“The Old Kingdom! Why did . . . I mean, I must be the only Abhorsen ever who doesn’t have a clue about how everything works! Why! Why?”
“Why?” asked Sabriel.
They ran before the wave, with hands inside the bells, faster and faster, till Sabriel thought her legs would seize up and she’d tumble head over heels, around and around and around, finally clattering to a halt in a tangle of sword and bells.
Mosrael she swung in a three-quarter circle above her head; Kibeth she swung in a reverse figure eight. Harsh alarm joined with dancing jig, merging into a discordant, grating, but energetic tone. Sabriel found herself walking towards the waterfall, despite all her efforts to keep still. A force like the grip of a demented giant moved her legs, bent her knees, made her step forward.
“Two bells?” asked Sabriel, puzzled. Waker and Walker? At the same time? She had never even heard it was possible—or had she? “Think,” said Abhorsen’s mouthpiece. “Remember.
Sabriel nodded, trying not to think about what he had just said. Subconsciously, she had always been aware that Abhorsen’s spirit had been too long from his body, and too deep in the realm of Death. He could never truly live again.
“A hundred hundred heartbeats . . .” whispered Sabriel, tears falling down her face. She gently pushed herself out of his embrace, and they started forward together, towards the First Gate, the First Precinct, Life—and then, the reservoir.
“I have not been an ideal parent, I know,”
Sabriel reached the Third Gate just ahead of the wave, gabbling a Free Magic spell as she ran, feeling it fume up and out of her mouth, filling her nostrils with acrid fumes.
He was either here in the Fourth Precinct, or past the Fourth Gate, in the Fifth Precinct.
Slowly, it came back, pages floating down into conscious memory, like leaves from a shaken tree. The bells could be rung in pairs, or even greater combinations, if enough necromancers were gathered to wield the bells. But the risks were much greater . . .
Sabriel rang the bell again before the echoes died, in a series of slight wrist-twitches, moving the sound out towards the Dead creature, weaving into the echoes of the first peal. Sound seemed to envelope the monster, circling around its head and muted mouth.
“In the reservoir,” sniffed Sabriel. “Next to yours. Inside a diamond of protection.”
“There can’t be much sunlight,” muttered Touchstone, looking at the light-shafts. Some sunshine was coming through, heavily filtered by clouds, but it wasn’t enough to cause the Dead in the reservoir any distress, or lift Touchstone’s spirits.
“What can we do?”
“Well done,” said Abhorsen, his voice deep and familiar, lending comfort and warmth like a favorite childhood toy. “Once trapped, it was all I could do to send the bells and sword. Now I am afraid we must hurry, back to Life, before Kerrigor can complete his plan. Give me Saraneth, for now . . . no, you keep the sword, and Ranna, I think. Come on!”
Near the Stones. With Mogget.”
But Mogget was silent. All Touchstone heard was the shuffling, wading, splashing of the Dead, as they slowly drew closer, like starving rats creeping up to a sleeping drunk’s dinner.
The spell parted the mists, and Sabriel stepped within, the wave breaking harmlessly around her, dumping its cargo of Dead down into the waterfall beyond. Sabriel waited a moment more, for the path to appear, then passed on— on to the Fourth Precinct.
The Dead creature finally hauled itself out, muscles differently arranged to a human’s visibly straining along the forearms. It stood on the rim for a moment, bulky head questing from side to side, then lumbered towards Sabriel with that familiar rolling gait. Several paces away from her—out of sword’s reach—it stopped, and pointed at its mouth. Its jaw worked up and down, but no sound issued from its red and fleshy mouth. A black thread ran from its back, down into the rushing waters of the Gate.
This was a relatively easy area to traverse. The current was strong again, but predictable. There were few Dead, because most were stunned and rushed through by the Third Precinct’s wave.
Abhorsen suddenly stopped, and gathered her into a quick, one-armed embrace. His grip felt strong, but Sabriel felt another reality there, as if his arm was a shadow, temporarily born of light, but doomed to fade at nightfall.
The echoes faded. Sabriel replaced Dyrim quickly, before it could try and sound of its own accord, and drew Ranna. The Sleeper could quell a large number of Dead at once, and she feared many would come to the sound of the bells.
Then Abhorsen was free, and he leapt forward, thrusting his hands into the bell-mouths, gripping the clappers with his pallid hands, making them suddenly quiet. There was silence, and father and daughter embraced on the very brink of the Fourth Gate.
Steps rose before them, cutting through the waterfall and the mist. Abhorsen took them two at a time, showing surprising energy. Sabriel followed as best she could. She felt tiredness in her bones now, a weariness beyond exhausted muscles.
But tell me of the Prince’s companion. Who is Mogget?”
Mosrael and Kibeth. Will they free you?”
drawled Mogget, as if stating the obvious to a tiresome child. “Hope. Pray to the Charter that Kerrigor doesn’t come before Sabriel returns.”
Abhorsen said, without really listening. “But he has the blood. What? Oh, yes, yes he is . . . you said was . . . you mean—”
But she made it somehow, Abhorsen chanting the spell that would open the base of the Second Gate, so they could ascend through the whirlpool.
asked Touchstone, looking nervously from side to side, ears straining to hear every sound, listening to the Dead wading out into the reservoir to form up in their strange, regimented lines.
Sabriel had no idea of how far she’d gone before she found him. That same niggling sensation prompted her to stop, to look out into the waterfall itself, and there he was. Abhorsen. Father.
He led the way back, walking swiftly. Sabriel followed at his heels, questions bursting up in her. She kept looking at him, looking at the familiar features, the way his hair was ragged at the back, the silver stubble just showing on his chin and sideburns. He wore the same sort of clothes as she did, complete with the surcoat of silver keys. He wasn’t quite as tall as she remembered.
“That may not suffice,” replied Abhorsen grimly. “Kerrigor grows stronger every day he spends in Life, taking the strength from living folk, and feeding off the broken Stones. He will soon be able to break even the strongest Charter Magic defenses. He may be strong enough now.
“Father . . .” Sabriel began, looking at his trapped spirit rather than the creature.
Abhorsen said quietly. “None of us ever are.
Consciously, she chose to barricade this knowledge from her mind.
But he wasn’t in the Fourth Precinct. Sabriel reached the Fourth Gate without feeling any intensification of his presence. This gate was another waterfall, of sorts, but it wasn’t cloaked in mist. It looked like the easy drop of water from a small weir, a matter of only two or three feet down. But Sabriel knew that if you approached the edge there was more than enough force to drag the strongest spirit down.
“Father . . .”
“Mogget,” said Abhorsen, as if trying to get his mouth around an unpalatable morsel. “That is the Wallmaker relict, or their last creation, or their child—no one knows, possibly not even him. I wonder why he took the shape of a cat? He was always a sort of albino dwarf-boy to me, and he practically never left the House. I suppose he may be some sort of protection for the Prince. We must hurry.”
She hesitated, thinking about it, then pushed out into the water, heading out parallel to the waterfall. It might be some Free Magic summoning, or it might be some connection with her father’s spirit.
“But I met him at our House! He’s a Free Magic—something—wearing the shape of a white cat, with a red collar that carries a miniature Saraneth.”
How he could tell, without landmarks or any obvious signs, Sabriel had no idea. Perhaps, when she had spent thirty-odd years traversing Death, she would find it as easy.
Nevertheless, Sabriel felt an urge to walk along next to the Gate, to turn on her heel and follow the line of the waterfall. It was an unidentifiable urge, and that made her uneasy. There were other things in Death than the Dead—inexplicable beings of Free Magic, strange constructs and incomprehensible forces. This urge—this calling— might come from one of them.
The creature’s mouth moved again, and now it had a tongue, a horrid pulpy mess of white flesh that writhed like a slug. But it worked. The thing made several gurgling, swallowing sounds, then it spoke with the voice of Abhorsen.
Abhorsen paused for the first time, clearly taken aback.
Sabriel followed his gaze, and saw something tall and shadowy thrust up through the waterfall, arms reaching up to pull itself out of the gate. She stepped forward, sword and bell at the ready, then hesitated. It was a Dead humanoid, very similar in shape and size to the one who had brought the bells and sword to Wyverley College. She looked back at her father, and he winked again, the corner of his mouth curving up ever so slightly—almost a smile.
She sheathed her sword, replaced Ranna, and drew Mosrael and Kibeth. Dangerous bells, both, and more so in combination than alone.
“So,” continued Abhorsen. “We finally have the chance to finish Kerrigor once and for all.
“He’s in the diamond of protection,” Sabriel said, suddenly feeling afraid for Touchstone.
They would probably expect to find a foolish, half-trained necromancer, but even so, they would be dangerous. Ranna twitched in her hand, expectantly, like a child waking at her touch.
“Mogget?” repeated Sabriel, surprised again.
When we become the Abhorsen, we lose much else. Responsibility to many people rides roughshod over personal responsibilities; difficulties and enemies crush out softness; our horizons narrow. You are my daughter, and I have always loved you. But now, I live again for only a short time—a hundred hundred heartbeats, no more— and I must win a battle against a terrible enemy.
“Ready to run?” asked Abhorsen. He took her elbow as they left the steps and went into the parted mists, a curiously formal gesture that reminded her of when she was a little girl, demanding to be properly escorted when they took a picnic basket out on one of her father’s corporeal school visitations.
“So how do we get out of it?” asked Touchstone, trying to keep his voice steady. He was inwardly fighting a strong desire to leave the diamond of protection and run for the southern stair, splashing through the reservoir like a runaway horse, careless of the noise—but there was Sabriel, frosted over, immobile . . .
The Clayr will direct you to his body, you will destroy it, and then banish Kerrigor’s spirit form—which will be severely weakened. After that, you can get the surviving royal prince out of his suspended state, and with the aid of the Wallmaker relict, repair the Great Charter Stones . . .”
“The surviving royal prince,” asked Sabriel, with a feeling of unlooked-for knowledge rising in her. “He wasn’t . . . ah . . . suspended as a figurehead in Holehallow, was he . . . and his spirit in Death?”
“Father!” cried Sabriel, but she resisted the urge to rush forward. At first, she thought he was unaware of her, then a slight wink of one eye showed conscious perception. He winked again, and moved his eyeballs to the right, several times.
“Sabriel! I both hoped and feared you would come.”
“There was no sign of them there, but Kerrigor is somewhere in Life. I don’t know where.”
“As I was saying,” Abhorsen continued, taking these steps two at a time as well, speaking as swiftly as he climbed. “Kerrigor could never be properly dealt with till an Abhorsen found the body. All of us pushed him back at various times, as far back as the Seventh Gate, but that was merely postponing the problem. He grew stronger all the time, as lesser Charter Stones were broken, and the Kingdom deteriorated— and we grew weaker.”
“Kerrigor’s body,” replied Abhorsen. “Or Rogir’s, to give him his original name. He could never be made truly dead because hisbody is preserved by Free Magic, somewhere in Life. It’s like an anchor that always brings him back. Every Abhorsen since the breaking of the Great Stones has been looking for that body—but none of us ever found it, including me, because we never suspected it is in Ancelstierre. Obviously, somewhere close to the Wall. The Clayr will have located it by now, because Kerrigor must have gone to it when he emerged into Life. Right, do you want to do the spell, or shall I?”
“Father!” she exclaimed, trying to talk, keep up with him and keep watch, all at the same time. “What is happening? What is Kerrigor’s plan? I don’t understand. Why wasn’t I brought up here, so I would know things?”
“A bastard son, actually, and possibly crazy,”
“There’s no simple answer,” replied Abhorsen, over his shoulder. “But I sent you to Ancelstierre for two main reasons. One was to keep you safe. I had already lost your mother, and the only way to keep you safe in the Old Kingdom was to keep you either with me or always at our House—practically a prisoner. I couldn’t keep you with me, because things were getting worse and worse since the death of the Regent, two years before you were born. The second reason was because the Clayr advised me to do so.
“I thought we were!” snapped Sabriel, as he started off again. She didn’t mean to be bad- tempered, but this was not her idea of a heartfelt reunion between father and daughter. He hardly seemed to notice her, except as a repository for numerous revelations and as an agent to deal with Kerrigor.
“Here?” asked Abhorsen, without slowing.
He left the rim of the whirlpool, and strode confidently out into the Second Precinct, Sabriel close at his heels. Unlike her earlier halting, probing advance, Abhorsen practically jogged along, obviously following a familiar route.
“All our plans go astray, it seems,” he said somberly, sighing. “Kerrigor lured me to the reservoir to use my blood to break a Great Stone, but I managed to protect myself, so he contented himself with trapping me in Death.
“I’m not sure we can,” said Mogget, with a sideways glance at the two ice-rimmed statues nearby. “It depends on Sabriel and her father.”
“And the Dead? Kerrigor?”
She halted well back, and was about to launch into the spell that would conjure her path, when a niggling sensation at the back of her head made her stop and look around.
They said we needed someone—or will need someone—they’re not good with time—who knows Ancelstierre. I didn’t know why then, but I suspect I do now.”
“The Great Charter bloodlines,” replied Abhorsen. “Which to all intents and purposes means Abhorsens and the Clayr, since the royal line is all but extinct. And there is, of course, the relict of the Wallmakers, a sort of construct left over after they put their powers in the Wall and the Great Stones.”
“When . . . when do you think he will come?”
“You know what I mean,” protested Sabriel.
“Yes,” said Sabriel, slowly. “I remember.
She stepped back, still cautious. There was always the chance that the spirit chained in the waterfall was merely the mimic of her father, or, even if it was him, that he was under the sway of some power.
But now, if the Prince is there, he has another source of blood to break the Great Charter—”
“Yes,” said Sabriel, unhappily. “He calls himself Touchstone. And he’s waiting in the reservoir.
“Defend ourselves if we’re attacked, I suppose,”
“Who’s we?” asked Sabriel. All this information was coming too quickly, particularly when given at the run.
They had reached the Third Gate. He didn’t wait for her answer, but immediately spoke the words. Sabriel felt strange hearing them, rather than speaking them—curiously distant, like a far-off observer.
“What if he does?” asked Touchstone, staring white-eyed out into the darkness. “What if he does?”
“What about the south—where we came in?”
The answer was slow in coming.
Sabriel thought for a moment, then replaced Saraneth, one-handed, and drew Dyrim. She cocked her wrist to ring the bell, hesitated—for to sound Dyrim would alert the Dead all around—then let it fall. Dyrim rang, sweet and clear, several notes sounding from that one peal, mixing together like many conversations overheard in a crowd.
“I always said it was a trap.”
Our parts now—which perforce we must play— are not father and daughter, but one old Abhorsen, making way for the new. But behind this, there is always my love.”
She broke down, and started to cry. She had come all this way, through so many troubles, only to find him trapped, trapped beyond her ability to free him. She hadn’t even known that it was possible to imprison someone within a Gate! “Sabriel! Hush, daughter! We have no time for tears. Where is your physical body?”
What would be the point? Everyone went into Death or out of it. Not sideways, save at the border with Life, where walkingalong altered where you came out—but that was only useful for spirit-forms, or rare beings like the Mordicant, who took their physical shape with them.
She increased her pace a little again, eager to find him, talk with him, free him. She knew everything would be all right once Father was freed . . .
asked Touchstone. Mogget didn’t need to ask who “he” was.
The waterfall stretched as far as she could see to either side, and Sabriel knew that if she was foolish enough to try and walk its length, it would be an unending journey. Perhaps it eventually looped back on itself, but as there were no landmarks, stars or anything else to fix one’s position, you’d never know. No one ever walked the breadth of an inner precinct or gate.
“Yes. For a time. Enough, I hope, to do what must be done. Quickly, now.”
She stilled her mind, emptying herself of all thought and emotion, concentrating solely on the bells. Then, she rang them.
“They’re coming down the east and west stairs, too,” said Mogget. “More Hands.”
Sabriel walked quickly, using the strength of her will to suppress the leeching cold and the plucking hands of the current. She could feel her father’s spirit now, close by, as if he were in one room of a large house, and she in another— tracking him down by the slight sounds of habitation.
He thought you would be lured to my body, and he could use your blood—but I was not trapped as securely as he thought, and planned a reverse.
The Book of the Dead.”
“Soon,” replied the cat, in a matter-of-fact tone.
“Yes, I knew he had emerged,” muttered Abhorsen, via the thing’s mouth. “He will benear the reservoir, I fear. We must move quickly.
“In Death?”
At the same time, her father was emerging from the waterfall of the Fourth Gate. His head was freed first, and he flexed his neck, then rolled his shoulders, raised his arms over his head and stretched. But still Sabriel stepped on, till she was only two paces from the rim, and could look down into the swirling waters, the sound of the bells filling her ears, forcing her onwards.
“Not yet,” replied Mogget. “That stair ends in sunlight, remember? They’d have to go through the park.”
Sabriel, do you remember how to ring two bells simultaneously? Mosrael and Kibeth?”
Somehow imprisoned within the Gate itself, so only his head was visible above the rush of the water.
