The Rose Field, page 49
Lyra saw the witches move. They were turning towards her, and Tilda and Sala Riikola were coming. Some of the others set off back towards where the fallen witches lay, no doubt to deal with their remains with honor.
The two witches came to sit next to Lyra, looking at Malcolm curiously. Tilda was curious about Lyra too, and their eyes met with a flash of mutual recognition.
“He’s watching something,” said Tilda, meaning Malcolm.
Lyra remembered that Tilda had spent time with him and Pan in the gryphons’ palace. She didn’t seem concerned about him, Lyra thought: simply respectful. Asta stirred, but didn’t wake.
“You’re Tilda Vasara,” said Lyra.
“And you are Lyra Silvertongue.”
“You took my dæmon with you,” Lyra said. “Why?”
“He asked me to.”
“Where is he now?”
“A day’s flight away, no more.”
“Was he safe when you left him?”
“Alive, yes. Safe, no. He has been in danger ever since he left you. So have you.”
“What is he doing?”
“Spying.”
“Spying—for what? What’s he looking for? Didn’t he tell you anything?”
Sala Riikola was surprised to hear any short-life woman speak to a witch-queen quite so fiercely as Lyra was doing.
Tilda was calm in response. “There’s a village on the hill just above the research station. We stopped there. We could see from the hill that the station buildings had been smashed up, windows broken, a wall or two knocked down, that sort of damage. Not destroyed completely. In fact, it seemed as if someone had already begun to repair it. The rubble was laid out neatly—bricks placed in tidy heaps, lengths of timber set together. Pan wanted to search properly, but he was going to wait till nightfall. We saw no one there except a couple of village people working on their land, but people had been and gone from the research station, because there were tracks of their wheels.”
“Pan didn’t want to go on to the red building?”
“Not then, but he talked about it. He said he’d go there with you.”
“We’d have to go separately…That was the rule. To keep out people who couldn’t separate from their dæmons, I suppose. But why, I don’t know.”
“I know nothing about that. He said you and he would go there together. I guessed he knew what he was talking about.”
“Yes…”
She fell quiet. Both of them looked at Malcolm, who was sleeping peacefully.
“You know,” said Tilda, “this man is younger than you are.”
Lyra looked at her. “I don’t understand,” she said.
“I said exactly what I mean. You are older, he is younger.”
“I still don’t understand. And I thought time didn’t matter for witches as it does for us.”
“A witch can be four hundred years old, but still seventeen. And I have seen human children seven years of age who seem to have lived through centuries. Numbers have little to do with it. This man is younger than you are. I can see this, and you can’t, so I tell you, and if you listen, you’ll know.”
Lyra looked down at the sleeping Malcolm again. The sun gilded his face and his hair.
“He told me you cured a wound he had,” she said.
“That’s right. Someone shot him in the leg. I had some bloodmoss, so I made a decoction and cleaned the wound.”
“Who shot him?”
“I don’t know. What will you do at Tashbulak?”
“Find Pan, first, and then go to the red building. After that…” She shrugged, and looked at Malcolm.
“Will he come with you?”
“I hope so,” said Lyra carefully.
“Did you come all this way alone?”
Lyra had to think. “Well, until Seleukeia I was alone. But there I found a guide, a man called Abdel Ionides. He was very helpful on the next part of the journey. But he…I don’t know where he is now. He just left me unexpectedly.”
“I’ve heard of that man. Did he steal anything from you?”
“No. He was honest in that way, at least. I came to trust him completely, and I really thought he was truthful, in spite of…in spite of everything he said and did, really. He pretended to be a sort of vagabond, a rogue, but he’d been a professor of mathematics and he knew a lot about all kinds of unexpected things.”
“When did he leave?”
“On the night when Malcolm and Gulya killed the sorcerer. He just went off in a boat that belonged to the Magisterium. Actually, now I think of him, he never claimed to be honest, except in a sort of ironic way, for mischief. I was very sorry to see him go.”
Tilda nodded. “Stay with him,” she said, looking at Malcolm. “Remember what I said about him.”
“I’ll remember. Even though I don’t understand it.”
“He is courageous and clever and honest and faithful. But he is younger than you.”
Tilda leaned across to kiss Lyra, and she and Sala left without another word.
Lyra sat still, a little dizzy with the witch’s words because they rang true. Was the witch warning her about something? Or was it just nonsense?
It troubled her, and she pulled her rucksack to herself and hugged it, as if for warmth. Asta yawned and stretched and sat up to look at Malcolm, who was still asleep.
“Lazy,” she said. “Lyra, can we look at your cards? The Myriorama?”
“Of course.”
Lyra opened the rucksack and felt inside. There was the little box, but her fingers also met the smooth surface of the lodestone resonator, and she brought that out first.
“That too. I want to know how it works,” said Asta.
“I think it must be something to do with entanglement. The particles of this one are connected with the ones in the stone that Malcolm’s got, and they respond when—”
“It’s responding now.”
“What?”
“There are words on it. But Malcolm’s asleep! They can’t be from him.”
“It can’t be…”
But Asta was right. As it lay in Lyra’s palm, the flat surface of the resonator was revealing, letter by letter, words that seemed to float into focus from deep inside the stone. Once she had read them, they disappeared to make room for more, as if it knew what her eyes were looking at.
Dear Miss Silver!
Yes, it is I, your “sorcier particulier,” Abdel Ionides, also known as Professor Rashid Xenakis, and more briefly as Master Parathanasius. When we waited for you and Mr. Malcolm on the beach under the mountain I took advantage of his absence to borrow from his rucksack the stone that is in my hand as I write these words.
I am aware that you will be feeling certain “misgivings” about my actions, and possibly even a little mistrust in consequence. Let me clarify for you and Mr. Malcolm the reasons behind what Dr. Pervani and I did when we left with the Magisterium vessel.
Dr. Pervani has been acting a “double role,” very dangerous, I assure you, in seeming to act for the Magisterium while secretly working as an agent for the group known sometimes as the “men from the mountains.” Both sides, she assures me, are despicable. She would like to see the destruction of both. Everything she has done has been done with that purpose in mind.
Before the Magisterium vessel arrived so unexpectedly, we had every intention of continuing with you on your journey to the red building in the desert. Dr. Pervani is convinced, as you are, that the secret of the “Rusakov field” is to be found there. Myself, I am, as you know, a skeptic about many things, but I trust her reasoning about this. The red building is of central importance.
When the vessel came into view on that stormy sea we had no more than a few seconds to decide what to do. That was the point at which I borrowed the lodestone. Dr. Pervani intended to continue her pretense to be on their side, and I went with her, claiming that I would throw all the resources of my intelligence and experience into the struggle alongside her. Fortunately I was able to convince her colleagues of my “bona fides.”
Now we are bound for Karamakan, as you are. When we arrive there we expect to find the Tashbulak station in the hands of an enemy both to the Magisterium and to you, and an enemy also to the “men from the mountains.” This enemy is very insidious, very deadly, and unless we can think strategically it will be the death of us all. These are complex currents. I shall write before long and tell you exactly what we discover, and we can formulate a “plan of action” together.
Please respond to me, my dear Miss Silver, Queen Tatiana. I hope with all the heart of a vagabond that you are safe, and that you will find your beloved dæmon, if you have not done so already.
Abdel Ionides
Asta sat and read it with her, and then they looked at each other without a word. Lyra blew out her cheeks.
“Well,” she managed to say.
“You trust him?”
“Yes. Well, no. Of course not. He’s a thief and a liar and God knows what else. But…Yes, I trust him. Naturally. He helped me such a lot…” She ran her fingers through her hair. It felt stiff and dirty, but that was too bad.
“Who are you talking about?” said Malcolm.
Lyra turned to look as he sat up carefully, blinking at the light, shading his eyes with his hand. “Can you see all right now?” she asked him. “Has your spangled thing gone?”
Asta butted his chin softly, and he stroked her back. “Yes. It’s gone, it’s clear. It just leaves me feeling a bit washed-out. What are you looking at?”
She showed him the lodestone. He screwed up his eyes to look at it, puzzled at first, and then realized what had happened.
“You mean this isn’t mine? It’s yours? Then who…” He took it from her, read it fully, and laughed. “ ‘Took advantage of his absence’…Very good. He doesn’t say anything about who he’s traveling with. They must have crossed the Caspian by now.”
“Who d’you think this other enemy is?”
“I think he’s loquacious enough to tell us if he has the chance. Are you going to reply?”
“Of course. As soon as I find my pencil.”
The point had broken. Malcolm offered her his knife.
“Can you do it?” she said.
He took it and she watched his deft movements as the shavings of cedarwood and grains of graphite fell away. The pencil was perfectly sharp in seconds.
“Don’t you like using a knife?” he said.
“My hand hurts. Thank you.”
She began to write:
Dear Mr. Ionides, thank you for this message. I think you are very dishonest for stealing the lodestone, but I’m glad you did. You don’t say where you are now. We are on the southern edge—she checked with Malcolm—of the Tien Shan mountains. Where are you? How are you traveling?
We want to know more about this other enemy. Who are they? What do they want? Tell us all you know.
She stopped there. She wanted to tell him about that other thing, the alkahest, the universal solvent: Was that the third enemy, in some way? But it was hard to sum up. Instead, she went on:
Today we survived an attack from the ogabgorgs—don’t know how to spell it—the witches tricked them into destroying themselves. The main army of the Magisterium is further north. We are safe but need more information now.
With my greetings, Tatiana R
She thought that was how queens signed themselves.
“Tatiana?” said Malcolm.
“I was Tatiana Iorekova, the queen of…I forget where. Novaya Zemlya, that’s it. He was my personal magician, my sorcier particulier. That was to get the audience with Mustafa Bey.”
“Perhaps it was this third enemy who killed Bey,” said Asta. “Have you heard of a third enemy before?”
“No. They’ve come out of nowhere.”
“Ionides thinks they might already be in control of the research station,” said Malcolm. “But look, Gulya’s coming. Perhaps it’s time to leave.”
The gryphon landed close by. The beating of her wings set up powerful eddies in the air and blew Lyra’s hair across her face as well as ruffling Asta’s fur. Gulya was still not used to managing her new size and power, but she clearly delighted in it.
“If we leave now,” she said, “we could arrive at the Tashbulak station by sunset.”
An idea occurred to Lyra. It came out of nowhere, but it had been generated by the report from Tilda as well as the message from Ionides.
“Gulya,” she said, “you know that my dæmon, Pan, went ahead with Tilda Vasara?”
“Indeed. And she has come back without him.”
“Well, I want to do the same thing. Go ahead. But I want to go directly to the red building.”
“Lyra, why?” said Malcolm. It sounded like a genuine inquiry, not like the beginning of a reproof.
“Because Pan’s in danger. I don’t want him to go into the red building before I do. Just a feeling I have. Will you fly us there, Gulya?”
“Yes. But only if Prince Keshvād agrees.”
“Of course.”
Without hesitation Gulya stretched out her wings and sprang into the air, wheeling high and then gliding down swiftly towards the prince.
“Lyra,” said Malcolm again. “Why?”
“This third enemy. I’m frightened by what he says—Ionides, I mean. Frightened for Pan, and frightened for all of us. You will come, won’t you?”
“As if I’d ever do anything else.”
She looked at him. His eyes were clear again and as blue as the sky, and he seemed to be made of sky things altogether: air and sunlight. She felt a little burst of joyful laughter, to think that someone like this was on her side, and then she saw Gulya spring up from the ground and sweep through the air back towards them. Malcolm stood and gathered his coat and rucksack, and Lyra stood beside him. Gulya landed with such a beating of her wings that Lyra was nearly buffeted off balance, and knocked into Malcolm. He caught her deftly.
“Gulya,” Lyra said, “who are the enemies the gryphons think are the most dangerous?”
Gulya said, “We fear no enemies.”
“I know you are fearless. But which enemy could do the most damage to the world?”
“One we can’t even see. One we don’t suspect for a moment. One we ignore. I can’t tell you who they are, because it’s in their nature to be invisible and unsuspected.”
“Do gryphons have stories about the end of the world?”
“We have stories about everything, but not that.”
Lyra nodded and put back the things she’d taken out of her rucksack, with the lodestone on top. Malcolm put on his big coat, and with Asta on his shoulders, he climbed up on Gulya’s back and helped Lyra up after him.
“Ready?” said the gryphon, and raised her wings. A few moments later they were in the air on the last leg of the journey to the red building.
* * *
—
As twilight fell, Pan ventured down the hillside towards the village and the research station beyond it, moving quickly, keeping close to the ground. Twilight was better than full darkness for hiding in, but the trouble was that it didn’t last.
He stopped several times to listen and to smell the air. He heard all the sounds he would have expected from a small village at dusk; voices, the crackle of flames, goat bells ringing occasionally as the animals moved around in their enclosure. Someone was intoning a prayer inside one of the houses; children were squabbling; men were laughing. He caught the smells of wood smoke, of grilling meat, of dung, of grass, and beyond them all, the bare and empty scent of the desert. A dog barked, and another took it up. Pan knew they had smelled him, but he ignored them and kept on through the tough grass towards the ruined station.
The moon would help when it rose, but it was now almost fully dark. Pan’s night-vision was good, though, and the shattered buildings and broken windows of the station lay fully open and clear.
He explored all around the buildings, noticing every slight glow from inside, counting the seven vehicles parked behind it, listening to every faint sound that reached him. From the village side there was little sign of occupation, but from the desert side half a dozen windows—or the spaces where windows had been—were lit, and three or four people were moving about inside the place.
The vehicles parked outside were mainly the kind used for cargo or building materials. One had the brandmark of Thuringia Potash on the side; the others had different symbols, and names in languages that Pan didn’t recognize. They were all covered in the dust of hundreds of miles’ travel.
Oh, Lyra, he thought. I can’t go much longer without you to talk to. And to fall asleep with. I’m weaker than I used to be and this is all frightening and I’m so tired of being alone…
He couldn’t even think much more than that. He stood still under one of the trucks and listened. If he concentrated, he could hear the sound of small burrowing creatures under the sand; and some kind of insect like a cricket was scraping away monotonously nearby; and there was the sound of an anbaric generator, no doubt the one that was powering the lights in the building, running on a naphtha engine; and the human voices that came from the nearest rooms in the building as people went past the broken windows. A woman, or two women, and maybe three or four men.
They spoke in different languages, but also in English, as if that was the one they had in common. He couldn’t hear enough of that to be sure what they were talking about, though he recognized some words like generator, logistics, hydrocarbon. These people must be experts from somewhere, planning to restore the research station, but that wasn’t hard to guess. Lyra could have imagined that herself.
He caught himself thinking that, and felt a pang of guilt. He’d set off full of self-importance to find the imagination he said she lacked, and now here he was, remarking to himself that she—
