chapter xxiv

The sunshine was harsh to their eyes, for it was surprisingly only a little past noon. They stumbled out onto the marble steps of the cave, blinking like nocturnal animals prematurely flushed out of an underground warren.

Sabriel looked around at the quiet, sunlit trees, the placid expanse of grass, the clogged fountain.

Everything seemed so normal, so far removed from the crazed and twisted chamber of horrors that was the reservoir, deep beneath their feet.

She looked at the sky, too, losing focus in the blue, retreating lines of clouds just edging about the fuzzy periphery of her vision. My father is dead, she thought. Gone forever . . .

“The road winds around the south-western part of Palace Hill,” a voice said, somewhere near her, beyond the blueness.

“What?”

“The road. Up to the West Yard.”

It was Touchstone talking. Sabriel closed her eyes, told herself to concentrate, to get a grip on the here and now. She opened her eyes and looked at Touchstone.

He was a mess. Face blood-streaked from his bleeding lip, hair wet, plastered flat, armor and clothes darkly sodden. Water dripped down the sword he still held out, angled to the ground.

“You didn’t tell me you were a Prince,” Sabriel said, in a conversational tone. She might have been commenting on the weather. Her voice sounded strange in her own ears, but she didn’t have the energy to do anything about it.

“I’m not,” Touchstone replied, shrugging. He looked up at the sky while he spoke. “The Queen was my mother, but my father was an obscure northern noble, who ‘took up with her’ a few years after her consort’s death. He was killed in a hunting accident before I was born . . . Look, shouldn’t we be going? To the West Yard?”

“I suppose so,” Sabriel said dully. “Father said there will be a Paperwing waiting for us there, and the Clayr, to tell us where to go.”

“I see,” said Touchstone. He came closer, and peered at Sabriel’s vacant eyes, then took her unresisting and oddly floppy arm, and steered her towards the line of beech trees that marked a path to the western end of the park. Sabriel walked obediently, increasing her pace as Touchstone sped up, till they were practically jogging. Touchstone was pushing on her arm, with many backward glances; Sabriel moving with a sleepwalker’s jerky animation.

A few hundred yards from the ornamental caves, the beeches gave way to more lawn, and a road started up the side of Palace Hill, switchbacking twice to the top.

The road was well paved, but the flagstones had pushed up, or sunk down, over two decades without maintenance, and there were some quite deep ruts and holes. Sabriel caught her foot in one and she almost fell, Touchstone just catching her. But this small shock seemed to break her from the effects of the larger shock, and she found a new alertness cutting through her dumb despair.

“Why are we running?”

“Those scavengers are following us,”

Touchstone replied shortly, pointing back through the park. “The ones who had the children at the gate.”

Sabriel looked where he pointed and, sure enough, there were figures slowly moving through the beech-lined path. All nine were there, close together, laughing and talking.

They seemed confident Sabriel and Touchstone could not escape them, and their mood looked to be that of casual beaters, easily driving their stupid prey to a definite end. One of them saw Sabriel and Touchstone watching and used a gesture that distance made unclear, but was probably obscene. Laughter carried to them, borne by the breeze. The men’s intentions were clear. Hostile.

“I wonder if they deal with the Dead,”

Sabriel said bleakly, revulsion in those words.

“To do their deeds when sunlight lends its aid to the living . . .”

“They mean no good, anyway,” said Touchstone, as they set off again, building up from a fast walk to a jog. “They have bows and I bet they can shoot, unlike the villagers of Nestowe.”

“Yes,” replied Sabriel. “I hope there is a Paperwing up there . . .”

She didn’t need to expand upon what would happen if it wasn’t. Neither of them were in any shape for fighting, or much Charter Magic, and nine bowmen could easily finish them off—or capture them. If the men were working for Kerrigor, it would be capture, and the knife, down in the dark of the reservoir . . .

The road grew steeper, and they jogged in silence, breath coming fast and ragged, with none to spare for words. Touchstone coughed, and Sabriel looked at him with concern, till she realized she was coughing too. The shape they were in, it might not take an arrow to finish matters.

The hill would do it anyway.

“Not . . . much . . . further,” Touchstone gasped as they turned at the switchback, tired legs gaining a few seconds of relief on the flat, before starting the next incline.

Sabriel started to laugh, a bitter, coughing laugh, because it was still a lot further. The laugh became a shocked cry as something struck her in the ribs like a sucker punch. She fell sideways, into Touchstone, carrying both of them down onto the hard flagstones. A long-shot arrow had found its mark.

“Sabriel!” Touchstone shouted, voice high with fear and anger. He shouted her name again, and then Sabriel suddenly felt Charter Magic explode into life within him. As it grew, he leapt up, and thrust his arms out and down towards the enemy, towards that over-gifted marksman.

Eight small suns flowered at his fingertips, grew to the size of his clenched fists, and shot out, leaving white trails of after-image in the air. A split second later, a scream from below testified to their finding at least one target.

Numbly, Sabriel wondered how Touchstone could possibly still have the strength for such a spell. Wonder became surprise as he suddenly bent and lifted her up, pack and all, cradling her in his arms—all in one easy motion. She screamed a little as the arrow shifted in her side, but Touchstone didn’t seem to notice. He threw his head back, roared out an animal-like challenge, and started to run up the road, gathering speed from an ungainly lurch to an inhuman sprint. Froth burst from his lips, blowing out over his chin and onto Sabriel. Every vein and muscle in his neck and face corded out, and his eyes went wild with unseeing energy.

He was berserk, and nothing could stop him now, save total dismemberment. Sabriel shivered in his grasp and turned her face into his chest, too disturbed to look on the savage, snorting face that bore so little resemblance to the Touchstone she knew. But at least he was running away from the enemy . . .

On he ran, leaving the road, climbing over the tumbled stones of what had once been a gateway, hardly pausing, jumping from one rock to another with goat-like precision. His face was as bright red as a fire engine now, the pulse in his neck beating as fast as a hummingbird’s wings.

Sabriel, forgetting her own wound in sudden fear that his heart would burst, started shouting at him, begging him to come out of the rage.

“Touchstone! We’re safe! Put me down! Stop! Please, stop!”

He didn’t hear her, his whole concentration bent on their path. Through the ruined gateway he ran, on along a walled path, nostrils wide, head darting from side to side like a scentfollowing hound.

“Touchstone! Touchstone!” Sabriel sobbed, beating on his chest with her hands. “We’ve got away! I’m all right! Stop! Stop!”

Still he ran, through another arch; along a raised way, the stones falling away under his feet; down a short stair, jumping gaping holes. A closed door halted him for a moment, and Sabriel breathed a sigh of relief, but he kicked at it viciously, till the rotten wood collapsed and he could back through, carefully shielding Sabriel from splinters.

Beyond the door was a large, open field, bordered by tumbledown walls. Tall weeds covered the expanse, with the occasional stunted, selfsown tree rising above them. Right at the western edge, perched where a wall had long since crumbled down the hill, there were two Paperwings, one facing south and the other north—and two people, indistinct silhouettes bordered with the flaming orange of the afternoon sun that was sinking down behind them.

Touchstone broke into a gait that could only be described as a gallop, parting the weeds like a ship ploughing a sargasso sea. He ran right up to the two standing figures, gently placed Sabriel on the ground before them—and fell over, eyes rolling back to whiteness, limbs twitching.

Sabriel tried to crawl over to him, but the pain in her side suddenly bit sharp and deadly, so it was all she could do to sit up and look at the two people, and beyond them, the Paperwings.

“Hello,” they said, in unison. “We are, for the moment, the Clayr. You must be the Abhorsen and the King.”

Sabriel stared, dry-mouthed. The sun was in her eyes, making it hard for her to see them clearly. Young women, both, with long blond hair and bright, piercing blue eyes. They wore white linen dresses, with long, open sleeves.

Freshly pressed dresses that made Sabriel feel extremely dirty and uncivilized, in her reservoirsoaked breeches and sweaty armor. Like their voices, their faces were identical. Very pretty.

Twins.

They smiled, and knelt down, one by Sabriel’s side, the other by Touchstone’s. Sabriel felt Charter Magic slowly welling up in them, like water rising in a spring—then it flowed into her, taking away the hurt and pain of the arrow.

Next to her, Touchstone’s breath became less labored, and he sank into the easy quiet of sleep.

“Thank you,” croaked Sabriel. She tried to smile, but seemed to have lost the knack of it. “There are slavers . . . human allies of the Dead . . . behind us.”

“We know,” said the duo. “But they are ten minutes behind. Your friend—the King—ran very, very fast. We saw him run yesterday. Or tomorrow.”

“Ah,” said Sabriel, laboriously pushing herself up onto her feet, thinking of her father and what he had said about the Clayr confusing their whens. Best to find out what she needed to know before things got really confusing.

“Thank you,” she said again, for the arrow fell on the ground as she fully straightened up. It was a hunting arrow, narrow-headed, not an armor-punching bodkin. They had only meant to slow her down. She shivered, and felt the hole between the armor plates. The wound didn’t feel healed exactly—just older, as if it had struck a week ago, instead of minutes.

“Father said you would be here . . . that you have been watching for us, and watching for where Kerrigor has his body.”

“Yes,” replied the Clayr. “Well, not us exactly.

We’ve only been allowed to be the Clayr today, because we’re the best Paperwing pilots . . .”

“Or actually, Ryelle is . . .” one of the twins said, pointing at the other. “But since she would need a Paperwing to fly home in, two Paperwings were needed, so . . .”

“Sanar came too,” Ryelle continued, pointing back at her sister.

“Both of us,” they chorused. “Now, there isn’t much time. You can take the red and gold Paperwing . . . we painted it in the royal colors when we knew last week. But first, there’s Kerrigor’s body.”

“Yes,” said Sabriel. Her father’s—her family’s— the Kingdom’s enemy. For her to deal with. Her burden, no matter how heavy, and how feeble her shoulders currently felt, she had to bear it.

“His body is in Ancelstierre,” said the twins.

“But our vision is weak across the Wall, so we don’t have a map, or know the place names.

We’ll have to show you—and you’ll have to remember.”

“Yes,” agreed Sabriel, feeling like a dull student promising to deal with a question quite beyond her. “Yes.”

The Clayr nodded, and smiled again. Their teeth were very white and even. One, possibly Ryelle—Sabriel had already got them confused— brought a bottle made of clear green glass out from the flowing sleeve of her robe, the telltale flash of Charter Magic showing it hadn’t been there before. The other woman—Sanar— produced a long ivory wand out of her sleeve.

“Ready?” they asked each other simultaneously, and, “Yes,” before their question had even penetrated Sabriel’s tired brain.

Ryelle unstoppered the bottle with a resonant “pop,” and in one quick motion, poured out the contents along a horizontal line. Sanar, equally quickly, drew the wand across the falling water—and it froze in mid-air, to form a pane of transparent ice. A frozen window, suspended in front of Sabriel.

“Watch,” commanded the women, and Sanar tapped the ice-window with her wand. It clouded over at that touch, briefly showed a scene of whirling snow, a glimpse of the Wall, then steadied into a moving vision—much like a film shot from a traveling car. Wyverley College had frowned on films, but Sabriel had been to see quite a few in Bain. This was much the same, but in color, and she could hear natural sounds as clearly as if she were there.

The window showed typical Ancelstierran farmland—a long field of wheat, ripe for the harvest, with a tractor stopped in the distance, its driver chatting with another man perched atop a cart, his two draft-horses standing stolidly, peering out through their blinkers.

The view raced closer towards these two men, veered around them with a snatch of caught conversation, and continued—following a road, up and over a hill, through a small wood and up to a crossroads, where the gravel intersected with a macadamized route of greater importance. There was a sign there, and the “eye,” or whatever it was, zoomed up to it, till the signpost filled the whole of the ice-window. “Wyverley ? miles,”

it read, directing travelers along the major road, and they were off again, shooting down towards Wyverley village.

A few seconds later, the moving image slowed, to show the familiar houses of Wyverley village; the blacksmith-cum-mechanic’s shop; the Wyvern public house; the constable’s trim house with the blue lantern. All landmarks known to Sabriel. She concentrated even more carefully, for surely the vision, having shown her a fixed point of reference, would now race off to parts of Ancelstierre which were unknown to her.

But the picture still moved slowly. At a walking pace, it went through the village, and turned off the road, following a bridle-path up the forested hill known as Docky Point. A nice enough hill, to be sure, covered by a cork tree plantation, with some quite old trees. Its only point of interest was the rectangular cairn upon the hilltop . . . the cairn . . . The image changed, closing in on the huge, grey-green stones, square-cut and tightly packed together. A relatively recent folly, Sabriel remembered from their local history lessons. A little less than two hundred years old. She’d almost visited it once, but something had changed her mind . . .

The image changed again, somehow sinking through the stone, down between the lines of mortar, zigzagging around the blocks, to the dark chamber at its heart. For an instant the icewindow went completely dark, then light came. A bronze sarcophagus lay under the cairn, metal crawling with Free Magic perversions of Charter marks. The vision dodged these shifting marks, penetrated the bronze. A body lay inside, a living body, wreathed in Free Magic.

The scene shifted, moving with jagged difficulty to the face of the body. A handsome face, that swam closer and closer into focus, a face that showed what Kerrigor once had been. The human face of Rogir, his features clearly showing that he had shared a mother with Touchstone.

Sabriel stared, sickened and fascinated by the similarities between the half-brothers—then the vision suddenly blurred, spinning into greyness, greyness accompanied by rushing water. Death.

Something huge and monstrous was wading against the current, a jagged cutting of darkness, formless and featureless, save for two eyes that burned with unnatural flame. It seemed to see her beyond the ice-window, and lurched forward, two arms like blown storm clouds reaching forward.

“Abhorsen’s Get!” screamed Kerrigor. “Your blood will gush upon the Stones . . .”

His arms seemed about to come through the window, but suddenly, the ice cracked, the pieces collapsing into a pile of swift-melting slush.

“You saw,” the Clayr said together. It wasn’t a question. Sabriel nodded, shaking, her thoughts still on the likeness between Kerrigor’s original human body and Touchstone. Where was the fork in their paths? What had put Rogir’s feet on the long road that led to the abomination known as Kerrigor? “We have four minutes,” announced Sanar.

“Till the slavers come. We’ll help you get the King to your Paperwing, shall we?”

“Yes, please,” replied Sabriel. Despite the fear- some sight of Kerrigor’s raw spirit form, the vision had imbued her with a new and definite sense of purpose. Kerrigor’s body was in Ancelstierre. She would find it and destroy it, and then deal with his spirit. But they had to get to the body first . . .

The two women lifted Touchstone up, grunting with the effort. He was no lightweight at any time, and now was even heavier, still sodden with water from his ducking in the reservoir. But the Clayr, despite their rather ethereal appearance, seemed to manage well enough.

“We wish you luck, cousin,” they said, as they walked slowly to the red and gold Paperwing, balanced so close to the edge of the broken wall, the Saere glistening white and blue below.

“Cousin?” Sabriel murmured. “I suppose we are cousins—of a sort, aren’t we?”

“Blood relatives, all the children of the Great Charters,” the Clayr agreed. “Though the clan dwindles . . .”

“Do you always—know what is going to happen?”

Sabriel asked, as they gently lowered Touchstone into the back of the cockpit, and strapped him in with the belts normally used for securing luggage.

Both the Clayr laughed. “No, thank the Charter! Our family is the most numerous of the bloodlines, and the gift is spread among many. Our visions come in snatches and splinters, glimpses and shadows. When we must, the whole family can spend its strength to narrow our sight—as it has done through us today.

Tomorrow, we will be back to dreams and confusion, not knowing where, when or what we see. Now, we have only two minutes . . .”

Suddenly, they hugged Sabriel, surprising her with the obvious warmth of the gesture. She hugged them back, gladly, grateful for their care.

With her father gone, she had no family left— but perhaps she would find sisters in the Clayr, and perhaps Touchstone would be . . .

“Two minutes,” repeated both the women, one in each ear. Sabriel let them go, and hurriedly took The Book of the Dead and the two Charter Magic books from her pack, wedging them down next to Touchstone’s slightly snoring form.

After a second’s thought, she also stuffed in the fleece-lined oilskin and the boat cloak.

Touchstone’s swords went into the special holders next, but the pack and the rest of its contents had to be abandoned.

“Next stop, the Wall,” Sabriel muttered as she climbed into the craft, trying not to think about what would happen if they had to land somewhere uncivilized in between.

The Clayr were already in their green and silver craft, and, as Sabriel did up her straps, she heard them begin to whistle, Charter Magic streaming out into the air. Sabriel licked her lips, summoned her breath and strength, and joined in. Wind rose behind both the craft, tossing black hair and blond, lifting the Paperwings’ tails and jostling their wings.

Sabriel took a breath after the wind-whistling, and stroked the smooth, laminated paper of the hull. A brief image of the first Paperwing came to mind, broken and burning in the depths of Holehallow.

“I hope we fare better together,” she whispered, before joining with the Clayr to whistle the last note, the pure clear sound that would wake the Charter Magic in their craft.

A second later, two bright-eyed Paperwings leapt out from the ruined palace of Belisaere, glided down almost to the swell in the Sea of Saere, then rose to circle higher and higher above the hill. One craft, of green and silver, turned to the north-west. The other, of red and gold, turned south.

Touchstone, waking to the rush of cold air on his face, and the unfamiliar sensation of flying, groggily muttered, “What happened?”

“We’re going to Ancelstierre,” Sabriel shouted.

“Across the Wall, to find Kerrigor’s body—and destroy it!”

“Oh,” said Touchstone, who only heard “across the Wall.” “Good.”