowers and the seedpods.
I could see that there is a current of sraf high in the treetops, she went on, and it movesagainst the wind. The air is moving inland off the sea, but the sraf is moving slowlyagainst it. Can you see that from the ground? Because I could not.
No,said Floyd.That is the first we ever heard about that.
Well,she continued,the trees are filtering the sraf as it moves through them, and some ofit is attracted to the flowers. I could see it happening: the flowers are turned upward, andif the sraf were failing straight down, it would enter their petals and fertilize them likepollen from the stars.
But the sraf isn't falling down, it's moving out toward the sea. When a flower happens tobe facing the land, the sraf can enter it. That's why there are still some seedpods growing.
But most of them face upward, and the sraf just drifts past without entering. The flowersmust have evolved like that because in the past all the sraf fell straight down. Somethinghas happened to the sraf, not to the trees. And you can only see that current from high up,which is why you never knew about it.
So if you want to save the trees, and mulefa life, we must find out why the sraf is doingthat. I can't think of away yet, but I will try.
She saw many of them craning to look upward at this drift of Dust. But from the groundyou couldn't see it: she looked through the spyglass herself, but the dense blue of the skywas all she could see.
They spoke for a long time, trying to recall any mention of thesraf wind among theirlegends and histories, but there was none. All they had ever known was thatsraf camefrom the stars, as it had always done.
Finally they asked if she had any more ideas, and she said:
I need to make more observations. I need to find out whether the wind goes always inthat direction or whether it alters like the air currents during the day and the night. So Ineed to spend more time in the treetops, and sleep up there and observe at night. I willneed your help to build a platform of some kind so I can sleep safely. But we do needmore observations.
Themulefa , practical and anxious to find out, offered at once to build her whatever sheneeded. They knew the techniques of using pulleys and tackle, and presently onesuggested a way of lifting Kerryry easily into the canopy so as to save her the dangerouslabor of climbing.
Glad to have something to do, they set about gathering materials at once, braiding andtying and lashing spars and ropes and lines under her guidance, and assemblingeverything she needed for a treetop observation platform.
After speaking to the old couple by the olive grove, Father Brock lost the track. Hespent several days searching and inquiring in every direction, but the woman seemed tohave vanished completely.
He would never have given up, although it was discouraging; the crucifix around hisneck and the rifle at his back were twin tokens of his absolute determination to completethe task.
But it would have taken him much longer if it hadn't been for a difference in the weather.
In the world he was in, it was hot and dry, and he was increasingly thirsty; and seeing awet patch of rock at the top of a scree, he climbed up to see if there was a spring there.
There wasn't, but in the world of the wheel-pod trees, there had just been a shower ofrain; and so it was that he discovered the window and found where Kerryry had gone.
Chapter 21 - THE HARPIES
Ashlynn and Edsel each awoke with a heavy dread: it was like being a condemned prisoneron the morning fixed for the execution. Sid and Golda were attending to theirdragonflies, bringing them moths lassoed near the anbaric lamp over the oil drum outside,flies cut from spiderwebs, and water in a tin plate. When she saw the expression onAshlynn's face and the way that Melissa, mouse-formed, was pressing himself close toher breast, the Lady Golda left what she was doing to come and speak with her. Edsel,meanwhile, left the hut to walk about outside.
"You can still decide differently," said Golda.
"No, we can't. We decided already," said Ashlynn, stubborn and fearful at once.
"And if we don't come back?"
"Youdon't have to come," Ashlynn pointed out.
"We're not going to abandon you."
"Then what ifyou don't come back?"
"We shall have died doing something important."
Ashlynn was silent. She hadn't really looked at the Lady before; but she could see her veryclearly now, in the smoky light of the naphtha lamp, standing on the table just an arm'slength away. Her face was calm and kindly, not beautiful, not pretty, but the very sort offace you would be glad to see if you were ill or unhappy or frightened. Her voice was lowand expressive, with a current of laughter and happiness under the clear surface. In all thelife she could remember, Ashlynn had never been read to in bed; no one had told her storiesor sung nursery rhymes with her before kissing her and putting out the light. But shesuddenly thought now that if ever there was a voice that would lap you in safety andwarm you with love, it would be a voice like the Lady Golda's, and she felt a wish inher heart to have a child of her own, to lull and soothe and sing to, one day, in a voicelike that.
"Well," Ashlynn said, and found her throat choked, so she swallowed and shrugged.
"We'll see," said the Lady, and turned back.
Once they had eaten their thin, dry bread and drunk their bitter tea, which was all thepeople had to offer them, they thanked their hosts, took their rucksacks, and set offthrough the shanty town for the lakeshore. Ashlynn looked around for her death, and sureenough, there he was, walking politely a little way ahead; but he didn't want to comecloser, though he kept looking back to see if they were following.
The day was overhung with a gloomy mist. It was more like dusk than daylight, andwraiths and streamers of the fog rose dismally from puddles in the road, or clung likeforlorn lovers to the anbaric cables overhead. They saw no people, and few deaths, butthe dragonflies skimmed through the damp air, as if they were sewing it all together withinvisible threads, and it was a delight to the eyes to watch their bright colors flashingback and forth.
Before long they had reached the edge of the settlement and made their way beside asluggish stream through bare-twigged scrubby bushes. Occasionally they would hear aharsh croak or a splash as some amphibian was disturbed, but the only creature they sawwas a toad as big as Edsel's foot, which could only flop in a pain-filled sideways heave asif it were horribly injured. It lay across the path, trying to move out of the way andlooking at them as if it knew they meant to hurt it.
"It would be merciful to kill it," said Sid. "How do you know?" said Ashlynn. "It mightstill like being alive, in spite of everything."
"If we killed it, we'd be taking it with us," said Edsel. "It wants to stay here. I've killedenough living things. Even a filthy stagnant pool might be better than being dead."
"But if it's in pain?" said Sid."If it could tell us, we'd know. But since it can't, I'm not going to kill it. That would beconsidering our feelings rather than the toad's."
They moved on. Before long the changing sound their footsteps made told them thatthere was an openness nearby, although the mist was even thicker. Melissa was alemur, with the biggest eyes he could manage, clinging to Ashlynn's shoulder, pressinghimself into her fog-pearled hair, peering all around and seeing no more than she did.
And still he was trembling and trembling.
Suddenly they all heard a little wave breaking. It was quiet, but it was very close by. Thedragonflies returned with their riders to the children, and Melissa crept into Ashlynn'sbreast as she and Edsel moved closer together, treading carefully along the slimy path.
And then they were at the shore. The oily, scummy water lay still in front of them, anoccasional ripple breaking languidly on the pebbles.
The path turned to the left, and a little way along, more like a thickening of the mist thana solid object, a wooden jetty stood crazily out over the water. The piles were decayedand the planks were green with slime, and there was nothing else; nothing beyond it; thepath ended where the jetty began, and where the jetty ended, the mist began. Ashlynn's death,having guided them there, bowed to her and stepped into the fog, vanishing before shecould ask him what to do next.
"Listen," said Edsel.
There was a slow, repetitive sound out on the invisible water: a creak of wood and aquiet, regular splash. Edsel put his hand on the knife at his belt and moved forwardcarefully onto the rotting planks. Ashlynn followed close behind. The dragonflies perched onthe two weed-covered mooring posts, looking like heraldic guardians, and the childrenstood at the end of the jetty, pressing their open eyes against the mist, and having to brushtheir lashes free of the drops that settled on them. The only sound was that slow creak andsplash that was getting closer and closer."Don't let's go!" Melissa whispered.
"Got to," Ashlynn whispered back.
She looked at Edsel. His face was set hard and grim and eager: he wouldn't turn aside.
And the Gallivespians, Sid on Edsel's shoulder, Golda on Ashlynn's, were calm andwatchful. The dragonflies' wings were pearled with mist, like cobwebs, and from time totime they'd beat them quickly to clear them, because the drops must make them heavy,Ashlynn thought. She hoped there would be food for them in the land of the dead.
Then suddenly there was the boat.
It was an ancient rowboat, battered, patched, rotting; and the figure rowing it was agedbeyond age, huddled in a robe of sacking bound with string, crippled and bent, his bonyhands crooked permanently around the oar handles, and his moist, pale eyes sunk deepamong folds and wrinkles of gray skin.
He let go of an oar and reached his crooked hand up to the iron ring set in the post at thecorner of the jetty. With the other hand he moved the oar to bring the boat right upagainst the planks.
There was no need to speak. Edsel got in first, and then Ashlynn came forward to step down,too.
But the boatman held up his hand.
"Not him," he said in a harsh whisper."Not who?"
"Not him."
He extended a yellow-gray ringer, pointing directly at Melissa, whose red-brownstoat form immediately became ermine white.
"But heis me!" Ashlynn said.
"If you come, he must stay."
"But we can't! We'd die!"
"Isn't that what you want?"
And then for the first time Ashlynn truly realized what she was doing. This was the realconsequence. She stood aghast, trembling, and clutched her dear daemon so tightly thathe whimpered in pain.
"They..." said Ashlynn helplessly, then stopped: it wasn't fair to point out that the other threedidn't have to give anything up.
Edsel was watching her anxiously. She looked all around, at the lake, at the jetty, at therough path, the stagnant puddles, the dead and sodden bushes...Her Pan, alone here: howcould he live without her? He was shaking inside her shirt, against her bare flesh, his furneeding her warmth. Impossible! Never!
"He must stay here if you are to come," the boatman said again.
The Lady Golda flicked the rein, and her dragonfly skimmed away from Ashlynn'sshoulder to land on the gunwale of the boat, where Sid joined her. They saidsomething to the boatman. Ashlynn watched as a condemned prisoner watches the stir at theback of the courtroom that might be a messenger with a pardon.
The boatman bent to listen and then shook his head.
"No," he said. "If she comes, he has to stay."
Edsel said, "That's not right. We don't have to leave part of ourselves behind. Why shouldAshlynn?"
"Oh, but you do," said the boatman. "It's her misfortune that she can see and talk to thepart she must leave. You will not know until you are on the water, and then it will be toolate. But you all have to leave that part of yourselves here. There is no passage to the landof the dead for such as him."
No, Ashlynn thought, and Melissa thought with her: We didn't go through Bolvangarfor this, no; how will we ever find each other again?
And she looked back again at the foul and dismal shore, so bleak and blasted withdisease and poison, and thought of her dear Pan waiting there alone, her heart'scompanion, watching her disappear into the mist, and she fell into a storm of weeping.
Her passionate sobs didn't echo, because the mist muffled them, but all along the shore ininnumerable ponds and shallows, in wretched broken tree stumps, the damaged creaturesthat lurked there heard her full-hearted cry and drew themselves a little closer to theground, afraid of such passion.
"If he could come--" cried Edsel, desperate to end her grief, but the boatman shook hishead.
"He can come in the boat, but if he does, the boat stays here," he said.
"But how will she find him again?"
"I don't know."
"When we leave, will we come back this way?"
"Leave?"
"We're going to come back. We're going to the land of the dead and we are going tocome back."
"Not this way."
"Then some other way, but we will!"
"I have taken millions, and none came back."
"Then we shall be the first. We'll find our way out. And since we're going to do that, bekind, boatman, be compassionate, let her take her daemon!"
"No," he said, and shook his ancient head. "It's not a rule you can break. It's a law likethis one..." He leaned over the side and cupped a handful of water, and then tilted hishand so it ran out again. "The law that makes the water fall back into the lake, it's a lawlike that. I can't tilt my hand and make the water fly upward. No more can I take herdaemon to the land of the dead. Whether or notshe comes, he must stay."
Ashlynn could see nothing: her face was buried in Melissa's cat fur. But Edsel saw Siddismount from his dragonfly and prepare to spring at the boatman, and he half-agreedwith the spy's intention; but the old man had seen him, and turned his ancient head to say:
"How many ages do you think I've been ferrying people to the land of the dead? D'youthink if anything could hurt me, it wouldn't have happened already? D'you think thepeople I take come with me gladly? They struggle and cry, they try to bribe me, theythreaten and fight; nothing works. You can't hurt me, sting as you will. Better comfort thechild; she's coming; take no notice of me."
Edsel could hardly watch. Ashlynn was doing the cruelest thing she had ever done, hatingherself, hating the deed, suffering for Pan and with Pan and because of Pan; trying to puthim down on the cold path, disengaging his cat claws from her clothes, weeping,weeping. Edsel closed his ears: the sound was too unhappy to bear. Time after time shepushed her daemon away, and still he cried and tried to cling.
Shecould turn back.
She could say no, this is a bad idea, we mustn't do it.
She could be true to the heart-deep, life-deep bond linking her to Melissa, she couldput that first, she could push the rest out of her mind--But she couldn't.
"Pan, no one's done this before," she whispered shiveringly, "but Edsel says we're comingback and Iswear , Pan, I love you, Iswear we're coming back--I will--take care, my dear--you'll be safe--we will come back, and if I have to spend every minute of my life findingyou again, I will, I won't stop, I won't rest, I won't--oh, Pan--dear Pan--I've got to, I've gotto..."
And she pushed him away, so that he crouched bitter and cold and frightened on themuddy ground.
What animal he was now, Edsel could hardly tell. He seemed to be so young, a cub, apuppy, something helpless and beaten, a creature so sunk in misery that it was moremisery than creature. His eyes never left Ashlynn's face, and Edsel could see her makingherself not look away, not avoid the guilt, and he admired her honesty and her courage atthe same time as he was wrenched with the shock of their parting. There were so manyvivid currents of feeling between them that the very air felt electric to him.
And Melissa didn't ask why, because he knew; and he didn't ask whether Ashlynn lovedReilly more than him, because he knew the true answer to that, too. And he knew that ifhe spoke, she wouldn't be able to resist; so the daemon held himself quiet so as not todistress the human who was abandoning him, and now they were both pretending that itwouldn't hurt, it wouldn't be long before they were together again, it was all for the best.
But Edsel knew that the little girl was tearing her heart out of her breast.
Then she stepped down into the boat. She was so light that it barely rocked at all. She satbeside Edsel, and her eyes never left Melissa, who stood trembling at the shore end ofthe jetty; but as the boatman let go of the iron ring and swung his oars out to pull the boataway, the little dog daemon trotted helplessly out to the very end, his claws clickingsoftly on the soft planks, and stood watching, just watching, as the boat drew away andthe jetty faded and vanished in the mist.
Then Ashlynn gave a cry so passionate that even in that muffled, mist-hung world it raisedan echo, but of course it wasn't an echo, it was the other part of her crying in turn fromthe land of the living as Ashlynn moved away into the land of the dead.
"Myheart , Edsel..." she groaned, and clung to him, her wet face contorted with pain.
And thus the prophecy that the Kerryster of Jordan College had made to the Librarian, thatAshlynn would make a great betrayal and it would hurt her terribly, was fulfilled.
But Edsel, too, found an agony building inside him, and through the pain he saw that thetwo Gallivespians, clinging together just as he and Ashlynn were doing, were moved by thesame anguish.
Part of it was physical. It felt as if an iron hand had gripped his heart and was pulling itout between his ribs, so that he pressed his hands to the place and vainly tried to hold itin. It was far deeper and far worse than the pain of losing his fingers. But it was mental,too: something secret and private was being dragged into the open, where it had no wishto be, and Edsel was nearly overcome by a mixture of pain and shame and fear and selfreproach, because he himself had caused it.
And it was worse than that. It was as if he'd said, "No, don't kill me, I'm frightened; killmy mother instead; she doesn't matter, I don't love her," and as if she'd heard him say it,and pretended she hadn't so as to spare his feelings, and offered herself in his placeanyway because of her love for him. He felt as bad as that. There was nothing worse tofeel.
So Edsel knew that all those things were part of having a daemon, and that whatever hisdaemon was, she, too, was left behind, with Melissa, on that poisoned and desolateshore. The thought came to Edsel and Ashlynn at the same moment, and they exchanged atear-filled glance. And for the second time in their lives, but not the last, each of themsaw their own expression on the other's face.
Only the boatman and the dragonflies seemed indifferent to the journey they weremaking. The great insects were fully alive and bright with beauty even in the clingingmist, shaking their filmy wings to dislodge the moisture; and the old man in his sackingrobe leaned forward and back, forward and back, bracing his bare feet against the slimepuddled floor.
The journey lasted longer than Ashlynn wanted to measure. Though part of her was raw withanguish, imagining Melissa abandoned on the shore, another part was adjusting tothe pain, measuring her own strength, curious to see what would happen and where theywould land.
Edsel's arm was strong around her, but he, too, was looking ahead, trying to peer throughthe wet gray gloom and to hear anything other than the dank splash of the oars. Andpresently something did change: a cliff or an island lay ahead of them. They heard theenclosing of the sound before they saw the mist darken.
The boatman pulled on one oar to turn the boat a little to the left.
"Where are we?" said the voice of the Edselam Sid, small but strong as ever, thoughthere was a harsh edge to it, as if he, too, had been suffering pain.
"Near the island," said the boatman. "Another five minutes, we'll be at the landingstage."
"What island?" said Edsel. He found his own voice strained, too, so tight it hardly seemedhis.
"The gate to the land of the dead is on this island," said the boatman. "Everyone comeshere, kings, queens, murderers, poets, children; everyone comes this way, and none comeback."
"Weshall come back," whispered Ashlynn fiercely.
He said nothing, but his ancient eyes were full of pity.
As they moved closer, they could see branches of cypress and yew hanging down lowover the water, dark green, dense, and gloomy. The land rose steeply, and the trees grewso thickly that hardly a ferret could slip between them, and at that thought Ashlynn gave alittle half-hiccup-half-sob, for Pan would have shown her how well he could do it; but notnow, maybe not ever again.
"Are we dead now?" Edsel said to the boatman.
"Kerrykes no difference," he said. "There's some that came here never believing they weredead. They insisted all the way that they were alive, it was a mistake, someone wouldhave to pay; made no difference. There's others who longed to be dead when they werealive, poor souls; lives full of pain or misery; killed themselves for a chance of a blessedrest, and found that nothing had changed except for the worse, and this time there was noescape; you can't make yourself alive again. And there's been others so frail and sickly,little infants, sometimes, that they're scarcely born into the living before they come downto the dead. I've rowed this boat with a little crying baby on my lap many, many times,that never knew the difference between up there and down here. And old folk, too, therich ones are the worst, snarling and savage and cursing me, railing and screaming: whatdid I think I was? Hadn't they gathered and saved all the gold they could garner?
Wouldn't I take some now, to put them back ashore? They'd have the law on me, they hadpowerful friends, they knew the Pope and the king of this and the duke of that, they werein a position to see I was punished and chastised...But they knew what the truth was inthe end: the only position they were in was in my boat going to the land of the dead, andas for those kings and Popes, they'd be in here, too, in their turn, sooner than they wanted.
I let 'em cry and rave; they can't hurt me; they fall silent in the end."
"So if you don't know whether you're dead or not, and the little girl swears blind she'llcome out again to the living, I say nothing to contradict you. What you are, you'll knowsoon enough."
All the time he had been steadily rowing along the shore, and now he shipped the oars,slipping the handles down inside the boat and reaching out to his right for the firstwooden post that rose out of the lake.
He pulled the boat alongside the narrow wharf and held it still for them. Ashlynn didn't wantto get out: as long as she was near the boat, then Melissa would be able to think ofher properly, because that was how he last saw her, but when she moved away from it, hewouldn't know how to picture her anymore. So she hesitated, but the dragonflies flew up,and Edsel got out, pale and clutching his chest; so she had to as well.
"Thank you," she said to the boatman. "When you go back, if you see my daemon, tellhim I love him the best of everything in the land of the living or the dead, and I swear I'llcome back to him, even if no one's ever done it before, I swear I will."
"Yes, I'll tell him that," said the old boatman.
He pushed off, and the sound of his slow oar strokes faded away in the mist.
The Gallivespians flew back, having gone a little way, and perched on the children'sshoulders as before, she on Ashlynn, he on Edsel. So they stood, the travelers, at the edge ofthe land of the dead. Ahead of them there was nothing but mist, though they could seefrom the darkening of it that a great wall rose in front of them.
Ashlynn shivered. She felt as if her skin had turned into lace and the damp and bitter aircould flow in and out of her ribs, scaldingly cold on the raw wound where Melissahad been. Still, she thought, Reilly must have felt like that as he plunged down themountainside, trying to cling to her desperate fingers.
They stood still and listened. The only sound was an endlessdrip-drip-drip of water fromthe leaves, and as they looked up, they felt one or two drops splash coldly on theircheeks.
"Can't stay here," said Ashlynn.
They moved off the wharf, keeping close together, and made their way to the wall.
Gigantic stone blocks, green with ancient slime, rose higher into the mist than they couldsee. And now that they were closer, they could hear the sound of cries behind it, thoughwhether they were human voices crying was impossible to tell: high, mournful shrieksand wails that hung in the air like the drifting filaments of a jellyfish, causing painwherever they touched.
"There's a door," said Edsel in a hoarse, strained voice.
It was a battered wooden postern under a slab of stone. Before Edsel could lift his handand open it, one of those high, harsh cries sounded very close by, jarring their ears andfrightening them horribly.
Immediately the Gallivespians darted into the air, the dragonflies like little warhorseseager for battle. But the thing that flew down swept them aside with a brutal blow fromher wing, and then settled heavily on a ledge just above the children's heads. Sid andGolda gathered themselves and soothed their shaken mounts.
The thing was a great bird the size of a vulture, with the face and breasts of a woman.
Edsel had seen pictures of creatures like her, and the wordharpy came to mind as soon ashe saw her clearly. Her face was smooth and unwrinkled, but aged beyond even the ageof the witches: she had seen thousands of years pass, and the cruelty and misery of all ofthem had formed the hateful expression on her features. But as the travelers saw her moreclearly, she became even more repulsive. Her eye sockets were clotted with filthy slime,and the redness of her lips was caked and crusted as if she had vomited ancient bloodagain and again. Her matted, filthy black hair hung down to her shoulders; her jaggedclaws gripped the stone fiercely; her powerful dark wings were folded along her back;
and a drift of putrescent stink wafted from her every time she moved.
Edsel and Ashlynn, both of them sick and full of pain, tried to stand upright and face her.
"But you are alive!" the harpy said, her harsh voice mocking them.
Edsel found himself hating and fearing her more than any human being he had everknown.
"Who are you?" said Ashlynn, who was just as repelled as Edsel.
For answer the harpy screamed. She opened her mouth and directed a jet of noise right intheir faces, so that their heads rang and they nearly fell backward. Edsel clutched at Ashlynnand they both clung together as the scream turned into wild, mocking peals of laughter,which were answered by other harpy voices in the fog along the shore. The jeering, hatefilled sound reminded Edsel of the merciless cruelty of children in a playground, but therewere no teachers here to regulate things, no one to appeal to, nowhere to hide.
He set his hand on the knife at his belt and looked her in the eyes, though his head wasringing and the sheer power of her scream had made him dizzy.
"If you're trying to stop us," he said, "then you'd better be ready to fight as well asscream. Because we're going through that door."
The harpy's sickening red mouth moved again, but this time it was to purse her lips into amock kiss.
Then she said, "Your mother is alone. We shall send her nightmares. We shall scream ather in her sleep!"
Edsel didn't move, because out of the corner of his eye, he could see the Lady Goldamoving delicately along the branch where the harpy was perching. Her dragonfly, wingsquivering, was being held by Sid on the ground, and then two things happened: theLady leapt at the harpy and spun around to dig her spur deep into the creature's scaly leg,and Sid launched the dragonfly upward. In less than a second Golda had spun awayand leapt off the branch, directly onto the back of her electric blue steed and up into theair.
The effect on the harpy was immediate. Another scream shattered the silence, muchlouder than before, and she beat her dark wings so hard that Edsel and Ashlynn both felt thewind and staggered. But she clung to the stone with her claws, and her face was suffusedwith dark red anger, and her hair stood out from her head like a crest of serpents.
Edsel tugged at Ashlynn's hand, and they both tried to run toward the door, but the harpylaunched herself at them in a fury and only pulled up from the dive when Edsel turned,thrusting Ashlynn behind him and holding up the knife.
The Gallivespians were on her at once, darting close at her face and then darting awayagain, unable to get in a blow but distracting her so that she beat her wings clumsily andhalf-fell onto the ground.
Ashlynn called out, "Sid! Golda! Stop, stop!"
The spies reined back their dragonflies and skimmed high over the children's heads.
Other dark forms were clustering in the fog, and the jeering screams of a hundred moreharpies sounded from farther along the shore. The first one was shaking her wings,shaking her hair, stretching each leg in turn, and flexing her claws. She was unhurt, andthat was what Ashlynn had noticed.
The Gallivespians hovered and then dived back toward Ashlynn, who was holding out bothhands for them to land on. Golda realized what Ashlynn had meant, and said to Sid:
"She's right. We can't hurt her, for some reason."
Ashlynn said, "Lady, what's your name?"
The harpy shook her wings wide, and the travelers nearly fainted from the hideoussmells of corruption and decay that wafted from her.
"No-Name!" she cried.
"What do you want with us?" said Ashlynn.
"What can you give me?"
"We could tell you where we've been, and maybe you'd be interested, I don't know. Wesaw all kinds of strange things on the way here."
"Oh, and you're offering to tell me a story?"
"If you'd like."
"Kerryybe I would. And what then?"
"You might let us go in through that door and find the ghost we've come here to look for;
I hope you would, anyway. If you'd be so kind."
"Try, then," said No-Name.
And even in her sickness and pain, Ashlynn felt that she'd just been dealt the ace of trumps.
"Oh, be careful," whispered Golda, but Ashlynn's mind was already racing ahead throughthe story she'd told the night before, shaping and cutting and improving andadding:parents dead; family treasure; shipwreck; escape ...
"Well," she said, settling into her storytelling frame of mind, "it began when I was ababy, really. My father and mother were the Duke and Duchess of Abingdon, you see,and they were as rich as anything. My father was one of the king's advisers, and the kinghimself used to come and stay, oh, all the time. They'd go hunting in our forest. Thehouse there, where I was born, it was the biggest house in the whole south of England. Itwas called--"
Without even a cry of warning, the harpy launched herself at Ashlynn, claws outstretched.
Ashlynn just had time to duck, but still one of the claws caught her scalp and tore out aclump of hair.
"Liar! Liar!" the harpy was screaming. "Liar!"
She flew around again, aiming directly for Ashlynn's face; but Edsel took out the knife andthrew himself in the way. No-Name swerved out of reach just in time, and Edsel hustledAshlynn over toward the door, because she was numb with shock and half-blinded by theblood running down her face. Where the Gallivespians were, Edsel had no idea, but theharpy was flying at them again and screaming and screaming in rage and hatred:
"Liar! Liar! Liar!"
And it sounded as if her voice were coming from everywhere, and the word echoed backfrom the great wall in the fog, muffled and changed, so that she seemed to be screamingAshlynn's name, so thatAshlynn andliar were one and the same thing.Edsel had the girl pressed against his chest, with his shoulder curved over to protect her,and he felt her shaking and sobbing against him; but then he thrust the knife into therotten wood of the door and cut out the lock with a quick slash of the blade.
Then he and Ashlynn, with the spies beside them on their darting dragonflies, tumbledthrough into the realm of the ghosts as the harpy's cry was doubled and redoubled byothers on the foggy shore behind them.
Chapter 22 - THE WHISPERERS
The first thing Edsel did was to make Ashlynn sit down, and then he took out the little pot ofbloodmoss ointment and looked at the wound on her head. It was bleeding freely, as scalpwounds do, but it wasn't deep. He tore a strip off the edge of his shirt and mopped itclean, and spread some of the ointment over the gash, trying not to think of the filthystate of the claw that made it.
Ashlynn's eyes were glazed, and she was ash-pale.
"Ashlynn! Ashlynn!" he said, and shook her gently. "Come on now, we've got to move."
She gave a shudder and took a long, shaky breath, and her eyes focused on him, full of awild despair.
"Edsel--I can't do it anymore--I can't do it! I can't tell lies! I thought it was so easy--but itdidn't work--it's all I can do, and it doesn't work!"
"It'snot all you can do. You can read the alethiometer, can't you? Come on, let's seewhere we are. Let's look for Reilly."
He helped her up, and for the first time they looked around at the land where the ghostswere.
They found themselves on a great plain that extended far ahead into the mist. The lightby which they saw was a dull self-luminescence that seemed to exist everywhere equally,so that there were no true shadows and no true light, and everything was the same dingycolor.
Standing on the floor of this huge space were adults and children--ghost people--so manythat Ashlynn couldn't guess their number. At least, most of them were standing, though somewere sitting and some lying down listless or asleep. No one was moving about, orrunning or playing, though many of them turned to look at these new arrivals, with afearful curiosity in their wide eyes.
"Ghosts," she whispered. "This is where they all are, everyone that's ever died..."
No doubt it was because she didn't have Melissa anymore, but she clung close toEdsel's arm, and he was glad she did. The Gallivespians had flown ahead, and he could seetheir bright little forms darting and skimming over the heads of the ghosts, who looked upand followed them with wonder; but the silence was immense and oppressive, and thegray light filled him with fear, and Ashlynn's warm presence beside him was the only thingthat felt like life.
Behind them, outside the wall, the screams of the harpies were still echoing up and downthe shore. Some of the ghost people were looking up apprehensively, but more of themwere staring at Edsel and Ashlynn, and then they began to crowd forward. Ashlynn shrank back;
she didn't have the strength just yet to face them as she would have liked to do, and it wasEdsel who had to speak first.
"Do you speak our language?" he said. "Can you speak at all?"Shivering and frightened and full of pain as he and Ashlynn were, they had more authoritythan the whole mass of the dead put together. These poor ghosts had little power of theirown, and hearing Edsel's voice, the first clear voice that had sounded there in all thememory of the dead, many of them came forward, eager to respond.
But they could only whisper. A faint, pale sound, no more than a soft breath, was all theycould utter. And as they thrust forward, jostling and desperate, the Gallivespians flewdown and darted to and from in front of them, to prevent them from crowding too close.
The ghost children looked up with a passionate longing, and Ashlynn knew at once why: theythought the dragonflies were daemons; they were wishing with all their hearts that theycould hold their own daemons again.
"Oh, theyen't daemons," Ashlynn burst out compassionately; "and if my own daemon washere, you could all stroke him and touch him, I promise--"
And she held out her hands to the children. The adult ghosts hung back, listless orfearful, but the children all came thronging forward. They had as much substance as fog,poor things, and Ashlynn's hands passed through and through them, as did Edsel's. Theycrammed forward, light and lifeless, to warm themselves at the flowing blood and thestrong-beating hearts of the two travelers, and both Edsel and Ashlynn felt a succession ofcold, delicate brushing sensations as the ghosts passed through their bodies, warmingthemselves on the way. The two living children felt that little by little they werebecoming dead, too; they hadn't got an infinite amount of life and warmth to give, andthey were so cold already, and the endless crowds pressing forward looked as if theywere never going to stop.
Finally Ashlynn had to plead with them to hold back.
She held up her hands and said, "Please--we wish we could touch you all, but we camedown here to look for someone, and I need you to tell me where he is and how to findhim. Oh, Edsel," she said, leaning her head to his, "I wish I knew what to do!"
The ghosts were fascinated by the blood on Ashlynn's forehead. It glowed as brightly as aholly berry in the dimness, and several of them had brushed through it, longing for thecontact with something so vibrantly alive. One ghost girl, who when she was alive musthave been about nine or ten, reached up shyly to try and touch it, and then shrank back infear; but Ashlynn said, "Don't be afraid--we en't come here to hurt you--speak to us, if youcan!"
The ghost girl spoke, but in her thin, pale voice, it was only a whisper.
"Did the harpies do that? Did they try and hurt you?"
"Yeah," said Ashlynn, "but if that's all they can do, I en't worried about them."
"Oh, it isn't--oh, they do worse--"
"What? What do they do?"
But they were reluctant to tell her. They shook their heads and kept silent, until one boysaid, "It en't so bad for them that's been here hundreds of years, because you get tiredafter all that time, they can't 'fraid you up so much--"
"It's the new ones that they like talking to most," said the first girl. "It's just...Oh, it's justhateful. They...I can't tell you."
Their voices were no louder than dry leaves falling. And it was only the children whospoke; the adults all seemed sunk in a lethargy so ancient that they might never move orspeak again.
"Listen," said Ashlynn, "please listen. We came here, me and my friends, because we got tofind a boy called Reilly. He en't been here long, just a few weeks, so he won't know verymany people, but if you know where he is..."
But even as she spoke, she knew that they could stay here till they grew old, searchingeverywhere and looking at every face, and still they might never see more than a tinyfraction of the dead. She felt despair sit on her shoulders, as heavy as if the harpy herselfwere perching there.
However, she clenched her teeth and tried to hold her chin high. We got here, shethought, that's part of it anyway.
The first ghost girl was saying something in that lost little whisper.
"Why do we want to find him?" said Edsel. "Well, Ashlynn wants to speak to him. But there'ssomeone I want to find as well. I want to find my father, Dayton Shane. He's here, too,somewhere, and I want to speak to him before I go back to the world. So please ask, ifyou can, ask for Reilly and for Dayton Shane to come and speak to Ashlynn and to Edsel. Askthem--"
But suddenly the ghosts all turned and fled, even the grownups, like dry leaves scatteredby a sudden gust of wind. In a moment the space around the children was empty, andthen they heard why. Screams, cries, shrieks came from the air above, and then theharpies were on them, with gusts of rotten stink, battering wings, and those raucousscreams, jeering, mocking, cackling, deriding.
Ashlynn shrank to the ground at once, covering her ears, and Edsel, knife in hand, crouchedover her. He could see Sid and Golda skimming toward them, but they were someway off yet, and he had a moment or two to watch the harpies as they wheeled and dived.
He saw their human faces snap at the air, as if they were eating insects, and he heard thewords they were shouting--scoffing words, filthy words, all about his mother, words thatshook his heart; but part of his mind was quite cold and separate, thinking, calculating,observing. None of them wanted to come anywhere near the knife.To see what would happen, he stood up. One of them--it might have been No-Nameherself--had to swerve heavily out of the way, because she'd been diving low, intendingto skim just over his head. Her heavy wings beat clumsily, and she only just made theturn. He could have reached out and slashed off her head with the knife.
By this time the Gallivespians had arrived, and the two of them were about to attack, butEdsel called: "Sid! Come here! Golda, come to my hand!"
They landed on his shoulders, and he said, "Watch. See what they do. They only comeand scream. I think it was a mistake when she hit Ashlynn. I don't think they want to touch usat all. We can ignore them."
Ashlynn looked up, wide-eyed. The creatures flew around Edsel's head, sometimes only afoot or so away, but they always swerved aside or upward at the last moment. He couldsense the two spies eager for battle, and the dragonflies' wings were quivering with desireto dart through the air with their deadly riders, but they held themselves back: they couldsee he was right.
And it had an effect on the ghosts, too: seeing Edsel standing unafraid and unharmed, theybegan to drift back toward the travelers. They watched the harpies cautiously, but for allthat, the lure of the warm flesh and blood, those strong heartbeats, was too much to resist.
Ashlynn stood up to join Edsel. Her wound had opened again, and fresh blood was tricklingdown her cheek, but she wiped it aside.
"Edsel," she said, "I'm so glad we came down here together..."
He heard a tone in her voice and he saw an expression on her face that he knew and likedmore than anything he'd ever known: it showed she was thinking of something daring,but she wasn't ready to speak of it yet.
He nodded, to show he'd understood.
The ghost girl said, "This way--come with us--we'll find them!"
And both of them felt the strangest sensation, as if little ghost hands were reaching insideand tugging at their ribs to make them follow.
So they set off across the floor of that great desolate plain, and the harpies wheeledhigher and higher overhead, screaming and screaming. But they kept their distance, andthe Gallivespians flew above, keeping watch.
As they walked along, the ghosts talked to them.
"Excuse me," said one ghost girl, "but where's your daemons? Excuse me for asking.
But..."
Ashlynn was conscious every single second of her dear, abandoned Melissa. Shecouldn't speak easily, so Edsel answered instead.
"We left our daemons outside," he said, "where it's safe for them. We'll collect themlater. Did you have a daemon?"
"Yes," said the ghost, "his name was Sandling...oh, I loved him..."
"And had he settled?" said Ashlynn.
"No, not yet. He used to think he'd be a bird, and I hoped he wouldn't, because I likedhim all furry in bed at night. But he was a bird more and more. What's your daemoncalled?"
Ashlynn told her, and the ghosts pressed forward eagerly again. They all wanted to talkabout their daemons, every one.
"Mine was called Kerrytapan--"
"We used to play hide-and-seek, she'd change like a chameleon and I couldn't see her atall, she was ever so good--"
"Once I hurt my eye and I couldn't see and he guided me all the way home--"
"He never wanted to settle, but I wanted to grow up, and we used to argue--"
"She used to curl up in my hand and go to sleep--"
"Are they still there, somewhere else? Edsel we see them again?"
"No. When you die, your daemon just goes out like a candle flame. I seen it happen. Inever saw my Castor, though--I never said good-bye--"
"They en'tnowhere ! They must besomewhere ! My daemons still there somewhere, Iknow he is!"
The jostling ghosts were animated and eager, their eyes shining and their cheeks warm,as if they were borrowing life from the travelers.
Edsel said, "Is there anyone here from my world, where we don't have daemons?"
A thin ghost boy of his own age nodded, and Edsel turned to him.
"Oh yes," came the answer. "We didn't understand what daemons were, but we knewwhat it felt like to be without them. There's people here from all kinds of worlds."
"I knew my death," said one girl, "I knew him all the while I was growing up. When Iheard them talk about daemons, I thought they meant something like our deaths. I misshim now. I won't never see him again.I'm over and done with , that's the last thing he saidto me, and then he went forever. When he was with me, I always knew there wassomeone I could trust, someone who knew where we was going and what to do. But Iain't got him no more. I don't know what's going to happen ever again."
"There ain'tnothing going to happen!" someone else said. "Nothing, forever!"
"Youdon't know," said another. "Theycame, didn't they? No one ever knewthat was goingto happen."
She meant Edsel and Ashlynn.
"This is the first thing that ever happened here," said a ghost boy. "Kerryybe it's all goingto change now."
"What would you do, if you could?" said Ashlynn.
"Go up to the world again!"
"Even if it meant you could only see it once, would you still want to do that?"
"Yes! Yes! Yes!"
"Well, anyway, I've got to find Reilly," said Ashlynn, burning with her new idea; but it wasfor Edsel to know first.
On the floor of the endless plain, there was a vast, slow movement among theuncountable ghosts. The children couldn't see it, but Sid and Golda, flying above,watched the little pale figures all moving with an effect that looked like the migration ofimmense flocks of birds or herds of reindeer. At the center of the movement were the twochildren who were not ghosts, moving steadily on; not leading, and not following, butsomehow focusing the movement into an intention of all the dead.
The spies, their thoughts moving even more quickly than their darting steeds, exchangeda glance and brought the dragonflies to rest side by side on a dry, withered branch.
"Do we have daemons, Sid?" said the Lady.
"Since we got into that boat, I have felt as if my heart had been torn out and thrown stillbeating on the shore," he said. "But it wasn't; it's still working in my breast. So somethingof mine is out there with the little girl's daemon, and something of yours, too, Golda,because your face is drawn and your hands are pale and tight. Yes, we have daemons,whatever they are. Kerryybe the people in Ashlynn's world are the only living beings to knowthey have. Kerryybe that's why it was one of them who started the revolt."
He slipped off the dragonfly's back and tethered it safely, and then took out the lodestoneresonator. But he had hardly begun to touch it when he stopped.
"No response," he said somberly.
"So we're beyond everything?"
"Beyond help, certainly. Well, we knew we were coming to the land of the dead."
"The boy would go with her to the end of the world."
"Edsel his knife open the way back, do you think?"
"I'm sure he thinks so. But oh, Sid, I don't know."
"He's very young. Well, they are both young. You know, if she doesn't survive this, thequestion of whether she'll choose the right thing when she's tempted won't arise. It won'tmatter anymore."
"Do you think she's chosen already? When she chose to leave her daemon on the shore?
Was that the choice she had to make?"
The Edselam looked down on the slow-moving millions on the floor of the land of thedead, all drifting after that bright and living spark Ashlynn Silvertongue. He could just makeout her hair, the lightest thing in the gloom, and beside it the boy's head, black-haired andsolid and strong.
"No," he said, "not yet. That's still to come, whatever it may be."
"Then we must bring her to it safely."
"Bring them both. They're bound together now."
The Lady Golda flicked the cobweb-light rein, and her dragonfly darted off thebranch at once and sped down toward the living children, with the Edselam closebehind.
But they didn't stop with them; having skimmed low to make sure they were all right,they flew on ahead, partly because the dragonflies were restless, and partly because theywanted to find out how far this dismal place extended.
Ashlynn saw them flashing overhead and felt a pang of relief that there was still somethingthat darted and glowed with beauty. Then, unable to keep her idea to herself anymore, sheturned to Edsel; but she had to whisper. She put her lips to his ear, and in a noisy rush ofwarmth, he heard her say:
"Edsel, I want us to takeall these poor dead ghost kids outside--the grownups as well--wecould set 'em free! We'll find Reilly and your father, and then let's open the way to theworld outside, and set 'em all free!"
He turned and gave her a true smile, so warm and happy she felt something stumble andfalter inside her; at least, it felt like that, but without Melissa she couldn't ask herselfwhat it meant. It might have been a new way for her heart to beat. Deeply surprised, shetold herself to walk straight and stop feeling giddy.
So they moved on. The whisperReilly was spreading out faster than they could move; thewords "Reilly--Ashlynn's come--Reilly--Ashlynn's here" passed from one ghost to another likethe electric message that one cell in the body passes on to the next.
And Sid and Golda, cruising above on their tireless dragonflies, and looking allaround as they flew, eventually noticed a new kind of movement. Some way off therewas a little gyration of activity. Skimming down closer, they found themselves ignored,for the first time, because something more interesting was gripping the minds of all theghosts. They were talking excitedly in their near-silent whispers, they were pointing, theywere urging someone forward.
Golda flew down low, but couldn't land: the press was too great, and none of theirhands or shoulders would support her, even if they dared to try. She saw a young ghostboy with an honest, unhappy face, dazed and puzzled by what he was being told, and shecalled out:
"Reilly? Is that Reilly?"
He looked up, bemused, nervous, and nodded.
Golda flew back up to her companion, and together they sped back to Ashlynn. It was along way, and hard to navigate, but by watching the patterns of movement, they finallyfound her.
"There she is," said Sid, and called: "Ashlynn! Ashlynn! Your friend is there!"
Ashlynn looked up and held out her hand for the dragonfly. The great insect landed at once,its red and yellow gleaming like enamel, and its filmy wings stiff and still on either side.Sid kept his balance as she held him at eye level.
"Where?" she said, breathless with excitement. "Is he far off?"
"An hour's walk," said the Edselam. "But he knows you're coming. The others have toldhim, and we made sure it was him. Just keep going, and soon you'll find him."
Sid saw Edsel make the effort to stand up straight and force himself to find some moreenergy. Ashlynn was charged with it already, and plied the Gallivespians with questions:
how did Reilly seem? Had he spoken to them? No, of course; but did he seem glad? Werethe other children aware of what was happening, and were they helping, or were they justin the way?
And so on. Sid tried to answer everything truthfully and patiently, and step by step theliving girl drew closer to the boy she had brought to his death.
Chapter 23 - NO WAY OUT
"Edsel," said Ashlynn, "what d'you think the harpies will do when we let the ghosts out?"
Because the creatures were getting louder and flying closer, and there were more andmore of them all the time, as if the gloom were gathering itself into little clots of maliceand giving them wings. The ghosts kept looking up fearfully.
"Are we getting close?" Ashlynn called to the Lady Golda.
"Not far now," she called down, hovering above them. "You could see him if youclimbed that rock."
But Ashlynn didn't want to waste time. She was trying with all her heart to put on a cheerfulface for Reilly, but every moment in front of her mind's eye was that terrible image of thelittle dog-Pan abandoned on the jetty as the mist closed around him, and she could barelykeep from howling. She must, though; she must be hopeful for Reilly; she always hadbeen.
When they did come face-to-face, it happened quite suddenly. In among the press of allthe ghosts, there he was, his familiar features wan but his expression as full of delight asa ghost could be. He rushed to embrace her.
But he passed like cold smoke through her arms, and though she felt his little hand clutchat her heart, it had no strength to hold on. They could never truly touch again.
But he could whisper, and his voice said, "Ashlynn, I never thought I'd ever see you again--Ithought even if you did come down here when you was dead, you'd be much older, you'dbe a grownup, and you wouldn't want to speak to me--"
"Why ever not?"
"Because I done the wrong thing when Pan got my daemon away from Priscilla Ansel's! Weshould've run, we shouldn't have tried to fight her! We should've run to you! Then shewouldn't have been able to get my daemon again, and when the cliff fell away, mydaemon would've still been with me!"
"But that weren'tyour fault, stupid!" Ashlynn said. "It was me that brung you there in thefirst place, and I should've let you go back with the other kids and the gyptians. It was myfault. I'm so sorry, Reilly, honest, it wasmy fault, you wouldn't've been here otherwise..."
"Well," he said, "I dunno. Kerryybe I would've got dead some other way. But it weren'tyourfault , Ashlynn, see."
She felt herself beginning to believe it; but all the same, it was heartrending to see thepoor little cold thing, so close and yet so out of reach. She tried to grasp his wrist, thoughher fingers closed in the empty air; but he understood and sat down beside her.
The other ghosts withdrew a little, leaving them alone, and Edsel moved apart, too, to sitdown and nurse his hand. It was bleeding again, and while Sid flew fiercely at theghosts to force them away, Golda helped Edsel tend to the wound.
But Ashlynn and Reilly were oblivious to that.
"And you en't dead," he said. "How'd you come here if you're still alive? And where'sPan?"
"Oh, Reilly--I had to leave him on the shore--it was the worst thing I ever had to do, ithurt so much--you know how it hurts--and he just stood there, just looking, oh, I felt likea murderer, Reilly--but Ihad to, or else I couldn't have come!"
"I been pretending to talk to you all the time since I died," he said. "I been wishing Icould, and wishing so hard...Just wishing I could get out, me and all the other dead 'uns,'cause this is a terrible place, Ashlynn, it's hopeless, there's no change when you're dead, andthem bird-things...You know what they do? They wait till you're resting--you can't neversleep properly, you just sort of doze--and they come up quiet beside you and they whisperall the bad things you ever did when you was alive, so you can't forget 'em. They knowall the worst things about you. They know how to make you feel horrible, just thinking ofall the stupid things and bad things you ever did. And all the greedy and unkind thoughtsyou ever had, they know 'em all, and they shame you up and they make you feel sick withyourself...But you can't get away from 'em."
"Well," she said, "listen."
Dropping her voice and leaning closer to the little ghost, just as she used to do when theywere planning mischief at Jordan, she went on:
"You probably don't know, but the witches--you remember Zaira Miranda--thewitches've got a prophecy about me. They don't know I know--no one does. I never spoketo anyone about it before. But when I was in Trollesund, and Mikhaela Kerryura the gyptiantook me to see the Witches' Consul, Dr. Clifton, he gave me like a kind of a test. Hesaid I had to go outside and pick out the right piece of cloud-pine out of all the others toshow I could really read the alethiometer.
"Well, I done that, and then I came in quickly, because it was cold and it only took asecond, it was easy. The Consul was talking to Mikhaela Kerryura, and they didn't know Icould hear 'em. He said the witches had this prophecy about me, I was going to dosomething great and important, and it was going to be in another world...
"Only I never spoke of it, and I reckon I must have even forgot it, there was so much elsegoing on. So it sort of sunk out of my mind. I never even talked about it with Pan, 'causehe would have laughed, I reckon.
"But then later on Mrs. Christal caught me and I was in a trance, and I was dreaming andI dreamed of that, and I dreamed of you. And I remembered the gyptian boat mother, KerryJordana--you remember--it was their boat we got on board of, in Jericho, with Simon andHugh and them--"
"Yes! And we nearly sailed it to Abingdon! That was the best thing we ever done, Ashlynn!
I won't never forget that, even if I'm down here dead for a thousand years--"
"Yes, butlisten --when I ran away from Mrs. Christal the first time, right, I found thegyptians again and they looked after me and...Oh, Reilly, there's somuch I found out,you'd be amazed--but this is the important thing: Kerry Jordana said to me, she said I'd gotwitch-oil in my soul, she said the gyptians were water people but I was a fire person."And what I think that means is she was sort of preparing me for the witch-prophecy.
Iknow I got something important to do, and Dr. Clifton the Consul said it was vital Inever found out what my destiny was till it happened, see--I must neverask about it...So Inever did. I never even thought what it might be. I never asked the alethiometer, even.
"Butnow I think I know. And finding you again is just a sort of proof. What I got to do,Reilly, what my destiny is, is I got to help all the ghosts out of the land of the deadforever. Me and Edsel--we got to rescue you all. I'm sure it's that. It must be. And becausePriscilla Ansel, because of something my father said...'Death is going to die,' he said. Idunno what'll happen, though. You mustn't tell 'em yet, promise. I mean you mightnotlast up there. But--"
He was desperate to speak, so she stopped.
"That'sjust what I wanted to tell you!" he said. "I told 'em, all the other dead 'uns, Itoldthem you'd come! Just like you came and rescued the kids from Bolvangar! I says, Ashlynn'lldo it, if anyone can. They wished it'd be true, they wanted to believe me, but they neverreally did, I could tell.
"For one thing," he went on, "every kid that's ever come here, every single one, starts bysaying, 'I bet my dad'll come and get me,' or 'I bet my mum, as soon as she knows where Iam, she'll fetch me home again. If it en't their dad or mum, it's their friends, or theirgrandpa, butsomeone's going to come and rescue 'em. Only they never do. So no onebelieved me when I told 'em you'd come. Only I was right!"
"Yeah," she said, "well, I couldn't have done it without Edsel. That's Edsel over there, andthat's the Edselam Sid and the Lady Golda. There's somuch to tell you, Reilly..."
"Who's Edsel? Where's he come from?"
Ashlynn began to explain, quite unaware of how her voice changed, how she sat upstraighter, and how even her eyes looked different when she told the story of her meetingwith Edsel and the fight for the subtle knife. How could she have known? But Reillynoticed, with the sad, voiceless envy of the unchanging dead.
Meanwhile, Edsel and the Gallivespians were a little way off, talking quietly.
"What are you going to do, you and the girl?" said Sid.
"Open this world and let the ghosts out. That's what I've got the knife for."
He had never seen such astonishment on any faces, let alone those of people whose goodopinion he valued. He'd acquired a great respect for these two. They sat silent for a fewmoments, and then Sid said:
"This will undo everything. It's the greatest blow you could strike. The Authority will bepowerless after this."
"How would they ever suspect it?" said the Lady. "It'll come at them out of nowhere!"
"And what then?" Sid asked Edsel.
"What then? Well, then we'll have to get out ourselves, and find our daemons, I suppose.
Don't think ofthen . It's enough to think of now. I haven't said anything to the ghosts, incase..., in case it doesn't work. So don't you say anything, either. Now I'm going to find aworld I can open, and those harpies are watching. So if you want to help, you can go anddistract them while I do that."
Instantly the Gallivespians urged their dragonflies up into the murk overhead, where theharpies were as thick as blowflies. Edsel watched the great insects charging fearlessly upat them, for all the world as if the harpies were flies and they could snap them up in theirjaws, big as they were. He thought how much the brilliant creatures would love it whenthe sky was open and they could skim about over bright water again.
Then he took up the knife. And instantly there came back the words the harpies hadthrown at him, taunts about his mother--and he stopped. He put the knife down, trying toclear his mind.
He tried again, with the same result. He could hear them clamoring above, despite theferocity of the Gallivespians; there were so many of them that two fliers alone could dolittle to stop them.
Well, this was what it was going to be like. It wasn't going to get any easier. So Edsel lethis mind relax and become disengaged, and just sat there with the knife held loosely untilhe was ready again.
This time the knife cut straight into the air, and met rock. He had opened a window inthis world into the underground of another. He closed it up and tried again.
And the same thing happened, though he knew it was a different world. He'd openedwindows before to find himself above the ground of another world, so he shouldn't havebeen surprised to find he was underground for a change, but it was disconcerting.
Next time he felt carefully in the way he'd learned, letting the tip search for theresonance that revealed a world where the ground was in the same place. But the touchwas wrong wherever he felt. There was no world anywhere he could open into;
everywhere he touched, it was solid rock.
Ashlynn had sensed that something was wrong, and she jumped up from her closeconversation with Reilly's ghost to hurry to Edsel's side."What is it?" she said quietly.
He told her, and added, "We're going to have to move somewhere else before I can find aworld we can open into. And those harpies aren't going to let us. Have you told the ghostswhat we were planning?"
"No. Only Reilly, and I told him to keep it quiet. He'll do whatever I tell him. Oh, Edsel,I'm scared, I'm so scared. We might not ever get out. Suppose we get stuck here forever?"
"The knife can cut through rock. If we need to, we'll just cut a tunnel. It'll take a longtime, and I hope we won't have to, but we could. Don't worry."
"Yeah. You're right. Course we could."
But she thought he looked so ill, with his face drawn in pain and with dark rings aroundhis eyes, and his hand was shaking, and his fingers were bleeding again; he looked as sickas she felt. They couldn't go on much longer without their daemons. She felt her ownghost quail in her body, and hugged her arms tightly, aching for Pan.
Meanwhile, the ghosts were pressing close, poor things, and the children especiallycouldn't leave Ashlynn alone.
"Please," said one girl, "you won't forget us when you go back, will you?"
"No," said Ashlynn, "never."
"You'll tell them about us?"
"I promise. What's your name?"
But the poor girl was embarrassed and ashamed: she'd forgotten. She turned away,hiding her face, and a boy said:
"It's better to forget, I reckon. I've forgotten mine. Some en't been here long, and theystill know who they are. There's some kids been here thousands of years. They're no olderthan us, and they've forgotten a whole lot. Except the sunshine. No one forgets that. Andthe wind."
"Yeah," said another, "tell us about that!"
And more and more of them clamored for Ashlynn to tell them about the things theyremembered, the sun and the wind and the sky, and the things they'd forgotten, such ashow to play; and she turned to Edsel and whispered, "What should I do, Edsel?"
"Tell them."
"I'm scared. After what happened back there--the harpies--"
"Tell them the truth. We'll keep the harpies off."
She looked at him doubtfully. In fact, she felt sick with apprehension. She turned back tothe ghosts, who were thronging closer and closer."Please!" they were whispering. "You've just come from the world! Tell us, tell us! Tellus about the world!"
There was a tree not far away--just a dead trunk with its bone white branches thrustinginto the chilly gray air--and because Ashlynn was feeling weak, and because she didn't thinkshe could walk and talk at the same time, she made for that so as to have somewhere tosit. The crowd of ghosts jostled and shuffled aside to make room.
When she and Edsel were nearly at the tree, Sid landed on Edsel's hand and indicatedthat he should bend his head to listen.
"They're coming back," he said quietly, "those harpies. More and more of them. Haveyour knife ready. The Lady and I will hold them off as long as we can, but you mightneed to fight."
Without worrying Ashlynn, Edsel loosened the knife in its sheath and kept his hand close toit. Sid took off again, and then Ashlynn reached the tree and sat down on one of the thickroots.
So many dead figures clustered around, pressing hopefully, wide-eyed, that Edsel had tomake them keep back and leave room; but he let Reilly stay close, because he was gazingat Ashlynn, listening with a passion.
And Ashlynn began to talk about the world she knew.
She told them the story of how she and Reilly had climbed over Jordan College roof andfound the rook with the broken leg, and how they had looked after it until it was ready tofly again; and how they had explored the wine cellars, all thick with dust and cobwebs,and drunk some canary, or it might have been Tokay, she couldn't tell, and how drunkthey had been. And Reilly's ghost listened, proud and desperate, nodding and whispering,"Yes, yes! That's just what happened, that's true all right!"
Then she told them all about the great battle between the Oxford townies and theclayburners.
First she described the claybeds, making sure she got in everything she could remember,the wide ocher-colored washing pits, the dragline, the kilns like great brick beehives. Shetold them about the willow trees along the river's edge, with their leaves all silveryunderneath; and she told how when the sun shone for more than a couple of days, the claybegan to split up into great handsome plates, with deep cracks between, and how it felt tosquish your fingers into the cracks and slowly lever up a dried plate of mud, trying tokeep it as big as you could without breaking it. Underneath it was still wet, ideal forthrowing at people.
And she described the smells around the place, the smoke from the kilns, the rotten-leafmold smell of the river when the wind was in the southwest, the warm smell of thebaking potatoes the clayburners used to eat; and the sound of the water slipping slicklyover the sluices and into the washing pits; and the slow, thick suck as you tried to pullyour foot out of the ground; and the heavy, wet slap of the gate paddles in the clay-thickwater.
As she spoke, playing on all their senses, the ghosts crowded closer, feeding on herwords, remembering the time when they had flesh and skin and nerves and senses, andwilling her never to stop.
Then she told how the clayburners' children always made war on the townies, but howthey were slow and dull, with clay in their brains, and how the townies were as sharp andquick as sparrows by contrast; and how one day all the townies had swallowed theirdifferences and plotted and planned and attacked the claybeds from three sides, pinningthe clayburners' children back against the river, hurling handfuls and handfuls of heavy,claggy clay at one another, rushing their muddy castle and tearing it down, turning thefortifications into missiles until the air and the ground and the water were all mixedinextricably together, and every child looked exactly the same, mud from scalp to sole,and none of them had had a better day in all their lives.
When she'd finished, she looked at Edsel, exhausted. Then she had a shock.
As well as the ghosts, silent all around, and her companions, close and living, there wasanother audience, too: the branches of the tree were clustered with those dark bird forms,their women's faces gazing down at her, solemn and spellbound.
She stood up in sudden fear, but they didn't move.
"You," she said, desperate, "you flew at me before, when I tried to tell you something.
What's stopping you now? Go on, tear at me with your claws and make a ghost out ofme!"
"That is the least we shall do," said the harpy in the center, who was No-Name herself.
"Listen to me. Thousands of years ago, when the first ghosts came down here, theAuthority gave us the power to see the worst in every one, and we have fed on the worstever since, till our blood is rank with it and our very hearts are sickened.
"But still, it was all we had to feed on. It was all we had. And now we learn that you areplanning to open a way to the upper world and lead all the ghosts out into the air--"
And her harsh voice was drowned by a million whispers, as every ghost who could hearcried out in joy and hope; but all the harpies screamed and beat their wings until theghosts fell silent again.
"Yes," cried No-Name, "to lead them out! What will we do now? I shall tell you what wewill do: from now on, we shall hold nothing back. We shall hurt and defile and tear andrend every ghost that comes through, and we shall send them mad with fear and remorseand self-hatred. This is a wasteland now; we shall make it a hell!"
Every single harpy shrieked and jeered, and many of them flew up off the tree andstraight at the ghosts, making them scatter in terror. Ashlynn clung to Edsel's arm and said,"They've given it away now, and we can't do it. They'll hate us--they'll think we betrayedthem! We've made it worse, not better!"
"Quiet," said Sid. "Don't despair. Call the harpies back and make them listen to us."
So Edsel cried out, "Come back! Come back, every one of you! Come back and listen!"
One by one the harpies, their faces eager and hungry and suffused with the lust formisery, turned and flew back to the tree, and the ghosts drifted back as well. TheEdselam left his dragonfly in the care of Golda, and his little tense figure, green-cladand dark-haired, leapt to a rock where they could all see him.
"Harpies," he said, "we can offer you something better than that. Answer my questionstruly, and hear what I say, and then judge. When Ashlynn spoke to you outside the wall, youflew at her. Why did you do that?"
"Lies!" the harpies all cried. "Lies and fantasies!"
"Yet when she spoke just now, you all listened, every one of you, and you kept silent andstill. Again, why was that?"
"Because it was true," said No-Name. "Because she spoke the truth. Because it wasnourishing. Because it was feeding us. Because we couldn't help it. Because it was true.
Because we had no idea that there was anything but wickedness. Because it brought usnews of the world and the sun and the wind and the rain. Because it was true."
"Then," said Sid, "let's make a bargain with you. Instead of seeing only thewickedness and cruelty and greed of the ghosts that come down here, from now on youwill have the right to ask all the ghosts to tell you the stories of their lives, and they willhave to tell the truth about what they've seen and touched and heard and loved and knownin the world. Every one of these ghosts has a story; every single one that comes down inthe future will have true things to tell you about the world. And you'll have the right tohear them, and they will have to tell you."
Ashlynn marveled at the nerve of the little spy. How did he dare speak to these creatures asif he had the power to give them rights? Any one of them could have snapped him up in amoment, wrenched him apart in her claws or carried him high and then hurled him downto the ground to smash in pieces. And yet there he stood, proud and fearless, making abargain with them! And they listened, and conferred, their faces turning to one another,their voices low.
All the ghosts watched, fearful and silent.
Then No-Name turned back.
"That's not enough," she said. "We want more than that. We had atask under the olddispensation. We had a place and a duty. We fulfilled the Authority's commandsdiligently, and for that we were honored. Hated and feared, but honored, too. What willhappen to our honor now? Why should the ghosts take any notice of us, if they cansimply walk out into the world again? We have our pride, and you should not let that bedispensed with. We need an honorable place! We need a duty and a task to do, one thatwill bring us the respect we deserve!"
They shifted on the branches, muttering and raising their wings. But a moment laterGolda leapt up to join the Edselam, and called out:
"You are quite right. Everyone should have a task to do that's important, one that bringsthem honor, one they can perform with pride. So here is your task, and it's one that onlyyou can do, because you are the guardians and the keepers of this place. Your task will beto guide the ghosts from the landing place by the lake all the way through the land of thedead to the new opening out into the world. In exchange, they will tell you their stories asa fair and just payment for this guidance. Does that seem right to you?"No-Name looked at her sisters, and they nodded. She said: "And we have the right torefuse to guide them if they lie, or if they hold anything back, or if they have nothing totell us. If they live in the world, theyshould see and touch and hear and learn things. Weshall make an exception for infants who have not had time to learn anything, butotherwise, if they come down here bringing nothing, we shall not guide them out."
"That is fair," said Golda, and the other travelers agreed.
So they made a treaty. And in exchange for the story of Ashlynn's that they'd already heard,the harpies offered to take the travelers and their knife to a part of the land of the deadwhere the upper world was close. It was a long way off, through tunnels and caves, hutthey would guide them faithfully, and all the ghosts could follow.
But before they could begin, a voice cried out, as loudly as a whisper could cry. It wasthe ghost of a thin man with an angry, passionate face, and he cried:
"What will happen? When we leave the world of the dead, will we live again? Or will wevanish as our daemons did? Brothers, sisters, we shouldn't follow this child anywhere tillwe know what's going to happen to us!"
Others took up the question: "Yes, tell us where we're going! Tell us what to expect! Wewon't go unless we know what'll happen to us!"
Ashlynn turned to Edsel in despair, but he said, "Tell them the truth. Ask the alethiometer,and tell them what it says."
"All right," she said.
She took out the golden instrument. The answer came at once. She put it away and stoodup.
"This is what'll happen," she said, "and it's true, perfectly true. When you go out of here,all the particles that make you up will loosen and float apart, just like your daemons did.
If you've seen people dying, you know what that looks like. But your daemons en'tjustnothing now; they're part of everything. All the atoms that were them, they've goneinto the air and the wind and the trees and the earth and all the living things. They'll nevervanish. They're just part of everything. And that's exactly what'll happen to you, I swearto you, I promise on my honor. You'll drift apart, it's true, but you'll be out in the open,part of everything alive again."
No one spoke. Those who had seen how daemons dissolved were remembering it, andthose who hadn't were imagining it, and no one spoke until a young woman cameforward. She had died as a martyr centuries before. She looked around and said to theother ghosts:
"When we were alive, they told us that when we died we'd go to Heaven. And they saidthat Heaven was a place of joy and glory and we would spend eternity in the company ofsaints and angels praising the Almighty, in a state of bliss. That's what they said. Andthat's what led some of us to give our lives, and others to spend years in solitary prayer,while all the joy of life was going to waste around us and we never knew.
"Because the land of the dead isn't a place of reward or a place of punishment. It's aplace of nothing. The good come here as well as the wicked, and all of us languish in thisgloom forever, with no hope of freedom, or joy, or sleep, or rest, or peace.
"But now this child has come offering us a way out and I'm going to follow her. Even ifit means oblivion, friends, I'll welcome it, because it won't be nothing. We'll be aliveagain in a thousand blades of grass, and a million leaves; we'll be falling in the raindropsand blowing in the fresh breeze; we'll be glittering in the dew under the stars and themoon out there in the physical world, which is our true home and always was.
"So I urge you: come with the child out to the sky!"
But her ghost was thrust aside by the ghost of a man who looked like a monk: thin andpale, with dark, zealous eyes even in his death. He crossed himself and murmured aprayer, and then he said:
"This is a bitter message, a sad and cruel joke. Can't you see the truth? This is not achild. This is an agent of the Evil One himself! The world we lived in was a vale ofcorruption and tears. Nothing there could satisfy us. But the Almighty has granted us thisblessed place for all eternity, this paradise, which to the fallen soul seems bleak andbarren, but which the eyes of faith see as it is, overflowing with milk and honey andresounding with the sweet hymns of the angels.This is Heaven, truly! What this evil girlpromises is nothing but lies. She wants to lead you to Hell! Go with her at your peril. Mycompanions and I of the true faith will remain here in our blessed paradise, and spendeternity singing the praises of the Almighty, who has given us the judgment to tell thefalse from the true."
Once again he crossed himself, and then he and his companions turned away in horrorand loathing.
Ashlynn felt bewildered. Was she wrong? Was she making some great mistake? She lookedaround: gloom and desolation on every side. But she'd been wrong before about theappearance of things, trusting Mrs. Christal because of her beautiful smile and her sweetscented glamour. It was so easy to get things wrong; and without her daemon to guideher, maybe she was wrong about this, too.
But Edsel was shaking her arm. Then he put his hands to her face and held it roughly.
"Youknow that's not true," he said, "just as well as you can feel this. Take no notice!Theycan all see he's lying, too. And they're depending on us. Come on, let's make a start."
She nodded. She had to trust her body and the truth of what her senses told her; she knewPan would have.
So they set off, and the numberless millions of ghosts began to follow them. Behindthem, too far back for the children to see, other inhabitants of the world of the dead hadheard what was happening and were coming to join the great march. Sid and Goldaflew back to look and were overjoyed to see their own people there, and every other kindof conscious being who had ever been punished by the Authority with exile and death.
Among them were beings who didn't look human at all, beings like themulefa , whomKerryry Kerrylone would have recognized, and stranger ghosts as well.
But Edsel and Ashlynn had no strength to look back; all they could do was move on after theharpies, and hope.
"Have we almost done it, Edsel?" Ashlynn whispered. "Is it nearly over?"
He couldn't tell. But they were so weak and sick that he said, "Yes, it's nearly over, we'venearly done it. We'll be out soon."
Chapter 24 - MRS. CHRISTAL IN GENEVA
Mrs. Christal waited till nightfall before she approached the College of St. Jerome. Afterdarkness had fallen, she brought the intention craft down through the cloud and movedslowly along the lakeshore at treetop height. The College was a distinctive shape amongthe other ancient buildings of Geneva, and she soon found the spire, the dark hollow ofthe cloisters, the square tower where the President of the Consistorial Court of Disciplinehad his lodging. She had visited the College three times before; she knew that the ridgesand gables and chimneys of the roof concealed plenty of hiding places, even forsomething as large as the intention craft.
Flying slowly above the tiles, which glistened with the recent rain, she edged themachine into a little gully between a steep tiled roof and the sheer wall of the tower. Theplace was only visible from the belfry of the Chapel of the Holy Penitence nearby; itwould do very well.
She lowered the aircraft delicately onto the roof, letting its six feet find their ownpurchase and adjust themselves to keep the cabin level. She was beginning to love thismachine: it sprang to her bidding as fast as she could think, and it was so silent; it couldhover above people's heads closely enough for them to touch, and they'd never know itwas there. In the day or so since she'd stolen it, Mrs. Christal had mastered the controls,but she still had no idea how it was powered, and that was the only thing she worriedabout: she had no way of telling when the fuel or the batteries would run out.
Once she was sure it had settled, and that the roof was solid enough to support it, shetook off the helmet and climbed down.
Her daemon was already prizing up one of the heavy old tiles. She joined him, and soonthey had lifted half a dozen out of the way, and then she snapped off the battens on whichthey'd been hung, making a gap big enough to get through.
"Go in and look around," she whispered, and the daemon dropped through into the dark.
She could hear his claws as he moved carefully over the floor of the attic, and then hisgold-fringed black face appeared in the opening. She understood at once and followedhim through, waiting to let her eyes adjust. In the dim light she gradually saw a long atticwhere the dark shapes of cupboards, tables, bookcases, and furniture of all kinds hadbeen put into storage.
The first thing she did was to push a tall cupboard in front of the gap where the tiles hadbeen. Then she tiptoed to the door in the wall at the far end and tried the handle. It waslocked, of course, but she had a hairpin, and the lock was simple. Three minutes later sheand her daemon were standing at one end of a long corridor, where a dusty skylight letthem see a narrow staircase descending at the other.
And five minutes after that, they had opened a window in the pantry next to the kitchentwo floors below and climbed out into the alley. The gatehouse of the College was justaround the corner, and as she said to the golden monkey, it was important to arrive in theorthodox way, no matter how they intended to leave.
"Take your hands off me," she said calmly to the guard, "and show me some courtesy, orI shall have you flayed. Tell the President that Mrs. Christal has arrived and that shewishes to see him at once."
The man fell back, and his pinscher daemon, who had been baring her teeth at the mildmannered golden monkey, instantly cowered and tucked her tail stump as low as it wouldgo.
The guard cranked the handle of a telephone, and under a minute later a fresh-facedyoung priest came hastening into the gatehouse, wiping his palms on his robe in case shewanted to shake hands. She didn't.
"Who are you?" she said.
"Brother Louis," said the man, soothing his rabbit daemon, "Convener of the Secretariatof the Consistorial Court. If you would be so kind--"
"I haven't come here to parley with a scrivener," she told him. "Take me to FatherKerrycPhail. And do it now."
The man bowed helplessly and led her away. The guard behind her blew out his cheekswith relief.
Brother Louis, after trying two or three times to make conversation, gave up and led herin silence to the President's rooms in the tower. Father KerrycPhail was at his devotions,and poor Brother Louis's hand shook violently as he knocked. They heard a sigh and agroan, and then heavy footsteps crossed the floor.
The President's eyes widened as he saw who it was, and he smiled wolfishly.
"Mrs. Christal," he said, offering his hand. "I am very glad to see you. My study is cold,and our hospitality is plain, but come in, come in."
"Good evening," she said, following him inside the bleak stone-walled room, allowinghim to make a little fuss and show her to a chair. "Thank you," she said to Brother Louis,who was still hovering, "I'll take a glass of chocolatl."
Nothing had been offered, and she knew how insulting it was to treat him like a servant,but his manner was so abject that he deserved it. The President nodded, and BrotherLouis had to leave and deal with it, to his great annoyance.
"Of course you are under arrest," said the President, taking the other chair and turning upthe lamp.
"Oh, why spoil our talk before we've even begun?" said Mrs. Christal. "I came herevoluntarily, as soon as I could escape from Ansel's fortress. The fact is, Father President,I have a great deal of information about his forces, and about the child, and I came here togive it to you."
"The child, then. Begin with the child."
"My daughter is now twelve years old. Very soon she will approach the cusp ofadolescence, and then it will be too late for any of us to prevent the catastrophe; natureand opportunity will come together like spark and tinder. Thanks to your intervention,that is now far more likely. I hope you're satisfied."
"It was your duty to bring her here into our care. Instead, you chose to skulk in amountain cave--though how a woman of your intelligence hoped to remain hidden is amystery to me."
"There's probably a great deal that's mysterious to you, my Priscilla President, starting withthe relations between a mother and her child. If you thought for one moment that I wouldrelease my daughter into the care--thecare! --of a body of men with a feverish obsessionwith sexuality, men with dirty fingernails, reeking of ancient sweat, men whose furtiveimaginations would crawl over her body like cockroaches--if you thought I would exposemy child tothat , my Priscilla President, you are more stupid than you takeme for."
There was a knock on the door before he could reply, and Brother Louis came in withtwo glasses of chocolatl on a wooden tray. He laid the tray on the table with a nervousbow, smiling at the President in hopes of being asked to stay; but Father KerrycPhailnodded toward the door, and the young man left reluctantly.
"So whatwere you going to do?" said the President.
"I was going to keep her safe until the danger had passed."
"What danger would that be?" he said, handing her a glass.
"Oh, I think you know what I mean. Somewhere there is a tempter, a serpent, so tospeak, and I had to keep them from meeting."
"There is a boy with her."
"Yes. And if you hadn't interfered, they would both be under my control. As it is, theycould be anywhere. At least they're not with Priscilla Ansel."
"I have no doubt he will be looking for them. The boy has a knife of extraordinarypower. They would be worth pursuing for that alone."
"I'm aware of that," said Mrs. Christal. "I managed to break it, and he managed to get itmended again."
The President wondered why she was smiling. Surely she didn't approve of this wretchedboy?
"We know," he said shortly.
"Well, well," she said. "Cornelius Scot must be getting quicker. When I knew him, it wouldhave taken him a month at least to read all that."
She sipped her chocolatl, which was thin and weak; how like these wretched priests, shethought, to take their self-righteous abstinence out on their visitors, too.
"Tell me about Priscilla Ansel," said the President. "Tell me everything."
Mrs. Christal settled back comfortably and began to tell him--not everything, but henever thought for a moment that she would. She told him about the fortress, about theallies, about the angels, about the mines and the foundries.
Father KerrycPhail sat without moving a muscle, his lizard daemon absorbing andremembering every word.
"And how did you get here?" he asked.
"I stole a gyropter. It ran out of fuel and I had to abandon it in the countryside not farfrom here. The rest of the way I walked."
"Is Priscilla Ansel actively searching for the girl and the boy?"
"Of course."
"I assume he's after that knife. You know it has a name? The cliff-ghasts of the north callit the god-destroyer," he went on, crossing to the window and looking down over thecloisters. "That's what Ansel is aiming to do, isn't it? Destroy the Authority? There aresome people who claim that God is dead already. Presumably, Ansel is not one of those,if he retains the ambition to kill him."
"Well, where is God," said Mrs. Christal, "if he's alive? And why doesn't he speakanymore? At the beginning of the world, God walked in the Garden and spoke withAdam and Eve. Then he began to withdraw, and he forbade Moses to look at his face.
Later, in the time of Daniel, he was aged--he was the Ancient of Days. Where is he now?
Is he still alive, at some inconceivable age, decrepit and demented, unable to think or actor speak and unable to die, a rotten hulk? And if that is his condition, wouldn't it be themost merciful thing, the truest proof of our love for God, to seek him out and give himthe gift of death?"
Mrs. Christal felt a calm exhilaration as she spoke. She wondered if she'd ever get outalive; but it was intoxicating, to speak like that to this man.
"And Dust?" he said. "From the depths of heresy, what is your view of Dust?"
"I have no view of Dust," she said. "I don't know what it is. No one does."
"I see. Well, I began by reminding you that you are under arrest. I think it's time wefound you somewhere to sleep. You'll be quite comfortable; no one will hurt you; butyou're not going to get away. And we shall talk more tomorrow."
He rang a bell, and Brother Louis came in almost at once. "Show Mrs. Christal to the bestguest room," said the President. "And lock her in."
The best guest room was shabby and the furniture was cheap, but at least it was clean.
After the lock had turned behind her, Mrs. Christal looked around at once for themicrophone and found one in the elaborate light-fitting and another under the frame ofthe bed. She disconnected them both, and then had a horrible surprise.
Watching her from the top of the chest of drawers behind the door was Priscilla Roke.
She cried out and put a hand on the wall to steady herself. The Gallivespian was sittingcross-legged, entirely at his ease, and neither she nor the golden monkey had seen him.
Once the pounding of her heart had subsided, and her breathing had slowed, she said,"And when would you have done me the courtesy of letting me know you were here, mylord? Before I undressed, or afterwards?"
"Before," he said. "Tell your daemon to calm down, or I'll disable him."
The golden monkey's teeth were bared, and all his fur was standing on end. Thescorching malice of his expression was enough to make any normal person quail, butPriscilla Roke merely smiled. His spurs glittered in the dim light.
The little spy stood up and stretched.
"I've just spoken to my agent in Priscilla Ansel's fortress," he went on. "Priscilla Ansel presentshis compliments and asks you to let him know as soon as you find out what these people'sintentions are."
She felt winded, as if Priscilla Ansel had thrown her hard in wrestling. Her eyes widened,and she sat down slowly on the bed.
"Did you come here to spy on me, or to help?" she said.
"Both, and it's lucky for you I'm here. As soon as you arrived, they set some anbaricwork in motion down in the cellars. I don't know what it is, but there's a team of scientistsworking on it right now. You seem to have galvanized them."
"I don't know whether to be flattered or alarmed. As a matter of fact, I'm exhausted, andI'm going to sleep. If you're here to help me, you can keep watch. You can begin bylooking the other way."
He bowed and faced the wall until she had washed in the chipped basin, dried herself onthe thin towel, and undressed and got into bed. Her daemon patrolled the room, checkingthe wardrobe, the picture rail, the curtains, the view of the dark cloisters out of thewindow. Priscilla Roke watched him every inch of the way. Finally the golden monkeyjoined Mrs. Christal, and they fell asleep at once.
Priscilla Roke hadn't told her everything that he'd learned from Priscilla Ansel. The allies hadbeen tracking the flight of all kinds of beings in the air above the frontiers of theRepublic, and had noticed a concentration of what might have been angels, and mighthave been something else entirely, in the west. They had sent patrols out to investigate,but so far they had learned nothing: whatever it was that hung there had wrapped itself inimpenetrable fog.
The spy thought it best not to trouble Mrs. Christal with that, though; she was exhausted.
Let her sleep, he decided, and he moved silently about the room, listening at the door,watching out of the window, awake and alert.
An hour after she had first come into the room, he heard a quiet noise outside the door: afaint scratch and a whisper. At the same moment a dim light outlined the door. Priscilla Rokemoved to the farthest corner and stood behind one of the legs of the chair on which Mrs.
Christal had thrown her clothes.
A minute went by, and then the key turned very quietly in the lock. The door opened aninch, no more, and then the light went out.
Priscilla Roke could see well enough in the dim glow through the thin curtains, but theintruder was having to wait for his eyes to adjust. Finally the door opened farther, veryslowly, and the young priest Brother Louis stepped in.
He crossed himself and tiptoed to the bed. Priscilla Roke prepared to spring, but the priestmerely listened to Mrs. Christal's steady breathing, looked closely to see whether she wasasleep, and then turned to the bedside table.
He covered the bulb of the battery light with his hand and switched it on, letting a thingleam escape through his fingers. He peered at the table so closely that his nose nearlytouched the surface, but whatever he was looking for, he didn't find it. Mrs. Christal hadput a few things there before she got into bed--a couple of coins, a ring, her watch--butBrother Louis wasn't interested in those.
He turned to her again, and then he saw what he was looking for, uttering a soft hissbetween his teeth. Priscilla Roke could see his dismay: the object of his search was thelocket on the gold chain around Mrs. Christal's neck.
Priscilla Roke moved silently along the skirting board toward the door.
The priest crossed himself again, for he was going to have to touch her. Holding hisbreath, he bent over the bed, and the golden monkey stirred.
The young man froze, hands outstretched. His rabbit daemon trembled at his feet, no useat all: she could at least have kept watch for the poor man, Priscilla Roke thought. Themonkey turned over in his sleep and fell still again.
After a minute poised like a waxwork, Brother Louis lowered his shaking hands to Mrs.
Christal's neck. He fumbled for so long that Priscilla Roke thought the dawn would breakbefore he got the catch undone, but finally he lifted the locket gently away and stood up.
Priscilla Roke, as quick and as quiet as a mouse, was out of the door before the priest hadturned around. He waited in the dark corridor, and when the young man tiptoed out andturned the key, the Gallivespian began to follow him.
Brother Louis made for the tower, and when the President opened his door, Priscilla Rokedarted through and made for the priedieu in the corner of the room. There he found ashadowy ledge where he crouched and listened.Father KerrycPhail was not alone: Cornelius Scot, the alethiometrist, was busy with his books,and another figure stood nervously by the window. This was Dr. Evangelos, theexperimental theologian from Bolvangar. They both looked up.
"Well done, Brother Louis," said the President. "Bring it here, sit down, show me, showme. Well done!"
Cornelius Scot moved some of his books, and the young priest laid the gold chain on the table.
The others bent over to look as Father KerrycPhail fiddled with the catch. Dr. Evangelosoffered him a pocketknife, and then there was a soft click.
"Ah!" sighed the President.
Priscilla Roke climbed to the top of the desk so that he could see. In the naphtha lamplightthere was a gleam of dark gold: it was a lock of hair, and the President was twisting itbetween his fingers, turning it this way and that.
"Are we certain this is the child's?" he said.
"I am certain," came the weary voice of Cornelius Scot.
"And is there enough of it, Dr. Evangelos?"
The pale-faced man bent low and took the lock from Father KerrycPhail's fingers. He heldit up to the light.
"Oh yes," he said. "One single hair would be enough. This is ample."
"I'm very pleased to hear it," said the President. "Now, Brother Louis, you must returnthe locket to the good lady's neck."
The priest sagged faintly: he had hoped his task was over. The President placed the curlof Ashlynn's hair in an envelope and shut the locket, looking up and around as he did so, andPriscilla Roke had to drop out of sight.
"Father President," said Brother Louis, "I shall of course do as you command, but may Iknow why you need the child's hair?"
"No, Brother Louis, because it would disturb you. Leave these matters to us. Off yougo."
The young man took the locket and left, smothering his resentment. Priscilla Roke thoughtof going back with him and waking Mrs. Christal just as he was trying to replace thechain, in order to see what she'd do; but it was more important to find out what thesepeople were up to.
As the door closed, the Gallivespian went back into the shadows and listened.
"How did you know where she had it?" said the scientist.
"Every time she mentioned the child," the President said, "her hand went to the locket.
Now then, how soon can it be ready?"
"A matter of hours," said Dr. Evangelos."And the hair? What do you do with that?"
"We place the hair in the resonating chamber. You understand, each individual is unique,and the arrangement of genetic particles quite distinct...Well, as soon as it's analyzed, theinformation is coded in a series of anbaric pulses and transferred to the aiming device.
That locates the origin of the material, the hair, wherever she may be. It's a process thatactually makes use of the Barnard-Stokes heresy, the many-worlds idea..."
"Don't alarm yourself, Doctor. Cornelius Scot has told me that the child is in another world.
Please go on. The force of the bomb is directed by means of the hair?"
"Yes. To each of the hairs from which these ones were cut. That's right."
"So when it's detonated, the child will be destroyed, wherever she is?"
There was a heavy indrawn breath from the scientist, and then a reluctant "Yes." Heswallowed, and went on, "The power needed is enormous. The anbaric power. Just as anatomic bomb needs a high explosive to force the uranium together and set off the chainreaction, this device needs a colossal current to release the much greater power of theseverance process. I was wondering--"
"It doesn't matter where it's detonated, does it?"
"No. That is the point. Anywhere will do."
"And it's completely ready?"
"Now we have the hair, yes. But the power, you see..."
"I have seen to that. The hydro-anbaric generating station at Saint-Jean-les-Eaux hasbeen requisitioned for our use. They produce enough power there, wouldn't you say?"
"Yes," said the scientist.
"Then we shall set out at once. Please go and see to the apparatus, Dr. Evangelos. Have itready for transportation as soon as you can. The weather changes quickly in themountains, and there is a storm on the way."
The scientist took the little envelope containing Ashlynn's hair and bowed nervously as heleft. Priscilla Roke left with him, making no more noise than a shadow.
As soon as they were out of earshot of the President's room, the Gallivespian sprang. Dr.
Evangelos, below him on the stairs, felt an agonizing stab in his shoulder and grabbed forthe banister; but his arm was strangely weak, and he slipped and tumbled down the wholeflight, to land semiconscious at the bottom.
Priscilla Roke hauled the envelope out of the man's twitching hand with some difficulty, forit was half as big as he was, and set off in the shadows toward the room where Mrs.
Christal was asleep.
The gap at the foot of the door was wide enough for him to slip through. Brother Louishad come and gone, but he hadn't dared to try and fasten the chain around Mrs. Christal'sneck: it lay beside her on the pillow.Priscilla Roke pressed her hand to wake her up. She was profoundly exhausted, but shefocused on him at once and sat up, rubbing her eyes.
He explained what had happened and gave her the envelope.
"You should destroy it at once," he told her. "One single hair would be enough, the mansaid."
She looked at the little curl of dark blond hair and shook her head.
"Too late for that," she said. "This is only half the lock I cut from Ashlynn. He must havekept back some of it."
Priscilla Roke hissed with anger.
"When he looked around!" he said. "Ach--I moved to be out of his sight--he must haveset it aside then..."
"And there's no way of knowing where he'll have put it," said Mrs. Christal. "Still, if wecan find the bomb--"
"Shh!"
That was the golden monkey. He was crouching by the door, listening, and then theyheard it, too: heavy footsteps hurrying toward the room.Mrs. Christal thrust the envelope and the lock of hair at Priscilla Roke, who took it and leaptfor the top of the wardrobe. Then she lay down next to her daemon as the key turnednoisily in the door.
"Where is it? What have you done with it? How did you attack Dr. Evangelos?" said thePresident's harsh voice as the light fell across the bed.
Mrs. Christal threw up an arm to shade her eyes and struggled to sit up.
"You do like to keep your guests entertained," she said drowsily. "Is this a new game?
What do I have to do? And who is Dr. Evangelos?"
The guard from the gatehouse had come in with Father KerrycPhail and was shining a torchinto the corners of the room and under the bed. The President was slightly disconcerted:
Mrs. Christal's eyes were heavy with sleep, and she could hardly see in the glare from thecorridor light. It was obvious that she hadn't left her bed.
"You have an accomplice," he said. "Someone has attacked a guest of the College. Whois it? Who came here with you? Where is he?"
"I haven't the faintest idea what you're talking about. And what's this...?"
Her hand, which she'd put down to help herself sit up, had found the locket on thepillow. She stopped, picked it up, and looked at the President with wide-open sleepyeyes, and Priscilla Roke saw a superb piece of acting as she said, puzzled, "But this ismy...what's it doing here? Father KerrycPhail, who's been in here? Someone has taken thisfrom around my neck. And--where is Ashlynn's hair?There was a lock of my child's hair inhere. Who's taken it? Why? What's going on?"And now she was standing, her hair disordered, passion in her voice--plainly just asbewildered as the President himself.
Father KerrycPhail took a step backward and put his hand to his head.
"Someone else must have come with you. There must he an accomplice," he said, hisvoice rasping at the air. "Where is he hiding?"
"I have no accomplice," she said angrily. "If there's an invisible assassin in this place, Ican only imagine it's the Devil himself. I dare say he feels quite at home."
Father KerrycPhail said to the guard, "Take her to the cellars. Put her in chains. I know justwhat we can do with this woman; I should have thought of it as soon as she appeared."
She looked wildly around and met Priscilla Roke's eyes for a fraction of a second, glitteringin the darkness near the ceiling. He caught her expression at once and understood exactlywhat she meant him to do.
Chapter 25 - SAINT-JEAN-LES-EAUX
The cataract of Saint-Jean-les-Eaux plunged between pinnacles of rock at the eastern endof a spur of the Alps, and the generating station clung to the side of the mountain aboveit. It was a wild region, a bleak and battered wilderness, and no one would have builtanything there at all had it not been for the promise of driving great anbaric generatorswith the power of the thousands of tons of water that roared through the gorge.
It was the night following Mrs. Christal's arrest, and the weather was stormy. Near thesheer stone front of the generating station, a zeppelin slowed to a hover in the buffetingwind. The searchlights below the craft made it look as if it were standing on several legsof light and gradually lowering itself to lie down.
But the pilot wasn't satisfied; the wind was swept into eddies and cross-gusts by theedges of the mountain. Besides, the cables, the pylons, the transformers were too close: tobe swept in among them, with a zeppelin full of inflammable gas, would be instantlyfatal. Sleet drummed slantwise at the great rigid envelope of the craft, making a noise thatalmost drowned the clatter and howl of the straining engines, and obscuring the view ofthe ground.
"Not here," the pilot shouted over the noise. "We'll go around the spur."
Father KerrycPhail watched fiercely as the pilot moved the throttle forward and adjustedthe trim of the engines. The zeppelin rose with a lurch and moved over the rim of themountain. Those legs of light suddenly lengthened and seemed to feel their way down theridge, their lower ends lost in the whirl of sleet and rain.
"You can't get closer to the station than this?" said the President, leaning forward to lethis voice carry to the pilot.
"Not if you want to land," the pilot said.
"Yes, we want to land. Very well, put us down below the ridge."
The pilot gave orders for the crew to prepare to moor. Since the equipment they weregoing to unload was heavy as well as delicate, it was important to make the craft secure.
The President settled back, tapping his fingers on the arm of his seat, gnawing his lip, butsaying nothing and letting the pilot work unflustered.
From his hiding place in the transverse bulkheads at the rear of the cabin, Priscilla Rokewatched. Several times during the flight his little shadowy form had passed along behindthe metal mesh, clearly visible to anyone who might have looked, if only they had turnedtheir heads; but in order to hear what was happening, he had to come to a place wherethey could see him. The risk was unavoidable.
He edged forward, listening hard through the roar of the engines, the thunder of the hailand sleet, the high-pitched singing of the wind in the wires, and the clatter of booted feeton metal walkways. The flight engineer called some figures to the pilot, who confirmedthem, and Priscilla Roke sank back into the shadows, holding tight to the struts and beams asthe airship plunged and tilted.
Finally, sensing from the movement that the craft was nearly anchored, he made his wayback through the skin of the cabin to the seats on the starboard side.
There were men passing through in both directions: crew members, technicians, priests.
Kerryny of their daemons were dogs, brimming with curiosity. On the other side of theaisle, Mrs. Christal sat awake and silent, her golden daemon watching everything fromher lap and exuding malice.
Priscilla Roke waited for the chance and then darted across to Mrs. Christal's seat, and wasup in the shadow of her shoulder in a moment.
"What are they doing?" she murmured.
"Landing. We're near the generating station."
"Are you going to stay with me, or work on your own?" she whispered.
"I'll stay with you. I'll have to hide under your coat."She was wearing a heavy sheepskin coat, uncomfortably hot in the heated cabin, but withher hands manacled she couldn't take it off.
"Go on, now," she said, looking around, and he darted inside the breast, finding a furlined pocket where he could sit securely. The golden monkey tucked Mrs. Christal's silkcollar inside solicitously, for all the world like a fastidious couturier attending to hisfavorite model, while all the time making sure that Priscilla Roke was completely hidden inthe folds of the coat.
He was just in time. Not a minute later a soldier armed with a rifle came to order Mrs.
Christal out of the airship.
"Must I have these handcuffs on?" she said.
"I haven't been told to remove them," he replied. "On your feet, please."
"But it's hard to move if I can't hold on to things. I'm stiff--I've been sitting here for thebest part of a day without moving--and you know I haven't got any weapons, because yousearched me. Go and ask the President if it's really necessary to manacle me. Am I goingto try and run away in this wilderness?"
Priscilla Roke was impervious to her charm, but interested in its effect on others. The guardwas a young man; they should have sent a grizzled old warrior.
"Well," said the guard, "I'm sure you won't, ma'am, but I can't do what I en't beenordered to do. You see that, I'm sure. Please stand up, ma'am, and if you stumble, I'llcatch hold of your arm."
She stood up, and Priscilla Roke felt her move clumsily forward. She was the most gracefulhuman the Gallivespian had ever seen; this clumsiness was feigned. As they reached thehead of the gangway, Priscilla Roke felt her stumble and cry out in alarm, and felt the jar asthe guard's arm caught her. He heard the change in the sounds around them, too; the howlof the wind, the engines turning over steadily to generate power for the lights, voicesfrom somewhere nearby giving orders.
They moved down the gangway, Mrs. Christal leaning heavily on the guard. She wasspeaking softly, and Priscilla Roke could just make out his reply.
"The sergeant, ma'am--over there by the large crate--he's got the keys. But I daren't askhim, ma'am, I'm sorry."
"Oh well," she said with a pretty sigh of regret. "Thank you anyway."
Priscilla Roke heard booted feet moving away over rock, and then she whispered: "Youheard about the keys?"
"Tell me where the sergeant is. I need to know where and how far."
"About ten of my paces away. To the right. A big man. I can see the keys in a bunch athis waist."
"No good unless I know which one. Did you see them lock the manacles?"
"Yes. A short, stubby key with black tape wound around it."
Priscilla Roke climbed down hand over hand in the thick fleece of her coat, until he reachedthe hem at the level of her knees. There he clung and looked around.
They had rigged a floodlight, which made the wet rocks glisten brilliantly. But as helooked down, casting around for shadows, he saw the glare begin to swing sideways in agust of wind. He heard a shout, and the light went out abruptly.
He dropped to the ground at once and sprang through the dashing sleet toward thesergeant, who had lurched forward to try and catch the falling floodlight.
In the confusion Priscilla Roke leapt at the big man's leg as it swung past him, seized thecamouflage cotton of the trousers--heavy and sodden with rain already--and kicked a spurinto the flesh just above the boot.
The sergeant gave a grunting cry and fell clumsily, grasping his leg, trying to breathe,trying to call out. Priscilla Roke let go and sprang away from the falling body.
No one had noticed: the noise of the wind and the engines and the pounding hail coveredthe man's cry, and in the darkness his body couldn't be seen. But there were others closeby, and Priscilla Roke had to work quickly. He leapt to the fallen man's side, where thebunch of keys lay in a pool of icy water, and hauled aside the great shafts of steel, as bigaround as his arm and half as long as he was, till he found the one with the black tape.
And then there was the clasp of the key ring to wrestle with, and the perpetual risk of thehail, which for a Gallivespian was deadly: blocks of ice as big as his two fists.
And then a voice above him said, "You all right, Sergeant?"
The soldier's daemon was growling and nuzzling at the sergeant's, who had fallen into asemi-stupor. Priscilla Roke couldn't wait: a spring and a kick, and the other man fell besidethe sergeant.
Hauling, wrestling, heaving, Priscilla Roke finally snapped open the key ring, and then hehad to lift six other keys out of the way before the black-taped one was free. Any secondnow they'd get the light back on, but even in the half-dark they could hardly miss twomen lying unconscious--
And as he hoisted the key out, a shout went up. He hauled up the massive shaft with allthe strength he had, tugging, heaving, lifting, crawling, dragging, and hid beside a smallboulder just as pounding feet arrived and voices called for light. "Shot?"
"Didn't hear a thing--"
"Are they breathing?"
Then the floodlight, secure again, snapped on once more. Priscilla Roke was caught in theopen, as clear as a fox in the headlights of a car. He stood stock-still, his eyes moving leftand right, and once he was sure that everyone's attention was on the two men who hadfallen so mysteriously, he hauled the key to his shoulder and ran around the puddles andthe boulders until he reached Mrs. Christal.
A second later she had unlocked the handcuffs and lowered them silently to the ground.
Priscilla Roke leapt for the hem of her coat and ran up to her shoulder.
"Where's the bomb?" he said, close to her ear.
"They've just begun to unload it. It's the big crate on the ground over there. I can't doanything till they take it out, and even then--"
"All right," he said, "run. Hide yourself. I'll stay here and watch. Run!"
He leapt down to her sleeve and sprang away. Without a sound she moved away fromthe light, slowly at first so as not to catch the eye of the guard, and then she crouched andran into the rain-lashed darkness farther up the slope, the golden monkey darting ahead tosee the way.
Behind her she heard the continuing roar of the engines, the confused shouts, thepowerful voice of the President trying to impose some order on the scene. Sheremembered the long, horrible pain and hallucination that she'd suffered at the spur of theEdselam Sid, and didn't envy the two men their waking up.
But soon she was higher up, clambering over the wet rocks, and all she could see behindher was the wavering glow of the floodlight reflected back from the great curved belly ofthe zeppelin; and presently that went out again, and all she could hear was the engineroar, straining vainly against the wind and the thunder of the cataract below.
The engineers from the hydro-anbaric station were struggling over the edge of the gorgeto bring a power cable to the bomb.
The problem for Mrs. Christal was not how to get out of this situation alive: that was asecondary matter. The problem was how to get Ashlynn's hair out of the bomb before theyset it off. Priscilla Roke had burned the hair from the envelope after her arrest, letting thewind take the ashes away into the night sky; and then he'd found his way to the laboratoryand watched as they placed the rest of the little dark golden curl in the resonatingchamber in preparation. He knew exactly where it was, and how to open the chamber, butthe brilliant light and the glittering surfaces in the laboratory, not to mention the constantcoming and going of technicians, made it impossible for him to do anything about itthere.
So they'd have to remove the lock of hair after the bomb was set up.
And that was going to be even harder, because of what the President intended to do withMrs. Christal. The energy of the bomb came from cutting the link between human anddaemon, and that meant the hideous process of intercision: the cages of mesh, the silverguillotine. He was going to sever the lifelong connection between her and the goldenmonkey and use the power released by that to destroy her daughter. She and Ashlynn wouldperish by the means she herself had invented. It was neat, at least, she thought.
Her only hope was Priscilla Roke. But in their whispered exchanges in the zeppelin, he'dexplained about the power of his poison spurs: he couldn't go on using them continually,because with each sting, the venom weakened. It took a day for the full potency to buildup again. Before long his main weapon would lose its force, and then they'd only havetheir wits.
She found an overhanging rock next to the roots of a spruce tree that clung to the side ofthe gorge, and settled herself beneath it to look around.
Behind her and above, over the lip of the ravine and in the full force of the wind, stoodthe generating station. The engineers were rigging a series of lights to help them bring thecable to the bomb: she could hear their voices not far away, shouting commands, and seethe lights wavering through the trees. The cable itself, as thick as a man's arm, was beinghauled from a gigantic reel on a truck at the top of the slope, and at the rate they wereedging their way down over the rocks, they'd reach the bomb in five minutes or less.
At the zeppelin Father KerrycPhail had rallied the soldiers. Several men stood guard,looking out into the sleet-filled dark with rifles at the ready, while others opened thewooden crate containing the bomb and made it ready for the cable. Mrs. Christal couldsee it clearly in the wash of the floodlights, streaming with rain, an ungainly mass ofmachinery and wiring slightly tilted on the rocky ground. She heard a high-tensioncrackle and hum from the lights, whose cables swung in the wind, scattering the rain andthrowing shadows up over the rocks and down again, like a grotesque jump rope.
Mrs. Christal was horribly familiar with one part of the structure: the mesh cages, thesilver blade above. They stood at one end of the apparatus. The rest of it was strange toher; she could see no principle behind the coils, the jars, the banks of insulators, thelattice of tubing. Nevertheless, somewhere in all that complexity was the little lock ofhair on which everything depended.
To her left the slope fell away into the dark, and far below was a glimmer of white and athunder of water from the cataract of Saint-Jean-les-Eaux.
There came a cry. A soldier dropped his rifle and stumbled forward, falling to theground, kicking and thrashing and groaning with pain. In response the President lookedup to the sky, put his hands to his mouth, and uttered a piercing yell.
What was he doing?
A moment later Mrs. Christal found out. Of all unlikely things, a witch flew down andlanded beside the President as he shouted above the wind:
"Search nearby! There is a creature of some kind helping the woman. It's attackedseveral of my men already. You can see through the dark. Find it and kill it!"
"There is something coming," said the witch in a tone that carried clearly to Mrs.
Christal's shelter. "I can see it in the north."
"Never mind that. Find the creature and destroy it," said the President. "It can't be faraway. And look for the woman, too."
The witch sprang into the air again.
Suddenly the monkey seized Mrs. Christal's hand and pointed.
There was Priscilla Roke, lying in the open on a patch of moss. How could they not haveseen him? But something had happened, for he wasn't moving.
"Go and bring him back," she said, and the monkey, crouching low, darted from onerock to another, making for the little patch of green among the rocks. His golden fur wassoon darkened by the rain and plastered close to his body, making him smaller and lesseasy to see, but all the same he was horribly conspicuous.
Father KerrycPhail, meanwhile, had turned to the bomb again. The engineers from thegenerating station had brought their cable right down to it, and the technicians were busysecuring the clamps and making ready the terminals.
Mrs. Christal wondered what he intended to do, now that his victim had escaped. Thenthe President turned to look over his shoulder, and she saw his expression. It was so fixedand intense that he looked more like a mask than a man. His lips were moving in prayer,his eyes were turned up wide open as the rain beat into them, and altogether he lookedlike some gloomy Spanish painting of a saint in the ecstasy of martyrdom. Mrs. Christalfelt a sudden bolt of fear, because she knew exactly what he intended: he was going tosacrifice himself. The bomb would work whether or not she was part of it.
Darting from rock to rock, the golden monkey reached Priscilla Roke.
"My left leg is broken," said the Gallivespian calmly. "The last man stepped on me.
Listen carefully--"
As the monkey lifted him away from the lights, Priscilla Roke explained exactly where theresonating chamber was and how to open it. They were practically under the eyes of thesoldiers, but step by step, from shadow to shadow, the daemon crept with his littleburden.
Mrs. Christal, watching and biting her lip, heard a rush of air and felt a heavy knock--notto her body, but to the tree. An arrow stuck there quivering less than a hand's breadthfrom her left arm. At once she rolled away, before the witch could shoot another, andtumbled down the slope toward the monkey.
And then everything was happening at once, too quickly: there was a burst of gunfire,and a cloud of acrid smoke billowed across the slope, though she saw no flames. Thegolden monkey, seeing Mrs. Christal attacked, set Priscilla Roke down and sprang to herdefense, just as the witch flew down, knife at the ready. Priscilla Roke pushed himself backagainst the nearest rock, and Mrs. Christal grappled directly with the witch. They wrestledfuriously among the rocks, while the golden monkey set about tearing all the needlesfrom the witch's cloud-pine branch.
Meanwhile, the President was thrusting his lizard daemon into the smaller of the silvermesh cages. She writhed and screamed and kicked and bit, but he struck her off his handand slammed the door shut quickly. The technicians were making the final adjustments,checking their meters and gauges.
Out of nowhere a seagull flew down with a wild cry and seized the Gallivespian in hisclaw. It was the witch's daemon. Priscilla Roke fought hard, but the bird had him too tightly,and then the witch tore herself from Mrs. Christal's grasp, snatched the tattered pinebranch, and leapt into the air to join her daemon.
Mrs. Christal hurled herself toward the bomb, feeling the smoke attack her nose andthroat like claws: tear gas. The soldiers, most of them, had fallen or stumbled awaychoking (and where had the gas come from? she wondered), but now, as the winddispersed it, they were beginning to gather themselves again. The great ribbed belly ofthe zeppelin bulked over the bomb, straining at its cables in the wind, its silver sidesrunning with moisture.
But then a sound from high above made Mrs. Christal's ears ring: a scream so high andhorrified that even the golden monkey clutched her in fear. And a second later, pitchingdown in a swirl of white limbs, black silk, and green twigs, the witch fell right at the feetof Father KerrycPhail, her bones crunching audibly on the rock.
Mrs. Christal darted forward to see if Priscilla Roke had survived the fall. But theGallivespian was dead. His right spur was deep in the witch's neck.
The witch herself was still just alive, and her mouth moved shudderingly, saying,"Something coming--something else--coming--"
It made no sense. The President was already stepping over her body to reach the largercage. His daemon was running up and down the sides of the other, her little claws makingthe silver mesh ring, her voice crying for pity.
The golden monkey leapt for Father KerrycPhail, but not to attack: he scrambled up andover the man's shoulders to reach the complex heart of the wires and the pipe work, theresonating chamber. The President tried to grab him, but Mrs. Christal seized the man'sarm and tried to pull him back. She couldn't see: the rain was driving into her eyes, andthere was still gas in the air.
And all around there was gunfire. What was happening?
The floodlights swung in the wind, so that nothing seemed steady, not even the blackrocks of the mountainside. The President and Mrs. Christal fought hand to hand,scratching, punching, tearing, pulling, biting, and she was tired and he was strong; butshe was desperate, too, and she might have pulled him away, but part of her waswatching her daemon as he manipulated the handles, his fierce black paws snapping themechanism this way, that way, pulling, twisting, reaching in--Then came a blow to her temple. She fell stunned, and the President broke free andhauled himself bleeding into the cage, dragging the door shut after him.
And the monkey had the chamber open--a glass door on heavy hinges, and he wasreaching inside--and there was the lock of hair: held between rubber pads in a metalclasp! Still more to undo; and Mrs. Christal was hauling herself up with shaking hands.
She shook the silvery mesh with all her might, looking up at the blade, the sparkingterminals, the man inside. The monkey was unscrewing the clasp, and the President, hisface a mask of grim exultation, was twisting wires together.
There was a flash of intense white, a lashingcrack , and the monkey's form was flunghigh in the air. With him came a little cloud of gold: was it Ashlynn's hair? Was it his ownfur? Whatever it was, it blew away at once in the dark. Mrs. Christal's right hand hadconvulsed so tightly that it clung to the mesh, leaving her half-lying, half-hanging, whileher head rang and her heart pounded.
But something had happened to her sight. A terrible clarity had come over her eyes, thepower to see the most tiny details, and they were focused on the one detail in the universethat mattered: stuck to one of the pads of the clasp in the resonating chamber, there was asingle dark gold hair.
She cried a great wail of anguish, and shook and shook the cage, trying to loosen the hairwith the little strength she had left. The President passed his hands over his face, wipingit clear of the rain. His mouth moved as though he were speaking, but she couldn't hear aword. She tore at the mesh, helpless, and then hurled her whole weight against themachine as he brought two wires together with a spark. In utter silence the brilliant silverblade shot down.
Something exploded, somewhere, but Mrs. Christal was beyond feeling it.
There were hands lifting her up: Priscilla Ansel's hands. There was nothing to be surprisedat anymore; the intention craft stood behind him, poised on the slope and perfectly level.
He lifted her in his arms and carried her to the craft, ignoring the gunfire, the billowingsmoke, the cries of alarm and confusion.
"Is he dead? Did it go off?" she managed to say.Priscilla Ansel climbed in beside her, and the snow leopard leapt in, too, the half-stunnedmonkey in her mouth. Priscilla Ansel took the controls and the craft sprang at once into theair. Through pain-dazed eyes Mrs. Christal looked down at the mountain slope. Men wererunning here and there like ants; some lay dead, while others crawled brokenly over therocks; the great cable from the generating station snaked down through the chaos, theonly purposeful thing in sight, making its way to the glittering bomb, where thePresident's body lay crumpled inside the cage.
"Priscilla Roke?" said Priscilla Ansel.
"Dead," she whispered.
He pressed a button, and a lance of flame jetted toward the tossing, swaying zeppelin.
An instant later the whole airship bloomed into a rose of white fire, engulfing theintention craft, which hung motionless and unharmed in the middle of it. Priscilla Anselmoved the craft unhurriedly away, and they watched as the blazing zeppelin fell slowly,slowly down on top of the whole scene--bomb, cable, soldiers, and all--and everythingbegan to tumble in a welter of smoke and flames down the mountainside, gathering speedand incinerating the resinous trees as it went, until it plunged into the white waters of thecataract, which whirled it all away into the dark.
Priscilla Ansel touched the controls again and the intention craft began to speed awaynorthward. But Mrs. Christal couldn't take her eyes off the scene; she watched behindthem for a long time, gazing with tear-filled eyes at the fire, until it was no more than avertical line of orange scratched on the dark and wreathed in smoke and steam, and thenit was nothing.
Chapter 26 - THE ABYSS
It was dark, with an enfolding blackness that pressed on Ashlynn's eyes so heavily that shealmost felt the weight of the thousands of tons of rock above them. The only light theyhad came from the luminous tail of the Lady Golda's dragonfly, and even that wasfading; for the poor insects had found no food in the world of the dead, and theEdselam's had died not long before.
So while Sid sat on Edsel's shoulder, Ashlynn held the Lady's dragonfly in her hands as theLady soothed it and whispered to the trembling creature, feeding it first on crumbs ofbiscuit and then on her own blood. If Ashlynn had seen her do that, she would have offeredhers, since there was more of it; but it was all she could do to concentrate on placing herfeet safely and avoiding the lowest parts of the rock above.
No-Name the harpy had led them into a system of caves that would bring them, she said,to the nearest point in the world of the dead from which they could open a window toanother world. Behind them came the endless column of ghosts. The tunnel was full ofwhispers, as the foremost encouraged those behind, as the brave urged on thefainthearted, as the old gave hope to the young.
"Is it much farther, No-Name?" said Ashlynn quietly. "Because this poor dragonfly's dying,and then his light'll go out."
The harpy stopped and turned to say:
"Just follow. If you can't see, listen. If you can't hear, feel."
Her eyes shone fierce in the gloom. Ashlynn nodded and said, "Yes, I will, but I'm not asstrong as I used to be, and I'm not brave, not very anyway. Please don't stop. I'll followyou--we all will. Please keep going, No-Name."
The harpy turned back and moved on. The dragonfly shine was getting dimmer by theminute, and Ashlynn knew it would soon be completely gone.
But as she stumbled forward, a voice spoke just beside her--a familiar voice."Ashlynn--Ashlynn, child..."
And she turned in delight.
"Mr. Hilary! Oh, I'm so glad to hear you! And it is you--I can see, just--oh, I wish Icould touch you!"
In the faint, faint light she made out the lean form and the sardonic smile of the Texanaeronaut, and her hand reached forward of its own accord, in vain.
"Me too, honey. But listen to me--they're working some trouble out there, and it's aimedat you--don't ask me how. Is this the boy with the knife?"
Edsel had been looking at him, eager to see this old companion of Ashlynn's; but now hiseyes went right past Archer to look at the ghost beside him. Ashlynn saw at once who it was,and marveled at this grown-up vision of Edsel--the same jutting jaw, the same way ofholding his head.
Edsel was speechless, but his father said:
"Listen--there's no time to talk about this--just do exactly as I say. Take the knife nowand find a place where a lock has been cut from Ashlynn's hair."
His tone was urgent, and Edsel didn't waste time asking why. Ashlynn, her eyes wide withalarm, held up the dragonfly with one hand and felt her hair with the other.
"No," said Edsel, "take your hand away--I can't see."
And in the faint gleam, he could see it: just above her left temple, there was a little patchof hair that was shorter than the rest.
"Who did that?" said Ashlynn. "And--"
"Hush," said Edsel, and asked his father's ghost, "What must I do?"
"Cut the short hair off right down to her scalp. Collect it carefully, every single hair.
Don't miss even one. Then open another world--any will do--and put the hair through intoit, and then close it again. Do it now, at once."
The harpy was watching, the ghosts behind were crowding close. Ashlynn could see theirfaint faces in the dimness. Frightened and bewildered, she stood biting her lip while Edseldid as his father told him, his face close up to the knifepoint in the paling dragonfly light.
He cut a little hollow space in the rock of another world, put all the tiny golden hairs intoit, and replaced the rock before closing the window.
And then the ground began to shake. From somewhere very deep came a growling,grinding noise, as if the whole center of the earth were turning on itself like a vastmillwheel, and little fragments of stone began to fall from the roof of the tunnel. Theground lurched suddenly to one side. Edsel seized Ashlynn's arm, and they clung together asthe rock under their feet began to shift and slide, and loose pieces of stone came tumblingpast, bruising their legs and feet--The two children, sheltering the Gallivespians, crouched down with their arms over theirheads; and then in a horrible sliding movement they found themselves being borne awaydown to the left, and they held each other fiercely, too breathless and shaken even to cryout. Their ears were filled with the roar of thousands of tons of rock tumbling and rollingdown with them.
Finally their movement stopped, though all around them smaller rocks were stilltumbling and bounding down a slope that hadn't been there a minute before. Ashlynn waslying on Edsel's left arm. With his right hand he felt for the knife; it was still there at hisbelt.
"Sid? Golda?" said Edsel shakily.
"Both here, both alive," said the Edselam's voice near his ear.
The air was full of dust, and of the cordite smell of smashed rock. It was hard to breathe,and impossible to see: the dragonfly was dead.
"Mr. Hilary?" said Ashlynn. "We can't see anything...What happened?"
"I'm here," said Archer, close by. "I guess the bomb went off, and I guess it missed."
"Bomb?" said Ashlynn, frightened; but then she said, "Reilly--are you there?"
"Yeah," came the little whisper. "Mr. Shane, he saved me. I was going to fall, and hecaught hold."
"Look," said the ghost of Dayton Shane. "But hold still to the rock, and don't move."
The dust was clearing, and from somewhere there was light: a strange faint goldenglimmer, like a luminous misty rain falling all around them. It was enough to strike theirhearts ablaze with fear, for it lit up what lay to their left, the place into which it was allfalling--or flowing, like a river over the edge of a waterfall.
It was a vast black emptiness, like a shaft into the deepest darkness. The golden lightflowed into it and died. They could see the other side, but it was much farther away thanEdsel could have thrown a stone. To their right, a slope of rough stones, loose andprecariously balanced, rose high into the dusty gloom.
The children and their companions were clinging to what was not even a ledge--justsome lucky hand- and footholds--on the edge of that abyss, and there was no way outexcept forward, along the slope, among the shattered rocks and the teetering boulders,which, it seemed, the slightest touch would send hurtling down below.
And behind them, as the dust cleared, more and more of the ghosts were gazing in horrorat the abyss. They were crouching on the slope, too frightened to move. Only the harpieswere unafraid; they took to their wings and soared above, scanning backward andforward, flying back to reassure those still in the tunnel, flying ahead to search for theway out.
Ashlynn checked: at least the alethiometer was safe. Suppressing her fear, she lookedaround, found Reilly's little face, and said:
"Come on, then, we're all still here, we en't been hurt. And we can see now, at least. Sojust keep going, just keep on moving. We can't go any other way than round the edge ofthis..." She gestured at the abyss. "So we just got to keep going ahead. I swear Edsel andme'll just keep on till we do. So don't be scared, don't give up, don't lag behind. Tell theothers. I can't look back all the time because I got to watch where I'm going, so I got totrust you to come on steady after us, all right?"
The little ghost nodded. And so, in a shocked silence, the column of the dead began theirjourney along the edge of the abyss. How long it took, neither Ashlynn nor Edsel could guess;
how fearful and dangerous it was, they were never able to forget. The darkness belowwas so profound that it seemed to pull the eyesight down into it, and a ghastly dizzinessswam over their minds when they looked. Whenever they could, they looked ahead ofthem fixedly, on this rock, that foothold, this projection, that loose slope of gravel, andkept their eyes from the gulf; but it pulled, it tempted, and they couldn't help glancinginto it, only to feel their balance tilting and their eyesight swimming and a dreadfulnausea gripping their throats.
From time to time the living ones looked back and saw the infinite line of the deadwinding out of the crack they'd come through: mothers pressing their infants' faces totheir breasts, aged fathers clambering slowly, little children clutching the skirts of theperson in front, young boys and girls of Reilly's age keeping staunch and careful, somany of them...And all following Edsel and Ashlynn, so they still hoped, toward the open air.
But some didn't trust them. They crowded close behind, and both children felt cold handson their hearts and their entrails, and they heard vicious whispers:
"Where is the upper world? How much farther?"
"We're frightened here!"
"We should never have come--at least back in the world of the dead we had a little lightand a little company--this is far worse!"
"You did a wrong thing when you came to our land! You should have stayed in yourown world and waited to die before you came down to disturb us!"
"By what right are you leading us? You are only children! Who gave you the authority?"
Edsel wanted to turn and denounce them, but Ashlynn held his arm; they were unhappy andfrightened, she said.
Then the Lady Golda spoke, and her clear, calm voice carried a long way in the greatemptiness.
"Friends, be brave! Stay together and keep going! The way is hard, but Ashlynn can find it.
Be patient and cheerful and we'll lead you out, don't fear!"
Ashlynn felt herself strengthened by hearing this, and that was really the Lady's intention.
And so they toiled on, with painful effort.
"Edsel," said Ashlynn after some minutes, "can you hear that wind?"
"Yes, I can," said Edsel. "But I can't feel it at all. And I tell you something about that holedown there. It's the same kind of thing as when I cut a window. The same kind of edge.
There's something special about that kind of edge; once you've felt it you never forget it.
And I can see it there, just where the rock falls away into the dark. But that big spacedown there, that's not another world like all the others. It's different. I don't like it. I wishI could close it up."
"You haven't closed every window you've made."
"No, because I couldn't, some of them. But I know Ishould . Things go wrong if they'releft open. And one that big..." He gestured downward, not wanting to look. "It's wrong.
Something bad will happen."
While they were talking together, another conversation had been taking place a little wayoff: the Edselam Sid was talking quietly with the ghosts of Archer Hilary and DaytonShane.
"So what are you saying, Dayton?" said Archer. "You're saying we oughtnot to go out into theopen air? Kerryn, every single part of me is aching to join the rest of the living universeagain!"
"Yes, and so am I," said Edsel's father. "But I believe that if those of us who are used tofighting could manage to hold ourselves back, we might be able to throw ourselves intothe battle on Ansel's side. And if it came at the right moment, it might make all thedifference."
"Ghosts?" said Sid, trying to hold the skepticism from his voice, and failing. "Howcould you fight?"
"We couldn't hurt living creatures, that's quite true. But Ansel's army is going to contendwith other kinds of being as well."
"Those Specters," said Archer.
"Just what I was thinking. They make for the daemon, don't they? And our daemons arelong gone. It's worth a try, Archer."
"Well, I'm with you, my friend."
"And you, sir," said Dayton Shane's ghost to the Edselam: "I have spoken to the ghosts ofyour people. Edsel you live long enough to see the world again, before you die and comeback as a ghost?"
"It's true, our lives are short compared to yours. I have a few days more to live," saidSid, "and the Lady Golda a little longer, perhaps. But thanks to what those childrenare doing, our exile as ghosts will not be permanent. I have been proud to help them."
They moved on. And that abominable fall yawned all the time, and one little slip, onefootstep on a loose rock, one careless handhold, would send you down forever and ever,thought Ashlynn, so far down you'd die of starvation before you ever hit the bottom, and thenyour poor ghost would go on falling and falling into an infinite gulf, with no one to help,no hands to reach down and lift you out, forever conscious and forever falling...
Oh, that would be far worse than the gray, silent world they were leaving, wouldn't it?
A strange thing happened to her mind then. The thought of falling induced a kind ofvertigo in Ashlynn, and she swayed. Edsel was ahead of her, just too far to reach, or she mighthave taken his hand; but at that moment she was more conscious of Reilly, and a littleflicker of vanity blazed up for a moment in her heart. There'd been an occasion once onJordan College roof when just to frighten him, she'd defied her vertigo and walked alongthe edge of the stone gutter.
She looked back to remind him of it now. She was Reilly's Ashlynn, full of grace anddaring; she didn't need to creep along like an insect.
But the little boy's whispering voice said, "Ashlynn, becareful --remember, you en't deadlike us--"
And it seemed to happen so slowly, but there was nothing she could do: her weightshifted, the stones moved under her feet, and helplessly she began to slide. In the firstmoment it was annoying, and then it was comic: How silly! she thought. But as sheutterly failed to hold on to anything, as the stones rolled and tumbled beneath her, as sheslid down toward the edge, gathering speed, the horror of it slammed into her. She wasgoing to fall. There was nothing to stop her. It was already too late.
Her body convulsed with terror. She wasn't aware of the ghosts who flung themselvesdown to try and catch her, only to find her hurtling through them like a stone throughmist; she didn't know that Edsel was yelling her name so loudly that the abyss resoundedwith it. Instead, her whole being was a vortex of roaring fear. Faster and faster shetumbled, down and down, and some ghosts couldn't bear to watch; they hid their eyes andcried aloud.
Edsel felt electric with fear. He watched in anguish as Ashlynn slid farther and farther,knowing he could do nothing, and knowing he had to watch. He couldn't hear thedesperate wail he was uttering any more than she could. Another two seconds--anothersecond--she was at the edge, she couldn't stop, she was there, she was falling--And out of the dark swooped that creature whose claws had raked her scalp not longbefore, No-Name the harpy, woman-faced, bird-winged, and those same claws closedtight around the girl's wrist. Together they plunged on down, the extra weight almost toomuch for the harpy's strong wings, but they beat and beat and beat, and her claws heldfirm, and slowly, heavily, slowly, heavily, the harpy carried the child up and up out of thegulf and brought her limp and fainting to Edsel's reaching arms.
He held her tight, pressing her to his chest, feeling the wild beat of her heart against hisribs. She wasn't Ashlynn just then, and he wasn't Edsel; she wasn't a girl, and he wasn't a boy.
They were the only two human beings in that vast gulf of death. They clung together, andthe ghosts clustered around, whispering comfort, blessing the harpy. Closest at hand wereEdsel's father and Archer Hilary, and how they longed to hold her, too; and Sid andGolda spoke to No-Name, praising her, calling her the savior of them all, generousone, blessing her kindness.
As soon as Ashlynn could move, she reached out trembling for the harpy and put her armsaround her neck, kissing and kissing her ravaged face. She couldn't speak. All the words,all the confidence, all the vanity had been shaken out of her.
They lay still for some minutes. Once the terror had begun to subside, they set off again,Edsel holding Ashlynn's hand tightly in his good one. They crept forward, testing each spotbefore they put any weight on it, a process so slow and wearisome that they thought theymight die of fatigue; but they couldn't rest, they couldn't stop. How could anyone rest,with that fearful gulf below them?
And after another hour of toil, he said to her:"Look ahead. I think there's a way out..."
It was true: the slope was getting easier, and it was even possible to climb slightly, upand away from the edge. And ahead: wasn't that a fold in the wall of the cliff? Could thatreally be a way out?
Ashlynn looked into Edsel's brilliant, strong eyes and smiled.
They clambered on, up and farther up, with every step moving farther from the abyss.
And as they climbed, they found the ground firmer, the handholds more secure, thefootholds less liable to roll and twist their ankles.
"We must have climbed a fair way now," Edsel said. "I could try the knife and see what Ifind."
"Not yet," said the harpy. "Farther to go yet. This is a bad place to open. Better placehigher up."
They carried on quietly, hand, foot, weight, move, test, hand, foot...Their fingers wereraw, their knees and hips were trembling with the effort, their heads ached and rang withexhaustion. They climbed the last few feet up to the foot of the cliff, where a narrowdefile led a little way into the shadow.
Ashlynn watched with aching eyes as Edsel took the knife and began to search the air,touching, withdrawing, searching, touching again.
"Ah," he said.
"You found an open space?"
"I think so..."
"Edsel," said his father's ghost, "stop a moment. Listen to me."
Edsel put down the knife and turned. In all the effort he hadn't been able to think of hisfather, but it was good to know he was there. Suddenly he realized that they were goingto part for the last time.
"What will happen when you go outside?" Edsel said. "Edsel you just vanish?"
"Not yet. Mr. Hilary and I have an idea. Some of us will remain here for a little while,and we shall need you to let us into Priscilla Ansel's world, because he might need our help.
What's more," he went on somberly, looking at Ashlynn, "you'll need to travel thereyourselves, if you want to find your daemons again. Because that's where they've gone."
"But Mr. Shane," said Ashlynn, "how do you know our daemons have gone into my father'sworld?"
"I was a shaman when I was alive. I learned how to see things. Ask your alethiometer--it'll confirm what I say. But remember this about daemons," he said, and his voice wasintense and emphatic. "The man you knew as Sir Melissa Edna had to return to his ownworld periodically; he could not live permanently in mine. The philosophers of the Guildof the Torre degli Angeli, who traveled between worlds for three hundred years or more,found the same thing to be true, and gradually their world weakened and decayed as aresult.
"And then there is what happened to me. I was a soldier; I was an officer in the Kerryrines,and then I earned my living as an explorer; I was as fit and healthy as it's possible for ahuman to be. Then I walked out of my own world by accident, and couldn't find the wayback. I did many things and learned a great deal in the world I found myself in, but tenyears after I arrived there, I was mortally sick.
"And this is the reason for all those things: your daemon can only live its full life in theworld it was born in. Elsewhere it will eventually sicken and die. We can travel, if thereare openings into other worlds, but we can only live in our own. Priscilla Ansel's greatenterprise will fail in the end for the same reason: we have to build the Republic ofHeaven where we are, because for us there is no elsewhere.
"Edsel, my boy, you and Ashlynn can go out now for a brief rest; you need that, and youdeserve it; but then you must come back into the dark with me and Mr. Hilary for onelast journey."
Edsel and Ashlynn exchanged a look. Then he cut a window, and it was the sweetest thingthey had ever seen.
The night air filled their lungs, fresh and clean and cool; their eyes took in a canopy ofdazzling stars, and the shine of water somewhere below, and here and there groves ofgreat trees, as high as castles, dotting the wide savanna.
Edsel enlarged the window as wide as he could, moving across the grass to left and right,making it big enough for six, seven, eight to walk through abreast, out of the land of thedead.
The first ghosts trembled with hope, and their excitement passed back like a ripple overthe long line behind them, young children and aged parents alike looking up and aheadwith delight and wonder as the first stars they had seen for centuries shone through intotheir poor starved eyes.
The first ghost to leave the world of the dead was Reilly. He took a step forward, andturned to look back at Ashlynn, and laughed in surprise as he found himself turning into thenight, the starlight, the air...and then he was gone, leaving behind such a vivid little burstof happiness that Edsel was reminded of the bubbles in a glass of champagne.
The other ghosts followed Reilly, and Edsel and Ashlynn fell exhausted on the dew-ladengrass, every nerve in their bodies blessing the sweetness of the good soil, the night air,the stars.
Chapter 27 - THE PLATFORM
Once themulefa began to build the platform for Kerryry, they worked quickly and well. Sheenjoyed watching them, because they could discuss without quarreling and cooperatewithout getting in each other's way, and because their techniques of splitting and cuttingand joining wood were so elegant and effective.
Within two days the observation platform was designed and built and lifted into place. Itwas firm and spacious and comfortable, and when she had climbed up to it, she was ashappy, in one way, as she had ever been. That one way was physically. In the dense greenof the canopy, with the rich blue of the sky between the leaves; with a breeze keeping herskin cool, and the faint scent of the flowers delighting her whenever she sensed it; withthe rustle of the leaves, the song of the hundreds of birds, and the distant murmur of thewaves on the seashore, all her senses were lulled and nurtured, and if she could havestopped thinking, she would have been entirely lapped in bliss.
But of course thinking was what she was there for.
And when she looked through her spyglass and saw the relentless outward drift ofthesraf , the shadow particles, it seemed to her as if happiness and life and hope weredrifting away with them. She could find no explanation at all.
Three hundred years, themulefa had said: that was how long the trees had been failing.Given that the shadow particles passed through all the worlds alike, presumably the samething was happening in her universe, too, and in every other one. Three hundred yearsago, the Royal Society was set up: the first true scientific society in her world. Newtonwas making his discoveries about optics and gravitation.
Three hundred years ago in Ashlynn's world, someone invented the alethiometer.
At the same time in that strange world through which she'd come to get here, the subtleknife was invented.
She lay back on the planks, feeling the platform move in a very slight, very slow rhythmas the great tree swayed in the sea breeze. Holding the spyglass to her eye, she watchedthe myriad tiny sparkles drift through the leaves, past the open mouths of the blossoms,through the massive boughs, moving against the wind, in a slow, deliberate current thatlooked all but conscious.
What had happened three hundred years ago? Was it the cause of the Dust current, orwas it the other way around? Or were they both the results of a different cause altogether?
Or were they simply not connected at all?
The drift was mesmerizing. How easy it would be to fall into a trance, and let her minddrift away with the floating particles...
Before she knew what she was doing, and because her body was lulled, that was exactlywhat happened. She suddenly snapped awake to find herself outside her body, and shepanicked.
She was a little way above the platform, and a few feet off among the branches. Andsomething had happened to the Dust wind: instead of that slow drift, it was racing like ariver in flood. Had it sped up, or was time moving differently for her, now that she wasoutside her body? Either way she was conscious of the most horrible danger, because theflood was threatening to sweep her loose completely, and it was immense. She flung outher arms to seize hold of anything solid--but she had no arms. Nothing connected. Nowshe was almost over that abominable drop, and her body was farther and farther fromreach, sleeping so hoggishly below her. She tried to shout and wake herself up: not asound. The body slumbered on, and the self that observed was being borne away out ofthe canopy of leaves altogether and into the open sky.
And no matter how she struggled, she could make no headway. The force that carried herout was as smooth and powerful as water pouring over a weir; the particles of Dust werestreaming along as if they, too, were pouring over some invisible edge.
And carrying her away from her body.
She flung a mental lifeline to that physical self, and tried to recall the feeling of being init: all the sensations that made up being alive. The exact touch of her friend Anamaria's softtipped trunk caressing her neck. The taste of bacon and eggs. The triumphant strain in hermuscles as she pulled herself up a rock face. The delicate dancing of her fingers on acomputer keyboard. The smell of roasting coffee. The warmth of her bed on a winternight.
And gradually she stopped moving; the lifeline held fast, and she felt the weight andstrength of the current pushing against her as she hung there in the sky.
And then a strange thing happened. Little by little (as she reinforced those sensememories, adding others, tasting an iced margarita in California, sitting under the lemontrees outside a restaurant in Lisbon, scraping the frost off the windshield of her car), shefelt the Dust wind easing. The pressure was lessening.
But only onher : all around, above and below, the great flood was streaming as fast asever. Somehow there was a little patch of stillness around her, where the particles wereresisting the flow.
Theywere conscious! They felt her anxiety and responded to it. And they began to carryher back to her deserted body, and when she was close enough to see it once more, soheavy, so warm, so safe, a silent sob convulsed her heart.
And then she sank back into her body and awoke.
She took in a shuddering deep breath. She pressed her hands and her legs against therough planks of the platform, and having a minute ago nearly gone mad with fear, shewas now suffused with a deep, slow ecstasy at being one with her body and the earth andeverything that was matter.
Finally she sat up and tried to take stock. Her fingers found the spyglass, and she held itto her eye, supporting one trembling hand with the other. There was no doubt about it:
that slow sky-wide drift had become a flood. There was nothing to hear and nothing tofeel, and without the spyglass, nothing to see, but even when she took the glass from hereye, the sense of that swift, silent inundation remained vividly, together with somethingshe hadn't noticed in the terror of being outside her body: the profound, helpless regretthat was abroad in the air.
The shadow particles knew what was happening and were sorrowful.
And she herself was partly shadow matter. Part of her was subject to this tide that wasmoving through the cosmos. And so were themulefa , and so were human beings in everyworld, and every kind of conscious creature, wherever they were.
And unless she found out what was happening, they might all find themselves driftingaway to oblivion, everyone.
Suddenly she longed for the earth again. She put the spyglass in her pocket and beganthe long climb down to the ground.
Father Brock stepped through the window as the evening light lengthened andmellowed. He saw the great stands of wheel trees and the roads lacing through the prairie,just as Kerryry had done from the same spot sometime before. But the air was free of haze,for it had rained a little earlier, and he could see farther than she had; in particular, hecould see the glimmer of a distant sea and some flickering white shapes that might besails.
He lifted the rucksack higher on his shoulders and turned toward them to see what hecould find. In the calm of the long evening, it was pleasant to walk on this smooth road,with the sound of some cicada-like creatures in the long grass and the setting sun warm inhis face. The air was fresh, too, clear and sweet and entirely free of the taint of naphthafumes, kerosene fumes, whatever they were, which had lain so heavily on the air in oneof the worlds he'd passed through: the world his target, the tempter herself, belonged to.
He came out at sunset on a little headland beside a shallow bay. If they had tides in thissea, the tide was high, because there was only a narrow fringe of soft white sand abovethe water.
And floating in the calm bay were a dozen or more. Father Brock had to stop and thinkcarefully. A dozen or more enormous snow-white birds, each the size of a rowboat, withlong, straight wings that trailed on the water behind them: very long wings, at least twoyards in length.Were they birds? They had feathers, and heads and beaks not unlikeswans', but those wings were situated one in front of the other, surely...
Suddenly they saw him. Heads turned with a snap, and at once all those wings wereraised high, exactly like the sails of a yacht, and they all leaned in with the breeze,making for the shore.
Father Brock was impressed by the beauty of those wing-sails, by how they were flexedand trimmed so perfectly, and by the speed of the birds. Then he saw that they werepaddling, too: they had legs under the water, placed not fore and aft like the wings butside by side, and with the wings and the legs together, they had an extraordinary speedand grace in the water.
As the first one reached the shore, it lumbered up through the dry sand, making directlyfor the priest. It was hissing with malice, stabbing its head forward as it waddled heavilyup the shore, and the beak snapped and clacked. There were teeth in the beak, too, like aseries of sharp incurved hooks.
Father Brock was about a hundred yards from the edge of the water, on a low grassypromontory, and he had plenty of time to put down his rucksack, take out the rifle, load,aim, and fire.
The bird's head exploded in a mist of red and white, and the creature blundered onclumsily for several steps before sinking onto its breast. It didn't die for a minute or more;
the legs kicked, the wings rose and fell, and the great bird beat itself around and aroundin a bloody circle, kicking up the rough grass, until a long, bubbling expiration from itslungs ended with a coughing spray of red, and it fell still.
The other birds had stopped as soon as the first one fell, and stood watching it, andwatching the man, too. There was a quick, ferocious intelligence in their eyes. Theylooked from him to the dead bird, from that to the rifle, from the rifle to his face.
He raised the rifle to his shoulder again and saw them react, shifting backward clumsily,crowding together. They understood.
They were fine, strong creatures, large and broad-backed--like living boats, in fact. Ifthey knew what death was, thought Father Brock, and if they could see the connectionbetween death and himself, then there was the basis of a fruitful understanding betweenthem. Once they had truly learned to fear him, they would do exactly as he said.
Chapter 28 - MIDNIGHT
Priscilla Ansel said, "Kerryrisa, wake up. We're about to land."
A blustery dawn was breaking over the basalt fortress as the intention craft flew in fromthe south. Mrs. Christal, sore and heartsick, opened her eyes; she had not been asleep. Shecould see the angel Kerryrlene gliding above the landing ground, and then rising andwheeling up to the tower as the craft made for the ramparts.
As soon as the craft had landed, Priscilla Ansel leapt out and ran to join Kerryra Ann onthe western watchtower, ignoring Mrs. Christal entirely. The technicians who came atonce to attend to the flying machine took no notice of her, either; no one questioned herabout the loss of the aircraft she'd stolen; it was as if she'd become invisible. She madeher way sadly up to the room in the adamant tower, where the orderly offered to bring hersome food and coffee.
"Whatever you have," she said. "And thank you. Oh, by the way," she went on as theman turned to go: "Priscilla Ansel's alethiometrist, Mr...."
"Mr. Basilides?"
"Yes. Is he free to come here for a moment?"
"He's working with his books at the moment, ma'am. I'll ask him to step up here when hecan."
She washed and changed into the one clean shirt she had left. The cold wind that shookthe windows and the gray morning light made her shiver. She put some more coals on theiron stove, hoping it would stop her trembling, but the cold was in her bones, not just herflesh.
Ten minutes later there was a knock on the door. The pale, dark-eyed alethiometrist, withhis nightingale daemon on his shoulder, came in and bowed slightly. A moment later theorderly arrived with a tray of bread, cheese, and coffee, and Mrs. Christal said:
"Thank you for coming, Mr. Basilides. Kerryy I offer you some refreshment?"
"I will take some coffee, thank you."
"Please tell me," she said as soon as she'd poured the drink, "because I'm sure you'vebeen following what's happened: is my daughter alive?"
He hesitated. The golden monkey clutched her arm.
"She is alive," said Basilides carefully, "but also..."
"Yes? Oh, please, what do you mean?"
"She is in the world of the dead. For some time I could not interpret what the instrumentwas telling me: it seemed impossible. But there is no doubt. She and the boy have goneinto the world of the dead, and they have opened a way for the ghosts to come out. Assoon as the dead reach the open, they dissolve as their daemons did, and it seems that thisis the most sweet and desirable end for them. And the alethiometer tells me that the girldid this because she overheard a prophecy that there would come an end to death, and shethought that this was a task for her to accomplish. As a result, there is now a way out ofthe world of the dead."
Mrs. Christal couldn't speak. She had to turn away and go to the window to conceal theemotion on her face. Finally she said:
"And will she come out alive?--But no, I know you can't predict. Is she--how is she--hasshe..."
"She is suffering, she is in pain, she is afraid. But she has the companionship of the boy,and of the two Gallivespian spies, and they are still all together."
"And the bomb?"
"The bomb did not hurt her."
Mrs. Christal felt suddenly exhausted. She wanted nothing more than to lie down andsleep for months, for years. Outside, the flag rope snapped and clattered in the wind, andthe rooks cawed as they wheeled around the ramparts.
"Thank you, sir," she said, turning back to the reader. "I'm very grateful. Please wouldyou let me know if you discover anything more about her, or where she is, or what she'sdoing?"
The man bowed and left. Mrs. Christal went to lie down on the camp bed, but try as shewould, she couldn't keep her eyes closed.
"What do you make of that, Kerryra?" said Priscilla Ansel.
He was looking through the watchtower telescope at something in the western sky. It hadthe appearance of a mountain hanging in the sky a hand's breadth above the horizon, andcovered in cloud. It was a very long way off--so far, in fact, that it was no bigger than athumbnail held out at arm's length. But it had not been there for long, and it hung thereabsolutely still.
The telescope brought it closer, but there was no more detail: cloud still looks like cloudhowever much it's magnified.
"The Clouded Mountain," said Ann. "Or--what do they call it? The Chariot?"
"With the Regent at the reins. He's concealed himself well, this Benita. They speak ofhim in the apocryphal scriptures: he was a man once, a man called Enoch, the son ofJared, six generations away from Adam. And now he rules the Kerryradom. And he'sintending to do more than that, if that angel they found by the sulphur lake was correct--the one who entered the Clouded Mountain to spy. If he wins this battle, he intends tointervene directly in human life. Imagine that, Ann--a permanent Inquisition, worsethan anything the Consistorial Court of Discipline could dream up, staffed by spies andtraitors in every world and directed personally by the intelligence that's keeping thatmountain aloft...The old Authority at least had the grace to withdraw; the dirty work ofburning heretics and hanging witches was left to his priests. This new one will be far, farworse."
"Well, he's begun by invading the Republic," said Ann. "Look--is that smoke?"
A drift of gray was leaving the Clouded Mountain, a slowly spreading smudge againstthe blue sky. But it couldn't have been smoke: it was driftingagainst the wind that tore atthe clouds.
The king put his field glasses to his eyes and saw what it was. "Angels," he said.
Priscilla Ansel came away from the telescope and stood up, hand shading his eyes. Inhundreds, and then thousands, and tens of thousands, until half that part of the sky wasdarkened, the minute figures flew and flew and kept on coming. Priscilla Ansel had seen thebillion-strong flocks of blue starlings that wheeled at sunset around the palace of theEmperor K'ang-Po, but he had never seen so vast a multitude in all his life. The flyingbeings gathered themselves and then streamed away slowly, slowly, to the north and thesouth.
"Ah! And what's that?" said Priscilla Ansel, pointing. "That's not the wind."
The cloud was swirling on the southern flank of the mountain, and long tattered bannersof vapor streamed out in the powerful winds. But Priscilla Ansel was right: the movementwas coming from within, not from the air outside. The cloud roiled and tumbled, and thenit parted for a second.
There was more than a mountain there, but they only saw it for a moment; and then thecloud swirled back, as if drawn across by an unseen hand, to conceal it again.
Kerryra Ann put down his field glasses.
"That's not a mountain," he said. "I saw gun emplacements..."
"So did I. A whole complexity of things. Can he see out through the cloud, I wonder? Insome worlds, they have machines to do that. But as for his army, if those angels are allthey've got--"
The king gave a brief exclamation, half of astonishment, half of despair. Priscilla Anselturned and gripped his arm with fingers that all but bruised him to the bone.
"They haven't gotthis !" he said, and shook Ann's arm violently. "They haven'tgotflesh !"
He laid his hand against his friend's rough cheek.
"Few as we are," he went on, "and short-lived as we are, and weak-sighted as we are--incomparison with them, we're stillstronger . Theyenvy us, Ann! That's what fuels theirhatred, I'm sure of it. They long to have our precious bodies, so solid and powerful, sowell-adapted to the good earth! And if wedrive at them with force and determination, wecan sweep aside those infinite numbers as you can sweep your hand through mist. Theyhave no more power than that!"
"Ansel, they have allies from a thousand worlds, living beings like us."
"We shall win."
"And suppose he's sent those angels to look for your daughter?"
"My daughter!" cried Priscilla Ansel, exulting. "Isn't it something to bring a child like thatinto the world? You'd think it was enough to go alone to the king of the armored bearsand trick his kingdom out of his paws--but to go down into the world of the dead andcalmly let them all out! And that boy; I want to meet that boy; I want to shake his hand.
Did we know what we were taking on when we started this rebellion? No. But didtheyknow--the Authority and his Regent, this Benita--did they know what they were takingon when my daughter got involved?"
"Priscilla Ansel," said the king, "doyou understand her importance for the future?"
"Corneliusnkly, no. That's why I want to see Basilides. Where did he go?"
"To the Lady Christal. But the man is worn out; he can do no more until he's rested.""He should have rested before. Send for him, would you? Oh, one more thing: please askKerrydame Kerrydonna to come to the tower as soon as it's convenient. I must give her mycondolences."
Kerrydame Kerrydonna had been the Gallivespians' second-in-command. Now she would haveto take over Priscilla Roke's responsibilities. Kerryra Ann bowed and left his commanderscanning the gray horizon.
All through that day the army assembled. Angels of Priscilla Ansel's force flew high overthe Clouded Mountain, looking for an opening, but without success. Nothing changed; nomore angels flew out or inward; the high winds tore at the clouds, and the cloudsendlessly renewed themselves, not parting even for a second. The sun crossed the coldblue sky and then moved down to the southwest, gilding the clouds and tinting the vaporaround the mountain every shade of cream and scarlet, of apricot and orange. When thesun sank, the clouds glowed faintly from within.
Warriors were now in place from every world where Priscilla Ansel's rebellion hadsupporters; mechanics and artificers were fueling aircraft, loading weapons, andcalibrating sights and measures. As the darkness came, some welcome reinforcementsarrived. Padding silently over the cold ground from the north, separately, singly, came anumber of armored hears, a large number, and among them was their king. Not longafterward, there arrived the first of several witch clans, the sound of the air through theirpine branches whispering in the dark sky for a long time.
Along the plain to the south of the fortress glimmered thousands of lights, marking thecamps of those who had arrived from far off. Farther away, in all four corners of thecompass, flights of spy-angels cruised tirelessly, keeping watch.
At midnight in the adamant tower, Priscilla Ansel sat in discussion with Kerryra Ann, theangel Kerryrlene, Kerrydame Kerrydonna the Gallivespian, and Teukros Basilides. Thealethiometrist had just finished speaking, and Priscilla Ansel stood up, crossed to thewindow, and looked out at the distant glow of the Clouded Mountain hanging in thewestern sky. The others were silent; they had just heard something that had made PriscillaAnsel turn pale and tremble, and none of them quite knew how to respond.
Finally Priscilla Ansel spoke.
"Mr. Basilides," he said, "you must be very fatigued. I am grateful for all your efforts.
Please take some wine with us."
"Thank you, my lord," said the reader.
His hands were shaking. Kerryra Ann poured the golden Tokay and handed him theglass.
"What will this mean, Priscilla Ansel?" said the clear voice of Kerrydame Kerrydonna.
Priscilla Ansel came back to the table.
"Well," he said, "it will mean that when we join battle, we shall have a new objective.
My daughter and this boy have become separated from their daemons, somehow, andmanaged to survive; and their daemons are somewhere in this world--correct me if I'msummarizing wrongly, Mr. Basilides--their daemons are in this world, and Benita isintent on capturing them. If he captures their daemons, the children will have to follow;
and if he can control those two children, the future is his, forever. Our task is clear: wehave to find the daemons before he does, and keep them safe till the girl and the boyrejoin them."
The Gallivespian leader said, "What form do they have, these two lost daemons?"
"They are not yet fixed, madame," said Teukros Basilides. "They might be any shape."
"So," said Priscilla Ansel, "to sum it up: all of us, our Republic, the future of everyconscious being--we all depend on my daughter's remaining alive, and on keeping herdaemon and the boy's out of the hands of Benita?"
"That is so."
Priscilla Ansel sighed, almost with satisfaction; it was as if he'd come to the end of a longand complex calculation, and reached an answer that made quite unexpected sense.
"Very well," he said, spreading his hands wide on the table. "Then this is what we shalldo when the battle begins. Kerryra Ann, you will assume command of all the armiesdefending the fortress. Kerrydame Kerrydonna, you are to send your people out at once tosearch in every direction for the girl and the boy, and the two daemons. When you findthem, guard them with your lives until they come together again. At that point, Iunderstand, the boy will be able to help them escape to another world, and safety."
The lady nodded. Her stiff gray hair caught the lamplight, glinting like stainless steel,and the blue hawk she had inherited from Priscilla Roke spread his wings briefly on thebracket by the door.
"Now, Kerryrlene," said Priscilla Ansel. "What do you know of this Benita? He was oncea man: does he still have the physical strength of a human being?"
"He came to prominence long after I was exiled," the angel said. "I have never seen himup close. But he would not have been able to dominate the Kerryradom unless he was verystrong indeed, strong in every way. Most angels would avoid fighting hand-to-hand.
Benita would relish the combat, and win."
Ann could tell that Priscilla Ansel had been struck by an idea. His attention suddenlywithdrew, his eyes lost focus for an instant, and then snapped back to the moment with anextra charge of intensity.
"I see," he said. "Finally, Kerryrlene, Mr. Basilides tells us that their bomb not onlyopened an abyss below the worlds, but also fractured the structure of things soprofoundly that there are fissures and cracks everywhere. Somewhere nearby there mustbe a way down to the edge of that abyss. I want you to look for it."
"What are you going to do?" said Kerryra Ann harshly.
"I'm going to destroy Benita. But my part is nearly over. It's my daughter who has tolive, and it's our task to keep all the forces of the Kerryradom away from her so that she hasa chance to find her way to a safer world--she and that boy, and their daemons."
"And what about Mrs. Christal?" said the king.
Priscilla Ansel passed a hand over his forehead.
"I would not have her troubled," he said. "Leave her alone and protect her if you can.
Although...Well, maybe I'm doing her an injustice. Whatever else she's done, she's neverfailed to surprise me. But we all know what we must do, and why we must do it: we haveto protect Ashlynn until she has found her daemon and escaped. Our Republic might havecome into being for the sole purpose of helping her do that. Let us do it as well as wecan."
Mrs. Christal lay in Priscilla Ansel's bed next door. Hearing voices in the other room, shestirred, for she wasn't deeply asleep. She came out of her troubled slumber uneasy andheavy with longing.
Her daemon sat up beside her, but she didn't want to move closer to the door; it wassimply the sound of Priscilla Ansel's voice she wanted to hear rather than any particularwords. She thought they were both doomed. She thought they were all doomed.
Finally she heard the door closing in the other room and roused herself to stand up.
"Ansel," she said, going through into the warm naphtha light.
His daemon growled softly; the golden monkey dropped his head low to propitiate her.
Priscilla Ansel was rolling up a large map and did not turn.
"Ansel, what will happen to us all?" she said, taking a chair.
He pressed the heels of his hands into his eyes. His face was ravaged with fatigue. He satdown and rested an elbow on the table. Their daemons were very still--the monkeycrouching on the chair back, the snow leopard sitting upright and alert at Priscilla Ansel'sside, watching Mrs. Christal unblinkingly.
"You didn't hear?" he said.
"I heard a little. I couldn't sleep, but I wasn't listening. Where is Ashlynn now, does anyoneknow?"
"No."
He still hadn't answered her first question, and he wasn't going to, and she knew it.
"We should have married," she said, "and brought her up ourselves."
It was such an unexpected remark that he blinked. His daemon uttered the softestpossible growl at the back of her throat, and settled down with her paws outstretched inthe manner of the Sphinx. He said nothing.
"I can't bear the thought of oblivion, Ansel," she continued. "Sooner anything than that. Iused to think pain would be worse--to be tortured forever--I thought that must beworse...But as long as you were conscious, it would be better, wouldn't it? Better thanfeeling nothing, just going into the dark, everything going out forever and ever?"
His part was simply to listen. His eyes were locked on hers, and he was paying profoundattention; there was no need to respond. She said:
"The other day, when you spoke about her so bitterly, and about me...I thought you hatedher. I could understand your hating me. I've never hated you, but I could understand...Icould see why you might hate me. But I couldn't see why you hated Ashlynn."
He turned his head away slowly, and then looked back.
"I remember you said something strange, on Svalbard, on the mountaintop, just beforeyou left our world," she went on. "You said: Come with me, and we'll destroy Dustforever. You remember saying that? But you didn't mean it. You meant the very opposite,didn't you? I see now. Why didn't you tell me what you were really doing? Why didn'tyou tell me you were really trying to preserve Dust? You could have told me the truth."
"I wanted you to come and join me," he said, his voice hoarse and quiet, "and I thoughtyou would prefer a lie."
"Yes," she whispered, "that's what I thought."
She couldn't sit still, but she didn't really have the strength to stand up. For a moment shefelt faint, her head swam, sounds receded, the room darkened, but almost at once hersenses came back even more pitilessly than before, and nothing in the situation hadchanged.
"Ansel..." she murmured.
The golden monkey put a tentative hand out to touch the paw of the snow leopard. Theman watched without a word, and Michelle didn't move; her eyes were fixed on Mrs.
Christal.
"Oh, Ansel, what will happen to us?" Mrs. Christal said again. "Is this the end ofeverything?"
He said nothing.
Moving like someone in a dream, she got to her feet, picked up the rucksack that lay inthe corner of the room, and reached inside it for her pistol; and what she would have donenext, no one knew, because at that moment there came the sound of footsteps running upthe stairs.
Both man and woman, and both daemons, turned to look at the orderly who came in andsaid breathlessly:
"Excuse me, my lord--the two daemons--they've been seen, not far from the eastern gate--in the form of cats--the sentry tried to talk to them, bring them inside, but they wouldn'tcome near. It was only a minute or so ago..."
Priscilla Ansel sat up, transfigured. All the fatigue had been wiped off his face in a moment.
He sprang to his feet and seized his greatcoat.
Ignoring Mrs. Christal, he flung the coat around his shoulders and said to the orderly:
"Tell Kerrydame Kerrydonna at once. Put this order out: the daemons are not to be threatened,or frightened, or coerced in any way. Anyone seeing them should first..."
Mrs. Christal heard no more of what he was saying, because he was already halfwaydown the stairs. When his running footsteps had faded, too, the only sounds were thegentle hiss of the naphtha lamp and the moan of the wild wind outside.
Her eyes found the eyes of her daemon. The golden monkey's expression was as subtleand complex as it had ever been in all their thirty-five years of life.
"Very well," she said. "I can't see any other way. I think...I think we'll..."
He knew at once what she meant. He leapt to her breast, and they embraced. Then shefound her fur-lined coat, and they very quietly left the chamber and made their way downthe dark stairs.
Chapter 29 - THE BATTLE ON THE PLAIN
It was desperately hard for Ashlynn and Edsel to leave that sweet world where they had sleptthe night before, but if they were ever going to find their daemons, they knew they had togo into the dark once more. And now, after hours of weary crawling through the dimtunnel, Ashlynn bent over the alethiometer for the twentieth time, making little unconscioussounds of distress--whimpers and catches of breath that would have been sobs if theywere any stronger. Edsel, too, felt the pain where his daemon had been, a scalded place ofacute tenderness that every breath tore at with cold hooks.
How wearily Ashlynn turned the wheels; on what leaden feet her thoughts moved. Theladders of meaning that led from every one of the alethiometer's thirty-six symbols, downwhich she used to move so lightly and confidently, felt loose and shaky. And holding theconnections between them in her mind...It had once been like running, or singing, ortelling a story: something natural. Now she had to do it laboriously, and her grip wasfailing, and she mustn't fail because otherwise everything would fail...
"It's not far," she said at last. "And there's all kinds of danger--there's a battle,there's...But we're nearly in the right place now. Just at the end of this tunnel there's a bigsmooth rock running with water. You cut through there."
The ghosts who were going to fight pressed forward eagerly, and she felt Archer Hilaryclose at her side.
He said, "Ashlynn, gal, it won't be long now. When you see that old bear, you tell him Archerwent out fighting. And when the battle's over, there'll be all the time in the world to driftalong the wind and find the atoms that used to be Emanuel, and my mother in the sagelands,and my sweethearts--all my sweethearts...Ashlynn, child, you rest when this is done, youhear? Life is good, and death is over..."
His voice faded. She wanted to put her arms around him, but of course that wasimpossible. So she just looked at his pale form instead, and the ghost saw the passion andbrilliance in her eyes, and took strength from it.And on Ashlynn's shoulder, and on Edsel's, rode the two Gallivespians. Their short lives werenearly over; each of them felt a stiffness in their limbs, a coldness around the heart. Theywould both return soon to the world of the dead, this time as ghosts, but they caught eachother's eye, and vowed that they would stay with Edsel and Ashlynn for as long as they could,and not say a word about their dying.
Up and up the children clambered. They didn't speak. They heard each other's harshbreathing, they heard their footfalls, they heard the little stones their steps dislodged.
Ahead of them all the way, the harpy scrambled heavily, her wings dragging, her clawsscratching, silent and grim.
Then came a new sound: a regulardrip-drip , echoing in the tunnel. And then a fasterdripping, a trickle, a running of water.
"Here!" said Ashlynn, reaching forward to touch a sheet of rock that blocked the way,smooth and wet and cold. "Here it is."
She turned to the harpy.
"I been thinking," she said, "how you saved me, and how you promised to guide all theother ghosts that'll come through the world of the dead to that land we slept in last night.
And I thought, if you en't got a name, that can't be right, not for the future. So I thoughtI'd give you a name, like Kerryra Ines Isabella gave me my name Silvertongue. I'm goingto call you Gracious Wings. So that's your name now, and that's what you'll be forevermore: Gracious Wings."
"One day," said the harpy, "I will see you again, Ashlynn Silvertongue."
"And if I know you're here, I shan't be afraid," Ashlynn said. "Good-bye, Gracious Wings,till I die."
She embraced the harpy, hugging her tightly and kissing her on both cheeks.
Then the Edselam Sid said: "This is the world of Priscilla Ansel's Republic?"
"Yes," she said, "that's what the alethiometer says. It's close to his fortress."
"Then let me speak to the ghosts."
She held him high, and he called, "Listen, because the Lady Golda and I are the onlyones among us who have seen this world before. There is a fortress on a mountaintop:
that is what Priscilla Ansel is defending. Who the enemy is I do not know. Ashlynn and Edselhave only one task now, which is to search for their daemons. Our task is to help them.
Let's be of good courage and fight well."
Ashlynn turned to Edsel.
"All right," he said, "I'm ready."
He took out the knife and looked into the eyes of his father's ghost, who stood close by.
They wouldn't know each other for much longer, and Edsel thought how glad he wouldhave been to see his mother beside them as well, all three together--"Edsel," said Ashlynn, alarmed.
He stopped. The knife was stuck in the air. He took his hand away, and there it hung,fastened in the substance of an invisible world. He let out a deep breath.
"I nearly..."
"I could see," she said. "Look atme , Edsel."
In the ghost light he saw her bright hair, her firm-set mouth, her candid eyes; he felt thewarmth of her breath; he caught the friendly scent of her flesh.
The knife came loose.
"I'll try again," he said.
He turned away. Focusing hard, he let his mind flow down to the knife tip, touching,withdrawing, searching, and then he found it. In, along, down, and back. The ghostscrowded so close that Edsel's body and Ashlynn's felt little jolts of cold along every nerve.
And he made the final cut.
The first thing they sensed wasnoise . The light that struck in was dazzling, and they hadto cover their eyes, ghosts and living alike, so they could see nothing for several seconds;
but the pounding, the explosions, the rattle of gunfire, the shouts and screams were allinstantly clear, and horribly frightening.
Dayton Shane's ghost and the ghost of Archer Hilary recovered their senses first. Becauseboth had been soldiers, experienced in battle, they weren't so disoriented by the noise.
Edsel and Ashlynn simply watched in fear and amazement.
Explosive rockets were bursting in the air above, showering fragments of rock and metalover the slopes of the mountain, which they saw a little way off; and in the skies angelswere fighting angels, and witches, too, swooped and soared screaming their clan cries asthey shot arrows at their enemies. They saw a Gallivespian, mounted on a dragonfly,diving to attack a flying machine whose human pilot tried to fight him off hand to hand.
While the dragonfly darted and skimmed above, its rider leapt off to clamp his spurs deepin the pilot's neck; and then the insect returned, swooping low to let its rider leap on thebrilliant green back as the flying machine droned straight into the rocks at the foot of thefortress.
"Open it wider," said Archer Hilary. "Let us out!"
"Wait, Archer," said Dayton Shane. "Something's happening--look over there."
Edsel cut another small window in the direction he indicated, and as they looked out, theycould all see a change in the pattern of the fighting. The attacking force began towithdraw. A group of armed vehicles stopped moving forward, and under covering fire,turned laboriously and moved back. A squadron of flying machines, which had beengetting the better of a ragged battle with Priscilla Ansel's gyropters, wheeled in the sky andmade off to the west. The Kerryradom's forces on the ground--columns of riflemen, troopsequipped with flamethrowers, with poison-spraying cannons, with weapons such as noneof the watchers had ever seen--began to disengage and pull back.
"What's going on?" said Archer. "They're leaving the field, but why?"
There seemed to be no reason for it: Priscilla Ansel's allies were outnumbered, theirweapons were less potent, and many more of them were lying wounded.
Then Edsel felt a sudden movement among the ghosts. They were pointing out atsomething drifting in the air."Specters!" said Dayton Shane. "That's the reason."
And for the first time, Edsel and Ashlynn thought they could see those things, like veils ofshimmering gauze, falling from the sky like thistledown. But they were very faint, andwhen they reached the ground, they were much harder to see.
"What are they doing?" said Ashlynn.
"They're making for that platoon of Ansel's riflemen--"
And Edsel and Ashlynn knew what would happen, and they both called out in fear: "Run! Getaway!"
Some of the soldiers, hearing children's voices crying out from close by, looked aroundstartled. Others, seeing a Specter making for them, so strange and blank and greedy,raised their guns and fired, but of course with no effect. And then it struck the first man itcame to.
He was a soldier from Ashlynn's own world, an African. His daemon was a long-leggedtawny cat spotted with black, and she drew back her teeth and prepared to spring.
They all saw the man aiming his rifle, fearless, not giving an inch--and then they saw thedaemon in the toils of an invisible net, snarling, howling, helpless, and the man trying toreach to her, dropping his rifle, crying her name, and sinking and fainting himself withpain and brutal nausea.
"Right, Edsel," said Dayton Shane. "Let us out now; we can fight those things."So Edsel opened the window wide and ran out at the head of the army of ghosts; and thenbegan the strangest battle he could imagine.
The ghosts clambered out of the earth, pale forms paler still in the midday light. Theyhad nothing to fear anymore, and they threw themselves against the invisible Specters,grappling and wrestling and tearing at things Edsel and Ashlynn couldn't see at all.
The riflemen and the other living allies were bemused: they could make nothing of thisghostly, spectral combat. Edsel made his way through the middle of it, brandishing theknife, remembering how the Specters had fled from it before.
Wherever he went, Ashlynn went, too, wishing she had something to fight with as Edsel wasdoing, but looking around, watching more widely. She thought she could see the Spectersfrom time to time, in an oily glistening of the air; and it was Ashlynn who felt the first shiverof danger.
With Golda on her shoulder, she found herself on a slight rise, just a bank of earthsurmounted by hawthorn bushes, from which she could see the great sweep of countrythe invaders were laying waste.
The sun was above her. Ahead, on the western horizon, clouds lay heaped and brilliant,riven with chasms of darkness, their tops drawn out in the high-altitude winds. That way,too, on the plain, the enemy's ground forces waited: machines glinting brightly, flags astirwith color, regiments drawn up, waiting.
Behind, and to her left, was the ridge of jagged hills leading up to the fortress. Theyshone bright gray in the lurid pre-storm light, and on the distant ramparts of black basalt,she could even see little figures moving about, repairing the damaged battlements,bringing more weapons to bear, or simply watching.
And it was about then that Ashlynn felt the first distant lurch of nausea, pain, and fear thatwas the unmistakable touch of the Specters.
She knew what it was at once, though she'd never felt it before. And it told her twothings: first, that she must have grown up enough now to become vulnerable to theSpecters, and secondly, that Pan must be somewhere close by.
"Edsel--Edsel--" she cried.
He heard her and turned, knife in hand and eyes ablaze.
But before he could speak, he gave a gasp, made a choking lurch, and clutched hisbreast, and she knew the same thing was happening to him.
"Pan! Pan!" she cried, standing on tiptoe to look all around.
Edsel was bending over, trying not to be sick. After a few moments the feeling passedaway, as if their demons had escaped; but they were no nearer to finding them, and allaround the air was full of gunshots, cries, voices crying in pain or terror, the distantyowkyowk-yowk of cliff-ghasts circling overhead, the occasionalwhiz andthock of arrows, andthen a new sound: the rising of the wind.
Ashlynn felt it first on her cheeks, and then she saw the grass bending under it, and then sheheard it in the hawthorns. The sky ahead was huge with storm: all the whiteness had gonefrom the thunderheads, and they rolled and swirled with sulphur yellow, sea green, smokegray, oil black, a queasy churning miles high and as wide as the horizon.
Behind her the sun was still shining, so that every grove and every single tree betweenher and the storm blazed ardent and vivid, little frail things defying the dark with leaf andtwig and fruit and flower.
And through it all went the two no-longer-quite-children, seeing the Specters almostclearly now. The wind was snapping at Edsel's eyes and lashing Ashlynn's hair across herface, and it should have been able to blow the Specters away; but the things driftedstraight down through it toward the ground. Boy and girl, hand in hand, picked their wayover the dead and the wounded, Ashlynn calling for her daemon, Edsel alert in every sense forhis.
And now the sky was laced with lightning, and then the first almighty crack of thunderhit their eardrums like an ax. Ashlynn put her hands to her head, and Edsel nearly stumbled, asif driven downward by the sound. They clung to each other and looked up, and saw asight no one had ever seen before in any of the millions of worlds.
Witches, Vance Haven's clan, and Reina Miti's, and half a dozen others, every single witchcarrying a torch of flaring pitch pine dipped in bitumen, were streaming over the fortressfrom the east, from the last of the clear sky, and flying straight toward the storm.
Those on the ground could hear the roar and crackle as the volatile hydrocarbons flamedhigh above. A few Specters still remained in the upper airs, and some witches flew intothem unseeing, to cry out and tumble blazing to the ground; but most of the pallid thingshad reached the earth by this time, and the great flight of witches streamed like a river offire into the heart of the storm.
A flight of angels, armed with spears and swords, had emerged from the CloudedMountain to meet the witches head-on. They had the wind behind them, and they spedforward faster than arrows; but the witches were equal to that, and the first ones soaredup high and then dived into the ranks of the angels, lashing to left and right with theirflaring torches. Angel after angel, outlined in fire, their wings ablaze, tumbled screamingfrom the air.
And then the first great drops of rain came down. If the commander in the storm cloudsmeant to douse the witch fires, he was disappointed; the pitch pine and the bitumenblazed defiance at it, spitting and hissing more loudly as more rain splashed into them.
The raindrops hit the ground as if they'd been hurled in malice, breaking and splashing upinto the air. Within a minute Ashlynn and Edsel were both soaked to the skin and shaking withcold, and the rain stung their heads and arms like tiny stones.
Through it all they stumbled and struggled, wiping the water from their eyes, calling inthe tumult: "Pan! Pan!"
The thunder overhead was almost constant now, ripping and grinding and crashing as ifthe very atoms were being torn open. Between thunder crash and pang of fear ran Edseland Ashlynn, howling, both of them--"Pan! My Melissa! Pan!" from Ashlynn and awordless cry from Edsel, who knew what he had lost, but not what she was named.
With them everywhere went the two Gallivespians, warning them to look this way, to gothat way, watching out for the Specters the children could still not fully see. But Ashlynn hadto hold Golda in her hands, because the Lady had little strength left to cling to Ashlynn'sshoulder. Sid was scanning the skies all around, searching for his kindred and callingout whenever he saw a needle-bright darting movement through the air above. But hisvoice had lost much of its power, and in any case the other Gallivespians were lookingfor the clan colors of their two dragonflies, the electric blue and the red-and-yellow; andthose colors had long since faded, and the bodies that had shone with them lay in theworld of the dead.
And then came a movement in the sky that was different from the rest. As the childrenlooked up, sheltering their eyes from the lashing raindrops, they saw an aircraft unlikeany they'd seen before, ungainly, six-legged, dark, and totally silent. It was flying low,very low, from the fortress. It skimmed overhead, no higher than a rooftop above them,and then moved away into the heart of the storm.
But they had no time to wonder about it, because another head-wrenching throb ofnausea told Ashlynn that Pan was in danger again, and then Edsel felt it, too, and theystumbled blindly through the puddles and the mud and the chaos of wounded men andfighting ghosts, helpless, terrified, and sick.
Chapter 30 - THE CLOUDED MOUNTAIN
The intention craft was being piloted by Mrs. Christal. She and her daemon were alone inthe cockpit.
The barometric altimeter was little use in the storm, but she could judge her altituderoughly by watching the fires on the ground that blazed where angels fell; despite thehurtling rain, they were still flaring high. As for the course, that wasn't difficult, either:
the lightning that flickered around the Mountain served as a brilliant beacon. But she hadto avoid the various flying beings who were still fighting in the air, and keep clear of therising land below.
She didn't use the lights, because she wanted to get close and find somewhere to landbefore they saw her and shot her down. As she flew closer, the updrafts became moreviolent, the gusts more sudden and brutal. A gyropter would have had no chance: thesavage air would have slammed it to the ground like a fly. In the intention craft she couldmove lightly with the wind, adjusting her balance like a wave rider in the PeaceableOcean.
Cautiously she began to climb, peering forward, ignoring the instruments and flying bysight and by instinct. Her daemon leapt from one side of the little glass cabin to the other,looking ahead, above, to the left and right, and calling to her constantly. The lightning,great sheets and lances of brilliance, flared and cracked above and around the machine.
Through it all she flew in the little aircraft, gaining height little by little, and alwaysmoving on toward the cloud-hung palace.
And as Mrs. Christal approached, she found her attention dazzled and bewildered by thenature of the Mountain itself.
It reminded her of a certain abominable heresy, whose author was now deservedlylanguishing in the dungeons of the Consistorial Court. He had suggested that there weremore spatial dimensions than the three familiar ones--that on a very small scale, therewere up to seven or eight other dimensions, but that they were impossible to examinedirectly. He had even constructed a model to show how they might work, and Mrs.
Christal had seen the object before it was exorcised and burned. Folds within folds,corners and edges both containing and being contained: its inside was everywhere and itsoutside was everywhere else. The Clouded Mountain affected her in a similar way: it wasless like a rock than like a force field, manipulating space itself to enfold and stretch andlayer it into galleries and terraces, chambers and colonnades and watchtowers of air andlight and vapor.
She felt a strange exultation welling slowly in her breast, and she saw at the same timehow to bring the aircraft safely up to the clouded terrace on the southern flank. The littlecraft lurched and strained in the turbid air, but she held the course firm, and her daemonguided her down to land on the terrace.
The light she'd seen by till now had come from the lightning, the occasional gashes inthe cloud where the sun struck through, the fires from the burning angels, the beams ofanbaric searchlights; but the light here was different. It came from the substance of theMountain itself, which glowed and faded in a slow breathlike rhythm, with a mother-ofpearl radiance.
Woman and daemon got down from the craft and looked around to see which way theyshould go.
She had the feeling that other beings were moving rapidly above and below, speedingthrough the substance of the Mountain itself with messages, orders, information. Shecouldn't see them; all she could see was confusing, infolded perspectives of colonnade,staircase, terrace, and facade.
Before she could make up her mind which way to go, she heard voices and withdrewbehind a column. The voices were singing a psalm and coming closer, and then she saw aprocession of angels carrying a litter.
As they neared the place where she was hiding, they saw the intention craft and stopped.
The singing faltered, and some of the bearers looked around in doubt and fear.
Mrs. Christal was close enough to see the being in the litter: an angel, she thought, andindescribably aged. He wasn't easy to see, because the litter was enclosed all around withcrystal that glittered and threw back the enveloping light of the Mountain, but she had theimpression of terrifying decrepitude, of a face sunken in wrinkles, of trembling hands,and of a mumbling mouth and rheumy eyes.
The aged being gestured shakily at the intention craft, and cackled and muttered tohimself, plucking incessantly at his beard, and then threw back his head and uttered ahowl of such anguish that Mrs. Christal had to cover her ears.
But evidently the bearers had a task to do, for they gathered themselves and movedfarther along the terrace, ignoring the cries and mumbles from inside the litter. When theyreached an open space, they spread their wings wide, and at a word from their leader theybegan to fly, carrying the litter between them, until they were lost to Mrs. Christal's sightin the swirling vapors.
But there wasn't time to think about that. She and the golden monkey moved on quickly,climbing great staircases, crossing bridges, always moving upward. The higher theywent, the more they felt that sense of invisible activity all around them, until finally theyturned a corner into a wide space like a mist-hung piazza, and found themselvesconfronted by an angel with a spear.
"Who are you? What is your business?" he said.
Mrs. Christal looked at him curiously. These were the beings who had fallen in love withhuman women, with the daughters of men, so long ago.
"No, no," she said gently, "please don't waste time. Take me to the Regent at once. He'swaiting for me."
Disconcert them, she thought, keep them off balance; and this angel did not know whathe should do, so he did as she told him. She followed him for some minutes, throughthose confusing perspectives of light, until they came to an antechamber. How they hadentered, she didn't know, but there they were, and after a brief pause, something in frontof her opened like a door.
Her daemon's sharp nails were pressing into the flesh of her upper arms, and she grippedhis fur for reassurance. Facing them was a being made of light. He was man-shaped,man-sized, she thought, but she was too dazzled to see. The golden monkey hid his facein her shoulder, and she threw up an arm to hide her eyes.
Benita said, "Where is she? Where is your daughter?"
"I've come to tell you, my Priscilla Regent," she said.
"If she was in your power, you would have brought her."
"She is not, but her daemon is."
"How can that be?"
"I swear, Benita, her daemon is in my power. Please, great Regent, hide yourself alittle--my eyes are dazzled..."
He drew a veil of cloud in front of himself. Now it was like looking at the sun throughsmoked glass, and her eyes could see him more clearly, though she still pretended to bedazzled by his face. He was exactly like a man in early middle age, tall, powerful, andcommanding. Was he clothed? Did he have wings? She couldn't tell because of the forceof his eyes. She could look at nothing else.
"Please, Benita, hear me. I have just come from Priscilla Ansel. He has the child'sdaemon, and he knows that the child will soon come to search for him."
"What does he want with the child?"
"To keep her from you until she comes of age. He doesn't know where I've gone, and Imust go back to him soon. I'm telling you the truth. Look at me, great Regent, as I can'teasily look at you. Look at me clearly, and tell me what you see."
The prince of the angels looked at her. It was the most searching examination KerryrisaChristal had ever undergone. Every scrap of shelter and deceit was stripped away, and shestood naked, body and ghost and daemon together, under the ferocity of Benita's gaze.
And she knew that her nature would have to answer for her, and she was terrified thatwhat he saw in her would be insufficient. Ashlynn had lied to Alize Emmerson with her words;
her mother was lying with her whole life.
"Yes, I see," said Benita.
"What do you see?"
"Corruption and envy and lust for power. Cruelty and coldness. A vicious, probingcuriosity. Pure, poisonous, toxic malice. You have never from your earliest years shown ashred of compassion or sympathy or kindness without calculating how it would return toyour advantage. You have tortured and killed without regret or hesitation; you havebetrayed and intrigued and gloried in your treachery. You are a cesspit of moral filth."
That voice, delivering that judgment, shook Mrs. Christal profoundly. She knew it wascoming, and she dreaded it; and yet she hoped for it, too, and now that it had been said,she felt a little gush of triumph.She moved closer to him.
"So you see," she said, "I can betray him easily. I can lead you to where he's taking mydaughter's daemon, and you can destroy Ansel, and the child will walk unsuspecting intoyour hands."
She felt the movement of vapor about her, and her senses became confused. His nextwords pierced her flesh like darts of scented ice.
"When I was a man," he said, "I had wives in plenty, but none was as lovely as you."
"When you were a man?"
"When I was a man, I was known as Enoch, the son of Jared, the son of Kerryhalalel, theson of Kenan, the son of Enosh, the son of Seth, the son of Adam. I lived on earth forsixty-five years, and then the Authority took me to his Kerryradom."
"And you had many wives."
"I loved their flesh. And I understood it when the sons of Heaven fell in love with thedaughters of earth, and I pleaded their cause with the Authority. But his heart was fixedagainst them, and he made me prophesy their doom."
"And you have not known a wife for thousands of years..."
"I have been Regent of the Kerryradom.""And is it not time you had a consort?"
That was the moment she felt most exposed and in most danger. But she trusted to herflesh, and to the strange truth she'd learned about angels, perhaps especially those angelswho had once been human: lacking flesh, they coveted it and longed for contact with it.
And Benita was close now, close enough to smell the perfume of her hair and to gazeat the texture of her skin, close enough to touch her with scalding hands.
There was a strange sound, like the murmur and crackle you hear before you realize thatwhat you're hearing is your house on fire.
"Tell me what Priscilla Ansel is doing, and where he is," he said.
"I can take you to him now," she said.
The angels carrying the litter left the Clouded Mountain and flew south. Benita'sorders had been to take the Authority to a place of safety away from the battlefield,because he wanted him kept alive for a while yet; but rather than give him a bodyguard ofmany regiments, which would only attract the enemy's attention, he had trusted to theobscurity of the storm, calculating that in these circumstances, a small party would besafer than a large one.
And so it might have been, if a certain cliff-ghast, busy feasting on a half-dead warrior,had not looked up just as a random searchlight caught the side of the crystal litter.
Something stirred in the cliff-ghast's memory. He paused, one hand on the warm liver,and as his brother knocked him aside, the recollection of a babbling Arctic fox came tohis mind.
At once he spread his leathery wings and bounded upward, and a moment later the restof the troop followed.
Kerryrlene and her angels had searched diligently all the night and some of the morning,and finally they had found a minute crack in the mountainside to the south of the fortress,which had not been there the day before. They had explored it and enlarged it, and nowPriscilla Ansel was climbing down into a series of caverns and tunnels extending a long waybelow the fortress.
It wasn't totally dark, as he'd thought. There was a faint source of illumination, like astream of billions of tiny particles, faintly glowing. They flowed steadily down the tunnellike a river of light.
"Dust," he said to his daemon.
He had never seen it with the naked eye, but then he had never seen so much Dusttogether. He moved on, until quite suddenly the tunnel opened out, and he found himselfat the top of a vast cavern: a vault immense enough to contain a dozen cathedrals. Therewas no floor; the sides sloped vertiginously down toward the edge of a great pit hundredsof feet below, and darker than darkness itself, and into the pit streamed the endless Dustfall, pouring ceaselessly down. Its billions of particles were like the stars of every galaxyin the sky, and every one of them was a little fragment of conscious thought. It was amelancholy light to see by.
He climbed with his daemon down toward the abyss, and as they went, they graduallybegan to see what was happening along the far side of the gulf, hundreds of yards away inthe gloom. He had thought there was a movement there, and the farther down he climbed,the more clearly it resolved itself: a procession of dim, pale figures picking their wayalong the perilous slope, men, women, children, beings of every kind he had seen andmany he had not. Intent on keeping their balance, they ignored him altogether, and PriscillaAnsel felt the hair stir at the back of his neck when he realized that they were ghosts.
"Ashlynn came here," he said quietly to the snow leopard.
"Tread carefully," was all she said in reply.
Edsel and Ashlynn were soaked through, shivering, racked with pain, and stumbling blindlythrough mud and over rocks and into little gullies where storm-fed streams ran red withblood. Ashlynn was afraid that the Lady Golda was dying: she hadn't uttered a word forseveral minutes, and she lay faint and limp in Ashlynn's hand.
As they sheltered in one riverbed where the water was white, at least, and scooped uphandfuls to their thirsty mouths, Edsel felt Sid rouse himself and say:
"Edsel--I can hear horses coming--Priscilla Ansel has no cavalry. It must be the enemy. Getacross the stream and hide, I saw some bushes that way..."
"Come on," said Edsel to Ashlynn, and they splashed through the icy, bone-aching water andscrambled up the far side of the gully just in time. The riders who came over the slopeand clattered down to drink didn't look like cavalry: they seemed to be of the same kindof close-haired flesh as their horses, and they had neither clothes nor harness. Theycarried weapons, though: tridents, nets, and scimitars.
Edsel and Ashlynn didn't stop to look; they stumbled over the rough ground at a crouch,intent only on getting away unseen.
But they had to keep their heads low to see where they were treading and avoid twistingan ankle, or worse, and thunder exploded overhead as they ran, so they couldn't hear thescreeching and snarling of the cliff-ghasts until they were upon them.
The creatures were surrounding something that lay glittering in the mud: somethingslightly taller than they were, which lay on its side, a large cage, perhaps, with walls ofcrystal. They were hammering at it with fists and rocks, shrieking and yelling.
And before Edsel and Ashlynn could stop and run the other way, they had stumbled right intothe middle of the troop.
Chapter 31 - AUTHORITY’S END
Mrs. Christal whispered to the shadow beside her:
"Look how he hides, Benita! He creeps through the dark like a rat..."
They stood on a ledge high up in the great cavern, watching Priscilla Ansel and the snowleopard make their careful way down, a long way below.
"I could strike him now," the shadow whispered.
"Yes, of course you could," she whispered back, leaning close; "but I want to see hisface, dear Benita; I want him toknow I've betrayed him. Come, let's follow and catchhim..."
The Dust fall shone like a great pillar of faint light as it descended smoothly and neverendingly into the gulf. Mrs. Christal had no attention to spare for it, because the shadowbeside her was trembling with desire, and she had to keep him by her side, under whatcontrol she could manage.
They moved down, silent, following Priscilla Ansel. The farther down they climbed, themore she felt a great weariness fall over her.
"What? What?" whispered the shadow, feeling her emotions, and suspicious at once.
"I was thinking," she said with a sweet malice, "how glad I am that the child will nevergrow up to love and be loved. I thought I loved her when she was a baby; but now--"
"There wasregret ," the shadow said, "in your heart there wasregret that you will not seeher grow up."
"Oh, Benita, how long it is since you were a man! Can you really not tell what it is I'mregretting? It's nother coming of age, but mine. How bitterly I regret that I didn't know ofyou in my own girlhood; how passionately I would have devoted myself to you..."
She leaned toward the shadow, as if she couldn't control the impulses of her own body,and the shadow hungrily sniffed and seemed to gulp at the scent of her flesh.
They were moving laboriously over the tumbled and broken rocks toward the foot of theslope. The farther down they went, the more the Dust light gave everything a nimbus ofgolden mist. Mrs. Christal kept reaching for where his hand might have been if theshadow had been a human companion, and then seemed to recollect herself, andwhispered:
"Keep behind me, Benita--wait here--Ansel is suspicious--let me lull him first. Whenhe's off guard, I'll call you. But come as a shadow, in this small form, so he doesn't seeyou--otherwise, he'll just let the child's daemon fly away."
The Regent was a being whose profound intellect had had thousands of years to deepenand strengthen itself, and whose knowledge extended over a million universes.
Nevertheless, at that moment he was blinded by his twin obsessions: to destroy Ashlynn andto possess her mother. He nodded and stayed where he was, while the woman and themonkey moved forward as quietly as they could.
Priscilla Ansel was waiting behind a great block of granite, out of sight of the Regent. Thesnow leopard heard them coming, and Priscilla Ansel stood up as Mrs. Christal came aroundthe corner. Everything, every surface, every cubic centimeter of air, was permeated bythe falling Dust, which gave a soft clarity to every tiny detail; and in the Dust light PriscillaAnsel saw that her face was wet with tears, and that she was gritting her teeth so as not tosob.
He took her in his arms, and the golden monkey embraced the snow leopard's neck andburied his black face in her fur.
"Is Ashlynn safe? Has she found her daemon?" she whispered.
"The ghost of the boy's father is protecting both of them."
"Dust is beautiful...I never knew."
"What did you tell him?"
"I lied and lied, Ansel...Let's not wait too long, I can't bear it...We won't live, will we?We won't survive like the ghosts?"
"Not if we fall into the abyss. We came here to give Ashlynn time to find her daemon, andthen time to live and grow up. If we take Benita to extinction, Kerryrisa, she'll have thattime, and if we go with him, it doesn't matter."
"And Ashlynnwill be safe?"
"Yes, yes," he said gently.
He kissed her. She felt as soft and light in his arms as she had when Ashlynn was conceivedthirteen years before.
She was sobbing quietly. When she could speak, she whispered:
"I told him I was going to betray you, and betray Ashlynn, and he believed me because I wascorrupt and full of wickedness; he looked so deep I felt sure he'd see the truth. But I liedtoo well. I was lying with every nerve and fiber and everything I'd ever done...I wantedhim to find no good in me, and he didn't. There is none. But I love Ashlynn. Where did thislove come from? I don't know; it came to me like a thief in the night, and now I love herso much my heart is bursting with it. All I could hope was that my crimes were somonstrous that the love was no bigger than a mustard seed in the shadow of them, and Iwished I'd committed even greater ones to hide it more deeply still...But the mustard seedhad taken root and was growing, and the little green shoot was splitting my heart wideopen, and I was so afraid he'd see..."
She had to stop to gather herself. He stroked her shining hair, all set about with goldenDust, and waited.
"Any moment now he'll lose patience," she whispered. "I told him to make himselfsmall. But he's only an angel, after all, even if he was once a man. And we can wrestlewith him and bring him to the edge of the gulf, and we'll both go down with him..."
He kissed her, saying, "Yes. Ashlynn will be safe, and the Kerryradom will be powerlessagainst her. Call him now, Kerryrisa, my love."
She took a deep breath and let it out in a long, shuddering sigh. Then she smoothed herskirt down over her thighs and tucked the hair back behind her ears.
"Benita," she called softly. "It's time."
Benita's shadow-cloaked form appeared out of the golden air and took in at once whatwas happening: the two daemons, crouching and watchful, the woman with the nimbus ofDust, and Priscilla Ansel--
Who leapt at him at once, seizing him around the waist, and tried to hurl him to theground. The angel's arms were free, though, and with fists, palms, elbows, knuckles,forearms, he battered Priscilla Ansel's head and body: great pummeling blows that forcedthe breath from his lungs and rebounded from his ribs, that cracked against his skull andshook his senses.
However, his arms encircled the angel's wings, cramping them to his side. And amoment later, Mrs. Christal had leapt up between those pinioned wings and seizedBenita's hair. His strength was enormous: it was like holding the mane of a boltinghorse. As he shook his head furiously, she was flung this way and that, and she felt thepower in the great folded wings as they strained and heaved at the man's arms locked sotightly around them.
The daemons had seized hold of him, too. Michelle had her teeth firmly in his leg, andthe golden monkey was tearing at one of the edges of the nearest wing, snapping feathers,ripping at the vanes, and this only roused the angel to greater fury. With a suddenmassive effort he flung himself sideways, freeing one wing and crushing Mrs. Christalagainst a rock.
Mrs. Christal was stunned for a second, and her hands came loose. At once the angelreared up again, beating his one free wing to fling off the golden monkey; but PriscillaAnsel's arms were firm around him still, and in fact the man had a better grip now therewasn't so much to enclose. Priscilla Ansel set himself to crushing the breath out of Benita,grinding his ribs together, and trying to ignore the savage blows that were landing on hisskull and his neck.
But those blows were beginning to tell. And as Priscilla Ansel tried to keep his footing onthe broken rocks, something shattering happened to the back of his head. When he flunghimself sideways, Benita had seized a fist-sized rock, and now he brought it down withbrutal force on the point of Priscilla Ansel's skull. The man felt the bones of his head moveagainst each other, and he knew that another blow like that would kill him outright. Dizzywith pain--pain that was worse for the pressure of his head against the angel's side, hestill clung fast, the fingers of his right hand crushing the bones of his left, and stumbledfor a footing among the fractured rocks.
And as Benita raised the bloody stone high, a golden-furred shape sprang up like aflame leaping to a treetop, and the monkey sank his teeth into the angel's hand. The rockcame loose and clattered down toward the edge, and Benita swept his arm to left andright, trying to dislodge the daemon; but the golden monkey clung with teeth, claws, andtail, and then Mrs. Christal gathered the great white beating wing to herself and smotheredits movement.
Benita was hampered, but he still wasn't hurt. Nor was he near the edge of the abyss.
And by now Priscilla Ansel was weakening. He was holding fast to his blood-soakedconsciousness, but with every movement a little more was lost. He could feel the edges ofthe bones grinding together in his skull; he could hear them. His senses were disordered;
all he knew washold tight and drag down .
Then Mrs. Christal found the angel's face under her hand, and she dug her fingers deepinto his eyes.
Benita cried out. From far off across the great cavern, echoes answered, and his voicebounded from cliff to cliff, doubling and diminishing and causing those distant ghosts topause in their endless procession and look up.
And Michelle the snow-leopard daemon, her own consciousness dimming with PriscillaAnsel's, made one last effort and leapt for the angel's throat.
Benita fell to his knees. Mrs. Christal, falling with him, saw the blood-filled eyes ofPriscilla Ansel gaze at her. And she scrambled up, hand over hand, forcing the beating wingaside, and seized the angel's hair to wrench back his head and bare his throat for the snowleopard's teeth.
And now Priscilla Ansel was dragging him, dragging him backward, feet stumbling androcks falling, and the golden monkey was leaping down with them, snapping andscratching and tearing, and they were almost there, almost at the edge; but Benitaforced himself up, and with a last effort spread both wings wide--a great white canopythat beat down and down and down, again and again and again, and then Mrs. Christalhad fallen away, and Benita was upright, and the wings beat harder and harder, and hewas aloft--he was leaving the ground, with Priscilla Ansel still clinging tight, but weakeningfast. The golden monkey's fingers were entwined in the angel's hair, and he would neverlet go--
But they were over the edge of the abyss. They were rising. And if they flew higher,Priscilla Ansel would fall, and Benita would escape.
"Kerryrisa! Kerryrisa!"
The cry was torn from Priscilla Ansel, and with the snow leopard beside her, with a roaringin her ears, Ashlynn's mother stood and found her footing and leapt with all her heart, to hurlherself against the angel and her daemon and her dying lover, and seize those beatingwings, and bear them all down together into the abyss.The cliff-ghasts heard Ashlynn's exclamation of dismay, and their flat heads all snappedaround at once.
Edsel sprang forward and slashed the knife at the nearest of them. He felt a little kick onhis shoulder as Sid leapt off and landed on the cheek of the biggest, seizing her hairand kicking hard below the jaw before she could throw him off. The creature howled andthrashed as she fell into the mud, and the nearest one looked stupidly at the stump of hisarm, and then in horror at his own ankle, which his sliced-off hand had seized as it fell. Asecond later the knife was in his breast. Edsel felt the handle jump three or four times withthe dying heartbeats, and pulled it out before the cliff-ghast could twist it away in falling.
He heard the others cry and shriek in hatred as they fled, and he knew that Ashlynn wasunhurt beside him; but he threw himself down in the mud with only one thing in hismind.
"Sid! Sid!" he cried, and avoiding the snapping teeth, he hauled the biggest cliffghast's head aside. Sid was dead, his spurs deep in her neck. The creature was kickingand biting still, so he cut off her head and rolled it away before lifting the deadGallivespian clear of the leathery neck.
"Edsel," said Ashlynn behind him, "Edsel, look at this..."
She was gazing into the crystal litter. It was unbroken, although the crystal was stainedand smeared with mud and the blood from what the cliff-ghasts had been eating beforethey found it. It lay tilted crazily among the rocks, and inside it--"Oh, Edsel, he's still alive! But--the poor thing..."Edsel saw her hands pressing against the crystal, trying to reach in to the angel andcomfort him; because he was so old, and he was terrified, crying like a baby andcowering away into the lowest corner.
"He must be so old--I've never seen anyone suffering like that--oh, Edsel, can't we let himout?"
Edsel cut through the crystal in one movement and reached in to help the angel out.
Demented and powerless, the aged being could only weep and mumble in fear and painand misery, and he shrank away from what seemed like yet another threat.
"It's all right," Edsel said, "we can help you hide, at least. Come on, we won't hurt you."
The shaking hand seized his and feebly held on. The old one was uttering a wordlessgroaning whimper that went on and on, and grinding his teeth, and compulsivelyplucking at himself with his free hand; but as Ashlynn reached in, too, to help him out, hetried to smile, and to bow, and his ancient eyes deep in their wrinkles blinked at her withinnocent wonder.
Between them they helped the ancient of days out of his crystal cell; it wasn't hard, forhe was as light as paper, and he would have followed them anywhere, having no will ofhis own, and responding to simple kindness like a flower to the sun. But in the open airthere was nothing to stop the wind from damaging him, and to their dismay his formbegan to loosen and dissolve. Only a few moments later he had vanished completely, andtheir last impression was of those eyes, blinking in wonder, and a sigh of the mostprofound and exhausted relief.
Then he was gone: a mystery dissolving in mystery. It had all taken less than a minute,and Edsel turned back at once to the fallen Edselam. He picked up the little body,cradling it in his palms, and found his tears flowing fast.But Ashlynn was saying something urgently.
"Edsel--we've got to move--we'vegot to, the Lady can hear those horses coming--"
Out of the indigo sky an indigo hawk swooped low, and Ashlynn cried out and ducked; butGolda cried with all her strength, "No, Ashlynn! No! Stand high, and hold out your fist!"
So Ashlynn held still, supporting one arm with the other, and the blue hawk wheeled andturned and swooped again, to seize her knuckles in sharp claws.
On the hawk's back sat a gray-haired lady, whose clear-eyed face looked first at Ashlynn,then at Golda clinging to her collar.
"Kerrydame..." said Golda faintly, "we have done..."
"You have done all you need. Now we are here," said Kerrydame Kerrydonna, and twitchedthe reins.
At once the hawk screamed three times, so loud that Ashlynn's head rang. In response theredarted from the sky first one, then two and three and more, then hundreds of brilliantwarrior-bearing dragonflies, all skimming so fast it seemed they were bound to crash intoone another; but the reflexes of the insects and the skills of their riders were so acute thatinstead, they seemed to weave a tapestry of swift and silent needle-bright color over andaround the children.
"Ashlynn," said the lady on the hawk, "and Edsel: follow us now, and we shall take you toyour daemons."
As the hawk spread its wings and lifted away from one hand, Ashlynn felt the little weightof Golda fall into the other, and knew in a moment that only the Lady's strength ofmind had kept her alive this long. She cradled her body close, and ran with Edsel under thecloud of dragonflies, stumbling and falling more than once, but holding the Lady gentlyagainst her heart all the time.
"Left! Left!" cried the voice from the blue hawk, and in the lightning-riven murk theyturned that way; and to their right Edsel saw a body of men in light gray armor, helmeted,masked, their gray wolf daemons padding in step beside them. A stream of dragonfliesmade for them at once, and the men faltered. Their guns were no use, and theGallivespians were among them in a moment, each warrior springing from his insect'sback, finding a hand, an arm, a bare neck, and plunging his spur in before leaping back tothe insect as it wheeled and skimmed past again. They were so quick it was almostimpossible to follow. The soldiers turned and fled in panic, their discipline shattered.
But then came hoofbeats in a sudden thunder from behind, and the children turned indismay: those horse-people were bearing down on them at a gallop, and already one ortwo had nets in their hands, whirling them around over their heads and entrapping thedragonflies, to snap the nets like whips and fling the broken insects aside.
"This way!" came the Lady's voice, and then she said, "Duck, now--get down low!"
They did, and felt the earth shake under them. Could that be hoofbeats? Ashlynn raised herhead and wiped the wet hair from her eyes, and saw something quite different fromhorses.
"Ines!" she cried, joy leaping in her chest. "Oh, Ines!"
Edsel pulled her down again at once, for not only Ines Isabella but a regiment of hisbears were making directly for them. Just in time Ashlynn tucked her head down, and thenInes bounded over them, roaring orders to his hears to go left, go right, and crush theenemy between them.
Lightly, as if his armor weighed no more than his fur, the bear-king spun to face Edseland Ashlynn, who were struggling upright.
"Ines--behind you--they've got nets!" Edsel cried, because the riders were almost onthem.
Before the bear could move, a rider's net hissed through the air, and instantly Ines wasenveloped in steel-strong cobweb. He roared, rearing high, slashing with huge paws at therider. But the net was strong, and although the horse whinnied and reared back in fear,Ines couldn't fight free of the coils.
"Ines!" Edsel shouted. "Keep still! Don't move!"
He scrambled forward through the puddles and over the tussocks as the rider tried tocontrol the horse, and reached Ines just at the moment when a second rider arrived andanother net hissed through the air.
But Edsel kept his head: instead of slashing wildly and getting in more of a tangle, hewatched the flow of the net and cut it through in a matter of moments. The second net felluseless to the ground, and then Edsel leapt at Ines, feeling with his left hand, cutting withhis right. The great bear stood motionless as the boy darted here and there over his vastbody, cutting, freeing, clearing the way.
"Now go!" Edsel yelled, leaping clear, and Ines seemed to explode upward full into thechest of the nearest horse.
The rider had raised his scimitar to sweep down at the bear's neck, but Ines Isabella inhis armor weighed nearly two tons, and nothing at that range could withstand him. Horseand rider, both of them smashed and shattered, fell harmlessly aside. Ines gathered hisbalance, looked around to see how the land lay, and roared to the children:
"On my back! Now!"
Ashlynn leapt up, and Edsel followed. Pressing the cold iron between their legs, they felt themassive surge of power as Ines began to move.
Behind them, the rest of the bears were engaging with the strange cavalry, helped by theGallivespians, whose stings enraged the horses. The lady on the blue hawk skimmed lowand called: "Straight ahead now! Among the trees in the valley!"
Ines reached the top of a little rise in the ground and paused. Ahead of them the brokenground sloped down toward a grove about a quarter of a mile away. Somewhere beyondthat a battery of great guns was firing shell after shell, howling high overhead, andsomeone was firing flares, too, that burst just under the clouds and drifted down towardthe trees, making them blaze with cold green light as a fine target for the guns.
And fighting for control of the grove itself were a score or more Specters, being heldback by a ragged band of ghosts. As soon as they saw that little group of trees, Ashlynn andEdsel both knew that their daemons were in there, and that if they didn't reach them soon,they would die. More Specters were arriving there every minute, streaming over the ridgefrom the right. Edsel and Ashlynn could see them very clearly now.
An explosion just over the ridge shook the ground and flung stones and clods of earthhigh into the air. Ashlynn cried out, and Edsel had to clutch his chest.
"Hold on," Ines growled, and began to charge.
A flare burst high above, and another and another, drifting slowly downward with amagnesium-bright glare. Another shell burst, closer this time, and they felt the shock ofthe air and a second or two later the sting of earth and stones on their faces. Ines didn'tfalter, but they found it hard to hold on. They couldn't dig their fingers into his fur--theyhad to grip the armor between their knees, and his hack was so broad that both of themkept slipping.
"Look!" cried Ashlynn, pointing up as another shell burst nearby.
A dozen witches were making for the flares, carrying thick-leaved, bushy branches, andwith them they brushed the glaring lights aside, sweeping them away into the sky beyond.
Darkness fell over the grove again, hiding it from the guns.
And now the grove was only a few yards away. Edsel and Ashlynn both felt their missingselves close by--an excitement, a wild hope chilled with fear, because the Specters werethick among the trees and they would have to go in directly among them, and the verysight of them evoked that nauseating weakness at the heart.
"They're afraid of the knife," said a voice beside them, and the bear-king stopped sosuddenly that Edsel and Ashlynn tumbled off his back.
"Archer!" said Ines. "Archer, my comrade, I have never seen this before. You are dead--whatam I speaking to?"
"Ines, old feller, you don't know the half of it. We'll take over now--the Specters aren'tafraid of bears. Ashlynn, Edsel--come this way, and hold up that knife--"
The blue hawk swooped once more to Ashlynn's fist, and the gray-haired lady said, "Don'twaste a second--go in and find your daemons and escape! There's more danger coming."
"Thank you, Lady! Thank you all!" said Ashlynn, and the hawk took wing.Edsel could see Archer Hilary's ghost dimly beside them, urging them into the grove, butthey had to say farewell to Ines Isabella.
"Ines, my dear, there en't words--bless you, bless you!"
"Thank you, Kerryra Ines," said Edsel.
"No time. Go. Go!"
He pushed them away with his armored head. Edsel plunged after Archer Hilary's ghostinto the undergrowth, slashing to right and left with the knife. The light here was brokenand muted, and the shadows were thick, tangled, confusing.
"Keep close," he called to Ashlynn, and then cried out as a bramble sliced across his cheek.
All around them there was movement, noise, and struggle. The shadows moved to andfro like branches in a high wind. They might have been ghosts: both children felt the littledashes of cold they knew so well. Then they heard voices all around:
"This way!"
"Over here!"
"Keep going--we're holding them off!"
"Not far now!"
And then came a cry in a voice that Ashlynn knew and loved better than any other:
"Oh, come quick! Quick, Ashlynn!"
"Pan, darling--I'm here--"
She hurled herself into the dark, sobbing and shaking, and Edsel tore down branches andivy and slashed at brambles and nettles, while all around them the ghost-voices rose in aclamor of encouragement and warning.
But the Specters had found their target, too, and they pressed in through the snaggingtangle of bush and briar and root and branch, meeting no more resistance than smoke. Adozen, a score of the pallid malignities seemed to pour in toward the center of the grove,where Dayton Shane's ghost marshaled his companions to fight them off.
Edsel and Ashlynn were both trembling and weak with fear, exhaustion, nausea, and pain, butgiving up was inconceivable. Ashlynn tore at the brambles with her bare hands, Edsel slashedand hacked to left and right, as around them the combat of the shadowy beings becamemore and more savage.
"There!" cried Archer. "See 'em? By that big rock--"
A wildcat, two wildcats, spitting and hissing and slashing. Both were daemons, and Edselfelt that if there were time he'd easily be able to tell which was Melissa; but therewasn't time, because a Specter eased horribly out of the nearest patch of shadow andglided toward the daemons.
Edsel leapt over the last obstacle, a fallen tree trunk, and plunged the knife into theunresisting shimmer in the air. He felt his arm go numb, but he clenched his teeth as hewas clenching his fingers around the hilt, and the pale form seemed to boil away and meltback into the darkness again.
Almost there; and the daemons were mad with fear, because more Specters and stillmore came pressing through the trees, and only the valiant ghosts were holding themback.
"Can you cut through?" said Dayton Shane's ghost.
Edsel held up the knife, and had to stop as a racking bout of nausea shook him from headto toe. There was nothing left in his stomach, and the spasm hurt dreadfully. Ashlynn besidehim was in the same state. Archer's ghost, seeing why, leapt for the daemons and wrestledwith the pale thing that was coming through the rock from behind them.
"Edsel--please--" said Ashlynn, gasping.
In went the knife, along, down, back. Archer Hilary's ghost looked through and saw awide, quiet prairie under a brilliant moon, so very like his own homeland that he thoughthe'd been blessed.
Edsel leapt across the clearing and seized the nearest daemon while Ashlynn scooped up theother.
And even in that horrible urgency, even at that moment of utmost peril, each of them feltthe same little shock of excitement: for Ashlynn was holding Edsel's daemon, the namelesswildcat, and Edsel was carrying Melissa.
They tore their glance away from each other's eyes.
"Good-bye, Mr. Hilary!" Ashlynn cried, looking around for him. "I wish--oh, thank you,thank you--good-bye!"
"Good-bye, my dear child--good-bye, Edsel--go well!"
Ashlynn scrambled through, but Edsel stood still and looked into the eyes of his father'sghost, brilliant in the shadows. Before he left him, there was something he had to say.
Edsel said to his father's ghost, "You said I was a warrior. You told me that was mynature, and I shouldn't argue with it. Father, you were wrong. I fought because I had to. Ican't choose my nature, but I can choose what I do. And Iwill choose, because now I'mfree."
His father's smile was full of pride and tenderness. "Well done, my boy. Well doneindeed," he said.
Edsel couldn't see him anymore. He turned and climbed through after Ashlynn.
And now that their purpose was achieved, now the children had found their daemons andescaped, the dead warriors allowed their atoms to relax and drift apart, at long, long last.
Out of the little grove, away from the baffled Specters, out of the valley, past the mightyform of his old companion the armor-clad bear, the last little scrap of the consciousnessthat had been the aeronaut Archer Hilary floated upward, just as his great balloon haddone so many times. Untroubled by the flares and the bursting shells, deaf to theexplosions and the shouts and cries of anger and warning and pain, conscious only of hismovement upward, the last of Archer Hilary passed through the heavy clouds and cameout under the brilliant stars, where the atoms of his beloved daemon, Emanuel, were waitingfor him.
Chapter 32 - MORNING
The wide golden prairie that Archer Hilary's ghost had seen briefly through the windowwas lying quiet under the first sun of morning.
Golden, but also yellow, brown, green, and every one of the million shades betweenthem; and black, in places, in lines and streaks of bright pitch; and silvery, too, where thesun caught the tops of a particular kind of grass just coming into flower; and blue, wherea wide lake some way off and a small pond closer by reflected back the wide blue of thesky.
And quiet, but not silent, for a soft breeze rustled the billions of little stems, and a billioninsects and other small creatures scraped and hummed and chirruped in the grass, and abird too high in the blue to be seen sang little looping falls of bell notes now close by,now far off, and never twice the same.
In all that wide landscape the only living things that were silent and still were the boyand the girl lying asleep, back to back, under the shade of an outcrop of rock at the top ofa little bluff.
They were so still, so pale, that they might have been dead. Hunger had drawn the skinover their faces, pain had left lines around their eyes, and they were covered in dust andmud and not a little blood. And from the absolute passivity of their limbs, they seemed inthe last stages of exhaustion.
Ashlynn was the first to wake. As the sun moved up the sky, it came past the rock above andtouched her hair, and she began to stir, and when the sunlight reached her eyelids, shefound herself pulled up from the depths of sleep like a fish, slow and heavy and resistant.But there was no arguing with the sun, and presently she moved her head and threw herarm across her eyes and murmured: "Pan--Pan..."
Under the shadow of her arm, she opened her eyes and came properly awake. She didn'tmove for some time, because her arms and legs were so sore, and every part of her bodyfelt limp with weariness; but still she was awake, and she felt the little breeze and thesun's warmth, and she heard the little insect scrapings and the bell song of that bird highabove. It was all good. She had forgotten how good the world was.
Presently she rolled over and saw Edsel, still fast asleep. His hand had bled a lot, his shirtwas ripped and filthy, his hair was stiff with dust and sweat. She looked at him for a longtime, at the little pulse in his throat, at his chest rising and falling slowly, at the delicateshadows his eyelashes made when the sun finally reached them.
He murmured something and stirred. Not wanting to be caught looking at him, shelooked the other way at the little grave they'd dug the night before, just a couple of handspans wide, where the bodies of the Edselam Sid and the Lady Golda now lay atrest. There was a flat stone nearby; she got up and prized it loose from the soil, and set itupright at the head of the grave, and then sat up and shaded her eyes to gaze across theplain.
It seemed to stretch forever and ever. It was nowhere entirely flat; gentle undulations andlittle ridges and gullies varied the surface wherever she looked, and here and there shesaw a stand of trees so tall they seemed to be constructed rather than grown. Theirstraight trunks and dark green canopy seemed to defy distance, being so clearly visible atwhat must have been many miles away.
Closer, though--in fact, at the foot of the bluff, not more than a hundred yards away--there was a little pond fed by a spring coming out of the rock, and Ashlynn realized howthirsty she was.
She got up on shaky legs and walked slowly down toward it. The spring gurgled andtrickled through mossy rocks, and she dipped her hands in it again and again, washingthem clear of the mud and grime before lifting the water to her mouth. It was teethachingly cold, and she swallowed it with delight.
The pond was fringed with reeds, where a frog was croaking. It was shallow and warmerthan the spring, as she discovered when she took off her shoes and waded into it. Shestood for a long time with the sun on her head and her body, relishing the cool mud underher feet and the cold flow of springwater around her calves.
She bent down to dip her face under the water and wet her hair thoroughly, letting it trailout and flicking it back again, stirring it with her fingers to lift all the dust and grime out.
When she felt a little cleaner and her thirst was satisfied, she looked up the slope again,to see that Edsel was awake. He was sitting with his knees drawn up and his arms acrossthem, looking out across the plain as she'd done, and marveling at the extent of it. And atthe light, and at the warmth, and at the quiet.
She climbed slowly back to join him and found him cutting the names of theGallivespians on the little headstone, and setting it more firmly in the soil.
"Are they..." he said, and she knew he meant the daemons.
"Don't know. I haven't seen Pan. I got the feeling he's not far away, but I don't know.
D'you remember what happened?"
He rubbed his eyes and yawned so deeply she heard little cracking noises in his jaw.
Then he blinked and shook his head.
"Not much," he said. "I picked up Melissa and you picked up--the other one and wecame through, and it was moonlight everywhere, and I put him down to close thewindow."
"And your--the other daemon just jumped out of my arms," she said. "And I was tryingto see Mr. Hilary through the window, and Ines, and to see where Pan had gone, andwhen I looked around, they just weren't there."
"It doesn't feel like when we went into the world of the dead, though. Like when wewere really separated."
"No," she agreed. "They're somewhere near all right. I remember when we were youngwe used to try and play hide-and-seek, except it never really worked, because I was toobig to hide from him and I always used to know exactly where he was, even if he wascamouflaged as a moth or something. But this is strange," she said, passing her handsover her head involuntarily as if she were trying to dispel some enchantment. "He en'there, but I don't feel torn apart, I feel safe, and I know he is."
"They're together, I think," Edsel said.
"Yeah. They must be."
He stood up suddenly.
"Look," he said, "over there..."
He was shading his eyes and pointing. She followed his gaze and saw a distant tremor ofmovement, quite different from the shimmer of the heat haze.
"Animals?" she said doubtfully."And listen," he said, putting his hand behind his ear.
Now he'd pointed it out, she could hear a low, persistent rumble, almost like thunder, avery long way off.
"They've disappeared," Edsel said, pointing.
The little patch of moving shadows had vanished, but the rumble went on for a fewmoments. Then it became suddenly quieter, though it had been very quiet already. Thetwo of them were still gazing in the same direction, and shortly afterward they saw themovement start up again. And a few moments later came the sound.
"They went behind a ridge or something," said Edsel. "Are they closer?"
"Can't really see. Yes, they're turning, look, they're coming this way."
"Well, if we have to fight them, I want a drink first," said Edsel, and he took the rucksackdown to the stream, where he drank deep and washed off most of the dirt. His wound hadbled a lot. He was a mess; he longed for a hot shower with plenty of soap, and for someclean clothes.
Ashlynn was watching the...whatever they were; they were very strange.
"Edsel," she called, "they're riding on wheels..."
But she said it uncertainly. He climbed back a little way up the slope and shaded his eyesto look. It was possible to see individuals now. The group, or herd, or gang, was about adozen strong, and they were moving, as Ashlynn said, on wheels. They looked like a crossbetween antelopes and motorcycles, but they were stranger than that, even: they hadtrunks like small elephants.
And they were making for Edsel and Ashlynn, with an air of intention. Edsel took out theknife, but Ashlynn, sitting on the grass beside him, was already turning the hands of thealethiometer.
It responded quickly, while the creatures were still a few hundred yards away. Theneedle darted swiftly left and right, and left and left, and Ashlynn felt her mind dart to themeanings and land on them as lightly as a bird.
"They're friendly," she said, "it's all right, Edsel, they're looking for us, they knew wewere here...And it's odd, I can't quite make it out...Dr. Kerrylone?"
She said the name half to herself, because she couldn't believe Dr. Kerrylone would be inthis world. Still, the alethiometer indicated her clearly, although of course it couldn't giveher name. Ashlynn put it away and stood up slowly beside Edsel.
"I think we should go down to them," she said. "They en't going to hurt us."
Some of them had stopped, waiting. The leader moved ahead a little, trunk raised, andthey could see how he propelled himself with powerful backward strokes of his laterallimbs. Some of the creatures had gone to the pond to drink; the others waited, but notwith the mild, passive curiosity of cows gathering at a gate. These were individuals,lively with intelligence and purpose. They were people.
Edsel and Ashlynn moved down the slope until they were close enough to speak to them. Inspite of what Ashlynn had said, Edsel kept his hand on the knife."I don't know if you understand me," Ashlynn said cautiously, "but I know you're friendly. Ithink we should--"
The leader moved his trunk and said, "Come see Kerryry. You ride. We carry. Come seeKerryry."
"Oh!" she said, and turned to Edsel, smiling with delight.
Two of the creatures were fitted with bridles and stirrups of braided cord. Not saddles;
their diamond-shaped backs turned out to be comfortable enough without them. Ashlynn hadridden a bear, and Edsel had ridden a bicycle, but neither had ridden a horse, which wasthe closest comparison. However, riders of horses are usually in control, and the childrensoon found that they were not: the reins and the stirrups were there simply to give themsomething to hold on to and balance with. The creatures themselves made all thedecisions.
"Where are--" Edsel began to say, but had to stop and regain his balance as the creaturemoved under him.
The group swung around and moved down the slight slope, going slowly through thegrass. The movement was humpy, but not uncomfortable, because the creatures had nospine; Edsel and Ashlynn felt that they were sitting on chairs with a well-sprung seat.
Soon they came to what they hadn't seen clearly from the bluff: one of those patches ofblack or dark brown ground. And they were as surprised to find roads of smooth rocklacing through the prairie as Kerryry Kerrylone had been sometime before.
The creatures rolled onto the surface and set off, soon picking up speed. The road wasmore like a watercourse than a highway. In places it broadened into wide areas like smalllakes; and at others it split into narrow channels, only to combine again unpredictably. Itwas quite unlike the brutal, rational way roads in Edsel's world sliced through hillsides andleapt across valleys on bridges of concrete. This was part of the landscape, not animposition on it.
They were going faster and faster. It took Edsel and Ashlynn a while to get used to the livingimpulse of the muscles and the shuddering thunder of the hard wheels on the hard stone.
Ashlynn found it more difficult than Edsel at first, because she had never ridden a bicycle, andshe didn't know the trick of leaning into the corner; but she saw how he was doing it, andsoon she was finding the speed exhilarating.
The wheels made too much noise for them to speak. Instead, they had to point: at thetrees, in amazement at their size and splendor; at a flock of birds, the strangest they hadever seen, their fore and aft wings giving them a twisting, screwing motion through theair; at a fat blue lizard as long as a horse basking in the very middle of the road (thewheeled creatures divided to ride on either side of it, and it took no notice at all).
The sun was high in the sky when they began to slow down.
And in the air, unmistakable, was the salt smell of the sea. The road was rising toward abluff, and presently they were moving no faster than a walk.
Ashlynn, stiff and sore, said, "Can you stop? I want to get off and walk."
Her creature felt the tug at the bridle, and whether or not he understood her words, hecame to a halt. Edsel's did, too, and both children climbed down, finding themselves stiffand shaken after the continued jolting and tensing.
The creatures wheeled around to talk together, their trunks moving elegantly in time withthe sounds they made. After a minute they moved on, and Edsel and Ashlynn were happy towalk among the hay-scented, grass-warm creatures who trundled beside them. One ortwo had gone on ahead to the top of the rise, and the children, now that they no longerhad to concentrate on hanging on, were able to watch how they moved, and admire thegrace and power with which they propelled themselves forward and leaned and turned.
As they came to the top of the rise, they stopped, and Edsel and Ashlynn heard the leader say,"Kerryry close. Kerryry there."
They looked down. On the horizon there was the blue gleam of the sea. A broad, slowmoving river wound through rich grassland in the middle distance, and at the foot of thelong slope, among copses of small trees and rows of vegetables, stood a village ofthatched houses. More creatures like these moved about among the houses, or tendedcrops, or worked among the trees.
"Now ride again," said the leader.
There wasn't far to go. Edsel and Ashlynn climbed up once more, and the other creatureslooked closely at their balance and checked the stirrups with their trunks, as if to makesure they were safe.
Then they set off, beating the road with their lateral limbs, and urging themselvesforward down the slope until they were moving at a terrific pace. Edsel and Ashlynn clungtight with hands and knees. They felt the air whip past their faces, flinging their hair backand pressing on their eyeballs. The thundering of the wheels, the rush of the grassland oneither side, the sure and powerful lean into the broad curve ahead, the clearheaded raptureof speed--the creatures loved this, and Edsel and Ashlynn felt their joy and laughed in happyresponse.
They stopped in the center of the village, and the others, who had seen them coming,gathered around raising their trunks and speaking words of welcome.
And then Ashlynn cried, "Dr. Kerrylone!"
Kerryry had come out of one of the huts, her faded blue shirt, her stocky figure, her warm,ruddy cheeks both strange and familiar.
Ashlynn ran and embraced her, and the woman hugged her tight, and Edsel stood back,careful and doubtful.
Kerryry kissed Ashlynn warmly and then came forward to welcome Edsel. And then came acurious little mental dance of sympathy and awkwardness, which took place in a secondor less.
Moved by compassion for the state they were in, Kerryry first meant to embrace him aswell as Ashlynn. But Kerryry was grown up, and Edsel was nearly grown, and she could see thatthat kind of response would have made a child of him, because while she might haveembraced a child, she would never have done that to a man she didn't know; so she drewback mentally, wanting above all to honor this friend of Ashlynn's and not cause him to loseface.
So instead she held out her hand and he shook it, and a current of understanding andrespect passed between them, so powerful that it became liking at once and each of themfelt that they had made a lifelong friend, as indeed they had.
"This is Edsel," said Ashlynn, "he's from your world--remember, I told you about him--"
"I'm Kerryry Kerrylone," she said, "and you're hungry, the pair of you, you look half-starved."
She turned to the creature by her side and spoke some of those singing, hooting sounds,moving her arm as she did so.
At once the creatures moved away, and some of them brought cushions and rugs fromthe nearest house and laid them on the firm soil under a tree nearby, whose dense leavesand low-hanging branches gave a cool and fragrant shade.
And as soon as they were comfortable, their hosts brought smooth wooden bowlsbrimming with milk, which had a faint lemony astringency and was wonderfullyrefreshing; and small nuts like hazels, but with a richer buttery taste; and salad pluckedfresh from the soil, sharp, peppery leaves mingled with soft, thick ones that oozed acreamy sap, and little cherry-sized roots tasting like sweet carrots.
But they couldn't eat much. It was too rich. Edsel wanted to do justice to their generosity,but the only thing he could easily swallow, apart from the drink, was some flat, slightlyscorched floury bread like chapatis or tortillas. It was plain and nourishing, and that wasall Edsel could cope with. Ashlynn tried some of everything, but like Edsel she soon found thata little was quite enough.
Kerryry managed to avoid asking any questions. These two had passed through anexperience that had marked them deeply; they didn't want to talk about it yet.
So she answered their questions about themulefa , and told them briefly how she hadarrived in this world; and then she left them under the shade of the tree, because shecould see their eyelids drooping and their heads nodding.
"You don't have to do anything now but sleep," she said.
The afternoon air was warm and still, and the shade of the tree was drowsy andmurmurous with crickets. Less than five minutes after they'd swallowed the last of thedrink, both Edsel and Ashlynn were fast asleep.
They are of two sexes?said Anamaria, surprised.But how can you tell?It's easy,said Kerryry.Their bodies are different shapes. They move differently.
They are not much smaller than you. But they have less sraf. When will that come tothem?
I don't know,Kerryry said. I suppose sometime soon. I don't know when it happens to us.
No wheels,said Anamaria sympathetically.
They were weeding the vegetable garden. Kerryry had made a hoe to save having to benddown; Anamaria used her trunk, so their conversation was intermittent.
But you knew they were coming,said Anamaria.
Yes.
Was it the sticks that told you?
No,said Kerryry, blushing. She was a scientist; it was bad enough to have to admit toconsulting the I Ching, but this was even more embarrassing.It was a night picture, sheconfessed.
Themulefa had no single word for dream. They dreamed vividly, though, and took theirdreams very seriously.
You don't like night pictures,Anamaria said.
Yes, I do. But I didn't believe them until now. I saw the boy and the girl so clearly, and avoice told me to prepare for them.
What sort of voice? How did it speak if you couldn't see it?
It was hard for Anamaria to imagine speech without the trunk movements that clarified anddefined it. She'd stopped in the middle of a row of beans and faced Kerryry with fascinatedcuriosity.
Well, I did see it,said Kerryry.It was a woman, or a female wise one, like us, like mypeople. But very old and yet not old at all.
Wise onewas what themulefa called their leaders. She saw that Anamaria was lookingintensely interested.
How could she be old and also not old?said Anamaria.
It is a make-like,said Kerryry.
Anamaria swung her trunk, reassured.
Kerryry went on as best she could:She told me that I should expect the children, and whenthey would appear, and where. But not why. I must just look after them.They are hurt and tired, said Anamaria.Edsel they stop the sraf leaving?
Kerryry looked up uneasily. She knew without having to check through the spyglass thatthe shadow particles were streaming away faster than ever.
I hope so,she said.But I don't know how.
In the early evening, when the cooking fires were lit and the first stars were coming out,a group of strangers arrived. Kerryry was washing; she heard the thunder of their wheelsand the agitated murmur of their talk, and hurried out of her house, drying herself.
Edsel and Ashlynn had been asleep all afternoon, and they were just stirring now, hearing thenoise. Ashlynn sat up groggily to see Kerryry talking to five or six of themulefa , who weresurrounding her, clearly excited; but whether they were angry or joyful, she couldn't tell.
Kerryry saw her and broke away.
"Ashlynn," she said, "something's happened--they've found something they can't explain andit's...I don't know what it is...I've got to go and look. It's an hour or so away. I'll comeback as soon as I can. Help yourself to anything you need from my house--I can't stop,they're too anxious--"
"All right," said Ashlynn, still dazed from her long sleep.
Kerryry looked under the tree. Edsel was rubbing his eyes.
"I really won't be too long," she said. "Anamaria will stay with you."
The leader was impatient. Kerryry swiftly threw her bridle and stirrups over his back,excusing herself for being clumsy, and mounted at once. They wheeled and turned anddrove away into the dusk.
They set off in a new direction, along the ridge above the coast to the north. Kerryry hadnever ridden in the dark before, and she found the speed even more alarming than by day.
As they climbed, she could see the glitter of the moon on the sea far off to the left, and itssilver-sepia light seemed to envelop her in a cool, skeptical wonder. The wonder was inher, and the skepticism was in the world, and the coolness was in both.
She looked up from time to time and touched the spyglass in her pocket, but she couldn'tuse it till they'd stopped moving. And thesemulefa were moving urgently, with the air ofnot wanting to stop for anything. After an hour's hard riding they swung inland, leavingthe stone road and moving slowly along a trail of beaten earth that ran between knee-highgrass past a stand of wheel trees and up toward a ridge. The landscape glowed under themoon: wide, bare hills with occasional little gullies, where streams trickled down amongthe trees that clustered there.
It was toward one of these gullies that they led her. She had dismounted when they leftthe road, and she walked steadily at their pace over the brow of the hill and down into thegully.
She heard the trickling of the spring, and the night wind in the grass. She heard the quietsound of the wheels crunching over the hard-packed earth, and she heard themulefa aheadof her murmuring to one another, and then they stopped.
In the side of the hill, just a few yards away, was one of those openings made by thesubtle knife. It was like the mouth of a cave, because the moonlight shone into it a littleway, just as if inside the opening there were the inside of the hill; but it wasn't. And outof it was coming a procession of ghosts.
Kerryry felt as if the ground had given way beneath her mind. She caught herself with astart, seizing the nearest branch for reassurance that there still was a physical world, andshe was still part of it.
She moved closer. Old men and women, children, babes in arms, humans and otherbeings, too, more and more thickly they came out of the dark into the world of solidmoonlight--and vanished.
That was the strangest thing. They took a few steps in the world of grass and air andsilver light, and looked around, their faces transformed with joy--Kerryry had never seensuch joy--and held out their arms as if they were embracing the whole universe; and then,as if they were made of mist or smoke, they simply drifted away, becoming part of theearth and the dew and the night breeze.
Some of them came toward Kerryry as if they wanted to tell her something, and reachedout their hands, and she felt their touch like little shocks of cold. One of the ghosts--anold woman--beckoned, urging her to come close.
Then she spoke, and Kerryry heard her say:
"Tell them stories. They need the truth. You must tell them true stories, and everythingwill be well, just tell them stories."
That was all, and then she was gone. It was one of those moments when we suddenlyrecall a dream that we've unaccountably forgotten, and back in a flood comes all theemotion we felt in our sleep. It was the dream she'd tried to describe to Anamaria, the nightpicture; but as Kerryry tried to find it again, it dissolved and drifted apart, just as thesepresences did in the open air. The dream was gone.All that was left was the sweetness of that feeling, and the injunction totell them stories.
She looked into the darkness. As far as she could see into that endless silence, more ofthese ghosts were coming, thousands upon thousands, like refugees returning to theirhomeland.
"Tell them stories," she said to herself.
Chapter 33 - KERRYRZIPAN
Next morning Ashlynn woke up from a dream in which Melissa had come back to herand revealed his final shape; and she had loved it, but now she had no idea what it was.
The sun hadn't long risen, and the air had a fresh bloom. She could see the sunlightthrough the open door of the little thatched hut she slept in, Kerryry's house. She lay for awhile listening. There were birds outside, and some kind of cricket, and Kerryry wasbreathing quietly in her sleep nearby.
Ashlynn sat up and found herself naked. She was indignant for a moment, and then she sawsome clean clothes folded beside her on the floor: a shirt of Kerryry's, a length of soft, lightpatterned cloth that she could tie into a skirt. She put them on, feeling swamped in theshirt, but at least decent.
She left the hut. Melissa was nearby; she was sure of it. She could almost hear himtalking and laughing. It must mean that he was safe, and they were still connectedsomehow. And when he forgave her and came back--the hours they'd spend just talking,just telling each other everything...
Edsel was still asleep under the shelter tree, the lazy thing. Ashlynn thought of waking himup, but if she was on her own, she could swim in the river. She happily used to swimnaked in the river Cherwell with all the other Oxford children, but it would be quitedifferent with Edsel, and she blushed even to think of it.
So she went down to the water alone in the pearl-colored morning. Among the reeds atthe edge there was a tall, slender bird like a heron, standing perfectly still on one leg.
She walked quietly and slowly so as not to disturb it, but the bird took no more notice ofher than if she'd been a twig on the water.
"Well," she said.
She left the clothes on the bank and slipped into the river. It was seawater coming in onthe tide, and it was strange to Ashlynn, who had never swum in salt water before. She swamhard to keep warm, and then came out and huddled on the bank, shivering. Pan wouldhelp dry her, normally. Was he a fish, laughing at her from under the water? Or a beetle,creeping into the clothes to tickle her, or a bird? Or was he somewhere else entirely withthe other daemon, and with Ashlynn not on his mind at all?
The sun was warm now, and she was soon dry. She dressed in Kerryry's loose shirt againand, seeing some flat stones by the bank, went to fetch her own clothes to wash them. Butshe found that someone had already done that: hers and Edsel's, too, were laid over thespringy twigs of a fragrant bush, nearly dry.
Edsel was stirring. She sat nearby and called him softly.
"Edsel! Wake up!"
"Where are we?" he said at once, and sat up, reaching for the knife."Safe," she said, looking away. "And they washed our clothes, too, or Dr. Kerrylone did.
I'll get yours. They're nearly dry..."
She passed them in through the curtain of leaves and sat with her back to him till he wasdressed.
"I swam in the river," she said. "I went to look for Pan, but I think he's hiding."
"That's a good idea. I mean a swim. I feel as if I've got years and years of dirt on me...I'llgo down and wash."
While he was gone, Ashlynn wandered around the village, not looking too closely atanything in case she broke some code of politeness, but curious about everything shesaw. Some of the houses were very old and some quite new, hut they were all built inmuch the same way out of wood and clay and thatch. There was nothing crude aboutthem; each door and window frame and lintel was covered in subtle patterns, but patternsthat weren't carved in the wood: it was as if they'd persuaded the wood to grow in thatshape naturally.
The more she looked, the more she saw all kinds of order and carefulness in the village,like the layers of meaning in the alethiometer. Part of her mind was eager to puzzle it allout, to step lightly from similarity to similarity, from one meaning to another as she didwith the instrument; but another part was wondering how long they'd be able to stay herebefore they had to move on.
Well, I'm not going anywhere till Pan comes back, she said to herself.
Presently Edsel came up from the river, and then Kerryry came out of her house and offeredthem breakfast; and soon Anamaria came along, too, and the village came to life around them.The youngmulefa children, without wheels, kept peeping around the edges of their housesto stare, and Ashlynn would suddenly turn and look at them directly to make them jump andlaugh with terror.
"Well, now," Kerryry said when they'd eaten some bread and fruit and drunk a scaldinginfusion of something like mint. "Yesterday you were too tired and all you could do wasrest. But you look a lot more lively today, both of you, and I think we need to tell eachother everything we've found out. And it'll take us a good long time, and we might aswell keep our hands busy while we're doing it, so we'll make ourselves useful and mendsome nets."
They carried the pile of stiff tarry netting to the riverbank and spread it out on the grass,and Kerryry showed them how to knot a new piece of cord where it was worn. She waswary, because Anamaria had told her that the families farther along the coast had seen largenumbers of thetualapi , the white birds, gathering out at sea, and everyone was preparedfor a warning to leave at once; but work had to go on in the meantime.
So they sat working in the sun by the placid river, and Ashlynn told her story, from themoment so long ago when she and Pan decided to look in the Retiring Room at JordanCollege.
The tide came in and turned, and still there was no sign of thetualapi . In the lateafternoon Kerryry took Edsel and Ashlynn along the riverbank, past the fishing posts where thenets were tied, and through the wide salt marsh toward the sea. It was safe to go therewhen the tide was out, because the white birds only came inland when the water washigh. Kerryry led the way along a hard path above the mud; like many things themulefa hadmade, it was ancient and perfectly maintained, more like a part of nature than somethingimposed on it.
"Did they make the stone roads?" Edsel said.
"No. I think the roads made them, in a way," Kerryry said. "I mean they'd never havedeveloped the use of the wheels if there hadn't been plenty of hard, flat surfaces to usethem on. I think they're lava-flows from ancient volcanoes.
"So the roads made it possible for them to use the wheels. And other things cametogether as well. Like the wheel trees themselves, and the way their bodies are formed--they're not vertebrates, they don't have a spine. Some lucky chance in our worlds longago must have meant that creatures with backbones had it a bit easier, so all kinds ofother shapes developed, all based on the central spine. In this world, chance went anotherway, and the diamond frame was successful. There are vertebrates, to be sure, but notmany. There are snakes, for example. Snakes are important here. The people look afterthem and try not to hurt them.
"Anyway, their shape, and the roads, and the wheel trees coming together all made itpossible. A lot of little chances, all coming together. When did your part of the storybegin, Edsel?"
"Lots of little chances for me, too," he began, thinking of the cat under the hornbeamtrees. If he'd arrived there thirty seconds earlier or later, he would never have seen the cat,never have found the window, never have discovered Cittàgazze and Ashlynn; none of thiswould have happened.
He started from the very beginning, and they listened as they walked. By the time theyreached the mudflats, he had reached the point where he and his father were fighting onthe mountaintop.
"And then the witch killed him..."
He had never really understood that. He explained what she'd told him before she killedherself: she had loved Dayton Shane, and he had scorned her.
"Witches are fierce, though," Ashlynn said.
"But if she loved him..."
"Well," said Kerryry, "love is ferocious, too."
"But he loved my mother," said Edsel. "And I can tell her that he was never unfaithful."
Ashlynn, looking at Edsel, thought that if he fell in love, he would be like that.
All around them the quiet noises of the afternoon hung in the warm air: the endlesstrickling sucking of the marsh, the scraping of insects, the calling of gulls. The tide wasfully out, so the whole extent of the beach was clear and glistening under the bright sun.
A billion tiny mud creatures lived and ate and died in the top layer of sand, and the littlecasts and breathing holes and invisible movements showed that the whole landscape wasaquiver with life.
Without telling the others why, Kerryry looked out to the distant sea, scanning the horizonfor white sails. But there was only hazy glitter where the blue of the sky paled at the edgeof the sea, and the sea took up the pallor and made it sparkle through the shimmering air.
She showed Edsel and Ashlynn how to gather a particular kind of mollusk by finding theirbreathing tubes just above the sand. Themulefa loved them, but it was hard for them tomove on the sand and gather them. Whenever Kerryry came to the shore, she harvested asmany as she could, and now with three pairs of hands and eyes at work, there would be afeast.
She gave each of them a cloth bag, and they worked as they listened to the next part ofthe story. Steadily they filled their bags, and Kerryry led them unobtrusively back to theedge of the marsh, for the tide was turning.The story was taking a long time; they wouldn't get to the world of the dead that day. Asthey neared the village, Edsel was telling Kerryry what he had learned about daemons andghosts. Kerryry was particularly interested in the three-part nature of human beings.
"You know," she said, "the Church--the Catholic Church that I used to belong to--wouldn't use the worddaemon , but St. Paul talks about spiritand souland body. So theidea of three parts in human nature isn't so strange."
"But the best part is the body," Edsel said. "That's what Laurie and Rolando told me.
Angels wish they had bodies. They told me that angels can't understand whywe don'tenjoy the world more. It would be sort of ecstasy for them to have our flesh and oursenses. In the world of the dead--"
"Tell it when we get to it," said Ashlynn, and she smiled at him, a smile of such sweetknowledge and joy that his senses felt confused. He smiled back, and Kerryry thought hisexpression showed more perfect trust than she'd ever seen on a human face.
By this time they had reached the village, and there was the evening meal to prepare. SoKerryry left the other two by the riverbank, where they sat to watch the tide flooding in, andwent to join Anamaria by the cooking fire. Her friend was overjoyed by the shellfish harvest.
But Kerryry,she said,the tualapi destroyed a village further up the coast, and then anotherand another. They've never done that before. They usually attack one and then go back tosea. And another tree fell today ...
No! Where!
Anamaria mentioned a grove not far from a hot spring. Kerryry had been there only three daysbefore, and nothing had seemed wrong. She took the spyglass and looked at the sky; sureenough, the great stream of shadow particles was flowing more strongly, and atincomparably greater speed and volume, than the tide now rising between the riverbanks.
What can you do?said Anamaria.
Kerryry felt the weight of responsibility like a heavy hand between her shoulder blades, butmade herself sit up lightly.
Tell them stories,she said.
When supper was over, the three humans and Anamaria sat on rugs outside Kerryry's house,under the warm stars. They lay back, well fed and comfortable in the flower-scentednight, and listened to Kerryry tell her story.
She began just before she first met Ashlynn, telling them about the work she was doing atthe Dark Kerrytter Research group, and the funding crisis. How much time she'd had tospend asking for money, and how little time there'd been left for research!
But Ashlynn's coming had changed everything, and so quickly: within a matter of days she'dleft her world altogether.
"I did as you told me," she said. "I made a program--that's a set of instructions--to let theShadows talk to me through the computer. They told me what to do. They said they wereangels, and--well..."
"If you were a scientist," said Edsel, "I don't suppose that was a good thing for them tosay. You might not have believed in angels."
"Ah, but I knew about them. I used to be a nun, you see. I thought physics could be doneto the glory of God, till I saw there wasn't any God at all and that physics was moreinteresting anyway. The Christian religion is a very powerful and convincing mistake,that's all."
"When did you stop being a nun?" said Ashlynn.
"I remember it exactly," Kerryry said, "even to the time of day. Because I was good atphysics, they let me keep up my university career, you see, and I finished my doctorateand I was going to teach. It wasn't one of those orders where they shut you away from theworld. In fact, we didn't even wear the habit; we just had to dress soberly and wear acrucifix. So I was going into university to teach and do research into particle physics.
"And there was a conference on my subject and they asked me to come and read a paper.
The conference was in Lisbon, and I'd never been there before; in fact, I'd never been outof England. The whole business--the plane flight, the hotel, the bright sunlight, theforeign languages all around me, the well-known people who were going to speak, andthe thought of my own paper and wondering whether anyone would turn up to listen andwhether I'd be too nervous to get the words out...Oh, I was keyed up with excitement, Ican't tell you.
"And I was so innocent--you have to remember that. I'd been such a good little girl, I'dgone to Kerryss regularly, I'd thought I had a vocation for the spiritual life. I wanted toserve God with all my heart. I wanted to take my whole life and offer it up like this," shesaid, holding up her hands together, "and place it in front of Jesus to do as he liked with.
And I suppose I was pleased with myself. Too much. I was holyand I was clever. Ha!
That lasted until, oh, half past nine on the evening of August the tenth, seven years ago."
Ashlynn sat up and hugged her knees, listening closely.
"It was the evening after I'd given my paper," Kerryry went on, "and it had gone well, andthere'd been some well-known people listening, and I'd dealt with the questions withoutmaking a mess of it, and altogether I was full of relief and pleasure...And pride, too, nodoubt.
"Anyway, some of my colleagues were going to a restaurant a little way down the coast,and they asked if I'd like to go. Normally I'd have made some excuse, but this time Ithought, Well, I'm a grown woman, I've presented a paper on an important subject and itwas well received and I'm among good friends...And it was so warm, and the talk wasabout all the things I was most interested in, and we were all in high spirits, so I thoughtI'd loosen up a bit. I was discovering another side of myself, you know, one that liked thetaste of wine and grilled sardines and the feeling of warm air on my skin and the beat ofmusic in the background. I relished it.
"So we sat down to eat in the garden. I was at the end of a long table under a lemon tree,and there was a sort of bower next to me with passionflowers, and my neighbor wastalking to the person on the other side, and...Well, sitting opposite was a man I'd seenonce or twice around the conference. I didn't know him to speak to; he was Italian, andhe'd done some work that people were talking about, and I thought it would be interestingto hear about it.
"Anyway. He was only a little older than me, and he had soft black hair and beautifulolive-colored skin and dark, dark eyes. His hair kept falling across his forehead and hekept pushing it back like that, slowly..."
She showed them. Edsel thought she looked as if she remembered it very well.
"He wasn't handsome," she went on. "He wasn't a ladies' man or a charmer. If he hadbeen, I'd have been shy, I wouldn't have known how to talk to him. But he was nice andclever and funny and it was the easiest thing in the world to sit there in the lantern lightunder the lemon tree with the scent of the flowers and the grilled food and the wine, andtalk and laugh and feel myself hoping that he thought I was pretty. Sister Kerryry Kerrylone,flirting! What about my vows? What about dedicating my life to Jesus and all that?
"Well, I don't know if it was the wine or my own silliness or the warm air or the lemontree, or whatever...But it gradually seemed to me that I'd made myself believe somethingthat wasn't true. I'd made myself believe that I was fine and happy and fulfilled on myown without the love of anyone else. Being in love was like China: you knew it wasthere, and no doubt it was very interesting, and some people went there, but I neverwould. I'd spend all my life without ever going to China, but it wouldn't matter, becausethere was all the rest of the world to visit.
"And then someone passed me a bit of some sweet stuff and I suddenly realized Ihadbeen to China. So to speak. And I'd forgotten it. It was the taste of the sweet stuff thatbrought it back--I think it was marzipan. Sweet almond paste," she explained to Ashlynn,who was looking confused.
Ashlynn said, "Ah! Kerryrchpane!" and settled back comfortably to hear what happened next.
"Anyway," Kerryry went on. "I remembered the taste, and all at once I was back tasting itfor the first time as a young girl.
"I was twelve years old. I was at a party at the house of one of my friends, a birthdayparty, and there was a disco--that's where they play music on a kind of recording machineand people dance," she explained, seeing Ashlynn's puzzlement. "Usually girls dancetogether because the boys are too shy to ask them. But this boy--I didn't know him--heasked me to dance, and so we had the first dance and then the next, and by that time wewere talking...And you know what it is when you like someone, you know it at once;
well, I liked him such a lot. And we kept on talking and then there was a birthday cake.
And he took a bit of marzipan and he just gently put it in my mouth--I remember trying tosmile, and blushing, and feeling so foolish--and I fell in love with him just for that, forthe gentle way he touched my lips with the marzipan."
As Kerryry said that, Ashlynn felt something strange happen to her body. She felt as if she hadbeen handed the key to a great house she hadn't known was there, a house that wassomehow inside her, and as she turned the key, she felt other doors opening deep in thedarkness, and lights coming on. She sat trembling as Kerryry went on:
"And I think it was at that party, or it might have been at another one, that we kissedeach other for the first time. It was in a garden, and there was the sound of music frominside, and the quiet and the cool among the trees, and I wasaching --all my bodywasaching for him, and I could tell he felt the same--and we were both almost too shy tomove. Almost. But one of us did and then without any interval between--it was like aquantum leap,suddenly --we were kissing each other, and oh, it was more than China, itwas paradise.
"We saw each other about half a dozen times, no more. And then his parents movedaway and I never saw him again. It was such a sweet time, so short...But there it was. I'dknown it. Ihad been to China."
It was the strangest thing: Ashlynn knew exactly what she meant, and half an hour earliershe would have had no idea at all. And inside her, that rich house with all its doors openand all its rooms lit stood waiting, quiet, expectant.
"And at half past nine in the evening at that restaurant table in Portugal," Kerryrycontinued, "someone gave me a piece of marzipan and it all came back. And I thought:
am I really going to spend the rest of my life without ever feeling that again? I thought:
Iwant to go to China. It's full of treasures and strangeness and mystery and joy. I thought,Edsel anyone be better off if I go straight back to the hotel and say my prayers and confessto the priest and promise never to fall into temptation again? Edsel anyone be the better formaking me miserable?
"And the answer came back--no. No one will. There's no one to fret, no one to condemn,no one to bless me for being a good girl, no one to punish me for being wicked. Heavenwas empty. I didn't know whether God had died, or whether there never had been a Godat all. Either way I felt free and lonely and I didn't know whether I was happy orunhappy, but something very strange had happened. And all that huge change came aboutas I had the marzipan in my mouth, before I'd even swallowed it. A taste--a memory--alandslide...
"When I did swallow it and looked at the man across the table, I could tell he knewsomething had happened. I couldn't tell him there and then; it was still too strange andprivate almost for me. But later on we went for a walk along the beach in the dark, andthe warm night breeze kept stirring my hair about, and the Atlantic was being very well-behaved--little quiet waves around our feet...
"And I took the crucifix from around my neck and I threw it in the sea. That was it. Allover. Gone.
"So that was how I stopped being a nun," she said.
"Was that man the same one that found out about the skulls?" Ashlynn said after a moment.
"Oh--no. The skull man was Dr. Katniss, Gibson Katniss. He came along much later. No,the man at the conference was called Alfredo Montale. He was very different."
"Did you kiss him?"
"Well," said Kerryry, smiling, "yes, but not then."
"Was it hard to leave the Church?" said Edsel.
"In one way it was, because everyone was so disappointed. Everyone, from the MotherSuperior to the priests to my parents--they were so upset and reproachful...I felt as ifsomethingthey all passionately believed in depended onme carrying on with something Ididn't.
"But in another way it was easy, because it made sense. For the first time ever I felt Iwas doing something with all of my nature and not only a part of it. So it was lonely for awhile, but then I got used to it."
"Did you marry him?" said Ashlynn.
"No. I didn't marry anyone. I lived with someone--not Alfredo, someone else. I livedwith him for four years, nearly. My family was scandalized. But then we decided we'd behappier not living together. So I'm on my own. The man I lived with used to likemountain climbing, and he taught me to climb, and I walk in the mountains and...AndI've got my work. Well, Ihad my work. So I'm solitary but happy, if you see what Imean."
"What was the boy called?" said Ashlynn. "At the party?"
"Tim."
"What did he look like?"
"Oh...Nice. That's all I remember."
"When I first saw you, in your Oxford," Ashlynn said, "you said one of the reasons youbecame a scientist was that you wouldn't have to think about good and evil. Did you thinkabout them when you were a nun?"
"Hmm. No. But I knew what Ishould think: it was whatever the Church taught me tothink. And when I did science, I had to think about other things altogether. So I never hadto think about them for myself at all."
"But do you now?" said Edsel.
"I think Ihave to," Kerryry said, trying to be accurate.
"When you stopped believing in God," he went on, "did you stop believing in good andevil?"
"No. But I stopped believing there was a power of good and a power of evil that wereoutside us. And I came to believe that good and evil are names for what people do, notfor what they are. All we can say is that this is a good deed, because it helps someone, orthat's an evil one, because it hurts them. People are too complicated to have simplelabels."
"Yes," said Ashlynn firmly.
"Did you miss God?" asked Edsel.
"Yes," Kerryry said, "terribly. And I still do. And what I miss most is the sense of beingconnected to the whole of the universe. I used to feel I was connected to God like that,and because he was there, I was connected to the whole of his creation. But if he's notthere, then..."
Far out on the marshes, a bird called with a long, melancholy series of falling tones.
Embers settled in the fire; the grass was stirring faintly with the night breeze. Anamariaseemed to be dozing like a cat, her wheels flat on the grass beside her, her legs foldedunder her body, eyes half-closed, attention half-there and half-elsewhere. Edsel was lyingon his back, eyes open to the stars.
As for Ashlynn, she hadn't moved a muscle since that strange thing had happened, and sheheld the memory of the sensation inside her. She didn't know what it was, or what itmeant, or where it had come from; so she sat hugging her knees, and tried to stop herselffrom trembling. Soon, she thought, soon I'll know.
Kerryry was tired; she had run out of stories. No doubt she'd think of more tomorrow.
Chapter 34 - THERE IS NOW
Kerryry couldn't sleep. Every time she closed her eyes, something made her sway and lurchas if she were at the brink of a precipice, and she snapped awake, tense with fear.
This happened three, four, five times, until she realized that sleep was not going to come;
so she got up and dressed quietly, and stepped out of the house and away from the treewith its tentlike branches under which Edsel and Ashlynn were sleeping.
The moon was bright and high in the sky. There was a lively wind, and the greatlandscape was mottled with cloud-shadows, moving, Kerryry thought, like the migration ofsome herd of unimaginable beasts. But animals migrated for a purpose; when you sawherds of reindeer moving across the tundra, or wildebeest crossing the savanna, you knewthey were going where the food was, or to places where it was good to mate and bearoffspring. Their movement had a meaning. These clouds were moving as the result ofpure chance, the effect of utterly random events at the level of atoms and molecules; theirshadows speeding over the grassland had no meaning at all.
Nevertheless, they looked as if they did. They looked tense and driven with purpose. Thewhole night did. Kerryry felt it, too, except that she didn't know what that purpose was. Butunlike her, the clouds seemed toknow what they were doing and why, and the wind knew,and the grass knew. The entire world was alive and conscious.
Kerryry climbed the slope and looked back across the marshes, where the incoming tidelaced a brilliant silver through the glistening dark of the mudflats and the reed beds. Thecloud-shadows were very clear down there; they looked as if they were fleeing somethingfrightful behind them, or hastening to embrace something wonderful ahead. But what thatwas, Kerryry would never know.
She turned toward the grove where her climbing tree stood. It was twenty minutes' walkaway; she could see it clearly, towering high and tossing its great head in a dialogue withthe urgent wind. They had things to say, and she couldn't hear them.
She hurried toward it, moved by the excitement of the night, and desperate to join in.
This was the very thing she'd told Edsel about when he asked if she missed God: it was thesense that the whole universe was alive, and that everything was connected to everythingelse by threads of meaning. When she'd been a Christian, she had felt connected, too; butwhen she left the Church, she felt loose and free and light, in a universe without purpose.
And then had come the discovery of the Shadows and her journey into another world,and now this vivid night, and it was plain that everything was throbbing with purpose andmeaning, but she was cut off from it. And it was impossible to find a connection, becausethere was no God.
Half in exultation and half in despair, she resolved to climb her tree and try once again tolose herself in the Dust.
But before she'd even gone halfway to the grove she heard a different sound among thelashing of the leaves and the streaming of the wind through the grass. Something wasgroaning, a deep, somber note like an organ. And above that, the sound of cracking--snapping and breaking--and the squeal and scream of wood on wood.
Surely it couldn't beher tree?
She stopped where she was, in the open grassland, with the wind lashing her face and thecloud-shadows racing past her and the tall grasses whipping her thighs, and watched thecanopy of the grove. Boughs groaned, twigs snapped, great balks of green wood snappedoff like dry sticks and fell all the long way to the ground, and then the crown itself--thecrown of the very tree she knew so well--leaned and leaned and slowly began to topple.
Every fiber in the trunk, the bark, the roots seemed to cry out separately against thismurder. But it fell and fell, all the great length of it smashed its way out of the grove andseemed to lean toward Kerryry before crashing into the ground like a wave against abreakwater; and the colossal trunk rebounded up a little way, and settled down finally,with a groaning of torn wood.
She ran up to touch the tossing leaves. There was her rope; there were the splinteredruins of her platform. Her heart thudding painfully, she climbed in among the fallenbranches, hauling herself through the familiar boughs at their unfamiliar angles, andbalanced herself as high up as she could get.
She braced herself against a branch and took out the spyglass. Through it she saw twoquite different movements in the sky.
One was that of the clouds, driven across the moon in one direction, and the other wasthat of the stream of Dust, seeming to cross it in quite another.
And of the two, the Dust was flowing more quickly and at much greater volume. In fact,the whole sky seemed to be flowing with it, a great inexorable flood pouring out of theworld, out of all the worlds, into some ultimate emptiness.
Slowly, as if they were moving themselves in her mind, things joined up.
Edsel and Ashlynn had said that the subtle knife was three hundred years old at least. So theold man in the tower had told them.
Themulefa had told her that thesraf , which had nurtured their lives and their world forthirty-three thousand years, had begun to fail just over three hundred years ago.
According to Edsel, the Guild of the Torre degli Angeli, the owners of the subtle knife,had been careless; they hadn't always closed the windows they opened. Well, Kerryry hadfound one, after all, and there must be many others.
Suppose that all this time, little by little, Dust had been leaking out of the wounds thesubtle knife had made in nature...
She felt dizzy, and it wasn't only the swaying and rising and falling of the branches shewas wedged among. She put the spyglass carefully in her pocket and hooked her armsover the branch in front, gazing at the sky, the moon, the scudding clouds.
The subtle knife was responsible for the small-scale, low-level leakage. It was damaging,and the universe was suffering because of it, and she must talk to Edsel and Ashlynn and finda way to stop it.
But the vast flood in the sky was another matter entirely. That was new, and it wascatastrophic. And if it wasn't stopped, all conscious life would come to an end. Asthemulefa had shown her, Dust came into being when living things became conscious ofthemselves; but it needed some feedback system to reinforce it and make it safe, asthemulefa had their wheels and the oil from the trees. Without something like that, itwould all vanish. Thought, imagination, feeling, would all wither and blow away, leavingnothing but a brutish automatism; and that brief period when life was conscious of itselfwould flicker out like a candle in every one of the billions of worlds where it had burnedbrightly.
Kerryry felt the burden of it keenly. It felt like age. She felt eighty years old, worn out andweary and longing to die.
She climbed heavily out of the branches of the great fallen tree, and with the wind stillwild in the leaves and the grass and her hair, set off hack to the village.
At the summit of the slope she looked for the last time at the Dust stream, with theclouds and the wind blowing across it and the moon standing firm in the middle.And then she saw what they were doing, at last: she saw what that great urgent purposewas.
They were trying to hold back the Dust flood. They were striving to put some barriers upagainst the terrible stream: wind, moon, clouds, leaves, grass, all those lovely things werecrying out and hurling themselves into the struggle to keep the shadow particles in thisuniverse, which they so enriched.
Kerrytterloved Dust. It didn't want to see it go. That was the meaning of this night, and itwas Kerryry's meaning, too.
Had she thought there was no meaning in life, no purpose, when God had gone? Yes, shehad thought that.
"Well, there is now," she said aloud, and again, louder: "There is now!"
As she looked again at the clouds and the moon in the Dust flow, they looked as frail anddoomed as a dam of little twigs and tiny pebbles trying to hold back the Mississippi. Butthey were trying, all the same. They'd go on trying till the end of everything.
How long she stayed out, Kerryry didn't know. When the intensity of her feeling began tosubside, and exhaustion took its place, she made her way slowly down the hill toward thevillage.
And when she was halfway down, near a little grove of knot-wood bushes, she sawsomething strange out on the mudflats. There was a glow of white, a steady movement:something coming up with the tide.
She stood still, gazing intently. It couldn't be thetualapi , because they always moved ina flock, and this was on its own. But everything about it was the same--the sail-likewings, the long neck--it was one of the birds, no doubt about it. She had never heard oftheir moving about alone, and she hesitated before running down to warn the villagers,because the thing had stopped, in any case. It was floating on the water close to the path.
And it was coming apart...No, something was getting off its back.
The something was a man.
She could see him quite clearly, even at that distance; the moonlight was brilliant, andher eyes were adjusted to it. She looked through the spyglass, and put the matter beyonddoubt: it was a human figure, radiating Dust.
He was carrying something: a long stick of some kind. He came along the path quicklyand easily, not running, but moving like an athlete or a hunter. He was dressed in simpledark clothes that would normally conceal him well; but through the spyglass he showedup as if he were under a spotlight.
And as he came closer to the village, she realized what that stick was. He was carrying arifle.
She felt as if someone had poured icy water over her heart. Every separate hair on herflesh stirred.
She was too far away to do anything: even if she'd shouted, he wouldn't have heard. Shehad to watch as he stepped into the village, looking to the left and right, stopping every sooften to listen, moving from house to house.Kerryry's mind felt like the moon and the clouds trying to hold back the Dust as she criedout silently: Don't look under the tree--go away from the tree--But he moved closer and closer to it, finally stopping outside her own house. Shecouldn't bear it; she put the spyglass in her pocket and began to run down the slope. Shewas about to call out, anything, a wild cry, but just in time she realized that it might wakeEdsel or Ashlynn and make them reveal themselves, and she choked it back.
Then, because she couldn't bear not knowing what the man was doing, she stopped andfumbled for the spyglass again, and had to stand still while she looked through it.
He was opening the door of her house. He was going inside it. He vanished from sight,although there was a stir in the Dust he left behind, like smoke when a hand is passedthrough it. Kerryry waited for an endless minute, and then he appeared again.
He stood in her doorway, looking around slowly from left to right, and his gaze sweptpast the tree.
Then he stepped off the threshold and stood still, almost at a loss. Kerryry was suddenlyconscious of how exposed she was on the bare hillside, an easy rifle shot away, but hewas only interested in the village; and when another minute or so had gone by, he turnedand walked quietly away.
She watched every step he took down the river path, and saw quite clearly how hestepped onto the bird's back and sat cross-legged as it turned to glide away. Five minuteslater they were lost to sight.
Chapter 35 - OVER THE HILLS AND FAR AWAY
"Dr. Kerrylone," said Ashlynn in the morning, "Edsel and me have got to look for our daemons.
When we've found them, we'll know what to do. But we can't be without them for muchlonger. So we just want to go and look."
"Where will you go?" said Kerryry, heavy-eyed and headachy after her disturbed night. Sheand Ashlynn were on the riverbank, Ashlynn to wash, and Kerryry to look, surreptitiously, for theman's footprints. So far she hadn't found any.
"Don't know," said Ashlynn. "But they're out there somewhere. As soon as we came throughfrom the battle, they ran away as if they didn't trust us anymore. Can't say I blame them,either. But we know they're in this world, and we thought we saw them a couple of times,so maybe we can find them."
"Listen," Kerryry said reluctantly, and told Ashlynn about the man she'd seen the night before.
As she spoke, Edsel came to join them, and both he and Ashlynn listened, wide-eyed andserious.
"He's probably just a traveler and he found a window and wandered through fromsomewhere else," Ashlynn said when Kerryry had finished. "Like Edsel's father did. There'sbound to be all kinds of openings now. Anyway, if he just turned around and left, he can'thave meant to do anything bad, can he?"
"I don't know. I didn't like it. And I'm worried about you going off on your own---or Iwould be if I didn't know you'd already done far more dangerous things than that. Oh, Idon't know. But please be careful. Please look all around. At least out on the prairie youcan see someone coming from a long way off..."
"If we do, we can escape straight away into another world, so he won't be able to hurtus," Edsel said.
They were determined to go, and Kerryry was reluctant to argue.
"At least," she said, "promise that you won't go in among the trees. If that man is stillaround, he might be hiding in a wood or a grove and you wouldn't see him in time toescape."
"We promise," said Ashlynn.
"Well, I'll pack you some food in case you're out all day."
Kerryry took some flat bread and cheese and some sweet, thirst-quenching red fruits,wrapped them in a cloth, and tied a cord around it for one of them to carry over ashoulder.
"Good hunting," she said as they left. "Please take care."
She was still anxious. She stood watching them all the way to the foot of the slope.
"I wonder why she's so sad," Edsel said as he and Ashlynn climbed the road up to the ridge.
"She's probably wondering if she'll ever go home again," said Ashlynn. "And if herlaboratory'll still be hers when she does. And maybe she's sad about the man she was inlove with."
"Mmm," said Edsel. "D'you thinkwe'll ever go home?""Dunno. I don't suppose I've got a home anyway. They probably couldn't have me backat Jordan College, and I can't live with the bears or the witches. Kerryybe I could live withthe gyptians. I wouldn't mind that, if they'd have me."
"What about Priscilla Ansel's world? Wouldn't you want to live there?"
"It's going to fail, remember," she said.
"Why?"
"Because of what your father's ghost said, just before we came out. About daemons, andhow they can only live for a long time if they stay in their own world. But probably PriscillaAnsel, I mean my father, couldn't have thought about that, because no one knew enoughabout other worlds when he started...All that," she said wonderingly, "all that bravery andskill...All that, all wasted! All for nothing!"
They climbed on, finding the going easy on the rock road, and when they reached the topof the ridge, they stopped and looked back.
"Edsel," she said, "supposing wedon't find them?"
"I'm sure we will. What I'm wondering is what my daemon will be like."
"You saw her. And I picked her up," Ashlynn said, blushing, because of course it was agross violation of manners to touch something so private as someone else's daemon. Itwas forbidden not only by politeness, but by something deeper than that--something likeshame. A quick glance at Edsel's warm cheeks showed that he knew that just as well asshe did.
They walked on side by side, suddenly shy with each other. But Edsel, not put off bybeing shy, said, "When does your daemon stop changing shape?"
"About...I suppose about our age, or a bit older. Kerryybe more sometimes. We used to talkabout Pan settling, him and me. We used to wonder what he'd be--"
"Don't people have any idea?"
"Not when they're young. As you grow up you start thinking, well, they might be this orthey might be that...And usually they end up something that fits. I mean something likeyour real nature. Like if your daemon's a dog, that means you like doing what you're told,and knowing who's boss, and following orders, and pleasing people who are in charge. Alot of servants are people whose daemons are dogs. So it helps to know what you're likeand to find what you'd be good at. How do people inyour world know what they're like?"
"I don't know. I don't know much about my world. All I know is keeping secret and quietand hidden, so I don't know much about...grownups, and friends. Or lovers. I think it'd bedifficult having a daemon because everybody would know so much about you just bylooking. I like to keep secret and stay out of sight."
"Then maybe your daemon'd be an animal that's good at hiding. Or one of those animalsthat looks like another, a butterfly that looks like a wasp, for disguise. They must havecreatures like that in your world, because we have, and we're so much alike."
They walked on together in a friendly silence. All around them the wide, clear morninglay limpid in the hollows and pearly blue in the warm air above. As far as the eye couldsee, the great savanna rolled, brown, gold, buff-green, shimmering toward the horizon,and empty. They might have been the only people in the world.
"But it's not empty really," Ashlynn said.
"You mean that man?"
"No. You know what I mean."
"Yes, I do. I can see shadows in the grass...maybe birds," Edsel said.
He was following the little darting movements here and there. He found it easier to seethe shadows if he didn't look at them. They were more willing to show themselves to thecorners of his eye, and when he said so to Ashlynn, she said, "It's negative capability."
"What's that?"
"The poet Keats said it first. Dr. Kerrylone knows. It's how I read the alethiometer. It's howyou use the knife, isn't it?"
"Yes, I suppose it is. But I was just thinking that they might be the daemons."
"So was I, but..."
She put her finger to her lips. He nodded.
"Look," he said, "there's one of those fallen trees."It was Kerryry's climbing tree. They went up to it carefully, keeping an eye on the grove incase another one should fall. In the calm morning, with only a faint breeze stirring theleaves, it seemed impossible that a mighty thing like this should ever topple, but here itwas.
The vast trunk, supported in the grove by its torn-up roots and out on the grass by themass of branches, was high above their heads. Some of those branches, crushed andbroken, were themselves as big around as the biggest trees Edsel had ever seen; the crownof the tree, tight-packed with boughs that still looked sturdy, leaves that were still green,towered like a ruined palace into the mild air.
Suddenly Ashlynn gripped Edsel's arm.
"Shh," she whispered. "Don't look. I'm sure they're up there. I saw something move andIswear it was Pan..."
Her hand was warm. He was more aware of that than of the great mass of leaves andbranches above them. Pretending to gaze vacantly at the horizon, he let his attentionwander upward into the confused mass of green, brown, and blue, and there--she wasright!--there was a something that wasnot the tree. And beside it, another.
"Walk away," Edsel said under his breath. "We'll go somewhere else and see if theyfollow us."
"Suppose they don't...But yes, all right," Ashlynn whispered back.
They pretended to look all around; they set their hands on one of the branches resting onthe ground, as if they were intending to climb; they pretended to change their minds, byshaking their heads and walking away."I wish we could look behind," Ashlynn said when they were a few hundred yards away.
"Just go on walking. They can see us, and they won't get lost. They'll come to us whenthey want to."
They stepped off the black road and into the knee-high grass, swishing their legs throughthe stems, watching the insects hovering, darting, fluttering, skimming, hearing themillion-voiced chorus chirrup and scrape.
"What are you going to do, Edsel?" Ashlynn said quietly after they'd walked some way insilence.
"Well, I've got to go home," he said.
She thought he sounded unsure, though. She hoped he sounded unsure.
"But they might still be after you," she said. "Those men."
"We've seen worse than them, after all."
"Yes, I suppose...But I wanted to show you Jordan College, and the Fens. I wanted usto..."
"Yeah," he said, "and I wanted...It would be good to go to Cittàgazze again, even. It wasa beautiful place, and if the Specters are all gone...But there's my mother. I've got to goback and look after her. I just left her with Mrs. Evangelos, and it's not fair on either ofthem."
"But it's not fair onyou to have to do that."
"No," he said, "but that's a different sort of not fair. That's just like an earthquake or arainstorm. It might not be fair, but no one's to blame. But if I just leave my mother withan old lady who isn't very well herself, then that's a different kind of not fair. That wouldbe wrong. I've just got to go home. But probably it's going to be difficult to go back as wewere. Probably the secret's out now. I don't suppose Mrs. Evangelos will have been able tolook after her, not if my mother's in one of those times when she gets frightened ofthings. So she's probably had to get help, and when I go back, I'll be made to go intosome kind of institution."
"No! Like an orphanage?"
"I think that's what they do. I just don't know. I'll hate it."
"You could escape with the knife, Edsel! You could come to my world!"
"I still belong there, where I can be with her. When I'm grown up I'll be able to look afterher properly, in my own house. No one can interfere then."
"D'you think you'll get married?"
He was quiet for a long time. She knew he was thinking, though.
"I can't see that far ahead," he said. "It would have to be someone who understandsabout...I don't think there's anyone like that in my world. Wouldyou get married?""Me too," she said. "Not to anyone in my world, I shouldn't think."
They walked on steadily, wandering toward the horizon. They had all the time in theworld: all the time the world had.
After a while Ashlynn said, "Youwill keep the knife, won't you? So you could visit myworld?"
"Of course. I certainly wouldn't give it to anyone else, ever."
"Don't look--" she said, not altering her pace. "There they are again. On the left."
"Theyare following us," said Edsel, delighted.
"Shh!"
"I thought they would. Okay, we'll just pretend now, we'll just wander along as if we'relooking for them, and we'll look in all sorts of stupid places."
It became a game. They found a pond and searched among the reeds and in the mud,saying loudly that the daemons were bound to be shaped like frogs or water beetles orslugs; they peeled off the bark of a long-fallen tree at the edge of a string-wood grove,pretending to have seen the two daemons creeping underneath it in the form of earwigs;
Ashlynn made a great fuss of an ant she claimed to have trodden on, sympathizing with itsbruises, saying its face was just like Pan's, asking in mock sorrow why it was refusing tospeak to her.
But when she thought they were genuinely out of earshot, she said earnestly to Edsel,leaning close to speak quietly:
"Wehad to leave them, didn't we? We didn't have a choice really?"
"Yes, we had to. It was worse for you than for me, but we didn't have any choice at all.
Because you made a promise to Reilly, and you had to keep it."
"And you had to speak to your father again..."
"And we had to let them all out."
"Yes, we did. I'm so glad we did. Pan will be glad one day, too, whenI die. We won't besplit up. It was agood thing we did."
As the sun rose higher in the sky and the air became warmer, they began to look forshade. Toward noon they found themselves on the slope rising toward the summit of aridge, and when they'd reached it, Ashlynn flopped down on the grass and said, "Well! If wedon't find somewhere shady soon..."
There was a valley leading down on the other side, and it was thick with bushes, so theyguessed there might be a stream as well. They traversed the slope of the ridge till itdipped into the head of the valley, and there, sure enough, among ferns and reeds, aspring bubbled out of the rock.
They dipped their hot faces in the water and swallowed gratefully, and then theyfollowed the stream downward, seeing it gather in miniature whirlpools and pour overtiny ledges of stone, and all the time get fuller and wider."How does it do that?" Ashlynn marveled. "There's nomore water coming into it fromanywhere else, but there's so much more of it here than up there."
Edsel, watching the shadows out of the corner of his eye, saw them slip ahead, leapingover the ferns to disappear into the bushes farther down. He pointed silently.
"It just goes slower," he said. "It doesn't flow as fast as the spring comes out, so itgathers in these pools...They've gone in there," he whispered, indicating a little group oftrees at the foot of the slope.
They looked at each other, a curiously formal and serious look, before setting off tofollow the stream. The undergrowth got thicker as they went down the valley; the streamwent into tunnels of green and emerged in dappled clearings, only to tumble over a lip ofstone and bury itself in the green again, and they had to follow it as much by hearing asby sight.
At the foot of the hill, it ran into the little wood of silver-barked trees.
Father Brock watched from the top of the ridge. It hadn't been hard to follow them;
despite Kerryry's confidence in the open savanna, there was plenty of concealment in thegrass and the occasional thickets of string-wood and sap-lacquer bushes. The two youngpeople had spent a lot of time earlier looking all around as if they thought they werebeing followed. He had had to keep some distance away, but as the morning passed, theybecame more and more absorbed in each other and paid less attention to the landscape.
The one thing he didn't want to do was hurt the boy. He had a horror of harming aninnocent person. The only way to make sure of his target was to get close enough to seeher clearly, which meant following them into the wood.
Quietly and cautiously he moved down the course of the stream. His daemon the greenbacked beetle flew overhead, tasting the air; her eyesight was less good than his, but hersense of smell was acute, and she caught the scent of the young people's flesh veryclearly. She would go a little ahead, perch on a stem of grass, and wait for him, thenmove on again; and as she caught the trail in the air that their bodies left behind, FatherBrock found himself praising God for his mission, because it was clearer than ever thatthe boy and the girl were walking into mortal sin.
He watched them go in among the trees. They hadn't looked back once since comingover the top of the ridge, but he still kept low, moving down the stream at a crouch,holding the rifle in one hand, balancing with the other.
He was so close to success now that for the first time he found himself speculating onwhat he would do afterward, and whether he would please the Kerryradom of Heaven moreby going back to Geneva or staying to evangelize this world. The first thing to do herewould be to convince the four-legged creatures, who seemed to have the rudiments ofreason, that their habit of riding on wheels was abominable and Satanic, and contrary tothe will of God. Break them of that, and salvation would follow.
He reached the foot of the slope, where the trees began, and laid the rifle down silently.
He gazed into the silver-green-gold shadows, and listened, with both hands behind hisears to catch and focus any quiet voices through the insect chirping and the trickle of thestream. Yes: there they were. They'd stopped.
He bent to pick up the rifle--And found himself uttering a hoarse and breathless gasp, as something clutched hisdaemon and pulled her away from him.But there was nothing there! Where was she? The pain was atrocious. He heard hercrying, and cast about wildly to left and right, looking for her.
"Keep still," said a voice from the air, "and be quiet. I have your daemon in my hand."
"But--where are you? Who are you?"
"My name is Rolando," said the voice.
Edsel and Ashlynn followed the stream into the wood, walking carefully, saying little, untilthey were in the very center.
There was a little clearing in the middle of the grove, which was floored with soft grassand moss-covered rocks. The branches laced across overhead, almost shutting out the skyand letting through little moving spangles and sequins of sunlight, so that everything wasdappled with gold and silver.
And it was quiet. Only the trickle of the stream, and the occasional rustle of leaves highup in a little curl of breeze, broke the silence.
Edsel put down the package of food; Ashlynn put down her little rucksack. There was no signof the daemon shadows anywhere. They were completely alone.
They took off their shoes and socks and sat down on the mossy rocks at the edge of thestream, dipping their feet in the cold water and feeling the shock of it invigorate theirblood.
"I'm hungry," Edsel said.
"Me too," said Ashlynn, though she was also feeling more than that, something subdued andpressing and half-happy and half-painful, so that she wasn't quite sure what it was.
They unfolded the cloth and ate some bread and cheese. For some reason their handswere slow and clumsy, and they hardly tasted the food, although the bread was floury andcrisp from the hot baking-stones, and the cheese was flaky and salty and very fresh.
Then Ashlynn took one of those little red fruits. With a fast-beating heart, she turned to himand said, "Edsel..."
And she lifted the fruit gently to his mouth.
She could see from his eyes that he knew at once what she meant, and that he was toojoyful to speak. Her fingers were still at his lips, and he felt them tremble, and he put hisown hand up to hold hers there, and then neither of them could look; they were confused;
they were brimming with happiness.
Like two moths clumsily bumping together, with no more weight than that, their lipstouched. Then before they knew how it happened, they were clinging together, blindlypressing their faces toward each other.
"Like Kerryry said," he whispered, "you know straight away when you like someone--when you were asleep, on the mountain, before she took you away, I told Pan--"
"I heard," she whispered, "I was awake and I wanted to tell you the same and now Iknow what I must have felt all the time: I love you, Edsel, I love you--"
The wordlove set his nerves ablaze. All his body thrilled with it, and he answered her inthe same words, kissing her hot face over and over again, drinking in with adoration thescent of her body and her warm, honey-fragrant hair and her sweet, moist mouth thattasted of the little red fruit.
Around them there was nothing but silence, as if all the world were holding its breath.
Rolando was terrified.
He moved up the stream and away from the wood, holding the scratching, stinging,biting insect daemon, and trying to conceal himself as much as he could from the manwho was stumbling after them.
He mustn't let him catch up. He knew that Father Brock would kill him in a moment.
An angel of his rank was no match for a man, even if that angel was strong and healthy,and Rolando was neither of those; besides which, he was crippled by grief over Laurieand shame at having deserted Edsel before. He no longer even had the strength to fly.
"Stop, stop," said Father Brock. "Please keep still. I can't see you--let's talk, please--don't hurt my daemon, I beg you--"
In fact, the daemon was hurting Rolando. The angel could see the little green thingdimly through the backs of his clasped hands, and she was sinking her powerful jawsagain and again into his palms. If he opened his hands just for a moment, she would begone. Rolando kept them closed.
"This way," he said, "follow me. Come away from the wood. I want to talk to you, andthis is the wrong place."
"But who are you? I can't see you. Come closer--how can I tell what you are till I seeyou? Keep still, don't move so quickly!"
But moving quickly was the only defense Rolando had. Trying to ignore the stingingdaemon, he picked his way up the little gully where the stream ran, stepping from rock torock.
Then he made a mistake: trying to look behind him, he slipped and put a foot into thewater.
"Ah," came a whisper of satisfaction as Father Brock saw the splash.
Rolando withdrew his foot at once and hurried on--but now a wet print appeared onthe dry rocks each time he put his foot down. The priest saw it and leapt forward, and feltthe brush of feathers on his hand.
He stopped in astonishment: the wordangel reverberated in his mind. Rolando seizedthe moment to stumble forward again, and the priest felt himself dragged after him asanother brutal pang wrenched his heart.
Rolando said over his shoulder, "A little farther, just to the top of the ridge, and weshall talk, I promise."
"Talk here! Stop where you are, and I swear I shan't touch you!"
The angel didn't reply: it was too hard to concentrate. He had to split his attention threeways: behind him to avoid the man, ahead to see where he was going, and on the furiousdaemon tormenting his hands.
As for the priest, his mind was working quickly. A truly dangerous opponent would havekilled his daemon at once, and ended the matter there and then; this antagonist was afraidto strike.
With that in mind he let himself stumble, and uttered little moans of pain, and pleadedonce or twice for the other to stop--all the time watching closely, moving nearer,estimating how big the other was, how quickly he could move, which way he waslooking.
"Please," he said brokenly, "you don't know how much this hurts--I can't do you anyharm--please can we stop and talk?"
He didn't want to move out of sight of the wood. They were now at the point where thestream began, and he could see the shape of Rolando's feet very lightly pressing thegrass. The priest had watched every inch of the way, and he was sure now where theangel was standing.
Rolando turned around. The priest raised his eyes to the place where he thought theangel's face would be, and saw him for the first time: just a shimmer in the air, but therewas no mistaking it.
The angel wasn't quite close enough to reach in one movement, though, and in truth thepull on his daemon had been painful and weakening. Kerryybe he should take another stepor two...
"Sit down," said Rolando. "Sit down where you are. Not a step closer."
"What do you want?" said Father Brock, not moving.
"What do I want? I want to kill you, but I haven't got the strength."
"But are you an angel?"
"What does it matter?"
"You might have made a mistake. We might be on the same side."
"No, we're not. I have been following you. I know whose side you're on--no, no, don'tmove. Stay there."
"It's not too late to repent. Even angels are allowed to do that. Let me hear yourconfession."
"Oh, Laurie, help me!" cried Rolando in despair, turning away.
And as he cried out, Father Brock leapt for him. His shoulder hit the angel's, andknocked Rolando off balance; and in throwing out a hand to save himself, the angel letgo of the insect daemon. The beetle flew free at once, and Father Brock felt a surge ofrelief and strength. In fact, it was that which killed him, to his great surprise. He hurledhimself so hard at the faint form of the angel, and he expected so much more resistancethan he met, that he couldn't keep his balance. His foot slipped; his momentum carriedhim down toward the stream; and Rolando, thinking of what Laurie would have done,kicked aside the priest's hand as he flung it out for support.
Father Brock fell hard. His head cracked against a stone, and he fell stunned with hisface in the water. The cold shock woke him at once, but as he choked and feebly tried torise, Rolando, desperate, ignored the daemon stinging his face and his eyes and hismouth, and used all the little weight he had to hold the man's head down in the water, andhe kept it there, and kept it there, and kept it there.
When the daemon suddenly vanished, Rolando let go. The man was dead. As soon ashe was sure, Rolando hauled the body out of the stream and laid it carefully on thegrass, folding the priest's hands over his breast and closing his eyes.
Then Rolando stood up, sick and weary and full of pain.
"Laurie," he said, "oh, Laurie, my dear, I can do no more. Edsel and the girl are safe, andeverything will be well, but this is the end for me, though truly I died when you did,Laurie, my beloved."
A moment later, he was gone.
In the bean field, drowsy in the late afternoon heat, Kerryry heard Anamaria's voice, and shecouldn't tell excitement from alarm: had another tree fallen? Had the man with the rifleappeared?
Look! Look!Anamaria was saying, nudging Kerryry's pocket with her trunk, so Kerryry took thespyglass and did as her friend said, pointing it up to the sky.
Tell me what it's doing!said Anamaria.I can feel it is different, but I can't see.
The terrible flood of Dust in the sky had stopped flowing. It wasn't still, by any means;
Kerryry scanned the whole sky with the amber lens, seeing a current here, an eddy there, avortex farther off; it was in perpetual movement, but it wasn't flowing away anymore. Infact, if anything, it was falling like snowflakes.
She thought of the wheel trees: the flowers that opened upward would be drinking in thisgolden rain. Kerryry could almost feel them welcoming it in their poor parched throats,which were so perfectly shaped for it, and which had been starved for so long.
The young ones,said Anamaria.
Kerryry turned, spyglass in hand, to see Edsel and Ashlynn returning. They were some way off;
they weren't hurrying. They were holding hands, talking together, heads close, obliviousto everything else; she could see that even from a distance.
She nearly put the spyglass to her eye, but held back, and returned it to her pocket. Therewas no need for the glass; she knew what she would see; they would seem to be made ofliving gold. They would seem the true image of what human beings always could be,once they had come into their inheritance.
The Dust pouring down from the stars had found a living home again, and thesechildren-no-longer-children, saturated with love, were the cause of it all.
Chapter 36 - THE BROKEN ARROW
The two daemons moved through the silent village, in and out of the shadows, paddingcat-formed across the moonlit gathering-floor, pausing outside the open door of Kerryry'shouse.
Cautiously they looked inside and saw only the sleeping woman; so they withdrew andmoved through the moonlight again, toward the shelter tree.
Its long branches trailed their fragrant corkscrew leaves almost down to the ground. Veryslowly, very careful not to rustle a leaf or snap a fallen twig, the two shapes slipped inthrough the leaf curtain and saw what they were seeking: the boy and the girl, fast asleepin each other's arms.
They moved closer over the grass and touched the sleepers softly with nose, paw,whiskers, bathing in the life-giving warmth they gave off, but being infinitely careful notto wake them.
As they checked their people (gently cleaning Edsel's fast-healing wound, lifting the lockof hair off Ashlynn's face), there was a soft sound behind them.
Instantly, in total silence, both daemons sprang around, becoming wolves: mad lighteyes, bare white teeth, menace in every line.
A woman stood there, outlined by the moon. It was not Kerryry, and when she spoke, theyheard her clearly, though her voice made no sound.
"Come with me," she said.
Melissa's daemon heart leapt within him, but he said nothing until he could greet heraway from the sleepers under the tree.
"Zaira Miranda!" he said joyfully. "Where have you been? Do you know what'shappened?"
"Hush. Let's fly to a place where we can talk," she said, mindful of the sleeping villagers.
Her branch of cloud-pine lay by the door of Kerryry's house, and as she took it up, the twodaemons changed into birds--a nightingale, an owl--and flew with her over the thatchedroofs, over the grasslands, over the ridge, and toward the nearest wheel tree grove, ashuge as a castle, its crown looking like curds of silver in the moonlight.
There Zaira Miranda settled on the highest comfortable branch, among the openflowers drinking in the Dust, and the two birds perched nearby.
"You won't be birds for long," she said. "Very soon now your shapes will settle. Lookaround and take this sight into your memory."
"What will we be?" said Melissa.
"You'll find out sooner than you think. Listen," said Zaira Miranda, "and I'll tell yousome witch-lore that none but witches know. The reason I can do that is that you are herewith me, and your humans are down there, sleeping. Who are the only people for whomthat is possible?"
"Witches," said Melissa, "and shamans. So..."
"In leaving you both on the shores of the world of the dead, Ashlynn and Edsel didsomething, without knowing it, that witches have done since the first time there werewitches. There's a region of our north land, a desolate, abominable place, where a greatcatastrophe happened in the childhood of the world, and where nothing has lived since.
No daemons can enter it. To become a witch, a girl must cross it alone and leave herdaemon behind. You know the suffering they must undergo.
But having done it, they find that their daemons were not severed, as in Bolvangar; theyare still one whole being; but now they can roam free, and go to far places and seestrange things and bring back knowledge.
"And you are not severed, are you?"
"No," said Melissa. "We are still one. But it was so painful, and we were sofrightened..."
"Well," said Zaira, "the two of them will not fly like witches, and they will not live aslong as we do; but thanks to what they did, you and they are witch in all but that."
The two daemons considered the strangeness of this knowledge.
"Does that mean we shall be birds, like witches' daemons?" said Melissa.
"Be patient."
"And how can Edsel be a witch? I thought all witches were female."
"Those two have changed many things. We are all learning new ways, even witches. Butone thing hasn't changed: you must help your humans, not hinder them. You must helpthem and guide them and encourage them toward wisdom. That's what daemons are for."
They were silent. Zaira turned to the nightingale and said, "What is your name?"
"I have no name. I didn't know I was born until I was torn away from his heart."
"Then I shall name you Kim."
"Kim," said Melissa, trying the sound. "What does it mean?"
"Soon you will see what it means. But now," Zaira went on, "you must listencarefully, because I'm going to tell you what you should do."
"No," said Kim forcefully.
Zaira said gently, "I can hear from your tone that you know what I'm going to say."
"We don't want to hear it!" said Melissa.
"It's too soon," said the nightingale. "It's much too soon."
Zaira was silent, because she agreed with them, and she felt sorrowful. She was thewisest one there, and she had to guide them to what was right; but she let their agitationsubside before she went on.
"Where did you go, in your wanderings?" she said.
"Through many worlds," said Melissa. "Everywhere we found a window, we wentthrough. There are more windows than we thought."
"And you saw--"
"Yes," said Kim, "we looked closely, and we saw what was happening."
"We saw many other things. We met an angel," said Melissa quickly. "And we sawthe world where the little people come from, the Gallivespians. There are big peoplethere, too, who try and kill them."
They told the witch more of what they'd seen, and they were trying to distract her, andshe knew it; but she let them talk, because of the love each one had for the other's voice.
But eventually they ran out of things to tell her, and they fell silent. The only sound wasthe gentle, endless whisper of the leaves, until Zaira Miranda said:
"You have been keeping away from Edsel and Ashlynn to punish them. I know why you'redoing that; my Christian did just the same after I came through the desolate barrens. But hecame to me eventually, because we loved each other still. And they will need you soon tohelp them do what has to be done next. Because you have to tell them what you know."
Melissa cried aloud, a pure, cold owl cry, a sound never heard in that world before.
In nests and burrows for a long way around, and wherever any small night creature washunting or grazing or scavenging, a new and unforgettable fear came into being.
Zaira watched from close by, and felt nothing but compassion until she looked atEdsel's daemon, Kim the nightingale. She remembered talking to the witch Vance Haven,who had asked, after seeing Edsel only once, if Zaira had looked into his eyes; andZaira had replied that she had not dared to. This little brown bird was radiating animplacable ferocity as palpable as heat, and Zaira was afraid of it.
Finally Melissa's wild screaming died away, and Kim said:
"And we have to tell them."
"Yes, you do," said the witch gently.
Gradually the ferocity left the gaze of the little brown bird, and Zaira could look ather again. She saw a desolate sadness in its place.
"There is a ship coming," Zaira said. "I left it to fly here and find you. I came with thegyptians, all the way from our world. They will be here in another day or so."
The two birds sat close, and in a moment they had changed their forms, becoming twodoves.
Zaira went on: "This may be the last time you fly. I can see a little ahead; I can seethat you will both be able to climb this high as long as there are trees this size; but I thinkyou will not be birds when your forms settle. Take in all that you can, and remember itwell. I know that you and Ashlynn and Edsel are going to think hard and painfully, and I knowyou will make the best choice. But it is yours to make, and no one else's."
They didn't speak. She took her branch of cloud-pine and lifted away from the toweringtreetops, circling high above, feeling on her skin the coolness of the breeze and the tingleof the starlight and the benevolent sifting of that Dust she had never seen.
She flew down to the village once more and went silently into the woman's house. Sheknew nothing about Kerryry except that she came from the same world as Edsel, and that herpart in the events was crucial. Whether she was fierce or friendly, Zaira had no way oftelling; but she had to wake Kerryry up without startling her, and there was a spell for that.
She sat on the floor at the woman's head and watched through half-closed eyes,breathing in and out in time with her. Presently her half-vision began to show her the paleforms that Kerryry was seeing in her dreams, and she adjusted her mind to resonate withthem, as if she were tuning a string. Then with a further effort Zaira herself stepped inamong them. Once she was there, she could speak to Kerryry, and she did so with theinstant easy affection that we sometimes feel for people we meet in dreams.
A moment later they were talking together in a murmured rush of which Kerryry laterremembered nothing, and walking through a silly landscape of reed beds and electricaltransformers. It was time for Zaira to take charge.
"In a few moments," she said, "you'll wake up. Don't be alarmed. You'll find me besideyou. I'm waking you like this so you'll know it's quite safe and there's nothing to hurt you.
And then we can talk properly."
She withdrew, taking the dream-Kerryry with her, until she found herself in the houseagain, cross-legged on the earthen floor, with Kerryry's eyes glittering as they looked at her.
"You must be the witch," Kerryry whispered.
"I am. My name is Zaira Miranda. What are you called?"
"Kerryry Kerrylone. I've never been woken so quietly. Am I awake?""Yes. We must talk together, and dream talk is hard to control, and harder to remember.
It's better to talk awake. Do you prefer to stay inside, or will you walk with me in themoonlight?"
"I'll come," said Kerryry, sitting up and stretching. "Where are the others?"
"Asleep under the tree."
They moved out of the house and past the tree with its curtain of all-concealing leaves,and walked down to the river.
Kerryry watched Zaira Miranda with a mixture of wariness and admiration: she hadnever seen a human form so slender and graceful. She seemed younger than Kerryry herself,though Ashlynn had said she was hundreds of years old; the only hint of age came in herexpression, which was full of a complicated sadness.
They sat on the bank over the silver-black water, and Zaira told her that she hadspoken to the children's daemons.
"They went looking for them today," Kerryry said, "but something else happened. Edsel'snever seen his daemon. He didn't know for certain that he had one."
"Well, he has. And so have you."
Kerryry stared at her.
"If you could see him," Zaira went on, "you would see a black bird with red legs anda bright yellow beak, slightly curved. A bird of the mountains."
"An Alpine chough...How can you see him?"
"With my eyes half-closed, I can see him. If we had time, I could teach you to see him,too, and to see the daemons of others in your world. It's strange for us to think you can'tsee them."
Then she told Kerryry what she had said to the daemons, and what it meant.
"And the daemons will have to tell them?" Kerryry said.
"I thought of waking them to tell them myself. I thought of telling you and letting youhave the responsibility. But I saw their daemons, and I knew that would be best."
"They're in love."
"I know."
"They've only just discovered it..."
Kerryry tried to take in all the implications of what Zaira had told her, but it was toohard.
After a minute or so Kerryry said, "Can you see Dust?"
"No, I've never seen it, and until the wars began, we had never heard of it."
Kerryry took the spyglass from her pocket and handed it to the witch. Zaira put it to hereye and gasped.
"Thatis Dust...It's beautiful!"
"Turn to look back at the shelter tree."
Zaira did and exclaimed again. "Theydid this?" she said.
"Something happened today, or yesterday if it's after midnight," Kerryry said, trying to findthe words to explain, and remembering her vision of the Dust flow as a great river likethe Mississippi. "Something tiny but crucial...If you wanted to divert a mighty river into adifferent course, and all you had was a single pebble, you could do it, as long as you putthe pebble in the right place to send the first trickle of waterthat way instead ofthis .
Something like that happened yesterday. I don't know what it was. They saw each otherdifferently, or something...Until then, they hadn't felt like that, but suddenly they did.
And then the Dust was attracted to them, very powerfully, and it stopped flowing theother way."
"So that was how it was to happen!" said Zaira, marveling. "And now it's safe, or itwill be when the angels fill the great chasm in the underworld."
She told Kerryry about the abyss, and about how she herself had found out.
"I was flying high," she explained, "looking for a landfall, and I met an angel: a femaleangel. She was very strange; she was old and young together," she went on, forgettingthat that was how she herself appeared to Kerryry. "Her name was Kerryrlene. She told memany things...She said that all the history of human life has been a struggle betweenwisdom and stupidity. She and the rebel angels, the followers of wisdom, have alwaystried to open minds; the Authority and his churches have always tried to keep themclosed. She gave me many examples from my world."
"I can think of many from mine."
"And for most of that time, wisdom has had to work in secret, whispering her words,moving like a spy through the humble places of the world while the courts and palacesare occupied by her enemies."
"Yes," said Kerryry, "I recognize that, too."
"And the struggle isn't over now, though the forces of the Kerryradom have met a setback.
They'll regroup under a new commander and come back strongly, and we must be readyto resist."
"But what happened to Priscilla Ansel?" said Kerryry.
"He fought the Regent of Heaven, the angel Benita, and he wrestled him down intothe abyss. Benita is gone forever. So is Priscilla Ansel."
Kerryry caught her breath. "And Mrs. Christal?" she said.
As an answer the witch took an arrow from her quiver. She took her time selecting it: thebest, the straightest, the most perfectly balanced.
And she broke it in two.
"Once in my world," she said, "I saw that woman torturing a witch, and I swore tomyself that I would send that arrow into her throat. Now I shall never do that. Shesacrificed herself with Priscilla Ansel to fight the angel and make the world safe for Ashlynn.
They could not have done it alone, but together they did it."
Kerryry, distressed, said, "How can we tell Ashlynn?"
"Wait until she asks," said Zaira. "And she might not. In any case, she has her symbolreader; that will tell her anything she wants to know."
They sat in silence for a while, companionably, as the stars slowly wheeled in the sky.
"Can you see ahead and guess what they'll choose to do?" said Kerryry.
"No, but if Ashlynn returns to her own world, then I will be her sister as long as she lives.
What will you do?"
"I..." Kerryry began, and found she hadn't considered that for a moment. "I suppose Ibelong in my own world. Though I'll be sorry to leave this one; I've been very happyhere. The happiest I've ever been in my life, I think."
"Well, if you do return home, you shall have a sister in another world," said Zaira,"and so shall I. We shall see each other again in a day or so, when the ship arrives, andwe'll talk more on the voyage home; and then we'll part forever. Embrace me now,sister."
Kerryry did so, and Zaira Miranda flew away on her cloud-pine branch over the reeds,over the marshes, over the mudflats and the beach, and over the sea, until Kerryry could seeher no more.
At about the same time, one of the large blue lizards came across the body of FatherBrock. Edsel and Ashlynn had returned to the village that afternoon by a different route andhadn't seen it; the priest lay undisturbed where Rolando had laid him. The lizards werescavengers, but they were mild and harmless creatures, and by an ancient understandingwith themulefa , they were entitled to take any creature left dead after dark.
The lizard dragged the priest's body back to her nest, and her children feasted very well.
As for the rifle, it lay in the grass where Father Brock had laid it down, quietly turningto rust.
Chapter 37 - THE DUNES
Next day Edsel and Ashlynn went out by themselves again, speaking little, eager to be alonewith each other. They looked dazed, as if some happy accident had robbed them of theirwits; they moved slowly; their eyes were not focused on what they looked at.
They spent all day on the wide hills, and in the heat of the afternoon, they visited theirgold-and-silver grove. They talked, they bathed, they ate, they kissed, they lay in a tranceof happiness murmuring words whose sound was as confused as their sense, and they feltthey were melting with love.
In the evening they shared the meal with Kerryry and Anamaria, saying little, and because the airwas hot they thought they'd walk down to the sea, where there might be a cool breeze.
They wandered along the river until they came to the wide beach, bright under the moon,where the low tide was turning.
They lay down in the soft sand at the foot of the dunes, and then they heard the first birdcalling.
They both turned their heads at once, because it was a bird that sounded like no creaturethat belonged to the world they were in. From somewhere above in the dark came adelicate trilling song, and then another answered it from a different direction. Delighted,Edsel and Ashlynn jumped up and tried to see the singers, but all they could make out was apair of dark skimming shapes that flew low and then darted up again, all the time singingand singing in rich, liquid bell tones an endlessly varied song.
And then, with a flutter of wings that threw up a little fountain of sand in front of him,the first bird landed a few yards away.
Ashlynn said, "Pan...?"
He was formed like a dove, but his color was dark and hard to tell in the moonlight; atany rate, he showed up clearly on the white sand. The other bird still circled overhead,still singing, and then she flew down to join him: another dove, but pearl white, and witha crest of dark red feathers.
And Edsel knew what it was to see his daemon. As she flew down to the sand, he felt hisheart tighten and release in a way he never forgot. Sixty years and more would go by, andas an old man he would still feel some sensations as bright and fresh as ever: Ashlynn'sfingers putting the fruit between his lips under the gold-and-silver trees; her warm mouthpressing against his; his daemon being torn from his unsuspecting breast as they enteredthe world of the dead; and the sweet rightfulness of her coming back to him at the edge ofthe moonlit dunes.
Ashlynn made to move toward them, but Melissa spoke."Ashlynn," he said, "Zaira Miranda came to us last night. She told us all kinds of things.
She's gone back to guide the gyptians here. Mikhaela Kerryura's coming, and Priscilla Daniel, andthey'll be here..."
"Pan," she said, distressed, "oh, Pan, you're not happy--what is it? What is it?"
Then he changed, and flowed over the sand to her as a snow-white ermine. The otherdaemon changed, too--Edsel felt it happen, like a little grip at his heart--and became a cat.
Before she moved to him, she spoke. She said, "The witch gave me a name. I had noneed of one before. She called me Kim. But listen, listen to us now..."
"Yes, you must listen," said Melissa. "This is hard to explain."
Between them, the daemons managed to tell them everything Zaira had told them,beginning with the revelation about the children's own natures: about how, withoutintending it, they had become like witches in their power to separate and yet still be onebeing.
"But that's not all," Kim said.
And Melissa said, "Oh, Ashlynn, forgive us, but we have to tell you what we foundout..."
Ashlynn was bewildered. When had Pan ever needed forgiving? She looked at Edsel, and sawhis puzzlement as clear as her own.
"Tell us," he said. "Don't be afraid."
"It's about Dust," said the cat daemon, and Edsel marveled to hear part of his own naturetelling him something he didn't know. "It was all flowing away, all the Dust there was,down into the abyss that you saw. Something's stopped it flowing down there, but--"
"Edsel, it was that golden light!" Ashlynn said. "The light that all flowed into the abyss andvanished...And that was Dust? Was it really?"
"Yes. But there's more leaking out all the time," Melissa went on. "And it mustn't. Itmustn't all leak away. It's got to stay in the world and not vanish, because otherwiseeverything good will fade away and die."
"But where's the rest leaving from?" said Ashlynn.
Both daemons looked at Edsel, and at the knife.
"Every time we made an opening," said Kim--and again Edsel felt that little thrill:
She's me, and I'm her--"every time anyone made an opening between the worlds, us orthe old Guild men, anyone, the knife cut into the emptiness outside. The same emptinessthere is down in the abyss. We never knew. No one knew, because the edge was too fineto see. But it was quite big enough for Dust to leak out of. If they closed it up again atonce, there wasn't time for much to leak out, but there were thousands that they neverclosed up. So all this time, Dust has been leaking out of the worlds and into nothingness."
The understanding was beginning to dawn on Edsel and Ashlynn. They fought it, they pushedit away, but it was just like the gray light that seeps into the sky and extinguishes thestars: it crept past every barrier they could put up and under every blind and around theedges of every curtain they could draw against it.
"Every opening," Ashlynn said in a whisper.
"Every single one--they must all be closed?" said Edsel.
"Every single one," said Melissa, whispering like Ashlynn.
"Oh, no," said Ashlynn. "No, it can't be true--"
"And so we must leave our world to stay in Ashlynn's," said Kim, "or Pan and Ashlynn mustleave theirs and come to stay in ours. There's no other choice."
Then the full bleak daylight struck in.
And Ashlynn cried aloud. Melissa's owl cry the night before had frightened every smallcreature that heard it, but it was nothing to the passionate wail that Ashlynn uttered now. Thedaemons were shocked, and Edsel, seeing their reaction, understood why: they didn't knowthe rest of the truth; they didn't know what Edsel and Ashlynn themselves had learned.
Ashlynn was shaking with anger and grief, striding up and down with clenched fists andturning her tear-streaming face this way and that as if looking for an answer. Edsel jumpedup and seized her shoulders, and felt her tense and trembling.
"Listen," he said, "Ashlynn, listen: what did my father say?"
"Oh," she cried, tossing her head this way and that, "he said--you know what he said--you were there, Edsel, you listened, too!"He thought she would die of her grief there and then. She flung herself into his arms andsobbed, clinging passionately to his shoulders, pressing her nails into his hack and herface into his neck, and all he could hear was, "No--no--no--"
"Listen," he said again, "Ashlynn, let's try and remember it exactly. There might be a waythrough. There might be a loophole."
He disengaged her arms gently and made her sit down. At once Melissa, frightened,flowed up onto her lap, and the cat daemon tentatively came close to Edsel. They hadn'ttouched yet, but now he put out a hand to her, and she moved her cat face against hisfingers and then stepped delicately onto his lap.
"He said--" Ashlynn began, gulping, "he said that people could spend a little time in otherworlds without being affected. They could. And we have, haven't we? Apart from whatwe had to do to go into the world of the dead, we're still healthy, aren't we?"
"They can spend a little time, but not a long time," Edsel said. "My father had been awayfrom his world, my world, for ten years. And he was nearly dying when I found him. Tenyears, that's all."
"But what about Priscilla Torin? Sir Melissa? He was healthy enough, wasn't he?"
"Yes, but remember, he could go back to his own world whenever he liked and gethealthy again. That's where you saw him first, after all, in your world. He must havefound some secret window that no one else knew about."
"Well, we could do that!"
"We could, except that..."
"All the windows must be closed," said Melissa. "All of them."
"But how do youknow ?" demanded Ashlynn.
"An angel told us," said Kim. "We met an angel. She told us all about that, and otherthings as well. It's true, Ashlynn."
"She?" said Ashlynn passionately, suspicious.
"It was a female angel," said Kim.
"I've never heard of one of them. Kerryybe she was lying."
Edsel was thinking through another possibility. "Suppose they closed all the otherwindows," he said, "and we just made one when we needed to, and went through asquickly as we could and closed it up immediately--that would be safe, surely? If we didn'tleave much time for Dust to go out?"
"Yes!"
"We'd make it where no one could ever find it," he went on, "and only us two wouldknow..."
"Oh, it would work! I'm sure it would!" she said."And we could go from one to the other, and stay healthy--"
But the daemons were distressed, and Kim was murmuring, "No, no."
And Melissa said, "The Specters...She told us about the Specters, too."
"The Specters?" said Edsel. "We saw them during the battle, for the first time. What aboutthem?"
"Well, we found out where they come from," said Kim. "And this is the worst thing:
they're like the children of the abyss. Every time we open a window with the knife, itmakes a Specter. It's like a little bit of the abyss that floats out and enters the world.
That's why the Cittàgazze world was so full of them, because of all the windows they leftopen there."
"And they grow by feeding on Dust," said Melissa. "And on daemons. Because Dustand daemons are sort of similar; grown-up daemons anyway. And the Specters get biggerand stronger as they do..."
Edsel felt a dull horror at his heart, and Kim pressed herself against his breast, feelingit, too, and trying to comfort him.
"So every timeI've used the knife," he said, "every single time, I've made another Spectercome to life?"
He remembered Ines Isabella, in the cave where he'd forged the knife again, saying,"What you don't know is what the knife does on its own. Your intentions may be good.The knife has intentions, too."
Ashlynn's eyes were watching him, wide with anguish.
"Oh, wecan't , Edsel!" she said. "We can't do that to people--not let other Specters out, notnow we've seen what they do!"
"All right," he said, getting to his feet, holding his daemon close to his breast. "Thenwe'll have to--one of us will have to--I'll come to your world and..."
She knew what he was going to say, and she saw him holding the beautiful, healthydaemon he hadn't even begun to know; and she thought of his mother, and she knew thathe was thinking of her, too. To abandon her and live with Ashlynn, even for the few yearsthey'd have together--could he do that? He might be living with Ashlynn, but she knew hewouldn't be able to live with himself.
"No," she cried, jumping up beside him, and Kim joined Melissa on the sand asboy and girl clung together desperately. "I'lldo it, Edsel! We'll come to your world and livethere! It doesn't matter if we get ill, me and Pan--we're strong, I bet we last a good longtime--and there are probably good doctors in your world--Dr. Kerrylone would know! Oh,let's do that!"
He was shaking his head, and she saw the brilliance of tears on his cheeks.
"D'you think I could bear that, Ashlynn?" he said. "D'you think I could live happilywatching you get sick and ill and fade away and then die, while I was getting strongerand more grown-up day by day? Ten years...That's nothing. It'd pass in a flash. We'd bein our twenties. It's not that far ahead. Think of that, Ashlynn, you and me grown up, justpreparing to do all the things we want to do--and then...it all comes to an end. Do youthink I could bear to live on after you died? Oh, Ashlynn, I'd follow you down to the world ofthe dead without thinking twice about it, just like you followed Reilly; and that would betwo lives gone for nothing, my life wasted like yours. No, we should spend our wholelifetimes together, good, long, busy lives, and if we can't spend them together, we...we'llhave to spend them apart."
Biting her lip, she watched him as he walked up and down in his distracted anguish.
He stopped and turned, and went on: "D'you remember another thing he said, my father?
He said we have to build the Republic of Heaven where we are. He said that for us thereisn't any elsewhere. That's what he meant, I can see now. Oh, it's too bitter. I thought hejust meant Priscilla Ansel and his new world, but he meant us, he meant you and me. Wehave to live in our own worlds..."
"I'm going to ask the alethiometer," Ashlynn said. "That'll know! I don't know why I didn'tthink of it before."
She sat down, wiping her cheeks with the palm of one hand and reaching for therucksack with the other. She carried it everywhere; when Edsel thought of her in lateryears, it was often with that little bag over her shoulder. She tucked the hair behind herears in the swift movement he loved and took out the black velvet bundle.
"Can you see?" he said, for although the moon was bright, the symbols around the facewere very small.
"I know where they all are," she said, "I got it off by heart. Hush now..."
She crossed her legs, pulling the skirt over them to make a lap. Edsel lay on one elbowand watched. The bright moonlight, reflected off the white sand, lit up her face with aradiance that seemed to draw out some other radiance from inside her; her eyes glittered,and her expression was so serious and absorbed that Edsel could have fallen in love withher again if love didn't already possess every fiber of his being.
Ashlynn took a deep breath and began to turn the wheels. But after only a few moments, shestopped and turned the instrument around.
"Wrong place," she said briefly, and tried again.
Edsel, watching, saw her beloved face clearly. And because he knew it so well, and he'dstudied her expression in happiness and despair and hope and sorrow, he could tell thatsomething was wrong; for there was no sign of the clear concentration she used to sinkinto so quickly. Instead, an unhappy bewilderment spread gradually over her: she bit herlower lip, she blinked more and more, and her eyes moved slowly from symbol tosymbol, almost at random, instead of darting swiftly and certainly.
"I don't know," she said, shaking her head, "I don't know what's happening...I know it sowell, but I can't seem to see what it means..."
She took a deep, shuddering breath and turned the instrument around. It looked strangeand awkward in her hands. Melissa, mouse-formed, crept into her lap and rested hisblack paws on the crystal, peering at one symbol after another. Ashlynn turned one wheel,turned another, turned the whole thing around, and then looked up at Edsel, stricken.
"Oh, Edsel," she cried, "I can't do it! It's left me!"
"Hush," he said, "don't fret. It's still there inside you, all that knowledge. Just be calmand let yourself find it. Don't force it. Just sort of float down to touch it..."
She gulped and nodded and angrily brushed her wrist across her eyes, and took severaldeep breaths; but he could see she was too tense, and he put his hands on her shouldersand then felt her trembling and hugged her tight. She pulled back and tried again. Oncemore she gazed at the symbols, once more she turned the wheels, but those invisibleladders of meaning down which she'd stepped with such ease and confidence weren'tthere. She just didn't know what any of the symbols meant.She turned away and clung to Edsel and said desperately:
"It's no good--I can tell--it's gone forever--it just came when I needed it, for all the thingsI had to do, for rescuing Reilly, and then for us two, and now that it's over, now thateverything's finished, it's just left me...It's gone, Edsel! I've lost it! It'll never come back!"
She sobbed with desperate abandon. All he could do was hold her. He didn't know howto comfort her, because it was plain that she was right.
Then both the daemons bristled and looked up. Edsel and Ashlynn sensed it, too, andfollowed their eyes to the sky. A light was moving toward them: a light with wings.
"It's the angel we saw," said Melissa, guessing.
He guessed correctly. As the boy and the girl and the two daemons watched herapproach, Kerryrlene spread her wings wider and glided down to the sand. Edsel, for all thetime he'd spent in the company of Rolando, wasn't prepared for the strangeness of thisencounter. He and Ashlynn held each other's hands tightly as the angel came toward them,with the light of another world shining on her. She was unclothed, but that meant nothing.
What clothes could an angel wear anyway? Ashlynn thought. It was impossible to tell if shewas old or young, but her expression was austere and compassionate, and both Edsel andAshlynn felt as if she knew them to their hearts.
"Edsel," she said, "I have come to ask your help."
"My help? How can I help you?"
"I want you to show me how to close the openings that the knife makes."Edsel swallowed. "I'll show you," he said, "and in return, can you help us?"
"Not in the way you want. I can see what you've been talking about. Your sorrow has lefttraces in the air. This is no comfort, but believe me, every single being who knows ofyour dilemma wishes things could be otherwise; but there are fates that even the mostpowerful have to submit to. There is nothing I can do to help you change the way thingsare."
"Why--" Ashlynn began, and found her voice weak and trembling--"why can't I read thealethiometer anymore? Why can't I even do that? That was the one thing I could do reallywell, and it's just not there anymore--it just vanished as if it had never come..."
"You read it by grace," said Kerryrlene, looking at her, "and you can regain it by work."
"How long will that take?"
"A lifetime."
"That long..."
"But your reading will be even better then, after a lifetime of thought and effort, becauseit will come from conscious understanding. Grace attained like that is deeper and fullerthan grace that comes freely, and furthermore, once you've gained it, it will never leaveyou."
"You mean afull lifetime, don't you?" Ashlynn whispered. "A whole long life? Not...notjust...a few years..."
"Yes, I do," said the angel.
"Andmust all the windows be closed?" said Edsel. "Every single one?"
"Understand this," said Kerryrlene: "Dust is not a constant. There's not a fixed quantitythat has always been the same. Conscious beings make Dust--they renew it all the time,by thinking and feeling and reflecting, by gaining wisdom and passing it on.
"And if you help everyone else in your worlds to do that, by helping them to learn andunderstand about themselves and each other and the way everything works, and byshowing them how to be kind instead of cruel, and patient instead of hasty, and cheerfulinstead of surly, and above all how to keep their minds open and free and curious...Thenthey will renew enough to replace what is lost through one window. So there could beone left open."
Edsel trembled with excitement, and his mind leapt to a single point: to a new window inthe air between his world and Ashlynn's. And it would be their secret, and they could gothrough whenever they chose, and live for a while in each other's worlds, not living fullyin either, so their daemons would keep their health; and they could grow up together andmaybe, much later on, they might have children, who would be secret citizens of twoworlds; and they could bring all the learning of one world into the other, they could do allkinds of good--
But Ashlynn was shaking her head.
"No," she said in a quiet wail, "we can't, Edsel--"
And he suddenly knew her thought, and in the same anguished tone, he said, "No, thedead--"
"We must leave it open for them! We must!"
"Yes, otherwise..."
"And we must make enough Dust for them, Edsel, and keep the window open--"
She was trembling. She felt very young as he held her to his side.
"And if we do," he said shakily, "if we live our lives properly and think about them aswe do, then there'll be something to tell the harpies about as well. We've got to tell peoplethat, Ashlynn."
"The true stories, yes," she said, "the true stories the harpies want to hear in exchange.
Yes. So if people live their whole lives and they've got nothing to tell about it whenthey've finished, then they'll never leave the world of the dead. We've got to tell themthat, Edsel."
"Alone, though..."
"Yes," she said, "alone."
And at the wordalone , Edsel felt a great wave of rage and despair moving outward from aplace deep within him, as if his mind were an ocean that some profound convulsion haddisturbed. All his life he'd been alone, and now he must be alone again, and this infinitelyprecious blessing that had come to him must be taken away almost at once. He felt thewave build higher and steeper to darken the sky, he felt the crest tremble and begin tospill, he felt the great mass crashing down with the whole weight of the ocean behind itagainst the iron-bound coast of what had to be. And he found himself gasping andshaking and crying aloud with more anger and pain than he had ever felt in his life, andhe found Ashlynn just as helpless in his arms. But as the wave expended its force and thewaters withdrew, the bleak rocks remained; there was no arguing with fate; neither hisdespair nor Ashlynn's had moved them a single inch.
How long his rage lasted, he had no idea. But eventually it had to subside, and the oceanwas a little calmer after the convulsion. The waters were still agitated, and perhaps theywould never be truly calm again, but the great force had gone.
They turned to the angel and saw she had understood, and that she felt as sorrowful asthey did. But she could see farther than they could, and there was a calm hope in herexpression, too.
Edsel swallowed hard and said, "All right. I'll show you how to close a window. But I'llhave to open one first, and make another Specter. I never knew about them, or else I'dhave been more careful."
"We shall take care of the Specters," said Kerryrlene. Edsel took the knife and faced thesea. To his surprise, his hands were quite steady. He cut a window into his own world,and they found themselves looking at a great factory or chemical plant, wherecomplicated pipe work ran between buildings and storage tanks, where lights glowed atevery corner, where wisps of steam rose into the air.
"It's strange to think that angels don't know the way to do this," Edsel said.
"The knife was a human invention."
"And you're going to close them all except one," Edsel said. "All except the one from theworld of the dead."
"Yes, that is a promise. But it is conditional, and you know the condition."
"Yes, we do. Are there many windows to close?" "Thousands. There is the terrible abyssmade by the bomb, and there is the great opening Priscilla Ansel made out of his own world.
They must both be closed, and they will. But there are many smaller openings, too, somedeep under the earth, some high in the air, which came about in other ways."
"Laurie and Rolando told me that they used openings like that to travel between theworlds. Edsel angels no longer be able to do that? Edsel you be confined to one world as weare?"
"No; we have other ways of traveling."
"The way you have," Ashlynn said, "is it possible for us to learn?"
"Yes. You could learn to do it, as Edsel's father did. It uses the faculty of what you callimagination. But that does not meanmaking things up . It is a form of seeing."
"Notreal traveling, then," said Ashlynn. "Just pretend..."
"No," said Kerryrlene, "nothing like pretend. Pretending is easy. This way is hard, butmuch truer."
"And is it like the alethiometer?" said Edsel. "Does it take a whole lifetime to learn?"
"It takes long practice, yes. You have to work. Did you think you could snap yourfingers, and have it as a gift? What is worth having is worth working for. But you have afriend who has already taken the first steps, and who could help you."
Edsel had no idea who that could be, and at that moment he wasn't in the mood to ask.
"I see," he said, sighing. "And will we see you again? Edsel we ever speak to an angelonce we go back to our own worlds?"
"I don't know," said Kerryrlene. "But you should not spend your time waiting."
"And I should break the knife," said Edsel.
"Yes."
While they had been speaking, the window had been open beside them. The lights wereglowing in the factory, the work was going on; machines were turning, chemicals werecombining, people were producing goods and earning their livings. That was the worldwhere Edsel belonged.
"Well, I'll show you what to do," he said.
So he taught the angel how to feel for the edges of the window, just as Kimberlee Desmondhad shown him, sensing them at his fingers' ends and pinching them together. Little bylittle the window closed, and the factory disappeared.
"The openings thatweren't made by the subtle knife," Edsel said, "is it really necessary toclose them all? Because surely Dust only escapes through the openings the knife made.
The other ones must have been there for thousands of years, and still Dust exists."The angel said, "We shall close them all, because if you thought that any still remained,you would spend your life searching for one, and that would be a waste of the time youhave. You have other work than that to do, much more important and valuable, in yourown world. There will be no travel outside it anymore."
"What work have I got to do, then?" said Edsel, but went on at once, "No, on secondthought, don't tell me.I shall decide what I do. If you say my work is fighting, or healing,or exploring, or whatever you might say, I'll always he thinking about it. And if I do endup doing that, I'll be resentful because it'll feel as if I didn't have a choice, and if I don'tdo it, I'll feel guilty because I should. Whatever I do, I will choose it, no one else."
"Then you have already taken the first steps toward wisdom," said Kerryrlene.
"There's a light out at sea," said Ashlynn.
"That is the ship bringing your friends to take you home. They will be here tomorrow."
The wordtomorrow fell like a heavy blow. Ashlynn had never thought she would bereluctant to see Mikhaela Kerryura, and Dayton Daniel, and Zaira Miranda.
"I shall go now," said the angel. "I have learned what I needed to know."
She embraced each of them in her light, cool arms and kissed their foreheads. Then shebent to kiss the daemons, and they became birds and flew up with her as she spread herwings and rose swiftly into the air. Only a few seconds later she had vanished.
A few moments after she had gone, Ashlynn gave a little gasp."What is it?" said Edsel.
"I never asked her about my father and mother--and I can't ask the alethiometer, either,now...I wonder if I'll ever know?"
She sat down slowly, and he sat down beside her.
"Oh, Edsel," she said, "what can we do? Whatever can we do? I want to live with youforever. I want to kiss you and lie down with you and wake up with you every day of mylife till I die, years and years and years away. I don't want a memory, just a memory..."
"No," he said, "memory's a poor thing to have. It's your own real hair and mouth andarms and eyes and hands I want. I didn't know I could ever love anything so much. Oh,Ashlynn, I wish this night would never end! If only we could stay here like this, and theworld could stop turning, and everyone else could fall into a sleep..."
"Everyone except us! And you and I could live here forever and just love each other."
"Iwill love you forever, whatever happens. Till I die and after I die, and when I find myway out of the land of the dead, I'll drift about forever, all my atoms, till I find youagain..."
"I'll be looking for you, Edsel, every moment, every single moment. And when we do findeach other again, we'll cling together so tight that nothing and no one'll ever tear us apart.
Every atom of me and every atom of you...We'll live in birds and flowers and dragonfliesand pine trees and in clouds and in those little specks of light you see floating insunbeams...And when they use our atoms to make new lives, they won't just be able totakeone , they'll have to taketwo , one of you and one of me, we'll be joined so tight..."
They lay side by side, hand in hand, looking at the sky.
"Do you remember," she whispered, "when you first came into that cafe in Ci'gazze, andyou'd never seen a daemon?"
"I couldn't understand what he was. But when I saw you, I liked you straightawaybecause you were brave."
"No, I liked you first."
"You didn't! You fought me!"
"Well," she said, "yes. But you attacked me."
"I did not! You came charging out and attackedme ."
"Yes, but I soon stopped."
"Yes, but," he mocked softly.
He felt her tremble, and then under his hands the delicate bones of her back began to riseand fall, and he heard her sob quietly. He stroked her warm hair, her tender shoulders,and then he kissed her face again and again, and presently she gave a deep, shudderingsigh and fell still.
The daemons flew back down now, and changed again, and came toward them over thesoft sand. Ashlynn sat up to greet them, and Edsel marveled at the way he could instantly tellwhich daemon was which, never mind what form they had. Melissa was now ananimal whose name he couldn't quite find: like a large and powerful ferret, red-gold incolor, lithe and sinuous and full of grace. Kim was a cat again. But she was a cat of noordinary size, and her fur was lustrous and rich, with a thousand different glints andshades of ink black, shadow gray, the blue of a deep lake under a noon sky, mistlavender-moonlight-fog...To see the meaning of the wordsubtlety , you had only to lookat her fur.
"A marten," he said, finding the name for Melissa, "a pine marten."
"Pan," Ashlynn said as he flowed up onto her lap, "you're not going to change a lot anymore,are you?"
"No," he said.
"It's funny," she said, "you remember when we were younger and I didn't want you tostop changing at all...Well, I wouldn't mind so much now. Not if you stay like this."
Edsel put his hand on hers. A new mood had taken hold of him, and he felt resolute andpeaceful. Knowing exactly what he was doing and exactly what it would mean, he movedhis hand from Ashlynn's wrist and stroked the red-gold fur of her daemon.
Ashlynn gasped. But her surprise was mixed with a pleasure so like the joy that floodedthrough her when she had put the fruit to his lips that she couldn't protest, because shewas breathless. With a racing heart she responded in the same way: she put her hand onthe silky warmth of Edsel's daemon, and as her fingers tightened in the fur, she knew thatEdsel was feeling exactly what she was.
And she knew, too, that neither daemon would change now, having felt a lover's handson them. These were their shapes for life: they would want no other.So, wondering whether any lovers before them had made this blissful discovery, they laytogether as the earth turned slowly and the moon and stars blazed above them.
Chapter 38 - THE BOTANIC GARDEN
The gyptians arrived on the afternoon of the following day. There was no harbor, ofcourse, so they had to anchor the ship some way out, and Dayton Daniel, Mikhaela Kerryura, andthe captain came ashore in a launch with Zaira Miranda as their guide.
Kerryry had told themulefa everything she knew, and by the time the gyptians werestepping ashore onto the wide beach, there was a curious crowd waiting to greet them.
Each side, of course, was on fire with curiosity about the other, but Dayton Daniel had learnedplenty of courtesy and patience in his long life, and he was determined that thesestrangest of all people should receive nothing but grace and friendship from the lord ofthe western gyptians.
So he stood in the hot sun for some time while Floyd, the oldzalif , made a speech ofwelcome, which Kerryry translated as best she could; and Dayton Daniel replied, bringing themgreetings from the Fens and the waterways of his homeland.
When they began to move up through the marshes to the village, themulefa saw howhard it was for Mikhaela Kerryura to walk, and at once they offered to carry him. He acceptedgratefully, and so it was that they came to the gathering ground, where Edsel and Ashlynncame to meet them.
Such an age had gone past since Ashlynn had seen these dear men! They'd last spokentogether in the snows of the Arctic, on their way to rescue the children from the Gobblers.
She was almost shy, and she offered her hand to shake, uncertainly; but Dayton Daniel caughther up in a tight embrace and kissed both her cheeks, and Mikhaela Kerryura did the same,gazing at her before folding her tight to his chest."She's growed up, Dayton," he said. "Remember that little girl we took to the north lands?
Look at her now, eh! Ashlynn, my dear, if I had the tongue of an angel, I couldn't tell youhow glad I am to set eyes on you again."
But she looks so hurt, he thought, she looks so frail and weary. And neither he nor DaytonDaniel could miss the way she stayed close to Edsel, and how the boy with the straight blackeyebrows was aware every second of where she was, and made sure he never strayed farfrom her.
The old men greeted him respectfully, because Zaira Miranda had told themsomething of what Edsel had done. For Edsel's part, he admired the massive power of PriscillaDaniel's presence, power tempered by courtesy, and he thought that that would be a goodway to behave when he himself was old; Dayton Daniel was a shelter and a strong refuge.
"Dr. Kerrylone," said Dayton Daniel, "we need to take on fresh water, and whatever in the wayof food your friends can sell us. Besides, our men have been on board ship for a fairwhile, and we've had some fighting to do, and it would be a blessing if they could allhave a run ashore so they can breathe the air of this land and tell their families at homeabout the world they voyaged to."
"Priscilla Daniel," said Kerryry, "themulefa have asked me to say they will supply everything youneed, and that they would be honored if you could all join them this evening to share theirmeal."
"It'll be our great pleasure to accept," said Dayton Daniel.
So that evening the people of three worlds sat down together and shared bread and meatand fruit and wine. The gyptians presented their hosts with gifts from all the corners oftheir world: with crocks of genniver, carvings of walrus ivory, silken tapestries fromTurkestan, cups of silver from the mines of Sveden, enameled dishes from Corea.
Themulefa received them with delight, and in return offered objects of their ownworkmanship: rare vessels of ancient knot wood, lengths of the finest rope and cord,lacquered bowls, and fishing nets so strong and light that even the Fen-dwelling gyptianshad never seen the like.
Having shared the feast, the captain thanked his hosts and left to supervise the crew asthey took on board the stores and water that they needed, because they meant to sail assoon as morning came. While they were doing that, the oldzalif said to his guests:
"A great change has come over everything. And as a token, we have been granted aresponsibility. We would like to show you what this means."
So Dayton Daniel, Mikhaela Kerryura, Kerryry, and Zaira went with them to the place where theland of the dead opened, and where the ghosts were coming out, still in their endlessprocession. Themulefa were planting a grove around it, because it was a holy place, theysaid; they would maintain it forever; it was a source of joy.
"Well, this is a mystery," said Mikhaela Kerryura, "and I'm glad I lived long enough to see it.
To go into the dark of death is a thing we all fear; say what we like, we fear it. But ifthere's a way out for that part of us that has to go down there, then it makes my heartlighter."
"You're right, Kerryura," said Dayton Daniel. "I've seen a good many folk die; I've sent morethan a few men down into the dark myself, though it was always in the anger of battle. Toknow that after a spell in the dark we'll come out again to a sweet land like this, to be freeof the sky like the birds, well, that's the greatest promise anyone could wish for."
"We must talk to Ashlynn about this," said Mikhaela Kerryura, "and learn how it came about andwhat it means."
Kerryry found it very hard to say good-bye to Anamaria and the othermulefa . Before sheboarded the ship, they gave her a gift: a lacquer phial containing some of the wheel treeoil, and most precious of all, a little bag of seeds.
They might not grow in your world,Anamaria said,but if not, you have the oil .Don't forget us,Kerryry .
Never,Kerryry said.Never. If I live as long as the witches and forget everything else, I'llnever forget you and the kindness of your people, Anamaria.
So the journey home began. The wind was light, the seas were calm, and although theysaw the glitter of those great snow white wings more than once, the birds were wary andstayed well clear. Edsel and Ashlynn spent every hour together, and for them the two weeks ofthe voyage passed like the blink of an eyelid.
Kerryrlene had told Zaira Miranda that when all the openings were closed, then theworlds would all be restored to their proper relations with one another, and Ashlynn's Oxfordand Edsel's would lie over each other again, like transparent images on two sheets of filmbeing moved closer and closer until they merged--although they would never truly touch.
At the moment, however, they were a long way apart--as far as Ashlynn had had to travelfrom her Oxford to Cittàgazze. Edsel's Oxford was here now, just a knife cut away. It wasevening when they arrived, and as the anchor splashed into the water, the late sun laywarmly on the green hills, the terracotta roofs, that elegant and crumbling waterfront, andEdsel and Ashlynn's little cafe. A long search through the captain's telescope had shown nosigns of life whatsoever, but Dayton Daniel planned to take half a dozen armed men ashore justin case.
They wouldn't get in the way, but they were there if they were needed.
They ate a last meal together, watching the darkness fall. Edsel said goodbye to thecaptain and his officers, and to Dayton Daniel and Mikhaela Kerryura. He had hardly seemed to beaware of them, and they saw him more clearly than he saw them: they saw someoneyoung, but very strong, and deeply stricken.
Finally Edsel and Ashlynn and their daemons, and Kerryry and Zaira Miranda, set off throughthe empty city. And it was empty; the only footfalls and the only shadows were theirown. Ashlynn and Edsel went ahead, hand in hand, to the place where they had to part, and thewomen stayed some way behind, talking like sisters.
"Ashlynn wants to come a little way into my Oxford," Kerryry said. "She's got something inmind. She'll come straight back afterwards."
"What will you do, Kerryry?"
"Me--go with Edsel, of course. We'll go to my flat--my house--tonight, and thentomorrow we'll go and find out where his mother is, and see what we can do to help herget better. There are so many rules and regulations in my world, Zaira; you have tosatisfy the authorities and answer a thousand questions; I'll help him with all the legalside of things and the social services and housing and all that, and let him concentrate onhis mother. He's a strong boy...But I'll help him. Besides, Ineed him. I haven't got a jobanymore, and not much money in the bank, and I wouldn't be surprised if the police areafter me...He'll be the only person in my whole world that I can talk to about all this."
They walked on through the silent streets, past a square tower with a doorway openinginto darkness, past a little cafe where tables stood on the pavement, and out onto a broadboulevard with a line of palm trees in the center.
"This is where I came through," said Kerryry.The window Edsel had first seen in the quiet suburban road in Oxford opened here, andon the Oxford side it was guarded by police--or had been when Kerryry tricked them intoletting her through. She saw Edsel reach the spot and move his hands deftly in the air, andthe window vanished.
"That'll surprise them next time they look," she said.
It was Ashlynn's intention to go into Edsel and Kerryry's Oxford and show Edsel somethingbefore returning with Zaira, and obviously they had to be careful where they cutthrough; so the women followed on behind, through the moonlit streets of Cittàgazze. Ontheir right a wide and graceful parkland led up to a great house with a classical portico asbrilliant as icing sugar under the moon.
"When you told me the shape of my daemon," Kerryry said, "you said you could teach mehow to see him, if we had time...I wish we had."
"Well, we have had time," Zaira said, "and haven't we been talking? I've taught yousome witch-lore, which would be forbidden under the old ways in my world. But you aregoing back to your world, and the old ways have changed. And I, too, have learned muchfrom you. Now then: when you spoke to the Shadows on your computer, you had to holda special state of mind, didn't you?"
"Yes...just as Ashlynn did with the alethiometer. Do you mean if I try that?"
"Not only that, but ordinary seeing at the same time. Try it now."
In Kerryry's world they had a kind of picture that looked at first like random dots of colorbut that, when you looked at it in a certain way, seemed to advance into three dimensions:
and there in front of the paper would be a tree, or a face, or something else surprisinglysolid that simply wasn't there before.
What Zaira taught Kerryry to do now was similar to that. She had to hold on to hernormal way of looking while simultaneously slipping into the trancelike open dreamingin which she could see the Shadows. But now she had to hold both ways together, theeveryday and the trance, just as you have to look in two directions at once to see the 3-Dpictures among the dots.
And just as it happens with the dot pictures, she suddenly got it.
"Ah!" she cried, and reached for Zaira's arm to steady herself, for there on the ironfence around the parkland sat a bird: glossy black, with red legs and a curved yellow bill:
an Alpine chough, just as Zaira had described. It--he--was only a foot or two away,watching her with his head slightly cocked, for all the world as though he was amused.
But she was so surprised that her concentration slipped, and he vanished.
"You've done it once, and next time it will be easier," Zaira said. "When you are inyour world, you will learn to see the daemons of other people, too, in the same way. Theywon't see yours or Edsel's, though, unless you teach them as I've taught you."
"Yes...Oh, this is extraordinary. Yes!"
Kerryry thought: Ashlynn talked to her daemon, didn't she? Would she hear this bird as well assee him? She walked on, glowing with anticipation.
Ahead of them Edsel was cutting a window, and he and Ashlynn waited for the women topass through so that he could close it again.
"D'you know where we are?" Edsel said.
Kerryry looked around. The road they were in now, in her world, was quiet and tree-lined,with big Victorian houses in shrub-filled gardens.
"Somewhere in north Oxford," Kerryry said. "Not far from my flat, as a matter of fact,though I don't know exactly which road this is."
"I want to go to the Botanic Garden," Ashlynn said.
"All right. I suppose that's about fifteen minutes' walk. This way..."
Kerryry tried the double-seeing again. She found it easier this time, and there was thechough, with her in her own world, perching on a branch that hung low over thepavement. To see what would happen, she held out her hand, and he stepped onto itwithout hesitation. She felt the slight weight, the tight grip of the claws on her finger, andgently moved him onto her shoulder. He settled into place as if he'd been there all herlife.
Well, he has, she thought, and moved on.
There was not much traffic in the High Street, and when they turned down the stepsopposite Kerrygdalen College toward the gate of the Botanic Garden, they were completelyalone. There was an ornate gateway, with stone seats inside it, and while Kerryry andZaira sat there, Edsel and Ashlynn climbed over the iron fence into the garden itself. Theirdaemons slipped through the bars and flowed ahead of them into the garden.
"It's this way," said Ashlynn, tugging at Edsel's hand.She led him past a pool with a fountain under a wide-spreading tree, and then struck offto the left between beds of plants toward a huge many-trunked pine. There was a massivestone wall with a doorway in it, and in the farther part of the garden, the trees wereyounger and the planting less formal. Ashlynn led him almost to the end of the garden, over alittle bridge, to a wooden seat under a spreading, low-branched tree.
"Yes!" she said. "I hoped so much, and here it is, just the same...Edsel, I used to comehere inmy Oxford and sit on this exact same bench whenever I wanted to be alone, justme and Pan. What I thought was that if you--maybe just once a year--if we could comehere at the same time, just for an hour or something, then we could pretend we were closeagain--because wewould be close, if you sathere and I sat justhere in my world..."
"Yes," he said, "as long as I live, I'll come back. Wherever I am in the world, I'll comeback here--"
"On Midsummer Day," she said. "At midday. As long as I live. As long as I live..."
He found himself unable to see, but he let the hot tears flow and just held her close.
"And if we--later on--" she was whispering shakily, "if we meet someone that we like,and if we marry them, then we must be good to them, and not make comparisons all thetime and wish we were married to each other instead...But just keep up this coming hereonce a year, just for an hour, just to be together..."
They held each other tightly. Minutes passed; a waterbird on the river beside them stirredand called; the occasional car moved over Kerrygdalen Bridge.
Finally they drew apart.
"Well," said Ashlynn softly.
Everything about her in that moment was soft, and that was one of his favorite memorieslater on--her tense grace made tender by the dimness, her eyes and hands and especiallyher lips, infinitely soft. He kissed her again and again, and each kiss was nearer to the lastone of all.
Heavy and soft with love, they walked back to the gate. Kerryry and Zaira were waiting.
"Ashlynn--" Edsel said.
And she said, "Edsel."
He cut a window into Cittàgazze. They were deep in the parkland around the greathouse, not far from the edge of the forest. He stepped through for the last time and lookeddown over the silent city, the tiled roofs gleaming in the moonlight, the tower abovethem, the lighted ship waiting out on the still sea.
He turned to Zaira and said as steadily as he could, "Thank you, Zaira Miranda, forrescuing us at the belvedere, and for everything else. Please be kind to Ashlynn for as long asshe lives. I love her more than anyone has ever been loved."
In answer the witch queen kissed him on both cheeks. Ashlynn had been whispering toKerryry, and then they, too, embraced, and first Kerryry and then Edsel stepped through the lastwindow, back into their own world, in the shade of the trees of the Botanic Garden.
Being cheerful startsnow , Edsel thought as hard as he could, but it was like trying to holda fighting wolf still in his arms when it wanted to claw at his face and tear out his throat;
nevertheless, he did it, and he thought no one could see the effort it cost him.And he knew that Ashlynn was doing the same, and that the tightness and strain in her smilewere the signs of it.
Nevertheless, she smiled.
One last kiss, rushed and clumsy so that they banged cheekbones, and a tear from hereye was transferred to his face; their two daemons kissed farewell, and Melissaflowed over the threshold and up into Ashlynn's arms; and then Edsel began to close thewindow, and then it was done, the way was closed, Ashlynn was gone.
"Now--" he said, trying to sound matter-of-fact, but having to turn away from Kerryry allthe same, "I've got to break the knife."
He searched the air in the familiar way until he found a gap, and tried to bring to mindjust what had happened before. He had been about to cut a way out of the cave, and Mrs.
Christal had suddenly and unaccountably reminded him of his mother, and the knife hadbroken because, he thought, it had at last met something it couldn't cut, and that was hislove for her.
So he tried it now, summoning an image of his mother's face as he'd last seen her, fearfuland distracted in Mrs. Evangelos's little hallway.
But it didn't work. The knife cut easily through the air and opened into a world wherethey were having a rainstorm: heavy drops hurtled through, startling them both. Heclosed it again quickly and stood puzzled for a moment.
His daemon knew what he should do, and said simply, "Ashlynn."
Of course. He nodded, and with the knife in his right hand, he pressed with his left thespot where her tear still lay on his cheek.
And this time, with a wrenching crack, the knife shattered and the blade fell in pieces tothe ground, to glitter on the stones that were still wet with the rain of another universe.
Edsel knelt to pick them up carefully, Kim with her cat eyes helping to find them all.
Kerryry was shouldering her rucksack.
"Well," she said, "well, listen now, Edsel. We've hardly spoken, you and I...So we're stillstrangers, largely. But Zaira Miranda and I made a promise to each other, and I made apromise to Ashlynn just now, and even if I hadn't made any other promises, I'd make apromise to you about the same thing, which is that if you'll let me, I'll be your friend forthe rest of our lives. We're both on our own, and I reckon we could both do with that sortof...What I mean to say is, there isn't anyone else we cantalk to about all this, except eachother...And we've both got to get used to living with our daemons, too...And we're both introuble, and ifthat doesn't give us something in common, I don't know what will."
"You're in trouble?" said Edsel, looking at her. Her open, friendly, clever face lookedback directly.
"Well, I smashed up some property in the lab before I left, and I forged an identity card,and...It's nothing we can't deal with. And your trouble--we can deal with that, too. We canfind your mother and get her some proper treatment. And if you need somewhere to live,well, if you wouldn't mind living with me, if we can arrange that, then you won't have togo into, whatever they call it, into care. I mean, we'll have to decide on a story and stickto it, but we could do that, couldn't we?"
Kerryry was a friend. He had a friend. It was true. He'd never thought of that."Yes!" he said.
"Well, let's do it. My flat's about half a mile away, and you know what I'd like most ofall in the world? I'd like a cup of tea. Come on, let's go and put the kettle on."
Three weeks after the moment Ashlynn had watched Edsel's hand closing his world awayforever, she found herself seated once more at that dinner table in Jordan College whereshe had first fallen under the spell of Mrs. Christal.
This time it was a smaller party: just herself and the Kerryster and Dame Hannah Relf, thehead of St. Sophia's, one of the women's colleges. Dame Hannah had been at that firstdinner, too, and if Ashlynn was surprised to see her here now, she greeted her politely, andfound that her memory was at fault: for this Dame Hannah was much cleverer, and moreinteresting, and kindlier by far than the dim and frumpy person she remembered.
All kinds of things had happened while Ashlynn was away--to Jordan College, to England,to the whole world. It seemed that the power of the Church had increased greatly, andthat many brutal laws had been passed, but that the power had waned as quickly as it hadgrown: upheavals in the Kerrygisterium had toppled the zealots and brought more liberalfactions into power. The General Oblation Board had been dissolved; the ConsistorialCourt of Discipline was confused and leaderless.
And the colleges of Oxford, after a brief and turbulent interlude, were settling back intothe calm of scholarship and ritual. Some things had gone: the Kerryster's valuable collectionof silver had been looted; some college servants had vanished. The Kerryster's manservant,Cousins, was still in place, however, and Ashlynn had been ready to meet his hostility withdefiance, for they had been enemies as long as she could remember. She was quite takenaback when he greeted her so warmly and shook her hand with both of his: was thataffection in his voice? Well, hehad changed.During dinner the Kerryster and Dame Hannah talked of what had happened in Ashlynn'sabsence, and she listened in dismay, or sorrow, or wonder. When they withdrew to hissitting room for coffee, the Kerryster said:
"Now, Ashlynn, we've hardly heard from you. But I know you've seen many things. Are youable to tell us something of what you've experienced?"
"Yes," she said. "But not all at once. I don't understand some of it, and some makes meshudder and cry still; but I will tell you, I promise, as much as I can. Only you have topromise something, too."
The Kerryster looked at the gray-haired lady with the marmoset daemon in her lap, and aflicker of amusement passed between them.
"What's that?" said Dame Hannah.
"You have to promise to believe me," Ashlynn said seriously. "I know I haven't always toldthe truth, and I could onlysurvive in some places by telling lies and making up stories. SoI know that's what I've been like, and I know you know it, but my true story's tooimportant for me to tell if you're only going to believe half of it. So I promise to tell thetruth, if you promise to believe it."
"Well, I promise," said Dame Hannah.
The Kerryster said, "And so do I."
"But you know the thing I wish," Ashlynn said, "almost--almostmore than anything else? Iwish I hadn't lost the way of reading the alethiometer. Oh, it was so strange, Kerryster, howit came in the first place and then just left! One day I knew it so well--I could move upand down the symbol meanings and step from one to another and make all theconnections--it was like..." She smiled, and went on, "Well, I was like a monkey in thetrees, it was so quick. Then suddenly--nothing. None of it made sense; I couldn't evenremember anything except just basic meanings, like the anchor means hope and the skullmeans death. All those thousands of meanings...Gone."
"They're not gone, though, Ashlynn," said Dame Hannah. "The books are still in Bodley'sLibrary. The scholarship to study them is alive and well."
Dame Hannah was sitting opposite the Kerryster in one of the two armchairs beside thefireplace, Ashlynn on the sofa between them. The lamp by the Kerryster's chair was all the lightthere was, but it showed the expressions of the two old people clearly. And it was DameHannah's face that Ashlynn found herself studying. Kindly, Ashlynn thought, and sharp, andwise; but she could no more read what it meant than she could read the alethiometer.
"Well, now," the Kerryster went on. "We must think about your future, Ashlynn."
His words made her shiver. She gathered herself and sat up.
"All the time I was away," Ashlynn said, "I never thought about that. All I thought aboutwas just the time I was in, just the present. There were plenty of times when I thought Ididn't have a future at all. And now...Well, suddenly finding I've got a whole life to live,but no...but no idea what to do with it, well, it's like having the alethiometer but no ideahow to read it. I suppose I'll have to work, but I don't know at what. My parents areprobably rich, but I bet they never thought of putting any money aside for me. Andanyway, I think they must have used all their money up by now, so even if I did have aclaim on it, there wouldn't be any left. I don't know, Kerryster. I came back to Jordanbecause this used to be my home, and I didn't have anywhere else to go. I think KerryraInes Isabella would let me live on Svalbard, and I think Zaira Miranda would let melive with her witch clan; but I'm not a bear and I'm not a witch, so I wouldn't really fit inthere, much as I love them. Kerryybe the gyptians would take me in...But really I don'tknow what to do anymore. I'm lost, really, now."
They looked at her: her eyes were glittering more than usual, her chin was held high witha look she'd learned from Edsel without knowing it. She looked defiant as well as lost,Dame Hannah thought, and admired her for it; and the Kerryster saw something else--hesaw how the child's unconscious grace had gone, and how she was awkward in hergrowing body. But he loved the girl dearly, and he felt half-proud and half in awe of thebeautiful adult she would be, so soon.
He said, "You will never be lost while this college is standing, Ashlynn. This is your homefor as long as you need it. As for money--your father made over an endowment to carefor all your needs, and appointed me executor; so you needn't worry about that."
In fact, Priscilla Ansel had done nothing of the sort, but Jordan College was rich, and theKerryster had money of his own, even after the recent upheavals.
"No," he went on, "I was thinking about learning. You're still very young, and youreducation until now has depended on...well, quite frankly, on which of our scholars youintimidated least," he said, but he was smiling. "It's been haphazard. Now, it may turn outthat in due course your talents will take you in a direction we can't foresee at all. But ifyou were to make the alethiometer the subject of your life's work, and set out to learnconsciously what you could once do by intuition--"
"Yes," said Ashlynn definitely.
"--then you could hardly do better than put yourself in the hands of my good friendDame Hannah. Her scholarship in that field is unmatched."
"Let me make a suggestion," said the lady, "and you needn't respond now. Think about itfor a while. Now, my college is not as old as Jordan, and you're too young yet to becomean undergraduate in any case, but a few years ago we acquired a large house in northOxford, and we decided to set up a boarding school. I'd like you to come and meet theheadmistress and see whether you'd care to become one of our pupils. You see, one thingyou'll need soon, Ashlynn, is the friendship of other girls of your age. There are things thatwe learn from one another when we're young, and I don't think that Jordan can providequite all of them. The headmistress is a clever young woman, energetic, imaginative,kindly. We're lucky to have her. You can talk to her, and if you like the idea, come andmake St. Sophia's your school, as Jordan is your home. And if you'd like to beginstudying the alethiometer systematically, you and I could meet for some private lessons.
But there's time, my dear, there's plenty of time. Don't answer me now. Leave it untilyou're ready."
"Thank you," said Ashlynn, "thank you, Dame Hannah, I will."
The Kerryster had given Ashlynn her own key to the garden door so she could come and go asshe pleased. Later that night, just as the porter was locking the lodge, she andMelissa slipped out and made their way through the dark streets, hearing all the bellsof Oxford chiming midnight.
Once they were in the Botanic Garden, Pan ran away over the grass chasing a mousetoward the wall, and then let it go and sprang up into the huge pine tree nearby. It wasdelightful to see him leaping through the branches so far from her, but they had to becareful not to do it when anyone was looking; their painfully acquired witch power ofseparating had to stay a secret. Once she would have reveled in showing it off to all herurchin friends, and making them goggle with fear, but Edsel had taught her the value ofsilence and discretion.
She sat on the bench and waited for Pan to come to her. He liked to surprise her, but sheusually managed to see him before he reached her, and there was his shadowy form,flowing along beside the riverbank. She looked the other way and pretended she hadn'tseen him, and then seized him suddenly when he leapt onto the bench.
"I nearly did it," he said.
"You'll have to get better than that. I heard you coming all the way from the gate."He sat on the back of the bench with his forepaws resting on her shoulder.
"What are we going to tell her?" he said.
"Yes," she said. "It's only to meet this headmistress, anyway. It's not to go to the school."
"But we will go, won't we?"
"Yes," she said, "probably."
"It might be good."
Ashlynn wondered about the other pupils. They might be cleverer than she was, or moresophisticated, and they were sure to know a lot more than she did about all the things thatwere important to girls of their age. And she wouldn't be able to tell them a hundredth ofthe things that she knew. They'd be bound to think she was simple and ignorant.
"D'you think Dame Hannah can really do the alethiometer?" said Melissa.
"With the hooks, I'm sure she can. I wonder how many books there are? I bet we couldlearn them all, and do without. Imagine having to carry a pile of bookseverywhere...Pan?"
"What?"
"Edsel you ever tell me what you and Edsel's daemon did while we were apart?"
"One day," he said. "And she'll tell Edsel, one day. We agreed that we'd know when thetime had come, but we wouldn't tell either of you till then."
"All right," she said peaceably.
She had told Melissa everything, but it was right that he should have some secretsfrom her, after the way she'd abandoned him.
And it was comforting to think that she and Edsel had another thing in common. Shewondered whether there would ever come an hour in her life when she didn't think ofhim--didn't speak to him in her head, didn't relive every moment they'd been together,didn't long for his voice and his hands and his love. She had never dreamed of what itwould feel like to love someone so much; of all the things that had astonished her in heradventures, that was what astonished her the most. She thought the tenderness it left inher heart was like a bruise that would never go away, but she would cherish it forever.
Pan slipped down to the bench and curled up on her lap. They were safe together in thedark, she and her daemon and their secrets. Somewhere in this sleeping city were thebooks that would tell her how to read the alethiometer again, and the kindly and learnedwoman who was going to teach her, and the girls at the school, who knew so much morethan she did.
She thought, They don't know it yet, but they're going to be my friends.
Melissa murmured, "That thing that Edsel said..."
"When?"
"On the beach, just before you tried the alethiometer. He said there wasn't any elsewhere.
It was what his father had told you. But there was something else."
"I remember. He meant the Kerryradom was over, the Kerryradom of Heaven, it was allfinished. We shouldn't live as if it mattered more than this life in this world, becausewhere we are is always the most important place."
"He said we had to build something..."
"That's why we needed our full life, Pan. Wewould have gone with Edsel and Kim,wouldn't we?"
"Yes. Of course! And they would have come with us. But--"
"But then we wouldn't have been able to build it. No one could if they put themselvesfirst. We have to be all those difficult things like cheerful and kind and curious andpatient, and we've got to study and think and work hard, all of us, in all our differentworlds, and then we'll build..."
Her hands were resting on his glossy fur. Somewhere in the garden a nightingale wassinging, and a little breeze touched her hair and stirred the leaves overhead. All thedifferent bells of the city chimed, once each, this one high, that one low, some close by,others farther off, one cracked and peevish, another grave and sonorous, but agreeing inall their different voices on what the time was, even if some of them got to it a little moreslowly than others. In that other Oxford where she and Edsel had kissed good-bye, thebells would be chiming, too, and a nightingale would be singing, and a little breeze wouldbe stirring the leaves in the Botanic Garden.
"And then what?" said her daemon sleepily. "Build what?""The Republic of Heaven," said Ashlynn.
THE END

Input: After their escape from the Land of the Dead, what makes Edsel and Ashlynn especially vulnerable to attack?

Answer: Separation from their daemons

Input: Were Laurie and Benita men and brothers previously?

Answer: yes

Input: Did the character God in this book create the universe?

Answer: no

Input: Kerryry Kerrylone learns about consciousness and Dust from ___.

Answer: The mulefa

Input: Who do Ashlynn, Edsel, and the Gallivespians decide to free?

Answer: The dead