Prologue

V1- ripped from official ebook - kud

Prologue

It was little more than three miles

from the Wall into the Old Kingdom, but that

was enough. Noonday sunshine could be seen on

the other side of the Wall in Ancelstierre, and not

a cloud in sight. Here, there was a clouded sunset,

and a steady rain had just begun to fall, coming

faster than the tents could be raised.

The midwife shrugged her cloak higher up

against her neck and bent over the woman again,

raindrops spilling from her nose onto the

upturned face below. The midwife’s breath blew

out in a cloud of white, but there was no answering

billow of air from her patient.

The midwife sighed and slowly straightened

up, that single movement telling the watchers

everything they needed to know. The woman

who had staggered into their forest camp was

dead, only holding on to life long enough to pass

it on to the baby at her side. But even as the midwife

picked up the pathetically small form beside

the dead woman, it shuddered within its wrappings,

and was still.

“The child, too?” asked one of the watchers, a

man who wore the mark of the Charter freshdrawn

in wood ash upon his brow. “Then there

shall be no need for baptism.”

His hand went up to brush the mark from his

forehead, then suddenly stopped, as a pale white

hand gripped his and forced it down in a single,

swift motion.

“Peace!” said a calm voice. “I wish you no

harm.”

The white hand released its grip and the

speaker stepped into the ring of firelight. The

others watched him without welcome, and

the hands that had half sketched Charter marks,

or gone to bowstrings and hilts, did not relax.

The man strode towards the bodies and looked

upon them. Then he turned to face the watchers,

pushing his hood back to reveal the face of someone

who had taken paths far from sunlight, for

his skin was a deathly white.

“I am called Abhorsen,” he said, and his words

sent ripples through the people about him, as if

he had cast a large and weighty stone into a pool

of stagnant water. “And there will be a baptism

tonight.”

The Charter Mage looked down on the bundle

in the midwife’s hands, and said: “The child is

dead, Abhorsen. We are travelers, our life lived

under the sky, and it is often harsh. We know

death, lord.”

“Not as I do,” replied Abhorsen, smiling so his

paper-white face crinkled at the corners and

drew back from his equally white teeth. “And I

say the child is not yet dead.”

The man tried to meet Abhorsen’s gaze, but faltered

and looked away at his fellows. None

moved, or made any sign, till a woman said, “So.

It is easily done. Sign the child, Arrenil. We will

make a new camp at Leovi’s Ford. Join us when

you are finished here.”

The Charter Mage inclined his head in assent,

and the others drifted away to pack up their halfmade

camp, slow with the reluctance of having

to move, but filled with a greater reluctance to

remain near Abhorsen, for his name was one of

secrets, and unspoken fears.

When the midwife went to lay the child down

and leave, Abhorsen spoke: “Wait. You will be

needed.”

The midwife looked down on the baby, and

saw that it was a girl child and, save for its stillness,

could be merely sleeping. She had heard of

Abhorsen, and if the girl could live . . . warily she

picked up the child again and held her out to the

Charter Mage.

“If the Charter does not—” began the man,

but Abhorsen held up a pallid hand and interrupted.

“Let us see what the Charter wills.”

The man looked at the child again and sighed.

Then he took a small bottle from his pouch and

held it aloft, crying out a chant that was the

beginning of a Charter; one that listed all things

that lived or grew, or once lived, or would live

again, and the bonds that held them all together.

As he spoke, a light came to the bottle, pulsing

with the rhythm of the chant. Then the chanter

was silent. He touched the bottle to the earth,

then to the sign of wood ash on his forehead, and

then upended it over the child.

A great flash lit the surrounding woods as the

glowing liquid splashed over the child’s head,

and the priest cried: “By the Charter that binds

all things, we name thee—”

Normally, the parents of the child would then

speak the name. Here, only Abhorsen spoke, and

he said:

“Sabriel.”

As he uttered the word, the wood ash disappeared

from the priest’s forehead, and slowly

formed on the child’s. The Charter had accepted

the baptism.

“But . . . but she is dead!” exclaimed the

Charter Mage, gingerly touching his forehead to

make sure the ash was truly gone.

He got no answer, for the midwife was staring

across the fire at Abhorsen, and Abhorsen was

staring at—nothing. His eyes reflected the dancing

flames, but did not see them.

Slowly, a chill mist began to rise from his body,

spreading towards the man and midwife, who

scuttled to the other side of the fire—wanting to

get away, but now too afraid to run.

He could hear the child crying, which was good.

If she had gone beyond the first gateway he

could not bring her back without more stringent

preparations, and a subsequent dilution of her

spirit.

The current was strong, but he knew this

branch of the river and waded past pools and

eddies that hoped to drag him under. Already, he

could feel the waters leaching his spirit, but his

will was strong, so they took only the color, not the

substance.

He paused to listen, and hearing the crying

diminish, hastened forward. Perhaps she was

already at the gateway, and about to pass.

The First Gate was a veil of mist, with a single

dark opening, where the river poured into the

silence beyond. Abhorsen hurried towards it, and

then stopped. The baby had not yet passed

through, but only because something had caught

her and picked her up. Standing there, looming

up out of the black waters, was a shadow darker

than the gate.

It was several feet higher than Abhorsen, and

there were pale marsh-lights burning where you

would expect to see eyes, and the fetid stench of

carrion rolled off it—a warm stench that relieved

the chill of the river.

Abhorsen advanced on the thing slowly,watching

the child it held loosely in the crook of a

shadowed arm. The baby was asleep, but restless,

and it squirmed towards the creature, seeking a

mother’s breast, but it only held her away from

itself, as if the child were hot, or caustic.

Slowly, Abhorsen drew a small, silver handbell

from the bandolier of bells across his chest, and

cocked his wrist to ring it. But the shadow-thing

held the baby up and spoke in a dry, slithery

voice, like a snake on gravel.

“Spirit of your spirit, Abhorsen. You can’t spell

me while I hold her. And perhaps I shall take her

beyond the gate, as her mother has already

gone.”

Abhorsen frowned, in recognition, and replaced

the bell. “You have a new shape, Kerrigor. And

you are now this side of the First Gate. Who was

foolish enough to assist you so far?”

Kerrigor smiled widely, and Abhorsen caught a

glimpse of fires burning deep inside his mouth.

“One of the usual calling,” he croaked. “But

unskilled. He didn’t realize it would be in the

nature of an exchange. Alas, his life was not sufficient

for me to pass the last portal. But now,

you have come to help me.”

“I, who chained you beyond the Seventh

Gate?”

“Yes,” whispered Kerrigor. “The irony does

not, I think, escape you. But if you want the

child . . .”

He made as if to throw the baby into the

stream and, with that jerk, woke her. Immediately,

she began to cry and her little fists reached

out to gather up the shadow-stuff of Kerrigor

like the folds of a robe. He cried out, tried to

detach her, but the tiny hands held tightly and he

was forced to overuse his strength, and threw

her from him. She landed, squalling, and was

instantly caught up in the flow of the river, but

Abhorsen lunged forward, snatching her from

both the river and Kerrigor’s grasping hands.

Stepping back, he drew the silver bell onehanded,

and swung it so it sounded twice. The

sound was curiously muffled, but true, and the

clear chime hung in the air, fresh and cutting,

alive. Kerrigor flinched at the sound, and fell

backwards to the darkness that was the gate.

“Some fool will soon bring me back, and

then . . .” he cried out, as the river took him

under. The waters swirled and gurgled and then

resumed their steady flow.

Abhorsen stared at the gate for a time, then

sighed and, placing the bell back in his belt,

looked at the baby held in his arm. She stared

back at him, dark eyes matching his own.

Already, the color had been drained from her

skin. Nervously, Abhorsen laid a hand across

the brand on her forehead and felt the glow of

her spirit within. The Charter mark had kept

her life contained when the river should have

drained it. It was her life-spirit that had so

burned Kerrigor.

She smiled up at him and gurgled a little, and

Abhorsen felt a smile tilting the corner of his

own mouth. Still smiling, he turned, and began

the long wade back up the river, to the gate that

would return them both to their living flesh.

The baby wailed a scant second before Abhorsen

opened his eyes, so that the midwife was already

halfway around the dying fire, ready to pick her

up. Frost crackled on the ground and icicles hung

from Abhorsen’s nose. He wiped them off with a

sleeve and leaned over the child, much as any

anxious father does after a birth.

“How is the babe?” he asked, and the midwife

stared at him wonderingly, for the dead child was

now loudly alive and as deathly white as he.

“As you hear, lord,” she answered. “She is very

well. It is perhaps a little cold for her—”

He gestured at the fire and spoke a word, and

it roared into life, the frost melting at once, the

raindrops sizzling into steam.

“That will do till morning,” said Abhorsen.

“Then I shall take her to my house. I shall have

need of a nurse.Will you come?”

The midwife hesitated, and looked to the

Charter Mage, who still lingered on the far side

of the fire. He refused to meet her glance and she

looked down once more at the little girl bawling

in her arms.

“You are . . . you are . . .” whispered the midwife.

“A necromancer?” said Abhorsen. “Only of a

sort. I loved the woman who lies here. She

would have lived if she had loved another, but

she did not. Sabriel is our child. Can you not see

the kinship?”

The midwife looked at him as he leant forward

and took Sabriel from her, rocking her on his

chest. The baby quietened and, in a few seconds,

was asleep.

“Yes,” said the midwife. “I shall come with

you, and look after Sabriel. But you must find a

wet-nurse . . .”

“And I daresay much else besides,” mused

Abhorsen. “But my house is not a place for—”

The Charter Mage cleared his throat, and

moved around the fire.

“If you seek a man who knows a little of the

Charter,” he said hesitantly, “I should wish to

serve, for I have seen its work in you, lord, though

I am loath to leave my fellow wanderers.”

“Perhaps you will not have to,” replied

Abhorsen, smiling at a sudden thought. “I wonder

if your leader will object to two new members

joining her band. For my work means I

must travel, and there is no part of the Kingdom

that has not felt the imprint of my feet.”

“Your work?” asked the man, shivering a little,

though it was no longer cold.

“Yes,” said Abhorsen. “I am a necromancer,

but not of the common kind. Where others of the

art raise the dead, I lay them back to rest. And

those that will not rest, I bind—or try to. I am

Abhorsen . . .”

He looked at the baby again, and added,

almost with a note of surprise, “Father of

Sabriel.”

chapter 1

The rabbit had been run over

minutes before. Its pink eyes were glazed and

blood stained its clean white fur. Unnaturally

clean fur, for it had just escaped from a bath. It

still smelt faintly of lavender water.

A tall, curiously pale young woman stood

over the rabbit. Her night-black hair, fashionably

bobbed, was hanging slightly over her face.

She wore no makeup or jewelry, save for an

enamelled school badge pinned to her regulation

navy blazer. That, coupled with her long

skirt, stockings and sensible shoes, identified her

as a schoolgirl. A nameplate under the badge

read “Sabriel” and the Roman “VI” and gilt

crown proclaimed her to be both a member of

the Sixth Form and a prefect.

The rabbit was, unquestionably, dead. Sabriel

looked up from it and back along the bricked

drive that left the road and curved up to an

imposing pair of wrought-iron gates. A sign

above the gate, in gilt letters of mock Gothic,

announced that they were the gates to Wyverley

College. Smaller letters added that the school

was “Established in 1652 for Young Ladies of

Quality.”

A small figure was busy climbing over the

gate, nimbly avoiding the spikes that were supposed

to stop such activities. She dropped the

last few feet and started running, her pigtails flying,

shoes clacking on the bricks. Her head was

down to gain momentum, but as cruising speed

was established, she looked up, saw Sabriel and

the dead rabbit, and screamed.

“Bunny!”

Sabriel flinched as the girl screamed, hesitated

for a moment, then bent down by the rabbit’s

side and reached out with one pale hand to

touch it between its long ears. Her eyes closed

and her face set as if she had suddenly turned to

stone. A faint whistling sound came from her

slightly parted lips, like the wind heard from far

away. Frost formed on her fingertips and rimed

the asphalt beneath her feet and knees.

The other girl, running, saw her suddenly tip

forward over the rabbit, and topple towards

the road, but at the last minute her hand came

out and she caught herself. A second later, she

had regained her balance and was using both

hands to restrain the rabbit—a rabbit now

inexplicably lively again, its eyes bright and

shiny, as eager to be off as when it escaped from

its bath.

“Bunny!” shrieked the younger girl again, as

Sabriel stood up, holding the rabbit by the scruff

of its neck. “Oh, thank you, Sabriel! When I

heard the car skidding I thought . . .”

She faltered as Sabriel handed the rabbit over

and blood stained her expectant hands.

“He’ll be fine, Jacinth,” Sabriel replied wearily.

“A scratch. It’s already closed up.”

Jacinth examined Bunny carefully, then looked

up at Sabriel, the beginnings of a wriggling fear

showing at the back of her eyes.

“There isn’t anything under the blood,” stammered

Jacinth. “What did you . . .”

“I didn’t,” snapped Sabriel. “But perhaps you

can tell me what you are doing out of bounds?”

“Chasing Bunny,” replied Jacinth, her eyes

clearing as life reverted to a more normal situation.

“You see . . .”

“No excuses,” recited Sabriel. “Remember

what Mrs. Umbrade said at Assembly on

Monday.”

“It’s not an excuse,” insisted Jacinth. “It’s a

reason.”

“You can explain it to Mrs. Umbrade then.”

“Oh, Sabriel! You wouldn’t! You know I was

only chasing Bunny. I’d never have come out—”

Sabriel held up her hands in mock defeat, and

gestured back to the gates.

“If you’re back inside within three minutes, I

won’t have seen you. And open the gate this

time. They won’t be locked till I go back inside.”

Jacinth smiled, her whole face beaming,

whirled around and sped back up the drive,

Bunny clutched against her neck. Sabriel

watched till she had gone through the gate, then

let the tremors take her till she was bent over,

shaking with cold. A moment of weakness and

she had broken the promise she had made both

to herself and her father. It was only a rabbit and

Jacinth did love it so much—but what would

that lead to? It was no great step from bringing

back a rabbit to bringing back a person.

Worse, it had been so easy. She had caught the

spirit right at the wellspring of the river, and had

returned it with barely a gesture of power, patching

the body with simple Charter symbols as

they stepped from death to life. She hadn’t even

needed bells, or the other apparatus of a necromancer.

Only a whistle and her will.

Death and what came after death was no great

mystery to Sabriel. She just wished it was.

It was Sabriel’s last term at Wyverley—the last

three weeks, in fact. She had graduated already,

coming first in English, equal first in Music,

third in Mathematics, seventh in Science, second

in Fighting Arts and fourth in Etiquette. She had

also been a runaway first in Magic, but that

wasn’t printed on the certificate. Magic only

worked in those regions of Ancelstierre close

to the Wall which marked the border with the

Old Kingdom. Farther away, it was considered

to be quite beyond the pale, if it existed at

all, and persons of repute did not mention it.

Wyverley College was only forty miles from

the Wall, had a good all-round reputation, and

taught Magic to those students who could obtain

special permission from their parents.

Sabriel’s father had chosen it for that reason

when he had emerged from the Old Kingdom

with a five-year-old girl in tow to seek a boarding

school. He had paid in advance for that first

year, in Old Kingdom silver deniers that stood

up to surreptitious touches with cold iron.

Thereafter, he had come to visit his daughter

twice a year, at Midsummer and Midwinter,

staying for several days on each occasion and

always bringing more silver.

Understandably, the Headmistress was very

fond of Sabriel. Particularly since she never

seemed troubled by her father’s rare visitations,

as most other girls would be. Once Mrs.

Umbrade had asked Sabriel if she minded, and

had been troubled by the answer that Sabriel

saw her father far more often than when he was

actually there. Mrs. Umbrade didn’t teach

Magic, and didn’t want to know any more about

it other than the pleasant fact that some parents

would pay considerable sums to have their

daughters schooled in the basics of sorcery and

enchantment.

Mrs. Umbrade certainly didn’t want to know

how Sabriel saw her father. Sabriel, on the other

hand, always looked forward to his unofficial

visits and watched the moon, tracing its movements

from the leather-bound almanac which

listed the phases of the moon in both Kingdoms

and gave valuable insights into the seasons, tides

and other ephemerae that were never the same

at any one time on both sides of the Wall.

Abhorsen’s sending of himself always appeared

at the dark of the moon.

On these nights, Sabriel would lock herself

into her study (a privilege of the Sixth Form—

previously she’d had to sneak into the library),

put the kettle on the fire, drink tea and read a

book until the characteristic wind rose up, extinguished

the fire, put out the electric light and rattled

the shutters—all necessary preparations, it

seemed, for her father’s phosphorescent sending

to appear in the spare armchair.

Sabriel was particularly looking forward to her

father’s visit that November. It would be his last,

because college was about to end and she wanted

to discuss her future. Mrs. Umbrade wanted her

to go to university, but that meant moving further

away from the Old Kingdom. Her magic would

wane and parental visitations would be limited

to actual physical appearances, and those might

well become even less frequent. On the other

hand, going to university would mean staying

with some of the friends she’d had virtually all

her life, girls she’d started school with at the

age of five. There would also be a much greater

world of social interaction, particularly with

young men, of which commodity there was a distinct

shortage around Wyverley College.

And the disadvantage of losing her magic

could possibly be offset by a lessening of her

affinity for death and the dead . . .

Sabriel was thinking of this as she waited, book

in hand, half-drunk cup of tea balanced precariously

on the arm of her chair. It was almost

midnight and Abhorsen hadn’t appeared. Sabriel

had checked the almanac twice and had even

opened the shutters to peer out through the glass

at the sky. It was definitely the dark of the moon,

but there was no sign of him. It was the first time

in her life that he hadn’t appeared and she felt

suddenly uneasy.

Sabriel rarely thought about what life was

really like in the Old Kingdom, but now old

stories came to mind and dim memories of when

she’d lived there with the Travelers. Abhorsen

was a powerful sorcerer, but even then . . .

“Sabriel! Sabriel!”

A high-pitched voice interrupted her thought,

quickly followed by a hasty knock and a rattle of

the doorknob. Sabriel sighed, pushed herself out

of her chair, caught the teacup and unlocked the

door.

A young girl stood on the other side, twisting

her nightcap from side to side in trembling

hands, her face white with fear.

“Olwyn!” exclaimed Sabriel. “What is it? Is

Sussen sick again?”

“No,” sobbed the girl. “I heard noises behind

the tower door, and I thought it was Rebece and

Ila having a midnight feast without me, so I

looked . . .”

“What!” exclaimed Sabriel, alarmed. No one

opened outside doors in the middle of the night,

not this close to the Old Kingdom.

“I’m sorry,” cried Olwyn. “I didn’t mean to. I

don’t know why I did. It wasn’t Rebece and Ila—

it was a black shape and it tried to get in. I

slammed the door . . .”

Sabriel threw the teacup aside and pushed

past Olwyn. She was already halfway down the

corridor before she heard the porcelain smash

behind her, and Olwyn’s horrified gasp at such

cavalier treatment of good china. She ignored

it and broke into a run, slapping on the light

switches as she ran towards the open door of

the west dormitory. As she reached it, screams

broke out inside, rapidly crescendoing to an

hysterical chorus. There were forty girls in the

dormitory—most of the First Form, all under

the age of eleven. Sabriel took a deep breath,

and stepped into the doorway, fingers crooked

in a spell-casting stance. Even before she looked,

she felt the presence of death.

The dormitory was very long, and narrow,

with a low roof and small windows. Beds and

dressers lined each side. At the far end, a door

led to the West Tower steps. It was supposed to

be locked inside and out, but locks rarely prevailed

against the powers of the Old Kingdom.

The door was open. An intensely dark shape

stood there, as if someone had cut a man-shaped

figure out of the night, carefully choosing a piece

devoid of stars. It had no features at all, but the

head quested from side to side, as if whatever

senses it did possess worked in a narrow range.

Curiously, it carried an absolutely mundane sack

in one four-fingered hand, the rough-woven

cloth in stark contrast to its own surreal flesh.

Sabriel’s hands moved in a complicated gesture,

drawing the symbols of the Charter that intimated

sleep, quiet and rest. With a flourish, she

indicated both sides of the dormitory and drew

one of the master symbols, drawing all together.

Instantly, every girl in the room stopped screaming

and slowly subsided back onto her bed.

The creature’s head stopped moving and

Sabriel knew its attention was now centered on

her. Slowly it moved, lifting one clumsy leg and

swinging it forward, resting for a moment, then

swinging the other a little past the first. A lumbering,

rolling motion, that made an eerie, shuffling

noise on the thin carpet. As it passed each

bed, the electric lights above them flared once

and went out.

Sabriel let her hands fall to her side and

focused her eyes on the center of the creature’s

torso, feeling the stuff of which it was made. She

had come without any of her instruments or

tools, but that led to only a moment’s hesitation

before she let herself slip over the border into

Death, her eyes still on the intruder.

The river flowed around her legs, cold as

always. The light, grey and without warmth,

still stretched to an entirely flat horizon. In the

distance, she could hear the roar of the First

Gate. She could see the creature’s true shape

clearly now, not wrapped in the aura of death

which it carried to the living world. It was an

Old Kingdom denizen, vaguely humanoid, but

more like an ape than a man and obviously

only semi-intelligent. But there was more to

it than that, and Sabriel felt the clutch of fear

as she saw the black thread that came from

the creature’s back and ran into the river.

Somewhere, beyond the First Gate, or even further,

that umbilical rested in the hands of an

Adept. As long as the thread existed the creature

would be totally under the control of its

master, who could use its senses and spirit as

it saw fit.

Something tugged at Sabriel’s physical body,

and she reluctantly twitched her senses back to

the living world, a slight feeling of nausea rising

in her as a wave of warmth rushed over her

death-chilled body.

“What is it?” said a calm voice, close to

Sabriel’s ear. An old voice, tinged with the power

of Charter Magic—Miss Greenwood, the

Magistrix of the school.

“It’s a Dead servant—a spirit form,” replied

Sabriel, her attention back on the creature. It was

halfway down the dorm, still single-mindedly

rolling one leg after the other. “Without free will.

Something sent it back to the living world. It’s

controlled from beyond the First Gate.”

“Why is it here?” asked the Magistrix. Her

voice sounded calm, but Sabriel felt the Charter

symbols gathering in her voice, forming on

her tongue—symbols that would unleash lightning

and flame, the destructive powers of the

earth.

“It’s not obviously malign, nor has it attempted

any actual harm . . .” replied Sabriel slowly, her

mind working over the possibilities. She was used

to explaining purely necromantic aspects of

magic to Miss Greenwood. The Magistrix had

taught her Charter Magic, but necromancy was

definitely not on the syllabus. Sabriel had learned

more than she wanted to know about necromancy

from her father . . . and the Dead themselves.

“Don’t do anything for a moment. I will

attempt to speak with it.”

The cold washed over her again, biting into her,

as the river gushed around her legs, eager to pull

her over and carry her away. Sabriel exerted her

will, and the cold became simply a sensation,

without danger, the current merely a pleasing

vibration about the feet.

The creature was close now, as it was in the

living world. Sabriel held out both her hands,

and clapped, the sharp sound echoing for longer

than it would anywhere else. Before the echo

died, Sabriel whistled several notes, and they

echoed too, sweet sounds within the harshness

of the handclap.

The thing flinched at the sound and stepped

back, putting both hands to its ears. As it did so,

it dropped the sack. Sabriel started in surprise.

She hadn’t noticed the sack before, possibly

because she hadn’t expected it to be there. Very

few inanimate things existed in both realms, the

living and the dead.

She was even more surprised as the creature suddenly

bent forward and plunged into the water,

hands searching for the sack. It found it almost at

once, but not without losing its footing. As the

sack surfaced, the current forced the creature

under. Sabriel breathed a sigh of relief as she saw

it slide away, then gasped as its head broke the

surface and it cried out: “Sabriel! My messenger!

Take the sack!” The voice was Abhorsen’s.

Sabriel ran forward and an arm pushed out

towards her, the neck of the sack clutched in its

fingers. She reached out, missed, then tried

again. The sack was secure in her grasp, as the

current took the creature completely under.

Sabriel looked after it, hearing the roar of the

First Gate suddenly increase as it always did

when someone passed its falls. She turned and

started to slog back against the current to a point

where she could easily return to life. The sack in

her hand was heavy and there was a leaden feeling

in her stomach. If the messenger was truly

Abhorsen’s, then he himself was unable to return

to the realm of the living.

And that meant he was either dead, or trapped

by something that should have passed beyond

the final gate.

Once again, a wave of nausea overcame her and

Sabriel fell to her knees, shaking. She could feel

the Magistrix’s hand on her shoulder, but her

attention was fastened on the sack she held in

her hand. She didn’t need to look to know that

the creature was gone. Its manifestation into the

living world had ceased as its spirit had gone

past the First Gate. Only a pile of grave mold

would remain, to be swept aside in the morning.

“What did you do?” asked the Magistrix, as

Sabriel brushed her hands through her hair, ice

crystals falling from her hands onto the sack that

lay in front of her knees.

“It had a message for me,” replied Sabriel. “So

I took it.”

She opened the sack, and reached inside. A

sword hilt met her grasp, so she drew it out, still

scabbarded, and put it to one side. She didn’t

need to draw it to see the Charter symbols

etched along its blade—the dull emerald in the

pommel and the worn bronze-plated crossguard

were as familiar to her as the school’s

uninspired cutlery. It was Abhorsen’s sword.

The leather bandolier she drew out next was

an old brown belt, a hand’s-breadth wide, which

always smelled faintly of beeswax. Seven tubular

leather pouches hung from it, starting with one

the size of a small pill bottle; growing larger, till

the seventh was almost the size of a jar. The bandolier

was designed to be worn across the chest,

with the pouches hanging down. Sabriel opened

the smallest and pulled out a tiny silver bell, with

a dark, deeply polished mahogany handle. She

held it gently, but the clapper still swung slightly,

and the bell made a high, sweet note that somehow

lingered in the mind, even after the sound

was gone.

“Father’s instruments,” whispered Sabriel.

“The tools of a necromancer.”

“But there are Charter marks engraved on the

bell . . . and the handle!” interjected the

Magistrix, who was looking down with fascination.

“Necromancy is Free Magic, not governed

by the Charter . . .”

“Father’s was different,” replied Sabriel distantly,

still staring at the bell she held in her

hand, thinking of her father’s brown, lined hands

holding the bells. “Binding, not raising. He was

a faithful servant of the Charter.”

“You’re going to be leaving us, aren’t you?”

the Magistrix said suddenly, as Sabriel replaced

the bell and stood up, sword in one hand, bandolier

in the other. “I just saw it, in the reflection

of the bell. You were crossing the Wall . . .”

“Yes. Into the Old Kingdom,” said Sabriel,

with sudden realization. “Something has happened

to Father . . . but I’ll find him . . . so I

swear by the Charter I bear.”

She touched the Charter mark on her forehead,

which glowed briefly, and then faded so that it

might never have been. The Magistrix nodded

and touched a hand to her own forehead, where

a glowing mark suddenly obscured all the patterns

of time. As it faded, rustling noises and

faint whimpers began to sound along both sides

of the dormitory.

“I’ll shut the door and explain to the girls,” the

Magistrix said firmly. “You’d better go and . . .

prepare for tomorrow.”

Sabriel nodded and left, trying to fix her mind

on the practicalities of the journey, rather than

on what could have happened to her father.

She would take a cab as early as possible into

Bain, the nearest town, and then a bus to the

Ancelstierre perimeter that faced the Wall. With

luck, she would be there by early afternoon . . .

Behind these plans, her thoughts kept jumping

back to Abhorsen. What could have happened

to trap him in Death? And what could she really

hope to do about it, even if she did get to the Old

Kingdom?

chapter ii

The Perimeter in Ancelstierre

ran from coast to coast, parallel to the Wall and

perhaps half a mile from it. Concertina wire lay

like worms impaled on rusting steel pickets; forward

defenses for an interlocking network of

trenches and concrete pillboxes. Many of these

strong points were designed to control the

ground behind them as well as in front, and

almost as much barbed wire stretched behind

the trenches, guarding the rear.

In fact, the Perimeter was much more successful

at keeping people from Ancelstierre out of the

Old Kingdom, than it was at preventing things

from the Old Kingdom going the other way.

Anything powerful enough to cross the Wall usually

retained enough magic to assume the shape

of a soldier; or to become invisible and simply go

where it willed, regardless of barbed wire, bullets,

hand grenades and mortar bombs—which

often didn’t work at all, particularly when the

wind was blowing from the North, out of the

Old Kingdom.

Due to the unreliability of technology, the

Ancelstierran soldiers of the Perimeter garrison

wore mail over their khaki battledress, had nasal

and neck bars on their helmets and carried

extremely old-fashioned sword-bayonets in wellworn

scabbards. Shields, or more correctly,

“bucklers, small, Perimeter garrison only,” were

carried on their backs, the factory khaki long

since submerged under brightly painted regimental

or personal signs. Camouflage was not

considered an issue at this particular posting.

Sabriel watched a platoon of young soldiers

march past the bus, while she waited for the

tourists ahead of her to stampede out the front

door, and wondered what they thought of their

strange duties. Most would have to be conscripts

from far to the south, where no magic crept over

the Wall and widened the cracks in what they

thought of as reality. Here, she could feel magic

potential brewing, lurking in the atmosphere like

charged air before a thunderstorm.

The Wall itself looked normal enough, past the

wasteland of wire and trenches. Just like any

other medieval remnant. It was stone and old,

about forty feet high and crenellated. Nothing

remarkable, until the realization set in that it was

in a perfect state of preservation. And for those

with the sight, the very stones crawled with

Charter marks—marks in constant motion,

twisting and turning, sliding and rearranging

themselves under a skin of stone.

The final confirmation of strangeness lay

beyond the Wall. It was clear and cool on the

Ancelstierre side, and the sun was shining—but

Sabriel could see snow falling steadily behind the

Wall, and snow-heavy clouds clustered right up

to the Wall, where they suddenly stopped, as if

some mighty weather-knife had simply sheared

through the sky.

Sabriel watched the snow fall, and gave thanks

for her Almanac. Printed by letterpress, the type

had left ridges in the thick, linen-rich paper,

making the many handwritten annotations

waver precariously between the lines. One spidery

remark, written in a hand she knew wasn’t

her father’s, gave the weather to be expected

under the respective calendars for each country.

Ancelstierre had “Autumn. Likely to be cool.”

The Old Kingdom had “Winter. Bound to be

snowing. Skis or snowshoes.”

The last tourist left, eager to reach the observation

platform. Although the Army and the

Government discouraged tourists, and there was

no accommodation for them within twenty

miles of the Wall, one busload a day was allowed

to come and view the Wall from a tower

located well behind the lines of the Perimeter.

Even this concession was often cancelled, for

when the wind blew from the north, the bus

would inexplicably break down a few miles

short of the tower, and the tourists would have

to help push it back towards Bain—only to see it

start again just as mysteriously as it stopped.

The authorities also made some slight

allowance for the few people authorized to

travel from Ancelstierre to the Old Kingdom,

as Sabriel saw after she had successfully negotiated

the bus’s steps with her backpack, crosscountry

skis, stocks and sword, all threatening

to go in different directions. A large sign next

to the bus stop proclaimed:

PERIMETER COMMAND

NORTHERN ARMY GROUP

Unauthorized egress from the Perimeter

Zone is strictly forbidden.

Anyone attempting to cross the Perimeter

Zone will be shot without warning.

Authorized travelers must report to the

Perimeter Command H.Q.

REMEMBER—

NO WARNING WILL BE MADE

Sabriel read the note with interest, and felt a

quickening sense of excitement start within her.

Her memories of the Old Kingdom were dim,

from the perspective of a child, but she felt a

sense of mystery and wonder kindle with the

force of the Charter Magic she felt around her—

a sense of something so much more alive than

the bitumened parade ground, and the scarlet

warning sign. And much more freedom than

Wyverley College.

But that feeling of wonder and excitement

came laced with a dread that she couldn’t shake,

a dread made up of fear for what might be happening

to her father . . . what might have already

happened . . .

The arrow on the sign indicating where

authorized travelers should go seemed to point

in the direction of a bitumen parade ground,

lined with white-painted rocks, and a number

of unprepossessing wooden buildings. Other

than that, there were simply the beginnings of

the communication trenches that sank into the

ground and then zigzagged their way to the

double line of trenches, blockhouses and fortifications

that confronted the Wall.

Sabriel studied them for a while, and saw the

flash of color as several soldiers hopped out of

one trench and went forward to the wire. They

seemed to be carrying spears rather than rifles

and she wondered why the Perimeter was built

for modern war, but manned by people expecting

something rather more medieval. Then she

remembered a conversation with her father and

his comment that the Perimeter had been

designed far away in the South, where they

refused to admit that this perimeter was different

from any other contested border. Up until a

century or so ago, there had also been a wall on

the Ancelstierre side. A lowish wall, made of

rammed earth and peat, but a successful one.

Recalling that conversation, her eyes made out

a low rise of scarred earth in the middle of the

desolation of wire, and she realized that was

where the southern wall had been. Peering at it,

she also realized that what she had taken to be

loose pickets between lines of concertina wire

were something different—tall constructs more

like the trunks of small trees stripped of every

branch. They seemed familiar to her, but she

couldn’t place what they were.

Sabriel was still staring at them, thinking,

when a loud and not very pleasant voice erupted

a little way behind her right ear.

“What do you think you’re doing, Miss? You

can’t loiter about here. On the bus, or up to the

Tower!”

Sabriel winced and turned as quickly as she

could, skis sliding one way and stocks the other,

framing her head in a St. Andrew’s Cross. The

voice belonged to a large but fairly young soldier,

whose bristling mustaches were more evidence

of martial ambition than proof of them. He had

two gilded bands on his sleeve, but didn’t wear

the mail hauberk and helmet Sabriel had seen on

the other soldiers. He smelled of shaving cream

and talc, and was so clean, polished and full of

himself that Sabriel immediately catalogued him

as some sort of natural bureaucrat currently disguised

as a soldier.

“I am a citizen of the Old Kingdom,” she

replied quietly, staring back into his red flushed

face and piggy eyes in the manner which Miss

Prionte had taught her girls to instruct lesser

domestic servants in Etiquette IV. “I am returning

there.”

“Papers!” demanded the soldier, after a moment’s

hesitation at the words “Old Kingdom.”

Sabriel gave a frosty smile (also part of Miss

Prionte’s curriculum) and made a ritual movement

with the tips of her fingers—the symbol

of disclosing, of things hidden becoming seen,

of unfolding. As her fingers sketched, she

formed the symbol in her mind, linking it with

the papers she carried in the inner pocket of

her leather tunic. Finger-sketched and minddrawn

symbol merged, and the papers were

in her hand. An Ancelstierre passport, as well

as the much rarer document the Ancelstierre

Perimeter Command issued to people who had

traffic in both countries: a hand-bound document

printed by letterpress on handmade paper,

with an artist’s sketch instead of a photograph

and prints from thumbs and toes in a purple

ink.

The soldier blinked, but said nothing. Perhaps,

thought Sabriel, as he took the proffered documents,

the man thought it was a parlor trick. Or

perhaps he just didn’t notice. Maybe Charter

Magic was common here, so close to the Wall.

The man looked through her documents carefully,

but without real interest. Sabriel now felt

certain that he was no one important from the

way he pawed through her special passport. He’d

obviously never seen one before. Mischievously,

she started to weave the Charter mark for a

snatch, or catch, to flick the papers out of his

hands and back into her pocket before his piggy

eyes worked out what was going on.

But, in the first second of motion, she felt

the flare of other Charter Magic to either side

and behind her—and heard the clattering of

hobnails on the bitumen. Her head snapped

back from the papers, and she felt her hair

whisk across her forehead as she looked from

side to side. Soldiers were pouring out of the

huts and out of the trenches, sword-bayonets

in their hands and rifles at the shoulder.

Several of them wore badges that she realized

marked them as Charter Mages. Their fingers

were weaving warding symbols, and barriers

that would lock Sabriel into her footsteps, tie

her to her shadow. Crude magic, but strongly

cast.

Instinctively, Sabriel’s mind and hands

flashed into the sequence of symbols that

would wipe clean these bonds, but her skis

shifted and fell into the crook of her elbow,

and she winced at the blow.

At the same time, a soldier ran ahead of the

others, sunlight glinting on the silver stars on

his helmet.

“Stop!” he shouted. “Corporal, step back

from her!”

The corporal, deaf to the hum of Charter

Magic, blind to the flare of half-wrought

signs, looked up from her papers and gaped

for a second, fear erasing his features. He

dropped the passports, and stumbled back.

In his face, Sabriel suddenly realized what it

meant to use magic on the Perimeter, and she

held herself absolutely still, blanking out the

partly made signs in her mind. Her skis

slipped further down her arm, the bindings

catching for a moment before tearing loose

and clattering onto the ground. Soldiers

rushed forward and, in seconds, formed a ring

around her, swords angled towards her throat.

She saw streaks of silver, plated onto the

blades, and crudely written Charter symbols,

and understood. These weapons were made to

kill things that were already dead—inferior

versions of the sword she wore at her own

side.

The man who’d shouted—an officer, Sabriel

realized—bent down and picked up her passports.

He studied them for a moment, then

looked up at Sabriel. His eyes were pale blue and

held a mixture of harshness and compassion that

Sabriel found familiar, though she couldn’t place

it—till she remembered her father’s eyes.

Abhorsen’s eyes were so dark brown they

seemed black, but they held a similar feeling.

The officer closed the passport, tucked it in his

belt and tilted his helmet back with two fingers,

revealing a Charter mark still glowing with some

residual charm of warding. Cautiously, Sabriel

lifted her hand, and then, as he didn’t dissuade

her, reached out with two fingers to touch the

mark. As she did so, he reached forward and

touched her own—Sabriel felt the familiar swirl

of energy, and the feeling of falling into some

endless galaxy of stars. But the stars here were

Charter symbols, linked in some great dance

that had no beginning or end, but contained and

described the world in its movement. Sabriel

knew only a small fraction of the symbols, but

she knew what they danced, and she felt the

purity of the Charter wash over her.

“An unsullied Charter mark,” the officer pronounced

loudly, as their fingers fell back to their

sides. “She is no creature or sending.”

The soldiers fell back, sheathing swords and

clicking on safety catches. Only the red-faced

corporal didn’t move, his eyes still staring at

Sabriel, as if he was unsure what he was looking

at.

“Show’s over, Corporal,” said the officer, his

voice and eyes now harsh. “Get back to the pay

office. You’ll see stranger happenings than this

in your time here—stay clear of them and you

might stay alive!

“So,” he said, taking the documents from his

belt and handing them back to Sabriel. “You are

the daughter of Abhorsen. I am Colonel Horyse,

the commander of a small part of the garrison

here—a unit the Army likes to call the Northern

Perimeter Reconaissance Unit and everyone else

calls the Crossing Point Scouts—a somewhat

motley collection of Ancelstierrans who’ve managed

to gain a Charter mark and some small

knowledge of magic.”

“Pleased to meet you, sir,” popped out of

Sabriel’s school-trained mouth, before she could

stifle it. A schoolgirl’s answer, she knew, and felt

a blush rise in her pale cheeks.

“Likewise,” said the Colonel, bending down.

“May I take your skis?”

“If you would be so kind,” said Sabriel, falling

back on formality.

The Colonel picked them up with ease, carefully

retied the stocks to the skis, refastened the

bindings that had come undone and tucked the

lot under one muscular arm.

“I take it you intend to cross into the Old

Kingdom?” asked Horyse, as he found the balancing

point of his load and pointed at the scarlet

sign on the far side of the parade ground. “We’ll

have to check in with Perimeter HQ—there are

a few formalities, but it shouldn’t take long.

Is someone . . . Abhorsen, coming to meet

you?”

His voice faltered a little as he mentioned

Abhorsen, a strange stutter in so confident a

man. Sabriel glanced at him and saw that his

eyes flickered from the sword at her waist to the

bell-bandolier she wore across her chest.

Obviously he recognized Abhorsen’s sword and

also the significance of the bells. Very few people

ever met a necromancer, but anyone who did

remembered the bells.

“Did . . . do you know my father?” she asked.

“He used to visit me, twice a year. I guess he

would have come through here.”

“Yes, I saw him then,” replied Horyse, as they

started walking around the edge of the parade

ground. “But I first met him more than twenty

years ago, when I was posted here as a subaltern.

It was a strange time—a very bad time, for me

and everyone on the Perimeter.”

He paused in mid-stride, boots crashing, and his

eyes once again looked at the bells, and the whiteness

of Sabriel’s skin, stark against the black of

her hair, black as the bitumen under the feet.

“You’re a necromancer,” he said bluntly. “So

you’ll probably understand. This crossing point

has seen too many battles, too many dead.

Before those idiots down South took things

under central command, the crossing point was

moved every ten years, up to the next gate on

the Wall. But forty years ago some . . . bureaucrat

. . . decreed that there would be no movement.

It was a waste of public money. This was,

and is to be, the only crossing point. Never mind

the fact that, over time, there would be such a

concentration of death, mixed with Free Magic

leaking over the Wall, that everything would . . .”

“Not stay dead,” interrupted Sabriel quietly.

“Yes. When I arrived, the trouble was just

beginning. Corpses wouldn’t stay buried—our

people or Old Kingdom creatures. Soldiers killed

the day before would turn up on parade.

Creatures prevented from crossing would rise up

and do more damage than they did when they

were alive.”

“What did you do?” asked Sabriel. She knew a

great deal about binding and enforcing true death,

but not on such a scale. There were no Dead creatures

nearby now, for she always instinctively felt

the interface between life and death around her,

and it was no different here than it had been forty

miles away at Wyverley College.

“Our Charter Mages tried to deal with the

problem, but there were no specific Charter

symbols to . . . make them dead . . . only to

destroy their physical shape. Sometimes that

was enough and sometimes it wasn’t. We had

to rotate troops back to Bain or even further

just for them to recover from what HQ liked to

think of as bouts of mass hysteria or madness.

“I wasn’t a Charter Mage then, but I was going

with patrols into the Old Kingdom, beginning to

learn. On one patrol, we met a man sitting by a

Charter Stone, on top of a hill that overlooked

both the Wall and the Perimeter.

“As he was obviously interested in the Perimeter,

the officer in charge of the patrol thought

we should question him and kill him if he turned

out to bear a corrupted Charter, or was some Free

Magic thing in the shape of a man. But we didn’t,

of course. It was Abhorsen, and he was coming to

us, because he’d heard about the Dead.

“We escorted him in and he met with the

General commanding the garrison. I don’t know

what they agreed, but I imagine it was for

Abhorsen to bind the Dead and, in return, he was

to be granted citizenship of Ancelstierre and freedom

to cross the Wall. He certainly had the two

passports after that. In any case, he spent the next

few months carving the wind flutes you can see

among the wire . . .”

“Ah!” exclaimed Sabriel. “I wondered what

they were. Wind flutes. That explains a lot.”

“I’m glad you understand,” said the

Colonel. “I still don’t. For one thing, they

make no sound no matter how hard the wind

blows through them. They have Charter symbols

on them I had never seen before he carved

them, and have never seen again anywhere

else. But when he started placing them . . . one

a night . . . the Dead just gradually disappeared,

and no new ones rose.”

They reached the far end of the parade

ground, where another scarlet sign stood

next to a communication trench, proclaiming:

“Perimeter Garrison HQ. Call and Wait for

Sentry.”

A telephone handset and a bell-chain proclaimed

the usual dichotomy of the Perimeter.

Colonel Horyse picked up the handset, wound

the handle, listened for a moment, then

replaced it. Frowning, he pulled the bell-chain

three times in quick succession.

“Anyway,” he continued, as they waited for

the sentry. “Whatever it was, it worked. So we

are deeply indebted to Abhorsen, and that

makes his daughter an honored guest.”

“I may be less honored and more reviled as a

messenger of ill omen,” said Sabriel quietly. She

hesitated, for it was hard to talk about Abhorsen

without tears coming to her eyes, then continued

quickly, to get it over and done with. “The reason

I am going into the Old Kingdom is to . . .

to look for my father. Something has happened

to him.”

“I had hoped there was another reason for you

to carry his sword,” said Horyse. He moved the

skis into the crook of his left arm, freeing his

right, to return the salute of the two sentries who

were running at the double up the communication

trench, hobnails clacking on the wooden

slats.

“There is worse, I think,” added Sabriel, taking

a deep breath to stop her voice from breaking

into sobs. “He is trapped in Death . . . or . . . or

he may even be dead. And his bindings will be

broken.”

“The wind flutes?” asked Horyse, grounding

the end of the skis, his salute dying out halfway

to his head. “All the Dead here?”

“The flutes play a song only heard in Death,”

replied Sabriel, “continuing a binding laid down

by Abhorsen. But the bound are tied to him, and

the flutes will have no power if . . . they will have

no power if Abhorsen is now among the Dead.

They will bind no more.”

chapter III

“I am not one to blame a messenger

for her tidings,” said Horyse, as he handed

a cup of tea over to Sabriel, who was sitting on

what looked like the only comfortable chair in

the dugout which was the Colonel’s headquarters,

“but you bring the worst news I have heard

for many years.”

“At least I am a living messenger . . . and a

friendly one,” Sabriel said quietly. She hadn’t

really thought beyond her own concern for her

father. Now, she was beginning to expand her

knowledge of him, to understand that he was

more than just her father, that he was many different

things to different people. Her simple

image of him—relaxing in the armchair of her

study at Wyverley College, chatting about her

schoolwork, Ancelstierre technology, Charter

Magic and necromancy—was a limited view, like

a painting that only captured one dimension of

the man.

“How long do we have until Abhorsen’s bindings

are broken?” asked Horyse, breaking into

Sabriel’s remembrance of her father. The image

she had of her father reaching for a teacup in her

study disappeared, banished by real tea slopping

over in her enamel mug and burning her fingers.

“Oh! Excuse me. I wasn’t thinking . . . how

long till what?”

“The binding of the dead,” the Colonel reiterated,

patiently. “How long till the bindings fail,

and the dead are free?”

Sabriel thought back to her father’s lessons,

and the ancient grimoire she’d spent every holiday

slowly memorizing. The Book of the Dead it

was called and parts of it still made her shudder.

It looked innocuous enough, bound in green

leather, with tarnished silver clasps. But if you

looked closely, both leather and silver were

etched with Charter marks. Marks of binding

and blinding, closing and imprisonment. Only a

trained necromancer could open that book . . .

and only an uncorrupted Charter Mage could

close it. Her father had brought it with him on

his visits, and always took it away again at the

end.

“It depends,” she said slowly, forcing herself to

consider the question objectively, without letting

emotion interfere. She tried to recall the pages

that showed the carving of the wind flutes, the

chapters on music and the nature of sound in the

binding of the dead. “If Father . . . if Abhorsen

is . . . truly dead, the wind flutes will simply fall

apart under the light of the next full moon. If he

is trapped before the Ninth Gate, the binding will

continue until the full moon after he passes

beyond, or a particularly strong spirit breaks the

weakened bonds.”

“So the moon will tell, in time,” said Horyse.

“We have fourteen days till it is full.”

“It is possible I could bind the dead anew,”

Sabriel said cautiously. “I mean, I haven’t done

it on this sort of scale. But I know how. The

only thing is, if Father isn’t . . . isn’t beyond the

Ninth Gate, then I need to help him as soon as

I can. And before I can do that, I must get to his

house and gather a few things . . . check some

references.”

“How far is this house beyond the Wall?” asked

Horyse, a calculating look on his face.

“I don’t know,” replied Sabriel.

“What?”

“I don’t know. I haven’t been there since I was

about four. I think it’s supposed to be a secret.

Father had many enemies, not just among the

dead. Petty necromancers, Free Magic sorcerers,

witches—”

“You don’t seem disturbed by your lack of

directions,” interrupted the Colonel dryly. For the

first time, a hint of doubt, even fatherly condescension,

had crept into his voice, as if Sabriel’s

youth undermined the respect due to her as both

a Charter Mage and necromancer.

“Father taught me to how to call a guide who

will give me directions,” replied Sabriel coolly.

“And I know it’s less than four days’ travel

away.”

That silenced Horyse, at least for the moment.

He nodded and, standing cautiously, so his head

didn’t hit the exposed beams of the dugout, he

walked over to a steel filing cabinet that was

rusting from the dark brown mud that oozed

between the pale planks of the revetment.

Opening the cabinet with a practiced heave of

considerable force, he found a mimeographed

map and rolled it out on the table.

“We’ve never been able to get our hands on a

genuine Old Kingdom map. Your father had

one, but he was the only person who could see

anything on it—it just looked like a square of

calfskin to me. A small magic, he said, but since

he couldn’t teach it, perhaps not so small . . .

Anyway, this map is a copy of the latest version

of our patrol map, so it only goes out about ten

miles from the crossing point. The garrison

standing orders strictly forbid us to go further.

Patrols tend not to come back beyond that distance.

Maybe they desert, or maybe . . .”

His tone of voice suggested that even nastier

things happened to the patrols, but Sabriel

didn’t question him. A small portion of the Old

Kingdom lay spread out on the table and, once

again, excitement stirred up within her.

“We generally go out along the Old North

Road,” said Horyse, tracing it with one hand,

the sword calluses on his fingers rasping across

the map, like the soft sandpapering of a master

craftsman. “Then the patrols sweep back, either

south-east or south-west, till they hit the Wall.

Then they follow that back to the gate.”

“What does this symbol mean?” asked Sabriel,

pointing to a blacked-in square atop one of the

farther hills.

“That’s a Charter Stone,” replied the Colonel.

“Or part of one now. It was riven in two, as if

struck by lightning, a month or so ago. The

patrols have started to call it Cloven Crest, and

they avoid it if possible. Its true name is

Barhedrin Hill and the stone once carried the

Charter for a village of the same name. Before

my time, anyway. If the village still exists it must

be further north, beyond the reach of our

patrols. We’ve never had any reports of inhabitants

from it coming south to Cloven Crest. The

fact is, we have few reports of people, fullstop.

The Garrison Log used to show considerable

interaction with Old Kingdom people—farmers,

merchants, travelers and so on—but encounters

have become rarer over the last hundred years,

and very rare in the last twenty. The patrols

would be lucky to see even two or three people

a year now. Real people that is, not creatures or

Free Magic constructs, or the Dead. We see far

too many of those.”

“I don’t understand,” muttered Sabriel. “Father

often used to talk of villages and towns . . . even

cities, in the Old Kingdom. I remember some of

them from my childhood . . . well, I sort of remember

. . . I think.”

“Further into the Old Kingdom, certainly,”

replied the Colonel. “The records mention quite

a few names of towns and cities. We know that

the people up there call the area around the Wall

‘the Borderlands.’ And they don’t say it with any

fondness.”

Sabriel didn’t answer, bending her head

lower over the map, thinking about the journey

that lay ahead of her. Cloven Crest might

be a good waypoint. It was no more than eight

miles away, so she should be able to ski there

before nightfall if she left fairly soon, and if it

wasn’t snowing too hard across the Wall. A

broken Charter Stone did not bode well, but

there would be some magic there and the path

into Death would be easier to tread. Charter

Stones were often erected where Free Magic

flowed and crossroads of the Free Magic currents

were often natural doorways into the

realm of death. Sabriel felt a shiver inch up

her spine at the thought of what might use

such a doorway and the tremor passed through

to her fingers on the map.

She looked up suddenly, and saw Colonel

Horyse looking at her long, pale hands, the

heavy paper of the map still shuddering at her

touch. With an effort of will, she stilled the

movement.

“I have a daughter almost your age,” he said

quietly. “Back in Corvere, with my wife. I would

not let her cross into the Old Kingdom.”

Sabriel met his gaze, and her eyes were not the

uncertain, flickering beacons of adolescence.

“I am only eighteen years old on the outside,”

she said, touching her palm against her breast

with an almost wistful motion. “But I first walked

in Death when I was twelve. I encountered a Fifth

Gate Rester when I was fourteen, and banished it

beyond the Ninth Gate. When I was sixteen I

stalked and banished a Mordicant that came near

the school. A weakened Mordicant, but still . . . A

year ago, I turned the final page of The Book of

the Dead. I don’t feel young anymore.”

“I am sorry for that,” said the Colonel, then,

almost as if he had surprised himself, he added,

“Ah, I mean that I wish you some of the foolish

joys my daughter has—some of the lightness, the

lack of responsibility that goes with youth. But I

don’t wish it if it will weaken you in the times

ahead. You have chosen a difficult path.”

“‘Does the walker choose the path, or the path

the walker?’” Sabriel quoted, the words, redolent

with echoes of Charter Magic, twining around

her tongue like some lingering spice. Those words

were the dedication in the front of her almanac.

They were also the very last words, all alone on

the last page, of The Book of the Dead.

“I’ve heard that before,” remarked Horyse.

“What does it mean?”

“I don’t know,” said Sabriel.

“It holds power when you say it,” added the

Colonel slowly. He swallowed, open-mouthed,

as if the taste of the Charter marks was still in

the air. “If I spoke those words, that’s all they

would be. Just words.”

“I can’t explain it.” Sabriel shrugged, and attempted

a smile. “But I do know other sayings

that are more to the point at the moment, like:

‘Traveler, embrace the morning light, but do not

take the hand of night.’ I must be on my way.”

Horyse smiled at the old rhyme, so beloved of

grandmothers and nannies, but it was an empty

smile. His eyes slid a little away from Sabriel’s

and she knew that he was thinking about refusing

to let her cross the Wall. Then he sighed, the

short, huffy sigh of a man who is forced into a

course of action through lack of alternatives.

“Your papers are in order,” he said, meeting

her gaze once again. “And you are the daughter

of Abhorsen. I cannot do other than let you pass.

But I can’t help feeling that I am thrusting you

out to meet some terrible danger. I can’t even

send a patrol out with you, since we have five

full patrols already out there.”

“I expected to go alone,” replied Sabriel. She

had expected that, but felt a tinge of regret. A

protective group of soldiers would be quite a

comfort. The fear of being alone in a strange and

dangerous land, even if it was her homeland,

was only just below the level of her excitement.

It wouldn’t take much for the fear to rise over it.

And always, there was the picture of her father

in her mind. Her father in trouble, trapped and

alone in the chill waters of Death . . .

“Very well,” said Horyse. “Sergeant!”

A helmeted head appeared suddenly around

the doorway, and Sabriel realized two soldiers

must have been standing on guard outside the

dugout, on the steps up into the communication

trench. She wondered if they’d heard.

“Prepare a crossing party,” snapped Horyse.

“A single person to cross. Miss Abhorsen, here.

And Sergeant, if you or Private Rahise so much

as talk in your sleep about what you may have

heard here, then you’ll be on gravedigging

fatigues for the rest of your lives!”

“Yes, sir!” came the sharp reply, echoed by the

unfortunate Private Rahise, who, Sabriel noted,

did seem half-asleep.

“After you, please,” continued Horyse, gesturing

towards the door. “May I carry your skis

again?”

The Army took no chances when it came to

crossing the Wall. Sabriel stood alone under the

great arch of the gate that pierced the Wall, but

archers stood or knelt in a reverse arrowhead

formation around the gate, and a dozen swordsmen

had gone ahead with Colonel Horyse. A

hundred yards behind her, past a zigzagged lane

of barbed wire, two Lewyn machine-gunners

watched from a forward emplacement—though

Sabriel noted they had drawn their swordbayonets

and thrust them, ready for use, in the

sandbags, showing little faith in their air-cooled

45-rounds-per-minute tools of destruction.

There was no actual gate in the archway,

though rusting hinges swung like mechanical

hands on either side and sharp shards of oak

thrust out of the ground, like teeth in a broken

jaw, testimony to some explosion of modern

chemistry or magical force.

It was snowing lightly on the Old Kingdom

side, and the wind channeled occasional snowflakes

through the gate into Ancelstierre, where

they melted on the warmer ground of the south.

One caught in Sabriel’s hair. She brushed at it

lightly, till it slid down her face and was captured

by her tongue.

The cold water was refreshing and, though it

tasted no different from any other melted snow

she’d drunk, it marked her first taste of the Old

Kingdom in thirteen years. Dimly, she remembered

it had been snowing then. Her father had

carried her through, when he first brought her

south into Ancelstierre.

A whistle alerted her, and she saw a figure

appear out of the snow, flanked by twelve others,

who drew up in two lines leading out from

the gate. They faced outwards, their swords

shining, blades reflecting the light that was itself

reflected from the snow. Only Horyse looked

inwards, waiting for her.

With her skis over her shoulder, Sabriel picked

her way among the broken timbers of the gate.

Going through the arch, from mud into snow,

from bright sun into the pallid luminescence of a

snowfall, from her past into her future.

The stones of the Wall on either side, and

above her head, seemed to call a welcome home,

and rivulets of Charter marks ran through the

stones like rain through dust.

“The Old Kingdom welcomes you,” said

Horyse, but he was watching the Charter marks

run on the stones, not looking at Sabriel.

Sabriel stepped out of the shadow of the gate

and pulled her cap down, so the peak shielded

her face against the snow.

“I wish your mission every success, Sabriel,”

continued Horyse, looking back at her. “I

hope . . . hope I see both you and your father before

too long.”

He saluted, turned smartly to his left, and was

gone, wheeling around her and marching back

through the gate. His men peeled off from the

line and followed. Sabriel bent down as they

marched past, slid her skis back and forth in

the snow, then slipped her boots into the bindings.

The snow was falling steadily, but it was

only a light fall and the cover was patchy. She

could still easily make out the Old North Road.

Fortunately, the snow had banked up in the gutters

to either side of the road, and she could

make good time if she kept to these narrow

snow-ways. Even though it seemed to be several

hours later in the Old Kingdom than it was in

Ancelstierre, she expected to reach Cloven Crest

before dusk.

Taking up her poles, Sabriel checked that her

father’s sword was easy in its scabbard, and the

bells hung properly from their baldric. She considered

a quick Charter-spell for warmth, but

decided against it. The road had a slight uphill

gradient, so the skiing would be quite hard

work. In her handknitted, greasy wool shirt,

leather jerkin and thick, double padded skiing

knickerbockers, she would probably be too

warm once she got going.

With a practiced motion, she pushed one ski

ahead, the opposite arm reaching forward with

her pole, and slid forward, just as the last

swordsman passed her on his way back through

the gate. He grinned as he passed by, but she

didn’t notice, concentrating on building up the

rhythm of her skis and poles. Within minutes,

she was practically flying up the road, a slim,

dark figure against the white of the ground.

chapter iv

Sabriel found the first dead

Ancelstierran soldier about six miles from the

Wall, in the last, fading hours of the afternoon.

The hill she thought was Cloven Crest was a

mile or two to the north. She’d stopped to look

at its dark bulk, rising rocky and treeless from

the snow-covered ground, its peak temporarily

hidden in one of the light, puffy clouds that

occasionally let forth a shower of snow or sleet.

If she hadn’t stopped, she would probably

have missed the frosted-white hand that peeked

out of a drift on the other side of the road. But

as soon as she saw that, her attention focused

and Sabriel felt the familiar pang of death.

Crossing over, her skis clacking on bare stone

in the middle of the road, she bent down and

gently brushed the snow away.

The hand belonged to a young man, who wore

a standard-issue coat of mail over an Ancelstierran

uniform of khaki serge. He was blond

and grey-eyed, and Sabriel thought he had been

surprised, for there was no fear in his frozen

expression. She touched his forehead with one

finger, closed his sightless eyes, and laid two

fingers against his open mouth. He had been

dead twelve days, she felt. There were no obvious

signs as to what had killed him. To learn more

than that, she would have to follow the young

man into Death. Even after twelve days, it was

unlikely he had gone further than the Fourth

Gate. Even so, Sabriel had a strong disinclination

to enter the realm of the dead until she absolutely

had to. Whatever had trapped—or killed—her

father could easily be waiting to ambush her

there. This dead soldier could even be a lure.

Quashing her natural curiosity to find out

exactly what had happened, Sabriel folded the

man’s arms across his chest, after first unclenching

the grip that his right hand still had on his

sword hilt—perhaps he had not been taken

totally unawares after all. Then she stood and

drew the Charter marks of fire, cleansing, peace

and sleep in the air above the corpse, while

whispering the sounds of those same marks. It

was a litany that every Charter Mage knew, and

it had the usual effect. A glowing ember sparked

up between the man’s folded arms, multiplied

into many stabbing, darting flames, then fire

whooshed the full length of the body. Seconds

later it was out and only ash remained, ash

staining a corselet of blackened mail.

Sabriel took the soldier’s sword from the pile

of ashes and thrust it through the melted snow,

into the dark earth beneath. It stuck fast,

upright, the hilt casting a shadow like a cross

upon the ashes. Something glinted in the shadow

and, belatedly, Sabriel remembered that the soldier

would have worn an identity disc or tag.

Shifting her skis again to rebalance she bent

down and hooked the chain of the identity disc

on one finger, pulling it up to read the name of

the man who had met his end here, alone in the

snow. But both the chain and disc were machinemade

in Ancelstierre and so unable to withstand

the Charter Magic fire. The disc crumbled into

ash as Sabriel raised it to eye level and the chain

fell into its component links, pouring between

Sabriel’s fingers like small steel coins.

“Perhaps they’ll know you from your sword,”

said Sabriel. Her voice sounded strange in the

quiet of the snowy wilderness and, behind each

word, her breath rolled out like a small, wet fog.

“Travel without regret,” she added. “Do not

look back.”

Sabriel took her own advice as she skied away.

There was an anxiety in her now that had been

mostly academic before and every sense was

alert, watchful. She had always been told that

the Old Kingdom was dangerous, and the

Borderlands near the Wall particularly so. But

that intellectual knowledge was tempered by her

vague childhood memories of happiness, of

being with her father and the band of Travelers.

Now, the reality of the danger was slowly coming

home . . .

Half a mile on she slowed and stopped to look

up at Cloven Crest again, neck cricked back to

watch where the sun struck between the clouds,

lighting up the yellow-red granite of the bluffs.

She was in cloud shadow herself, so the hill

looked like an attractive destination. As she

looked, it started to snow again, and two

snowflakes fell upon her forehead, melting into

her eyes. She blinked and the melted snow

traced tear trails down her cheeks. Through

misted eyes, she saw a bird of prey—a hawk or

kite—launch itself from the bluffs and hover, its

concentration totally centered upon some small

mouse or vole creeping across the snow.

The kite dropped like a cast stone, and a few

seconds later, Sabriel felt some small life snuffed

out. At the same time, she also felt the tug of

human death. Somewhere ahead, near where the

kite dined, more people lay dead.

Sabriel shivered, and looked at the hill again.

According to Horyse’s map, the path to Cloven

Crest lay in a narrow gully between two bluffs.

She could see quite clearly where it must be, but

the dead lay in that direction. Whatever had

killed them might also still be there.

There was sunlight on the bluffs, but the wind

was driving snow clouds across the sun and

Sabriel guessed it was only an hour or so till

dusk. She’d lost time freeing the soldier’s spirit,

and now had no choice but to hurry on if she

wished to reach Cloven Crest before nightfall.

She thought about what lay ahead for a

moment, then chose a compromise between

speed and caution. Stabbing her poles into the

snow, she released her bindings, stepped out of

her skis and then quickly fastened skis and poles

together to be strapped diagonally across her

backpack. She tied them on carefully, remembering

how they’d fallen and broken her Charterspell

on the parade ground—only that morning,

but it seemed like weeks ago and a world away.

That done, she started to pick her way down

the center of the road, keeping away from the

gutter drifts. She’d have to leave the road fairly

soon, but it looked like there was little snow on

the steep, rocky slopes of Cloven Crest.

As a final precaution, she drew Abhorsen’s

sword, then resheathed it, so an inch of blade

was free of the scabbard. It would draw fast and

easily when she needed it.

Sabriel expected to find the bodies on the road,

or near it, but they lay further on. There were

many footprints, and churned-up snow, leading

from the road towards the path to Cloven Crest.

That path ran between the bluffs, following a

route gouged out by a stream falling from some

deep spring higher up the hill. The path crossed

the stream several times, with stepping-stones or

tree trunks across the water to save walkers from

wet feet. Halfway up, where the bluffs almost

ground together, the stream had dug itself a short

gorge, about twelve feet wide, thirty feet long

and deep. Here, the pathmakers had been forced

to build a bridge along the stream, rather than

across it.

Sabriel found the rest of the Ancelstierran

patrol here, tumbled on the dark olive-black

wood of the bridge, with the water murmuring

beneath and the red stone arching overhead.

There were seven of them along the bridge’s

length. Unlike the first soldier, it was quite clear

what had killed them. They had been hacked

apart and, as Sabriel edged closer, she realized

they had been beheaded. Worse than that, whoever

. . . whatever . . . had killed them had taken

their heads away—almost a guarantee that their

spirits would return.

Her sword did draw easily. Gingerly, her right

hand almost glued to the sword hilt, Sabriel

stepped around the first of the splayed-out bodies

and onto the bridge. The water beneath was

partly iced over, shallow and sluggish, but it was

clear the soldiers had sought refuge over it.

Running water was a good protection from dead

creatures or things of Free Magic, but this torpid

stream would not have dismayed even one of the

Lesser Dead. In Spring, fed with melted snow,

the stream would burst between the bluffs, and

the bridge would be knee-deep in clear, swift

water. The soldiers would probably have survived

at that time of year.

Sabriel sighed quietly, thinking of how easily

seven people could be alive in one instant, and

then, despite everything they could do, despite

their last hope, they could be dead in just another.

Once again, she felt the temptation of the

necromancer, to take the cards nature had dealt,

to reshuffle them and deal again. She had the

power to make these men live again, laugh again,

love again . . .

But without their heads she could only bring

them back as “Hands,” a derogatory term that

Free Magic necromancers used for their lackluster

revenants, who retained little of their original

intelligence and none of their initiative. They

made useful servants, though, either as reanimated

corpses or the more difficult Shadow

Hands, where only the spirit was brought back.

Sabriel grimaced as she thought of Shadow

Hands. A skilled necromancer could easily raise

Shadow Hands from the heads of the newly

dead. Similarly, without the heads, she couldn’t

give them the final rites and free their spirits.

All she could do was treat the bodies with some

respect and, in the process, clear the bridge.

It was near to dusk, and dark already in the

shadow of the gorge, but she ignored the little

voice inside her that was urging her to leave the

bodies and run for the open space of the hilltop.

By the time she finished dragging the bodies

back down the path a way, laying them out with

their swords plunged in the earth next to their

headless bodies, it was dark outside the gorge

too. So dark, she had to risk a faint, Charterconjured

light, that hung like a pale star above

her head, showing the path before dying out.

A slight magic, but one with unexpected

consequences, for, as she left the bodies behind,

an answering light burned into brilliance on

the upper post of the bridge. It faded into red

embers almost immediately, but left three glowing

Charter marks. One was strange to Sabriel,

but, from the other two, she guessed its meaning.

Together, they held a message.

Three of the dead soldiers had the feel of

Charter Magic about them, and Sabriel guessed

that they were Charter Mages. They would have

had the Charter mark on their foreheads. The

very last body on the bridge had been one of

these men and Sabriel remembered that he had

been the only one not holding a weapon—his

hands had been clasped around the bridge post.

These marks would certainly hold his message.

Sabriel touched her own forehead Charter

mark and then the bridge post. The marks flared

again, then went dark. A voice came from

nowhere, close to Sabriel’s ear. A man’s voice,

husky with fear, backed by the sound of clashing

weapons, screaming and total panic.

“One of the Greater Dead! It came behind us,

almost from the Wall. We couldn’t turn back. It

has servants, Hands, a Mordicant! This is

Sergeant Gerren. Tell Colonel . . .”

Whatever he wanted to tell Colonel Horyse

was lost in the moment of his own death. Sabriel

stood still, listening, as if there might be more.

She felt ill, nauseous, and took several deep

breaths. She had forgotten that for all her familiarity

with death and the dead, she had never

seen or heard anyone actually die. The aftermath

she had learnt to deal with . . . but not the event.

She touched the bridge post again, just with

one finger, and felt the Charter marks twisting

through the grain of the wood. Sergeant Gerren’s

message would be there forever for any Charter

Mage to hear, till time did its work, and bridge

post and bridge rotted or were swept away by

flood.

Sabriel took a few more breaths, stilled her

stomach, and forced herself to listen once more.

One of the Greater Dead was back in Life, and

that was something her father was sworn to

stop. It was almost certain that this emergence

and Abhorsen’s disappearance were connected.

Once again, the message came, and Sabriel listened.

Then, brushing back her starting tears,

she walked on, up the path, away from the

bridge and the dead, up towards Cloven Crest

and the broken Charter Stone.

The bluffs parted and, in the sky above, stars

started to twinkle, as the wind grew braver and

swept the snow clouds before it into the west.

The new moon unveiled itself and swelled in

brightness, till it cast shadows on the snowflecked

ground.

chapter v

It was no more than a halfhour’s

steady climb to the flat top of Cloven

Crest, though the path grew steeper and more

difficult. The wind was strong now and had

cleared the sky, the moonlight giving form to the

landscape. But without the clouds, it had grown

much colder.

Sabriel considered a Charter-spell for warmth,

but she was tired, and the effort of the spell

might cost more than the gain in warmth. She

stopped instead and shrugged on a fleece-lined

oilskin that had been handed down from her

father. It was a bit worn and too large, needing

severe buckling-in with her sword-belt and the

baldric that held the bells, but it was certainly

windproof.

Feeling relatively warmer, Sabriel resumed

climbing up the last, winding portion of the

path, where the incline was so steep the pathmakers

had resorted to cutting steps out of the

granite—steps now worn and crumbling, prone

to sliding away underfoot.

So prone to sliding, that Sabriel reached the

top without realizing it, head down, her eyes

searching in the moonlight for the solid part of

the next step. Her foot was actually halfway up

in the air before she realized that there wasn’t a

next step.

Cloven Crest lay before her. A narrow ridge

where several slopes of the hill met to form a

miniature plateau, with a slight depression in the

middle. Snow lay in this depression, a fat, cigarshaped

drift, bright in the moonlight, stark

white against the red granite. There were no

trees, no vegetation at all, but in the very center

of the drift, a dark grey stone cast a long moonshadow.

It was twice Sabriel’s girth and three

times her height, and looked whole till she

walked closer and saw the zigzag crack that cut

it down the middle.

Sabriel had never seen a true Charter Stone

before, but she knew they were supposed to be

like the Wall, with Charter marks running like

quicksilver through the stone, forming and

dissolving, only to re-form again, in a neverending

story that told of the making of the

world.

There were Charter marks on this stone,

but they were still, as frozen as the snow. Dead

marks, nothing more than meaningless inscriptions,

carved into a sculptured stone.

It wasn’t what Sabriel had expected, though

she now realized that she hadn’t thought

about it properly. She’d thought of lightning

or suchlike as the splitter of the stone, but forgotten

lessons remembered too late told her

that wasn’t so. Only some terrible power of

Free Magic could split a Charter Stone.

She walked closer to the stone, fear rising in

her like a toothache in its first growth, signaling

worse to come. The wind was stronger and

colder, too, out on the ridge, and the oilskin

seemed less comforting, as its memories of her

father brought back remembrance of certain

pages of The Book of the Dead and tales of

horror told by little girls in the darkness of

their dormitory, far from the Old Kingdom.

Fears came with these memories, till Sabriel

wrestled them to the back of her mind, and

forced herself closer to the stone.

Dark patches of . . . something . . . obscured

some of the marks, but it wasn’t until Sabriel

pushed her face almost to the stone that she

could make out what they were, so dull and

black in the moonlight.

When she did see, her head snapped up, and

she stumbled backwards, almost overbalancing

into the snow. The patches were dried

blood, and when she saw them, Sabriel knew

how the stone had been broken, and why the

blood hadn’t been cleaned away by rain or

snow . . . why the stone never would be clean.

A Charter Mage had been sacrificed on the

stone. Sacrificed by a necromancer to gain

access to Death, or to help a Dead spirit break

through into Life.

Sabriel bit her lower lip till it hurt and her

hands, almost unconsciously, fidgeted, halfdrawing

Charter marks in nervousness and fear.

The spell for that sort of sacrifice was in the last

chapter of The Book of the Dead. She remembered

it now, in sickening detail. It was one of

the many things she seemed to have forgotten

from that green-bound book—or had been made

to forget. Only a very powerful necromancer

could use that spell. Only a totally evil one

would want to. And evil breeds evil, evil taints

places and makes them attractive to further acts

of . . .

“Stop it!” whispered Sabriel aloud, to still her

mind of its imaginings. It was dark, windy and

getting colder by the minute. She had to make a

decision: to camp and call her guide, or to move

on immediately in some random direction in the

hope that she would be able to summon her

guide from somewhere else.

The worst part of it all was that her guide was

dead. Sabriel had to enter Death, albeit briefly, to

call and converse with the guide. It would be

easy to do so here, for the sacrifice had created a

semi-permanent entry, as if a door had been

wedged ajar. But who knew what might be lurking,

watching, in the cold river beyond.

Sabriel stood for a minute, shivering, listening,

every sense concentrated, like some small animal

that knows a predator hunts nearby. Her mind

ran through the pages of The Book of the Dead,

and through the many hours she had spent learning

Charter Magic from Magistrix Greenwood

in the sunny North Tower of Wyverley College.

At the end of the minute, she knew that camping

was out of the question. She was simply too

frightened to sleep anywhere near the ruined

Charter Stone. But it would be quicker to call

her guide here—and the quicker she got to her

father’s house, the sooner she could do something

to help him, so a compromise was called

for. She would protect herself with Charter

Magic as best she could, enter Death with all

precaution, summon her guide, get directions

and get out as quickly as possible. Quicker, even.

With decision came action. Sabriel dropped

her skis and pack, stuffed some dried fruit and

homemade toffee in her mouth for quick energy,

and adopted the meditative pose that made

Charter Magic easier.

After bit of trouble with the toffee and her

teeth, she began. Symbols formed in her mind—

the four cardinal Charter marks that were the

poles of a diamond that would protect her from

both physical harm and Free Magic. Sabriel held

them in her mind, fixed them in time, and pulled

them out of the flow of the never-ending Charter.

Then, drawing her sword, she traced rough outlines

in the snow around her, one mark at each

cardinal point of the compass. As she finished

each mark, she let the one in her mind run from

her head to her hand, down the sword and into

the snow. There, they ran like lines of golden fire

and the marks became alive, burning on the

ground.

The last mark was the North mark, the one

closest to the destroyed stone, and it almost

failed. Sabriel had to close her eyes and use all

her will to force it to leave the sword. Even then,

it was only a pallid imitation of the other three,

burning so weakly it hardly melted the snow.

Sabriel ignored it, quelling the nausea that had

brought bile to the back of her mouth, her body

reacting to the struggle with the Charter mark.

She knew the North mark was weak, but golden

lines had run between all four points and the diamond

was complete, if shaky. In any case, it was

the best she could do. She sheathed her sword,

took off her gloves, and fumbled with her bellbandolier,

cold fingers counting the bells.

“Ranna,” she said aloud, touching the first,

the smallest bell. Ranna the sleepbringer, the

sweet, low sound that brought silence in its

wake.

“Mosrael.” The second bell, a harsh, rowdy

bell. Mosrael was the waker, the bell Sabriel

should never use, the bell whose sound was a

seesaw, throwing the ringer further into Death,

as it brought the listener into Life.

“Kibeth.” Kibeth, the walker. A bell of several

sounds, a difficult and contrary bell. It could

give freedom of movement to one of the Dead,

or walk them through the next gate. Many a

necromancer had stumbled with Kibeth and

walked where they would not.

“Dyrim.” A musical bell, of clear and pretty

tone. Dyrim was the voice that the Dead so often

lost. But Dyrim could also still a tongue that

moved too freely.

“Belgaer.” Another tricksome bell, that sought

to ring of its own accord. Belgaer was the thinking

bell, the bell most necromancers scorned to

use. It could restore independent thought, memory

and all the patterns of a living person. Or,

slipping in a careless hand, erase them.

“Saraneth.” The deepest, lowest bell. The

sound of strength. Saraneth was the binder, the

bell that shackled the Dead to the wielder’s will.

And last, the largest bell, the one Sabriel’s cold

fingers found colder still, even in the leather case

that kept it silent.

“Astarael, the Sorrowful,” whispered Sabriel.

Astarael was the banisher, the final bell. Properly

rung, it cast everyone who heard it far into

Death. Everyone, including the ringer.

Sabriel’s hand hovered, touched on Ranna,

and then settled on Saraneth. Carefully, she

undid the strap and withdrew the bell. Its clapper,

freed of the mask, rang slightly, like the

growl of a waking bear.

Sabriel stilled it, holding the clapper with her

palm inside the bell, ignoring the handle. With

her right hand, she drew her sword and raised it

to the guard position. Charter marks along the

blade caught the moonlight and flickered into

life. Sabriel watched them for a moment, as portents

could sometimes be seen in such things.

Strange marks raced across the blade, before

transmuting into the more usual inscription, one

that Sabriel knew well. She bowed her head, and

prepared to enter into Death.

Unseen by Sabriel, the inscription began again,

but parts of it were not the same. “I was made

for Abhorsen, to slay those already Dead,” was

what it usually said. Now it continued, “The

Clayr saw me, the Wallmaker made me, the King

quenched me, Abhorsen wields me.”

Sabriel, eyes closed now, felt the boundary

between Life and Death appear. On her back,

she felt the wind, now curiously warm, and the

moonlight, bright and hot like sunshine. On her

face, she felt the ultimate cold and, opening her

eyes, saw the grey light of Death.

With an effort of will, her spirit stepped

through, sword and bell prepared. Inside the

diamond her body stiffened, and fog blew up in

eddies around her feet, twining up her legs. Frost

rimed her face and hands and the Charter marks

flared at each apex of the diamond. Three steadied

again, but the North mark blazed brighter

still—and went out.

The river ran swiftly, but Sabriel set her feet

against the current and ignored both it and the

cold, concentrating on looking around, alert for

a trap or ambush. It was quiet at this particular

entry point to Death. She could hear the water

tumbling through the Second Gate, but nothing

else. No splashing, or gurgling, or strange mewlings.

No dark, formless shapes or grim silhouettes,

shadowy in this grey light.

Carefully holding her position, Sabriel looked

all around her again, before sheathing her sword

and reaching into one of the thigh pockets in

her woollen knickerbockers. The bell, Saraneth,

stayed ready in her left hand. With her right, she

drew out a paper boat and, still one-handed,

opened it out to its proper shape. Beautifully

white, almost luminous in this light, it had one

small, perfectly round stain at its bow, where

Sabriel had carefully blotted a drop of blood

from her finger.

Sabriel laid it flat on her hand, lifted it to her

lips, and blew on it as if she were launching a

feather. Like a glider, it flew from her hand into

the river. Sabriel held that launching breath as

the boat was almost swamped, only to breathe in

with relief as it breasted a ripple, righted itself

and surged away with the current. In a few seconds

it was out of sight, heading for the Second

Gate.

It was the second time in her life that Sabriel

had launched just such a paper boat. Her father

had shown her how to make them, but had

impressed on her to use them sparingly. No more

than thrice every seven years, he had said, or a

price would have to be paid, a price much

greater than a drop of blood.

As events should follow as they had the first

time, Sabriel knew what to expect. Still, when

the noise of the Second Gate stilled for a moment

some ten or twenty, or forty, minutes later—time

being slippery in Death—she drew her sword

and Saraneth hung down in her hand, its clapper

free, waiting to be heard. The Gate had stilled

because someone . . . something . . . was coming

back from the deeper realms of Death.

Sabriel hoped it was the one she had invited

with the paper boat.

chapter vi

Charter Magic on Cloven Crest.

It was like a scent on the wind to the thing that

lurked in the caves below the hill, some mile or

more to the west of the broken Charter Stone.

It had been human once, or human-like at

least, in the years it had lived under the sun.

That humanity had been lost in the centuries the

thing spent in the chill waters of Death, ferociously

holding its own against the current,

demonstrating an incredible will to live again. A

will it didn’t know it possessed before a badly

cast hunting spear bounced from a rock and

clipped its throat, just enough for a last few minutes

of frantic life.

By sheer effort of will, it had held itself on the

life side of the Fourth Gate for three hundred

years, growing in power, learning the ways of

Death. It preyed on lesser spirits, and served or

avoided greater ones. Always, the thing held on

to life. Its chance finally came when a mighty

spirit erupted from beyond the Seventh Gate,

smashing through each of the Upper Gates in

turn, till it went ravening into Life. Hundreds of

the Dead had followed, and this particular spirit

had joined the throng. There had been terrible

confusion and a mighty enemy at the very border

between Life and Death, but, in the melee, it

had managed to sneak around the edges and

squirm triumphantly into Life.

There were plenty of recently vacated bodies

where it emerged, so the thing occupied one, animated

it and ran away. Soon after, it found the

caves it now inhabited. It even decided to give

itself a name. Thralk. A simple name, not too

difficult for a partially decomposed mouth to

voice. A male name. Thralk could not remember

what its original sex had been, those centuries

before, but its new body was male.

It was a name to instill fear in the few small

settlements that still existed in this area of The

Borderlands, settlements Thralk preyed upon,

capturing and consuming the human life he

needed to keep himself on the living side of

Death.

Charter Magic flared on Cloven Crest again,

and Thralk sensed that it was strong and pure—

but weakly cast. The strength of the magic scared

him, but the lack of skill behind it was reassuring

and strong magic meant a strong life. Thralk

needed that life, needed it to shore up the body he

used, needed it to replenish the leakage of his

spirit back into Death. Greed won over fear. The

Dead thing left the mouth of the cave and started

climbing the hill, his lidless, rotting eyes fixed on

the distant crest.

Sabriel saw her guide, first as a tall, pale light

drifting over the swirling water towards her,

and then, as it stopped several yards away, as a

blurred, glowing, human shape, its arms outstretched

in welcome.

“Sabriel.”

The words were fuzzy and seemed to come

from much farther away than where the shining

figure stood, but Sabriel smiled as she felt the

warmth in the greeting. Abhorsen had never

explained who or what this luminous person

was, but Sabriel thought she knew. She’d summoned

this advisor only once before—when

she’d first menstruated.

There was minimal sex education at Wyverley

College—none at all till you were fifteen. The

older girls’ stories about menstruation were

many, varied and often meant to scare. None

of Sabriel’s friends had reached puberty before

her, so in fear and desperation she had entered

Death. Her father had told her that the one the

paper boat summoned would answer any question

and would protect her—and so it had. The

glowing spirit answered all her questions and

many more besides, till Sabriel was forced to

return to Life.

“Hello, Mother,” said Sabriel, sheathing her

sword and carefully muffling Saraneth with her

fingers inside the bell.

The shining shape didn’t answer, but that

wasn’t unexpected. Apart from her one-word

greeting, she could only answer questions.

Sabriel wasn’t really sure if the manifestation

was the very unusual dead spirit of her mother,

which was unlikely, or some residual protective

magic left by her.

“I don’t have much time,” Sabriel continued.

“I’d love to ask about . . . oh, everything, I

guess . . . but at the moment, I need to know how

to get to Father’s house from Cloven Crest . . . I

mean Barhedrin Ridge.”

The sending nodded, and spoke. As Sabriel

listened, she also saw pictures in her head of

what the woman was describing; vivid images,

like memories of a journey she’d taken herself.

“Go to the northern side of the ridge. Follow

the spur that begins there down till it reaches the

valley floor. Look at the sky . . . there won’t be

any cloud. Look to the bright red star, Uallus,

near the horizon, three fingers east of north.

Follow that star till you come to a road that runs

from south-west to north-east. Take that road for

a mile to the north-east, till you reach a mile

marker and the Charter Stone behind it. A path

behind the stone leads to the Long Cliffs immediately

north. Take the path. It ends in a door in the

Cliffs. The door will answer to Mosrael. Beyond

the door is a tunnel, sloping sharply upwards.

Beyond the tunnel lies Abhorsen’s Bridge. The

house is over the bridge. Go with love—and do

not tarry, do not stop, no matter what happens.”

“Thank you,” Sabriel began, carefully filing the

words away with the accompanying thoughts.

“Could you also . . .”

She stopped as the mother-sending in front of

her suddenly raised both arms as if shocked, and

shouted, “Go!”

At the same time, Sabriel felt the diamond of

protection around her physical body twinge in

warning and she became aware that the North

mark had failed. Instantly, she turned on her left

heel and began racing back to the border with

Life, drawing her sword. The current almost

seemed to strengthen against her, twining around

her legs, but then fell away before her urgency.

Sabriel reached the border and, with a furious

thrust of will, her spirit emerged back into Life.

For a second, she was disoriented, suddenly

freezing again and thick-witted. A grinning,

corpse-like creature was just stepping through

the failed North mark, its arms reaching to

embrace her, carrion-breath misting out of a

mouth unnaturally wide.

Thralk had been pleased to find the Charter

Mage’s spirit wandering and a broken diamond

of protection. The sword had worried

him a little, but it was frosted over and his

shriveled eyes couldn’t see the Charter marks

that danced beneath the rime. Similarly, the

bell in Sabriel’s left hand looked like a lump of

ice or snow, as if she’d caught a snowball. All

in all, Thralk felt very fortunate, particularly

as the life that blazed within this still victim

was particularly young and strong. Thralk

sidled closer still and his double-jointed arms

reached to embrace Sabriel’s neck.

Just as his slimy, corrupted fingers stretched

forward, Sabriel opened her eyes and executed

the stop-thrust that had earned her second

place in Fighting Arts and, later, lost her the

First. Her arm and sword straightened like one

limb to their full extent and the sword-point

ripped through Thralk’s neck, and into eight

inches of air beyond.

Thralk screamed, his reaching fingers gripping

the sword to push himself free—only to

scream again as Charter marks flared on the

blade. White-hot sparks plumed between his

knuckles and Thralk suddenly knew what he’d

encountered.

“Abhorsen!” he croaked, falling backwards as

Sabriel twisted the blade free with one explosive

jerk.

Already, the sword was affecting the dead flesh

Thralk inhabited, Charter Magic burning

through reanimated nerves, freezing those alltoo-

fluid joints. Fire rose in Thralk’s throat, but

he spoke, to distract this terrible opponent while

his spirit tried to shuck the body, like a snake its

skin, and retreat into the night.

“Abhorsen! I will serve you, praise you, be

your Hand . . . I know things, alive and dead . . .

I will help lure others to you . . .”

The clear, deep sound of Saraneth cut

through the whining, broken voice like a foghorn

booming above the shriek of seagulls.

The chime vibrated on and on, echoing into

the night, and Thralk felt it bind him even as

his spirit leaked out of the body and made

for flight. The bell bound him to paralyzed

flesh, bound him to the will of the bell-ringer.

Fury seethed in him, anger and fear fueling

his struggle, but the sound was everywhere, all

around him, all through him. He would never

be free of it.

Sabriel watched the misshapen shadow

writhing, half out of the corpse, half in it, the

body bleeding a pool of darkness. It was still

trying to use the corpse’s mouth, but without

success. She considered going with it into Death,

where it would have a shape and she could make

it answer with Dyrim. But the broken Charter

Stone loomed nearby and she felt it as an everpresent

fear, like a cold jewel upon her breast.

In her mind, she heard her mother-sending’s

words, “Do not tarry, do not stop, no matter

what happens.”

Sabriel thrust her sword point-first into the

snow, put Saraneth away and drew Kibeth from

the bandolier, using both hands. Thralk sensed it

and his fury gave way to pure, unadulterated

fear. After all the centuries of struggle, he knew

true death had come for him at last.

Sabriel took up a careful stance, with the bell

held in a curious two-handed grip. Kibeth

seemed almost to twitch in her hands, but she

controlled it, swinging it backwards, forwards,

and then in a sort of odd figure eight. The

sounds, all from the one bell, were very different

to each other, but they made a little marching

tune, a dancing song, a parade.

Thralk heard them and felt forces grip him.

Strange, inexorable powers that made him find

the border, made him return to Death. Vainly,

almost pathetically, he struggled against them,

knowing he couldn’t break free. He knew that

he would walk through every Gate, to fall at last

through the Ninth. He gave up the struggle and

used the last of his strength to form a semblance

of a mouth in the middle of his shadow-stuff, a

mouth with a writhing tongue of darkness.

“Curse you!” he gurgled. “I will tell the

Servants of Kerrigor! I will be revenged . . .”

His grotesque, gulping voice was chopped off

in mid-sentence, as Thralk lost free will.

Saraneth had bound him, but Kibeth gripped

him and Kibeth walked him, walked him so

Thralk would be no more. The twisting shadow

simply disappeared and there was only snow

under a long-dead corpse.

Even though the revenant was gone, his last

words troubled Sabriel. The name Kerrigor,

while not exactly familiar, touched some basic

fear in her, some memory. Perhaps Abhorsen had

spoken this name, which undoubtedly belonged

to one of the Greater Dead. The name scared her

in the same way the broken stone did, as if they

were tangible symbols of a world gone wrong, a

world where her father was lost, where she herself

was terribly threatened.

Sabriel coughed, feeling the cold in her lungs,

and very carefully replaced Kibeth in the bandolier.

Her sword seemed to have burned itself

clean, but she ran a cloth over the blade before

returning it to the scabbard. She felt very tired

as she swung her pack back on, but there was

no doubt in her mind that she must move on

immediately. Her mother-spirit’s words kept

echoing in her mind, and her own senses told

her something was happening in Death, something

powerful was moving towards Life, moving

towards emergence at the broken stone.

There had been too much death and too much

Charter Magic on this hill, and the night was yet

to reach its blackest. The wind was swinging

around, the clouds regaining their superiority

over sky. Soon, the stars would disappear and

the young moon would be wrapped in white.

Quickly, Sabriel scanned the heavens, looking

for the three bright stars that marked the Buckle

of the North Giant’s Belt. She found them, but

then had to check the star map in her almanac, a

handmade match stinking as it cast a yellow

flicker on the pages, for she didn’t dare use any

more Charter Magic till she was away from the

broken stone. The almanac showed that she had

remembered correctly: the Buckle was due north

in the Old Kingdom; its other name was

Mariner’s Cheat. In Ancelstierre, the Buckle was

easily ten degrees west of north.

North located, Sabriel started to make her way

to that side of the crest, looking for the spur that

slanted down to the valley lost in darkness

below. The clouds were thickening and she

wanted to reach level ground before the moonlight

disappeared. At least the spur, when found,

looked like easier going than the broken steps to

the south, though its gentle slope proclaimed a

long descent to the valley.

In fact, it took several hours before Sabriel

reached the valley floor, stumbling and shivering,

a very pale Charter flame dancing a little

ways in front of her. Too insubstantial to really

ease her path, it had helped her avoid major disaster,

and she hoped it was pallid enough to be

taken for marsh-gas or chance reflection. In any

case, it had proved essential when clouds closed

the last remaining gap in the sky.

So much for no cloud, Sabriel thought, as she

looked towards what she guessed was still north,

searching for the red star, Uallus. Her teeth were

chattering and would not be stilled, and a shiver

that had started with her ice-cold feet was

repeating itself through every limb. If she didn’t

keep moving, she’d simply freeze where she

stood—particularly as the wind was rising once

more . . .

Sabriel laughed quietly, almost hysterically,

and turned her face to feel the breeze. It was an

easterly, gaining strength with the minute.

Colder, yes, but it also cleared the cloud, sweeping

it to the west—and there, in the first cleared

broom-stroke of the wind, was Uallus gleaming

red. Sabriel smiled, stared at it, took stock of the

little she could see around her, and started off

again, following the star, a whispering voice constant

in the back of her mind.

Do not tarry, do not stop, no matter what

happens.

The smile lasted as Sabriel found the road and,

with a good cover of snow in each gutter, she

skied, making good time.

By the time Sabriel found the mile marker and

the Charter Stone behind it, no trace of the smile

could be seen on her pale face. It was snowing

again, snowing sideways as the wind grew more

frenzied, taking the snowflakes and whipping

them into her eyes, now the only exposed portion

of her entire body. Her boots were soaked

too, despite the mutton fat she’d rubbed into

them. Her feet, face and hands were freezing,

and she was exhausted. She’d dutifully eaten a

little every hour, but now, simply couldn’t open

her frozen jaws.

For a short time, at the intact Charter Stone

that rose proudly behind the smaller milemarker,

Sabriel had made herself warm, invoking

a Charter-spell for heat. But she’d grown too

tired to maintain it without the assistance of the

stone, and the spell dissipated almost as soon as

she walked on. Only the mother-spirit’s warning

kept her going. That, and the sensation that she

was being followed.

It was only a feeling, and in her tired, chilled

state, Sabriel wondered if it was just imagination.

But she wasn’t in any state to face up to

anything that might not be imagined, so she

forced herself to go on.

Do not tarry, do not stop, no matter what

happens.

The path from the Charter Stone was better

made than the one that climbed Cloven Crest,

but steeper. The pathmakers here had to cut

through a dense, greyish rock, which did not

erode like granite, and they had built hundreds

of wide, low steps, carved with intricate patterns.

Whether these meant something, Sabriel

didn’t know. They weren’t Charter marks, or

symbols of any language that she knew, and she

was too tired to speculate. She concentrated on

one step at a time, using her hands to push down

on her aching thighs, coughing and gasping,

head down to avoid the flying snow.

The path grew steeper still and Sabriel could

see the cliff-face ahead, a huge, black, vertical

mass, a much darker backdrop to the swirling

snow than the clouded sky, palely backlit by the

moon. But she didn’t seem to get any closer as

the path switchbacked to and fro, rising further

and further up from the valley below.

Then, suddenly, Sabriel was there. The path

turned again and her little will-o’-the-wisp light

reflected back from a wall, a wall that stretched

for miles to either side, and for hundreds of

yards upwards. Clearly, these were the Long

Cliffs, and the path had ended.

Almost sobbing with relief, Sabriel pushed

herself forward to the very base of the cliff, and

the little light rose above her head to disclose

grey, lichen-veined rock. But even with that

light, there was no sign of a door—nothing but

100

jagged, impervious rock, going up and out of

her tiny circle of illumination. There was no

path and nowhere else to go.

Wearily, Sabriel knelt in a patch of snow and

rubbed her hands together vigorously, trying to

restore circulation, before drawing Mosrael

from the bandolier. Mosrael, the Waker. Sabriel

stilled it carefully and concentrated her senses,

feeling for anything Dead that might be near

and should not be woken. There was nothing

close, but once again Sabriel felt something

behind her, something following her, far down

on the path. Something Dead, something reeking

of power. She tried to judge how distant the

thing was, before forcing it from her thoughts.

Whatever it might be, it was too far away to

hear even Mosrael’s raucous voice. Sabriel

stood up, and rang the bell.

It made a sound like tens of parrots screeching,

a noise that burst into the air and wove itself

into the wind, echoing from the cliffs, multiplying

into the scream of a thousand birds.

Sabriel stilled the bell at once and put it away,

but the echoes raced across the valley, and she

knew the thing behind her had heard. She felt it

fix its attention on where she was and she felt

101

it quicken its pace, like watching the muscles on

a racehorse going from the walk to a gallop. It

was coming up the steps at least four or five at a

time. She felt the rush of it in her head and the

fear rising in her at equal pace, but she still went

to the path and looked down, drawing her

sword as she did so.

There, between gusts of snow, she saw a figure

leaping from step to step; impossible leaps, that

ate up the distance between them with horrible

appetite. It was manlike, more than man-high,

and flames ran like burning oil on water where it

trod. Sabriel cried out as she saw it, and felt the

Dead spirit within. The Book of the Dead

opened to fearful pages in her memory, and

descriptions of evil poured into her head. It was

a Mordicant that hunted her—a thing that could

pass at will through Life and Death, its body of

bog-clay and human blood molded and infused

with Free Magic by a necromancer, and a Dead

spirit placed inside as its guiding force.

Sabriel had banished a Mordicant once, but

that had been forty miles from the Wall, in

Ancelstierre, and it had been weak, already fading.

This one was strong, fiery, new-born. It

would kill her, she suddenly knew, and subjugate

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103

her spirit. All her plans and dreams, her hopes

and courage, fell out of her to be replaced by

pure, unthinking panic. She turned to one side,

then the other, like a rabbit running from a dog,

but the only way down was the path and the

Mordicant was only a hundred yards below,

closing with every blink, with every falling

snowflake. Flames were spewing from its

mouth, and it thrust its pointed head back and

howled as it ran, a howl like the last shout of

someone falling to their death, underlaid with

the squeal of fingernails on glass.

Sabriel, a scream somehow stuck and choking

in her throat, turned to the cliff, hammering on

it with the pommel of her sword.

“Open! Open!” she screamed, as Charter

marks raced through her brain—but not the

right ones for forcing a door, a spell she’d

learned in the Second Form. She knew it like she

knew her times tables, but the Charter marks

just wouldn’t come, and why was twelve times

twelve sticking in her head when she wanted

Charter marks . . .

The echoes from Mosrael faded, and in that

silence, the pommel struck on something that

thudded hollowly, rather than throwing sparks

and jarring her hand. Something wooden, something

that hadn’t been there before. A door, tall

and strangely narrow, its dark oak lined with silver

Charter marks dancing through the grain. An

iron ring, exactly at hand height, touched

Sabriel’s hip.

Sabriel dropped her sword with a gasp,

grabbed the ring, and pulled. Nothing happened.

Sabriel tugged again, half-turning to look over

her shoulder, almost cringing at what she would

see.

The Mordicant turned the last corner and its

eyes met hers. Sabriel shut them, unable to bear

the hatred and bloodlust glowing in its gaze like

a poker left too long in the forge. It howled again

and almost flowed up the remaining steps,

flames dripping from its mouth, claws and feet.

Sabriel, eyes still closed, pushed on the ring.

The door flew open and she fell in, crashing to

the ground in a flurry of snow, eyes snapping

open. Desperately, she twisted herself around on

the ground, ignoring the pain in her knees and

hands. Reaching back outside, she snagged the

hilt of her sword and snatched it in.

As the blade cleared the doorway, the

Mordicant reached it, and twisting itself side-

104

ways to pass the narrow portal, thrust an arm

inside. Flames boiled from its grey-green flesh,

like beads of sweat, and small plumes of black

smoke spiraled from the flames, bringing with

them a stench like burning hair.

Sabriel, sprawled defenseless on the floor, could

only stare in terror as the thing’s four-taloned

hand slowly opened and reached out for her.

105

chapter vii

But the hand didn’t close; the

talons failed to rend defenseless flesh.

Instead, Sabriel felt a sudden surge of Charter

Magic and Charter marks flared around the door,

blazing so brightly that they left red after-images

at the back of her eyes, black dots dancing across

her vision.

Blinking, she saw a man step out from the

stones of the wall, a tall and obviously strong

man, with a longsword the twin of Sabriel’s own.

This sword came whistling down on the

Mordicant’s arm, biting out a chunk of burning

marsh-rotten flesh. Rebounding, the sword

flicked back again, and hewed another slice, like

an axeman sending chips flying from a tree.

The Mordicant howled, more in anger than in

pain—but it withdrew the arm and the stranger

threw himself against the door, slamming it shut

with the full weight of his mail-clad body.

Curiously for mail, it made no sound, no jangling

from the flow of hundreds of steel links. A strange

body under it too, Sabriel saw, as the black dots

and the red wash faded, revealing that her rescuer

wasn’t human at all. He had seemed solid enough,

but every square inch of him was defined by tiny,

constantly moving Charter marks, and Sabriel

could see nothing between them but empty air.

He . . . it was a Charter-ghost, a sending.

Outside, the Mordicant howled again, like a

steam train venting pressure, then the whole corridor

shook and hinges screeched in protest as the

thing threw itself against the door. Wood splintered

and clouds of thick grey dust fell from the

ceiling, mocking the falling snow outside.

The sending turned to face Sabriel and offered

its hand to help her up. Sabriel took it, looking up

at it as her tired, frozen legs struggled to make a

tenth-round comeback. Close to, the illusion of

flesh was imperfect, fluid and unsettling. Its face

wouldn’t stay fixed, migrating between scores of

possibilities. Some were women, some were

men—but all bore tough, competent visages. Its

107

body and clothing changed slightly, too, with

every face, but two details always remained the

same; a black surcoat with the blazon of a silver

key, and a longsword redolent with Charter

Magic.

“Thank you,” Sabriel said nervously, flinching

as the Mordicant pounded the door again.

“Can . . . do you think that . . . will it get

through?”

The sending nodded grimly, and let go her hand

to point up the long corridor, but it did not speak.

Sabriel turned her head to follow its pointing

hand and saw a dark passage that rose up into

darkness. Charter marks illuminated where they

stood, but faded only a little way on. Despite this,

the darkness seemed friendly, and she could

almost taste the Charter-spells that rode on the

corridor’s dusty air.

“I must go on?” asked Sabriel, as it pointed

again, more urgently. The sending nodded, and

flapped its hand backwards and forwards, indicating

haste. Behind him, another crashing blow

caused another great billow of dust, and the door

sounded as if it was weakening. Once again, the

vile, burnt smell of the Mordicant wafted through

the air.

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The doorkeeper wrinkled its nose and gave

Sabriel a bit of a push in the right direction, like

a parent urging a reluctant child to press on. But

Sabriel needed no urging. Her fear was still

burning in her. Momentarily extinguished by

the rescue, the smell of the Mordicant was all it

needed to blaze again. She set her face upwards

and started to walk quickly, into the passage.

She looked back after a few yards, to see the

doorkeeper waiting near the door, its sword at the

guard position. Beyond it, the door was bulging

in, iron-bound planks bursting, breaking around

a hole as big as a dinner plate.

The Mordicant reached in and broke off more

planks, as easily as it might snap toothpicks. It

was obviously furious that its prey was getting

away, for it burned all over now. Yellow-red

flames vomited from its mouth in a vile torrent,

and black smoke rose like a second shadow

around it, eddying in crazy circles as it howled.

Sabriel looked away, setting off at a fast walk,

but the walk grew faster and faster, became a jog

and then a run. Her feet pounded on the stone,

but it wasn’t until she was almost sprinting, that

she realized why she could—her pack and skis

were still back at the lower door. For a moment,

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she was struck with a nervous inclination to go

back, but it passed before it even became conscious

thought. Even so, her hands checked scabbard

and bandolier, and gained reassurance from

the cool metal of sword hilt and the handsmoothed

wood of the bell handles.

It was light too, she realized as she ran. Charter

marks ran in the stone, keeping pace with her.

Charter marks for light and for fleetness, and for

many other things she didn’t know. Strange marks

and many of them—so many that Sabriel wondered

how she could have ever thought that a

First in magic from an Ancelstierran school would

make her a great mage in the Old Kingdom. Fear

and realization of ignorance were strong medicines

against stupid pride.

Another howl came racing up the passage

and echoed onwards, accompanied by many

crashes, and thuds or clangs of steel striking

supernatural flesh, or ricocheting off stone.

Sabriel didn’t need to look back to know the

Mordicant had broken through the door and

was now fighting the doorkeeper—or pushing

past him. Sabriel knew little of such sendings,

but a common failing with the sentinel variety

was an inability to leave their post. Once the

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creature got a few feet past the doorkeeper, the

sending would be useless—and one great charge

would soon get the Mordicant past.

That thought gave her another burst of speed,

but Sabriel knew that it was the last. Her body,

pushed by fear and weakened by cold and exertion,

was on the edge of failure. Her legs felt stiff,

muscles ready to cramp, and her lungs seemed to

bubble with fluid rather than air.

Ahead, the corridor seemed to go on and on,

sloping ever upwards. But the light only shone

where Sabriel ran, so perhaps the exit might not

be too far ahead, perhaps just past the next little

patch of darkness . . .

Even as this thought passed through her mind,

Sabriel saw a glow that sharpened into the bright

tracing of a doorway. She half gasped, half cried

out, both slight human noises drowned out by the

unholy, inhuman screech of the Mordicant. It was

past the doorkeeper.

At the same time, Sabriel became aware of a

new sound ahead, a sound she had initially

thought was the throb of blood in her ears, the

pounding of a racing heart. But it was outside,

beyond the upper door. A deep, roaring noise, so

low it was almost a vibration, a shudder that she

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felt through the floor, rather than heard.

Heavy trucks passing on a road above, Sabriel

thought, before remembering where she was. In

that same instant, she recognized the sound.

Somewhere ahead, out of these encircling cliffs, a

great waterfall was crashing down. And a waterfall

that made so great a sound must be fed by an

equally great river.

Running water! The prospect of it fueled Sabriel

with sudden hope, and with that hope came the

strength she thought beyond her. In a wild spurt

of speed, she almost hit the door, hands slapping

against the wood, slowing for the instant she

needed to find the handle or ring.

But another hand was already on the ring when

she touched it, though none had been there a second

before. Again, Charter marks defined this

hand, and Sabriel could see the grain of the wood

and the blueing of the steel through the palm of

another sending.

This one was smaller, of indeterminate sex, for

it was wearing a habit like a monk’s, with the

hood drawn across its head. The habit was black

and bore the emblem of the silver key front and

back.

It bowed, and turned the ring. The door swung

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open, to reveal bright starlight shining down

between clouds fleeing the newly risen wind. The

noise of the waterfall roared through the open

doorway, accompanied by flecks of flying spray.

Without thinking, Sabriel stepped out.

The cowled doorkeeper came with her and shut

the door behind it, before dragging a delicate,

silver portcullis down across the door and locking

it with an iron padlock. Both defenses

apparently came out of thin air. Sabriel looked

at them and felt power in them, for both were

also Charter sendings. But door, portcullis and

lock would only slow the Mordicant, not stop

it. The only possible escape lay across the

swiftest of running water, or the untimely glare

of a noonday sun.

The first lay at her feet and the second was still

many hours away. Sabriel stood on a narrow

ledge that projected out from the bank of a river

at least four hundred yards wide. A little to her

right, a scant few paces away, this mighty river

hurled itself over the cliff, to make a truly glorious

waterfall. Sabriel leaned forward a little, to look

at the waters crashing below, creating huge white

wings of spray that could easily swallow her

entire school, new wing and all, like a rubber

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duck swamped in an unruly bath.

It was a very long fall, and the height, coupled

with the sheer power of the water, made

her quickly look back to the river. Straight

ahead, halfway across, Sabriel could just make

out an island, an island perched on the very lip

of the waterfall, dividing the river into two

streams. It wasn’t a very big island, about the

size of a football field, but it rose like a ship of

jagged rock from the turbulent waters.

Encircling the island were limestone-white walls

the height of six men. Behind those walls was a

house. It was too dark to see clearly, but there was

a tower, a thrusting, pencil silhouette, with red

tiles that were just beginning to catch the dawning

sun. Below the tower, a dark bulk hinted at the

existence of a hall, a kitchen, bedrooms, armory,

buttery and cellar. The study, Sabriel suddenly

remembered, occupied the second to top floor of

the tower. The top floor was an observatory, both

of stars and the surrounding territory.

It was Abhorsen’s House. Home, although

Sabriel had only visited it twice, or maybe three

times, all when she was too young to remember

much. That period of her life was hazy, and

mostly filled with recollections of the Travelers,

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the interiors of their wagons, and many different

campsites that all blurred together. She didn’t

even remember the waterfall, though the sound

of it did stir some recognition—something had

lodged in the mind of a four-year-old girl.

Unfortunately, she didn’t remember how to get

to the house. Only the words her mother-sending

had given her—Abhorsen’s Bridge.

She hadn’t realized she’d spoken these words

aloud, till the little gate warden tugged at her

sleeve and pointed down. Sabriel looked and

saw steps carved into the bank, steps leading

right down to the river.

This time, Sabriel didn’t hesitate. She nodded to

the Charter sending and whispered, “Thank

you,” before taking the steps. The Mordicant’s

presence was pressing at her again, like a

stranger’s rank breath behind her ear. She knew it

had reached the upper gate, though the sound of

its battering and destruction was drowned in the

greater roar of the waters.

The steps led to the river, but did not end

there. Though invisible from the ledge, there

were stepping-stones leading out to the island.

Sabriel eyed them nervously, and looked at the

water. It was clearly very deep and rushing past

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at an alarming speed. The stepping-stones were

barely above its boisterous wavelets and, even

though they were wide and cross-hatched for

grip, they were also wet with spray and the

slushy remnants of snow and ice.

Sabriel watched a small piece of ice from upstream

hurtle by, and pictured its slingshot ride

over the falls, to be smashed apart so far below.

She imagined herself in its place, and then

thought of the Mordicant behind her, of the

Dead spirit that was at its heart, of the death it

would bring, and the imprisonment she would

suffer beyond death.

She jumped. Her boots skidded a little and her

arms flailed for balance, but she ended up steady,

bent over in a half-crouch. Hardly waiting to rebalance,

she jumped to the next stone and then

the one after that, and again, in a mad leapfrog

through the spray and thunder of the river.

When she was halfway out, with a hundred

yards of pure, ferocious water behind her, she

stopped and looked back.

The Mordicant was on the ledge, the silvery

portcullis broken and mangled in its grip. There

was no sign of the gate warden, but that was not

surprising. Defeated, it would merely fade until

the Charter-spell renewed itself—hours, days or

even years later.

The Dead thing was curiously still, but it was

clearly watching Sabriel. Even so powerful a creature

couldn’t cross this river and it made no

attempt to do so. In fact, the longer Sabriel stared

at it, the more it seemed to her that the Mordicant

was content to wait. It was a sentry, guarding

what might be the only exit from the island. Or

perhaps it was waiting for something to happen,

or for someone to arrive . . .

Sabriel suppressed a shudder and jumped on.

There was more light now, heralding the advent

of the sun, and she could see a sort of wooden

landing stage leading up to a gate in the white

wall. Treetops were also visible behind the walls,

winter trees, their branches bare of green raiment.

Birds flew between trees and tower, little birds

launching themselves for their morning forage. It

was a vision of normalcy, of a haven. But Sabriel

could not forget the tall, flame-etched silhouette

of the Mordicant, brooding on the ledge.

Wearily, she made the jump to the last stone and

collapsed on the steps of the landing stage. Even

her eyelids could barely move, and her field of

vision had narrowed to a little slit directly to her

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front. The grain of the planks of the landing stage

loomed close, as she crawled up to the gate and

halfheartedly fell against it.

The gate swung open, pitching her onto a paved

courtyard, the beginning of a red-brick path, the

bricks ancient, their redness the color of dusty

apples. The path wound up to the front door of

the house, a cheerful sky-blue door, bright against

whitewashed stone. A bronze doorknocker in the

shape of a lion’s head holding a ring in its mouth

gleamed in counterpoint to the white cat that lay

coiled on the rush mat before the door.

Sabriel lay on the bricks and smiled up at the

cat, blinking back tears. The cat twitched and

turned its head ever so slightly to look at her,

revealing bright, green eyes.

“Hello, puss,” croaked Sabriel, coughing as she

staggered once more to her feet and walked forward,

groaning and creaking with every step. She

reached down to pat the cat, and froze—for, as

the cat thrust its head up, she saw the collar

around its neck and the tiny bell that hung there.

The collar was only red leather, but the Charterspell

on it was the strongest, most enduring, binding

that Sabriel had ever seen or felt—and the bell

was a miniature Saraneth. The cat was no cat, but

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a Free Magic creature of ancient power.

“Abhorsen,” mewed the cat, its little pink

tongue darting. “About time you got here.”

Sabriel stared at it for a moment, gave a little

sort of moan and fell forward in a faint of

exhaustion and dismay.

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chapter viii

Sabriel awoke to soft candlelight,

the warmth of a feather bed, and silken sheets,

delightfully smooth under heavy blankets. A fire

burned briskly in a red-brick fireplace and

wood-paneled walls gleamed with the dark mystery

of well-polished mahogany. A blue-papered

ceiling with silver stars dusted across it, faced her

newly opened eyes. Two windows confronted

each other across the room, but they were shuttered,

so Sabriel had no idea what time it was, no

more than she had any remembrance of how

she’d got there. It was definitely Abhorsen’s

House, but her last memory was of fainting on

the doorstep.

Gingerly—for even her neck ached from her

day and night of travel, fear and flight—Sabriel

lifted her head to look around and once again

met the green eyes of the cat that wasn’t a cat.

The creature was lying near her feet, at the end

of the bed.

“Who . . . what are you?” Sabriel asked nervously,

suddenly all too aware that she was

naked under the soft sheets. A sensuous delight,

but a defenseless one. Her eyes flickered to her

sword-belt and bell-bandolier, carefully draped

on a clothes-horse near the door.

“I have a variety of names,” replied the cat. It

had a strange voice, half-mew, half-purr, with

hissing on the vowels. “You may call me

Mogget. As to what I am, I was once many

things, but now I am only several. Primarily, I

am a servant of Abhorsen. Unless you would be

kind enough to remove my collar?”

Sabriel gave an uneasy smile, and shook her

head firmly. Whatever Mogget was, that collar

was the only thing that kept it as a servant of

Abhorsen . . . or anybody else. The Charter

marks on the collar were quite explicit about

that. As far as Sabriel could tell, the binding spell

was over a thousand years old. It was quite possible

that Mogget was some Free Magic spirit as

old as the Wall, or even older. She wondered

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why her father hadn’t mentioned it, and with a

pang, wished that she had awoken to find her

father here, in his house, both their troubles over.

“I thought not,” said Mogget, combining a

careless shrug with a limbering stretch. It . . . or

he, for Sabriel felt the cat was definitely masculine,

jumped to the parquet floor and sauntered

over to the fire. Sabriel watched, her trained eye

noting that Mogget’s shadow was not always

that of a cat.

A knock at the door interrupted her study of

the cat, the sharp sound making Sabriel jump

nervously, the hair on the back of her neck

frizzing to attention.

“It’s only one of the servants,” Mogget said, in

a patronizing tone. “Charter sendings, and pretty

low-grade ones at that. They always burn the

milk.”

Sabriel ignored him, and said, “Come in.” Her

voice shook, and she realized that shaky nerves

and weakness would be with her for a while.

The door swung open silently and a short,

robed figure drifted in. It was similar to the

upper gatewarden, being cowled and so without

a visible face, but this one’s habit was of light

cream rather than black. It had a simple cotton

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underdress draped over one arm, a thick towel

over the other and its Charter-woven hands held

a long woollen surcoat and a pair of slippers.

Without a word, it went to the end of the bed

and put the garments on Sabriel’s feet. Then it

crossed to a porcelain basin that sat in a silver

filigree stand, above a tiled area of the floor to

the left of the fire. There, it twisted a bronze

wheel, and steaming hot water splashed and gurgled

from a pipe in the wall, bringing with it the

stench of something sulphurous and unpleasant.

Sabriel wrinkled her nose.

“Hot springs,” commented Mogget. “You

won’t smell it after a while. Your father always

said that having permanent hot water was

worth bearing the smell. Or was it your grandfather

who said that? Or great-great-aunt? Ah,

memory . . .”

The servant stood immobile while the basin

filled, then twisted the wheel to cut the flow as

water slopped over the rim to the floor, close to

Mogget—who leapt to his feet and padded

away, keeping a cautious distance from the

Charter sending. Just like a real cat, Sabriel

thought. Perhaps the imposed shape impressed

behavior too, over the years—or centuries. She

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liked cats. The school had a cat, a plump marmalade

feline, who went by the name of Biscuits.

Sabriel thought about the way it slept on the

windowsill of the Prefect’s Room, and then found

herself thinking about the school in general, and

what her friends would be doing. Her eyelids

drooped as she imagined an Etiquette class, and

the Mistress droning on about silver salvers . . .

A sharp clang woke her with yet another start,

sending further stabs of pain through tired muscles.

The Charter sending had tapped the bronze

wheel with the poker from the fireplace. It was

obviously impatient for Sabriel to have her wash.

“Water’s getting cold,” explained Mogget,

leaping up to the bed again. “And they’ll be serving

dinner in half an hour.”

“They?” asked Sabriel, sitting up and reaching

forward to grab slippers and towel, preparatory

to sidling out of bed and into them.

“Them,” said Mogget, butting his head in the

direction of the sending, who had stepped back

from the basin and was now holding out a bar of

soap.

Sabriel shuffled over to the basin, the towel

wrapped firmly around her, and gingerly

touched the water. It was delightfully hot, but

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before she could do anything with it, the sending

stepped forward, whisked the towel off her and

upended the whole basin over her head.

Sabriel shrieked, but, again before she could

do anything else, the sending had put back the

basin, turned the wheel for more hot water and

was soaping her down, paying particular attention

to her head, as if it wanted to get soap in

Sabriel’s eyes, or suspected an infestation of nits.

“What are you doing!” Sabriel protested, as

the strangely cool hands of the sending scrubbed

at her back and then, quite without interest, at

her breasts and stomach. “Stop it! I’m quite old

enough to wash myself, thank you!”

But Miss Prionte’s techniques for dealing with

domestic servants didn’t seem to work on domestic

sendings. It kept scrubbing, occasionally

tipping hot water over Sabriel.

“How do I stop it?” she spluttered to Mogget,

as still more water cascaded over her head and

the sending started to scrub lower regions.

“You can’t,” replied Mogget, who seemed

quite amused by the spectacle. “This one’s particularly

recalcitrant.”

“What do you . . . ow! . . . stop that! What do

you mean, this one?”

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“There’s lots about the place,” said Mogget.

“Every Abhorsen seems to have made their own.

Probably because they get like this one after a

few hundred years. Privileged family retainers,

who always think they know best. Practically

human, in the worst possible way.”

The sending paused in its scrubbing just long

enough to flick some water at Mogget, who

jumped the wrong way and yowled as it hit him.

Just before another great basin-load of water hit

Sabriel, she saw the cat shoot under the bed, his

tail dividing the bedspread.

“That’s enough, thank you!” she pronounced,

as the last drench of water drained out through

a grille in the tiled area. The sending had probably

finished anyway, thought Sabriel, as it

stopped washing and started to towel her dry.

She snatched the towel back from it and tried to

finish the job herself, but the sending counterattacked

by combing her hair, causing another

minor tussle. Eventually, between the two of

them, Sabriel shrugged on the underdress and

surcoat, and submitted to a manicure and vigorous

hair-brushing.

She was admiring the tiny, repeated silver key

motif on the black surcoat in the mirror that

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backed one of the window-shutters, when a

gong sounded somewhere else in the house and

the servant-sending opened the door. A split

second later, Mogget raced through, with a cry

that Sabriel thought was “Dinner!” She followed,

rather more sedately, the sending closing

the door behind her.

Dinner was in the main hall of the house. A

long, stately room that took up half the ground

floor, it was dominated by the floor to ceiling

stained-glass window at the western end. The

window showed a scene from the building of the

Wall and, like many other things around the

house, was heavily laden with Charter Magic.

Perhaps there was no real glass in it at all,

Sabriel mused, as she watched the light of the

evening sun play in and around the toiling figures

that were building the Wall. As with the

sendings, if you looked closely enough you could

see tiny Charter marks making up the patterns.

It was hard to see through the window, but judging

from the sun, it was almost dusk. Sabriel

realized she must have slept for a full day, or

possibly even two.

A table nearly as long as the hall stretched

away from her—a brightly polished table of

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some light and lustrous timber, heavily laden

with silver salt cellars, candelabra and rather

fantastic-looking decanters and covered dishes.

But only two places were fully set, with a plethora

of knives, forks, spoons and other instruments,

which Sabriel only recognized from

obscure drawings in her Etiquette textbook.

She’d never seen a real golden straw for sucking

the innards out of a pomegranate before, for

example.

One place was before a high-backed chair at

the head of the table and the other was to the

left of this, in front of a cushioned stool. Sabriel

wondered which was hers, till Mogget jumped

up on the stool and said, “Come on! They won’t

serve till you’re seated.”

“They” were more sendings. Half a dozen in

all, including the cream-dressed tyrant of the

bedroom. They were all basically the same;

human in shape, but cowled or veiled. Only their

hands were visible, and these were almost transparent,

as if Charter marks had been lightly

etched on prosthetic hands carved from moonstone.

The sendings stood grouped around a

door—the kitchen door, for Sabriel saw fires

beyond them, and smelled the tang of cooking—

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and stared at her. It was rather unnerving, not to

meet any eyes.

“Yes, that’s her,” Mogget said caustically.

“Your new mistress. Now let’s have dinner.”

None of the sendings moved, till Sabriel

stepped forward. They stepped forward, too, and

all dropped to one knee, or whatever supported

them beneath the floor-length robes. Each held

out their pale right hand, Charter marks running

bright trails around their palms and fingers.

Sabriel stared for a moment, but it was clear

they offered their services, or loyalty, and expected

her to do something in return. She

walked to them and gently pressed each upthrust

hand in turn, feeling the Charter-spells

that made them whole. Mogget had spoken

truly, for some of the spells were old, far older

than Sabriel could guess.

“I thank you,” she said slowly. “On behalf of

my father, and for the kindness you have shown

me.”

This seemed to be appropriate, or enough to

be going on with. The sendings stood, bowed

and went about their business. The one in the

cream habit pulled out Sabriel’s chair and placed

her napkin as she sat. It was of crisp black linen,

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dusted with tiny silver keys, a miracle of needlework.

Mogget, Sabriel noticed, had a plain white

napkin, with evidence of old stains.

“I’ve had to eat in the kitchen for the last two

weeks,” Mogget said sourly, as two sendings

approached from the kitchen, bearing plates that

signaled their arrival with a tantalizing odor of

spices and hot food.

“I expect it was good for you,” Sabriel replied

brightly, taking a mouthful of wine. It was a

fruity, dry white wine, though Sabriel hadn’t

developed a palate to know whether it was good

or merely indifferent. It was certainly drinkable.

Her first major experiments with alcohol lay several

years behind her, enshrined in memory as significant

occasions shared with two of her closest

friends. None of the three could ever drink brandy

again, but Sabriel had started to enjoy wine with

her meals.

“Anyway, how did you know I was coming?”

Sabriel asked. “I didn’t know myself, till . . . till

Father sent his message.”

The cat didn’t answer at once, his attention

focused on the plate of fish the sending had just

put down—small, almost circular fish, with the

bright eyes and shiny scales of the freshly caught.

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Sabriel had them too, but hers were grilled, with

a tomato, garlic and basil sauce.

“I have served ten times as many of your forebears

as you have years,” Mogget replied at last.

“And though my powers wane with the ebb of

time, I always know when one Abhorsen falls and

another takes their place.”

Sabriel swallowed her last mouthful, all taste

gone, and put down her fork. She took a mouthful

of wine to clear her throat, but it seemed to

have become vinegar, making her cough.

“What do you mean by ‘fall’? What do you

know? What has happened to Father?”

Mogget looked up at Sabriel, eyes half-lidded,

meeting her gaze steadily, as no normal cat could.

“He is dead, Sabriel. Even if he hasn’t passed

the Final Gate, he will walk in life no more. That

is—”

“No,” interrupted Sabriel. “He can’t be! He

cannot be. He is a necromancer . . . he can’t be

dead . . .”

“That is why he sent the sword and bells to

you, as his aunt sent them to him, in her time,”

Mogget continued, ignoring Sabriel’s outburst.

“And he was not a necromancer, he was

Abhorsen.”

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132

“I don’t understand,” Sabriel whispered. She

couldn’t face Mogget’s eyes anymore. “I don’t

know . . . I don’t know enough. About anything.

The Old Kingdom, Charter Magic, even my own

father. Why do you say his name as if it were a

title?”

“It is. He was the Abhorsen. Now you are.”

Sabriel digested this in silence, staring at the

swirls of fish and sauce on her plate, silver scales

and red tomato blurring into a pattern of swords

and fire. The table blurred too, and the room

beyond, and she felt herself reaching for the border

with Death. But try as she might, she couldn’t

cross it. She sensed it, but there was no way to

cross, in either direction—Abhorsen’s House was

too well protected. But she did feel something at

the border. Inimical things lurked there, waiting

for her to cross, but there was also the faintest

thread of something familiar, like the scent of a

woman’s perfume after she has left the room, or

the waft of a particular pipe tobacco around a

corner. Sabriel focused on it and threw herself

once more at the barrier that separated her from

Death.

Only to ricochet back to Life, as sharp claws

pricked her arm. Her eyes snapped open, blinking

off flakes of frost, to see Mogget, fur bristling, one

paw ready to strike again.

“Fool!” he hissed. “You are the only one who

can break the wards of this House and they wait

for you to do so!”

Sabriel stared at the angry cat, unseeing, biting

back a sharp and proud retort as she realized the

truth in Mogget’s words. There were Dead spirits

waiting, and probably the Mordicant would cross

as well—and she would have faced them alone

and weaponless.

“I’m sorry,” she muttered, bowing her head

into two frosted hands. She hadn’t felt this

stupidly awful since she’d burned one of the

Headmistress’s rose bushes with an uncontrolled

Charter-spell, narrowly missing the school’s

ancient and much-loved gardener. She had cried

then, but she was older now, and could keep the

tears at bay.

“Father is not yet truly dead,” she said, after a

moment. “I felt his presence, though he is trapped

beyond many gates. I could bring him back.”

“You must not,” said Mogget firmly, and his

voice now seemed to carry all the weight of centuries.

“You are Abhorsen, and must put the

Dead to rest. Your path is chosen.”

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“I can walk a different path,” Sabriel replied

firmly, raising her head.

Mogget seemed about to protest again, then he

laughed—a sardonic laugh—and jumped back to

his stool.

“Do as you will,” he said. “Why should I gainsay

you? I am but a slave, bound to service. Why

would I weep if Abhorsen falls to evil? It is your

father who would curse you, and your mother

too—and the Dead who will be merry.”

“I don’t think he’s dead,” Sabriel said, bright

blushes of withheld emotion in her pallid cheeks,

frost melting, trickling down around her face.

“His spirit felt alive. He is trapped in Death, I

think, but his body lives. Would I still be reviled if

I brought him back then?”

“No,” said Mogget, calm again. “But he has

sent the sword and bells. You are only wishing

that he lives.”

“I feel it,” Sabriel said simply. “And I must find

out if my feeling is true.”

“Perhaps it is so—though strange.” Mogget

seemed to be musing to himself, his voice a soft

half-purr. “I have grown dull. This collar strangles

me, chokes my wits . . .”

“Help me, Mogget,” Sabriel suddenly pleaded,

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reaching over to touch her hand to the cat’s head,

scratching under the collar. “I need to know—I

need to know so much!”

Mogget purred under the scratching, but as

Sabriel leaned close, she could hear the faint peal

of the tiny Saraneth bell cut through the purr, and

she was reminded that Mogget was no cat, but a

Free Magic creature. For a moment, Sabriel wondered

what Mogget’s true shape was, and his true

nature.

“I am the servant of Abhorsen,” Mogget said

at last. “And you are Abhorsen, so I must help

you. But you must promise me that you will not

raise your father, if his body is dead. Truly, he

would not wish it.”

“I cannot promise. But I will not act without

much thought. And I will listen to you, if you are

by me.”

“I guessed as much,” Mogget said, twisting his

head away from Sabriel’s hand. “It is true that

you are sadly ignorant, or you would promise

with a will. Your father should never have sent

you beyond the Wall.”

“Why did he?” asked Sabriel, her heart suddenly

leaping with the question that had been

with her all her school days, a question Abhorsen

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had always smiled away with the one word,

“Necessity.”

“He was afraid,” replied Mogget, turning his

attention back to the fish. “You were safer in

Ancelstierre.”

“What was he afraid of?”

“Eat your fish,” replied Mogget, as two sendings

appeared from the kitchen, bearing what was

obviously the next course. “We’ll talk later. In the

study.”

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chapter ix

Lanterns lit the study, old brass

lanterns that burned with Charter Magic in

place of oil. Smokeless, silent and eternal, they

provided as good a light as the electric bulbs of

Ancelstierre.

Books lined the walls, following the curves of

the tower around, save for where the stair rose

from below, and the ladder climbed to the observatory

above.

A redwood table sat in the middle of the room,

its legs scaled and beady-eyed, ornamental

flames licking from the mouths of the dragonheads

that gripped each corner of the tabletop.

An inkwell, pens, papers and a pair of bronze

map dividers lay upon the table. Chairs of the

same red wood surrounded it, their upholstery

black with a variation on the silver key motif.

The table was one of the few things Sabriel

remembered from her childhood visits. “Dragon

desk” her father had called it, and she’d wrapped

herself around one of those dragon legs, her head

not even reaching the underside of the table.

Sabriel ran her hand over the smooth, cool

wood, feeling both her memory of it and the current

sensation, then she sighed, pulled up a chair

and put down the three books she’d tucked

under her arm. Two, she put together close to

her, the other she pushed to the center of the

table. This third book came from the single

glassed-in cabinet among the bookshelves and

now lay like some quiescent predator, possibly

asleep, possibly waiting to spring. Its binding

was of pale green leather and Charter marks

burned in the silver clasps that held it closed. The

Book of the Dead.

The other two books were normal enough by

comparison. Both were Charter Magic spell

books, listing mark after mark, and how they

could be used. Sabriel didn’t even recognize most

of the marks after chapter four in the first book.

There were twenty chapters in each volume.

Doubtless there were many other books that

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would be useful, Sabriel thought, but she still

felt too tired and shaky to get more down. She

planned to talk to Mogget, then study for an

hour or two, before going back to bed. Even four

or five waking hours seemed too much after her

ordeal, and the loss of consciousness involved

in sleep suddenly seemed very appealing.

Mogget, as if he had heard Sabriel thinking

of him, appeared at the top of the steps and

sauntered over to sprawl on a well-upholstered

footstand.

“I see you have found that book,” he said, tail

flicking backwards and forwards as he spoke.

“Take care you do not read too much.”

“I’ve already read it all, anyway,” replied

Sabriel, shortly.

“Perhaps,” remarked the cat. “But it isn’t

always the same book. Like me, it is several

things, not one.”

Sabriel shrugged, as if to show that she knew

all about the book. But that was just bravado—

the inner Sabriel was afraid of The Book of the

Dead. She had worked her way through every

chapter, under her father’s direction, but her

normally excellent memory held only selected

pages of this tome. If it changed its contents as

139

well—she suppressed a shiver, and told herself

that she knew all that was necessary.

“My first step must be to find my father’s

body,” she said. “Which is where I need your

help, Mogget.”

“I have no knowledge of where he met his

end,” Mogget stated, with finality. He yawned,

and started licking his paws.

Sabriel frowned, and found herself pulling in

her lips, a characteristic she had deplored in the

unpopular history teacher at school, who often

went “thin-lipped” in anger or exasperation.

“Just tell me when you last saw him, and what

his plans were.”

“Why don’t you read his diary,” suggested

Mogget, in a momentary break from cleaning

himself.

“Where is it?” asked Sabriel, excited. A diary

would be tremendously helpful.

“He probably took it with him,” replied

Mogget. “I haven’t seen it.”

“I thought you had to help me!” Sabriel said,

another frown wrinkling across her forehead,

reinforcing the thin lips. “Please answer my

question.”

“Three weeks ago,” Mogget mumbled, mouth

140

half muffled in the fur of his stomach, pink

tongue alternating between words and cleansing.

“A messenger came from Belisaere, begging

for his help. Something Dead, something that

could pass the wards, was preying on them.

Abhorsen—I mean the previous Abhorsen,

ma’am—suspected that there was more to it

than that, Belisaere being Belisaere. But he went.”

“Belisaere. The name’s familiar—it’s a town?”

“A city. The capital. At least it was, when there

was still a kingdom.”

“Was?”

Mogget stopped washing, and looked across,

eyes narrowing to frowning slits. “What did

they teach you in that school? There hasn’t been

a King or Queen for two hundred years, and not

even a Regent for twenty. That’s why the

Kingdom sinks day by day, into a darkness from

which no one will rise . . .”

“The Charter—” Sabriel began, but Mogget

interrupted with a yowl of derision.

“The Charter crumbles too,” he mewed.

“Without a ruler, Charter Stones broken one

by one with blood, one of the Great Charters

twi . . . twis . . . twisted—”

“What do you mean, one of the Great

141

Charters?” Sabriel interrupted in turn. She had

never heard of such a thing. Not for the first

time, she also wondered what she’d been taught

in school, and why her father had kept so quiet

about the state of the Old Kingdom.

But Mogget was silent, as if the things he’d

already said had stopped his mouth. For a

moment, he seemed to be trying to form words,

but nothing came from his small red mouth.

Finally, he gave up. “I cannot tell you. It’s part of

my binding, curse it! Suffice to say that the

whole world slides into evil, and many are helping

the slide.”

“And others resist it,” said Sabriel. “Like my

father. Like me.”

“It depends what you do,” Mogget said, as if

he doubted that someone as patently useless as

Sabriel would make much difference. “Not that

I care—”

The sound of the trapdoor opening above

their heads stopped the cat in mid-speech.

Sabriel tensed, looking up to see what was coming

down the ladder, then started breathing

again as she realized that it was only another

Charter sending, its black habit flopping over

the rungs of the ladder as it came down. This

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one, like the guards on the cliff corridor—but

unlike the other House servants—had the silver

key emblazoned on its chest and back. It bowed

to Sabriel, and pointed up.

With a feeling of foreboding, Sabriel knew that

it wanted her to look at something from the

observatory. Reluctantly, she pushed her chair

back and went over to the ladder. A cold draft

was blowing in through the open trapdoor, carrying

with it the chill of ice from further up the

river. Sabriel shivered, as her hands touched the

cold metal rungs.

Emerging into the observatory, the chill

passed, for the room was still lit by the last, red

light of the setting sun, giving an illusion of

warmth and making Sabriel squint. She had

no memory of this room, so it was with delight

that she saw that it was totally walled in glass,

or something like it. The bare beams of the redtiled

roof rested on transparent walls, so cleverly

morticed together that the roof was like a work

of art, complete with the slight draft that

reduced its perfection to a more human level.

A large telescope of gleaming glass and bronze

dominated the observatory, standing triumphant

on a tripod of dark wood and darker iron. A tall

143

observer’s stool stood next to it, and a lectern,

a star chart still spilled across it. A thick, toe

wriggle-inviting carpet lay under all, a carpet that

was also a map of the heavens, showing many

different, colorful constellations and whirling

planets, woven in thick, richly dyed wool.

The sending, who had followed Sabriel, went

to the south wall and pointed out towards the

southern riverbank, its pallid, Charter-drawn

hand indicating the very spot where Sabriel had

emerged after her underground flight from the

Mordicant.

Sabriel looked there, shielding her right eye

from the west-falling sun. Her gaze crossed the

white tops of the river and was drawn to the

ledge, despite an inner quailing about what she

would see.

As she feared, the Mordicant was still there.

But with what she had come to think of as her

Death sight, Sabriel sensed it was quiescent, temporarily

just an unpleasant statue, a foreground

to other, more active shapes that bustled about in

some activity behind.

Sabriel stared a little longer, then went to the

telescope, narrowly avoiding Mogget, who had

somehow appeared underfoot. Sabriel wondered

144

how he had got up the ladder, then dismissed the

thought as she concentrated on what was happening

outside.

Unaided, she hadn’t been certain what the

shapes around the Mordicant were, but they

sprang sharply at her through the telescope,

drawn so close she felt she could somehow lean

forward and snatch them away.

They were men and women—living, breathing

people. Each was shackled to a partner’s leg by

an iron chain and they shuffled about in these

pairs under the dominating presence of the

Mordicant. There were scores of them, coming

out of the corridor, carrying heavily laden

leather buckets or lengths of timber, taking them

across the ledge and down the steps to the river.

Then they filed back again, buckets empty, timber

left behind.

Sabriel depressed the telescope a little, and

almost growled in exasperation and anger as she

saw the scene by the river. More living slaves

were hammering long boxes together from the

timber, and these boxes were being filled with

earth from the buckets. As each box was filled,

it was pushed out to bridge the gap from shore

to stepping-stone and locked in place by slaves

145

146

hammering iron spikes into the stone.

This particular part of the operation was being

directed by something that lurked well back

from the river, halfway up the steps. A manshaped

blot of blackest night, a moving silhouette.

A necromancer’s Shadow Hand, or some

free-willed Dead spirit that scorned the use of a

body.

As Sabriel watched, the last of four boxes was

thrust out to the first stepping-stone, spiked in

place, and then chained to its three adjacent

fellows. One slave, fastening the chain, overbalanced

and went headfirst into the water, his

shackle-mate following a second later. Their

screams, if any, were drowned by the roar of the

waterfall as its waters took their bodies. A few

seconds later, Sabriel felt their lives snuffed out.

The other slaves at the river’s edge stopped

working for a moment, either shocked at the

sudden loss, or momentarily made more afraid

of the river than their masters. But the Shadow

Hand on the steps moved towards them, its legs

like treacle, pouring down the slope, lapping

over each step in turn. It gestured for some of the

nearer slaves to walk across the earth-filled

boxes to the stepping-stone. They did so, to

cluster unhappily amid the spray.

The Shadow Hand hesitated then, but the

Mordicant on the ledge above seemed to stir and

rock forward a little, so the shadowy abomination

gingerly trod on the boxes—and walked

across to the stepping-stone, taking no scathe

from the running water.

“Grave dirt,” commented Mogget, who obviously

didn’t need the telescope. “Carted up by

the villagers from Qyrre and Roble’s Town. I

wonder if they’ve got enough to cross all the

stones.”

“Grave dirt,” commented Sabriel bleakly,

watching a fresh round of slaves arriving with

buckets and more timber. “I had forgotten it

could negate the running water. I thought . . . I

thought I would be safe here, for a time.”

“Well, you are,” said Mogget. “It’ll take at least

until tomorrow evening before their bridge is

complete, particularly allowing for a couple of

hours off around noon, when the Dead will have

to hide if it isn’t overcast. But this shows planning,

and that means a leader. Still, every Abhorsen has

enemies. It may just be a petty necromancer with

a better brain for strategy than most.”

“I slew a Dead thing at Cloven Crest,” Sabriel

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said slowly, thinking aloud. “It said it would have

its revenge and spoke of telling the servants of

Kerrigor. Do you know that name?”

“I know it,” spat Mogget, tail quivering straight

out behind him. “But I cannot speak of it, except

to say it is one of the Greater Dead, and your

father’s most terrible enemy. Do not say it lives

again!”

“I don’t know,” replied Sabriel, looking down

at the cat, whose body seemed twisted, as if in

turmoil between command and resistance.

“Why can’t you tell me more? The binding?”

“A . . . a perversion of . . . the g . . . g . . . yes,”

Mogget croaked out with effort. Though his

green eyes seemed to grow luminous and fiery

with anger at his own feeble explanation, he

could say no more.

“Coils within coils,” remarked Sabriel

thoughtfully. There seemed little doubt that

some evil power was working against her, from

the moment she’d crossed the Wall—or even

before that, if her father’s disappearance was

anything to go by.

She looked back through the telescope again

and took some heart in the slowing of the work

as the last light faded, though at the same time

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she felt a pang of sympathy for the poor people

the Dead had enslaved. Many would probably

freeze to death, or die of exhaustion, only to be

brought back as dull-witted Hands. Only those

who went over the waterfall would escape that

fate. Truly, the Old Kingdom was a terrible

place, when even death did not mean an end to

slavery and despair.

“Is there another way out?” she asked, swivelling

the telescope around 180 degrees to look at

the northern bank. There were stepping-stones

going there, too, and another door high on the

riverbank, but there were also dark shapes clustered

on the ledge by the door. Four or five

Shadow Hands, too many for Sabriel to fight

through alone.

“It seems not,” she answered herself grimly.

“What of defenses, then? Can the sendings

fight?”

“The sendings don’t need to fight,” replied

Mogget. “For there is another defense, though

it is a rather constrictive one. And there is one

other way out, though you probably won’t like

it.”

The sending next to her nodded and pantomimed

something with its arm that looked like

149

a snake wiggling through grass.

“What’s that?” asked Sabriel, fighting back a

sudden urge to break into hysterical laughter.

“The defense or the way out?”

“The defense,” replied Mogget. “The river

itself. It can be invoked to rise almost to the

height of the island walls—four times your

height above the stepping-stones. Nothing can

pass such a flood, in or out, till it subsides, in a

matter of weeks.”

“So how would I get out?” asked Sabriel. “I

can’t wait weeks!”

“One of your ancestors built a flying device. A

Paperwing, she called it. You can use that,

launched out over the waterfall.”

“Oh,” said Sabriel, in a little voice.

“If you do wish to raise the river,” Mogget

continued, as if he hadn’t noticed Sabriel’s sudden

silence, “then we must begin the ritual

immediately. The flood comes from meltwater

and the mountains are many leagues upstream. If

we call the waters now, the flood will be on us by

dusk tomorrow.”

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chapter x

The arrival of the floodwaters

was heralded by great chunks of ice that came

battering against the wooden bridge of grave

dirt boxes like storm-borne icebergs ramming

anchored ships. Ice shattered, wood splintered;

a regular drumming that beat out a warning,

announcing the great wave that followed the

outriding ice.

Dead Hands and living slaves scurried back

along the coffin bridge, the Dead’s shadowy

bodies losing shape as they ran, so they became

like long, thick worms of black crepe, squirming

and sliding over rocks and boxes, throwing

human slaves aside without mercy, desperate to

escape the destruction that came roaring down

the river.

Sabriel, watching from the tower, felt the people

die, convulsively swallowing as she sensed

their last breaths gurgling, sucking water instead

of air. Some of them, at least two pairs, had

deliberately thrown themselves into the river,

choosing a final death, rather than risk eternal

bondage. Most had been knocked, pushed or

simply scared aside by the Dead.

The wavefront of the flood came swiftly after

the ice, shouting as it came, a higher, fiercer roar

than the deep bellow of the waterfall. Sabriel

heard it for several seconds before it rounded the

last bend of the river, then suddenly, it was

almost upon her. A huge, vertical wall of water,

with chunks of ice on its crest like marble battlements

and all the debris of four hundred miles

swilling about in its muddy body. It looked enormous,

far taller than the island’s walls, taller

even than the tower where Sabriel stared,

shocked at the power she had unleashed, a

power she had hardly dreamed possible when

she’d summoned it the night before.

It had been a simple enough summoning.

Mogget had taken her to the cellar and then

down a winding, narrow stair, that grew colder

and colder as they descended. Finally, they

152

reached a strange grotto, where icicles hung and

Sabriel’s breath blew clouds of white, but it was

no longer cold, or perhaps so cold she no longer

felt it. A block of pure, blue-white ice stood

upon a stone pedestal, both limned with

Charter marks, marks strange and beautiful.

Then, following Mogget’s instruction, she’d

simply placed her hand on the ice, and said,

“Abhorsen pays her respects to the Clayr, and

requests the gift of water.” That was all. They’d

gone back up the stairs, a sending locked the

cellar door behind them, and another brought

Sabriel a nightshirt and a cup of hot chocolate.

But that simple ceremony had summoned

something that seemed totally out of control.

Sabriel watched the wave racing towards them,

trying to calm herself, but her breath raced in

and out as quickly as her stomach flipped over.

Just as the wave hit, she screamed and ducked

under the telescope.

The whole tower shook, stones screeching as

they moved, and for a moment, even the sound

of the waterfall was lost in a crack that sounded

as if the island had been leveled by the first

shock of the wave.

But, after a few seconds, the floor stopped

153

shaking, and the crash of the flood subsided to

a controlled roar, like a shouting drunk made

aware of company. Sabriel hauled herself up

the tripod and opened her eyes.

The walls had held, and though now the

wave was past, the river still raged a mere

handspan below the island’s defenses and was

almost up to the tunnel doors on either bank.

There was no sign of the stepping-stones, the

coffin bridge, the Dead, or any people—just a

wide, brown rushing torrent, carrying debris

of all descriptions. Trees, bushes, parts of

buildings, livestock, chunks of ice—the flood

had claimed its tribute from every riverbank

for hundreds of miles.

Sabriel looked at this evidence of destruction

and inwardly counted the number of villagers

who had died on the grave boxes. Who knew

how many other lives had been lost, or livelihoods

threatened, upstream? Part of her tried to

rationalize her use of the flood, telling her that

she had to do it in order to fight on against the

Dead. Another part said she had simply summoned

the flood to save herself.

Mogget had no time for such introspection,

mourning or pangs of responsibility. He left

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her watching, blank-eyed, for no more than a

minute, before padding forward and delicately

inserting his claws in Sabriel’s slippered foot.

“Ow! What did you—”

“There’s no time to waste sightseeing,”

Mogget said. “The sendings are readying the

Paperwing on the Eastern wall. And your clothing

and gear have been ready for at least half an

hour.”

“I’ve got all . . .” Sabriel began, then she

remembered that her pack and skis lay at the

bottom end of the entrance tunnel, probably as

a pile of Mordicant-burned ash.

“The sendings have got everything you’ll

need, and a few things you won’t, knowing them.

You can get dressed, pack up, and head off for

Belisaere. I take it you intend to go to Belisaere?”

“Yes,” replied Sabriel shortly. She could detect

a tone of smugness in Mogget’s voice.

“Do you know how to get there?”

Sabriel was silent. Mogget already knew the

answer was “no.” Hence the smugness.

“Do you have a . . . er . . . map?”

Sabriel shook her head, clenching her fists as

she did so, resisting the urge to lean forward

and spank Mogget, or perhaps give his tail a

155

judicious tug. She had searched the study and

asked several of the sendings, but the only map

in the house seemed to be the starmap in the

tower. The map Colonel Horyse had told her

about must still be with Abhorsen. With Father,

Sabriel thought, suddenly confused about their

identities. If she was now Abhorsen, who was

her father? Had he too once had a name that was

lost in the responsibility of being Abhorsen?

Everything that had seemed so certain and solid

in her life a few days ago was crumbling. She

didn’t even know who she was really, and trouble

seemed to beset her from all sides—even a

supposed servant of Abhorsen like Mogget

seemed to provide more trouble than service.

“Do you have anything positive to say—anything

that might actually help?” she snapped.

Mogget yawned, showing a pink tongue that

seemed to contain the very essence of scorn.

“Well, yes. Of course. I know the way, so I’d

better come with you.”

“Come with me?” Sabriel asked, genuinely

surprised. She unclenched her fists, bent down,

and scratched between the cat’s ears, till he

ducked away.

“Someone has to look after you,” Mogget

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added. “At least till you’ve grown into a real

Abhorsen.”

“Thank you,” said Sabriel. “I think. But I

would still like a map. Since you know the country

so well, would it be possible for you to—I

don’t know—describe it, so I can make a sketch

map or something?”

Mogget coughed, as if a hairball had suddenly

lodged in his throat, and thrust his head back a

little. “You! Draw a sketch map? If you must

have one, I think it would be better if I undertook

the cartography myself. Come down to the

study and put out an inkwell and paper.”

“As long as I get a useable map I don’t care

who draws it,” Sabriel remarked, as she went

backwards down the ladder. She tilted her head

to watch how Mogget came down, but there was

only the open trapdoor. A sarcastic meow under

her feet announced that Mogget had once again

managed to get between rooms without visible

means of support.

“Ink and paper,” the cat reminded her, jumping

up onto the dragon desk. “The thick paper.

Smooth side up. Don’t bother with a quill.”

Sabriel followed Mogget’s instructions, then

watched with a resigned condescension that

157

rapidly changed to surprise as the cat crouched

by the square of paper, his strange shadow falling

on it like a dark cloak thrown across sand, pink

tongue out in concentration. Mogget seemed to

think for a moment, then one bright ivory claw

shot out from a white pad—he delicately inked

the claw in the inkwell, and began to draw. First,

a rough outline, in swift, bold strokes; the penning

in of the major geographical features; then

the delicate process of adding important sites,

each named in fine, spidery writing. Last of all,

Mogget marked Abhorsen’s House with a small

illustration, before leaning back to admire his

handiwork, and lick the ink from his paw. Sabriel

waited a few seconds to be sure he was done,

then cast drying sand over the paper, her eyes trying

to absorb every detail, intent on learning the

physical face of the Old Kingdom.

“You can look at it later,” Mogget said after

a few minutes, when his paw was clean, but

Sabriel was still bent over the table, nose inches

from the map. “We’re still in a hurry. You’d better

go and get dressed, for a start. Do try to be

quick.”

“I will.” Sabriel smiled, still looking at the

map. “Thank you, Mogget.”

158

159

The sendings had laid out a great pile of

clothes and equipment in Sabriel’s room, and

four of them were in attendance to help her

get everything on and organized. She had hardly

stepped inside before they’d stripped her indoor

dress and slippers off, and she’d only just managed

to remove her own underclothes before

ghostly Charter-traced hands tickled her sides.

A few seconds later, she was suffering them anyway,

as they pulled a thin, cotton-like undergarment

over her head, and a pair of baggy

drawers up her legs. Next came a linen shirt,

then a tunic of doeskin and breeches of supple

leather, reinforced with some sort of hard, segmented

plates at thighs, knees and shins, not to

mention a heavily padded bottom, no doubt

designed for riding.

A brief respite followed, lulling Sabriel into

thinking that might be it, but the sendings had

merely been arranging the next layer for immediate

fitting. Two of them pushed her arms into

a long, armored coat that buckled up at the

sides, while the other two unlaced a pair of hobnailed

boots and waited.

The coat wasn’t like anything Sabriel had

ever worn before, including the mail hauberk

she’d worn in Fighting Arts lessons at school. It

was as long as an hauberk, with split skirts

coming down to her knees and sleeves swallowtailed

at her wrists, but it seemed to be entirely

made of tiny overlapping plates, much like

a fish’s scales. They weren’t metal, either, but

some sort of ceramic, or even stone. Much

lighter than steel, but clearly very strong, as

one sending demonstrated, by cutting down it

with a dagger, striking sparks without leaving a

scratch.

Sabriel thought the boots completed the

ensemble, but as the laces were done up by one

pair of sendings, the other pair were back in

action. One raised what appeared to be a blue

and silver striped turban, but Sabriel, pulling it

down to just above her eyebrows, found it to be

a cloth-wrapped helmet, made from the same

material as the armor.

The other sending waved out a gleaming, deep

blue surcoat, dusted with embroidered silver keys

that reflected the light in all directions. It waved

the coat to and fro for a moment, then whipped

it over Sabriel’s head and adjusted the drape

with a practiced motion. Sabriel ran her hand

over its silken expanse and discreetly tried to rip

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it in one corner, but, for all its apparent fragility,

it wouldn’t tear.

Last of all came sword-belt and bell-bandolier.

The sendings brought them to her, but made no

attempt to put them on. Sabriel adjusted them

herself, carefully arranging bells and scabbard,

feeling the familiar weight—bells across her

breast and sword balanced on her hip. She

turned to the mirror and looked at her reflection,

both pleased and troubled by what she saw. She

looked competent, professional, a traveler who

could look after herself. At the same time, she

looked less like someone called Sabriel, and

more like the Abhorsen, capital letter and all.

She would have looked longer, but the sendings

tugged at her sleeves and directed her attention

to the bed. A leather backpack lay open on

it and, as Sabriel watched, the sendings packed it

with her remaining old clothes, including her

father’s oilskin, spare undergarments, tunic and

trousers, dried beef and biscuits, a water bottle,

and several small leather pouches full of useful

things, each of which were painstakingly opened

and shown to her: telescope, sulphur matches,

clockwork firestarter, medicinal herbs, fishing

hooks and line, a sewing kit and a host of other

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small essentials. The three books from the

library and the map went into oilskin pouches,

and then into an outside pocket.

Backpack on, Sabriel tried a few basic exercises,

and was relieved to find that the armor

didn’t restrict her too much—hardly at all in

fact, though the pack was not something she’d

like to have on in a fight. She could even touch

her toes, so she did, several times, before straightening

up to thank the sendings.

They were gone. Instead, there was Mogget,

stalking mysteriously towards her from the middle

of the room.

“Well, I’m ready,” Sabriel said.

Mogget didn’t answer, but sat at her feet, and

made a movement that looked very much like he

was going to be sick. Sabriel recoiled, disgusted,

then halted, as a small metallic object fell from

Mogget’s mouth and bounced on the floor.

“Almost forgot,” said Mogget. “You’ll need

this if I’m to come with you.”

“What is it?” asked Sabriel, bending down to

pick up a ring; a small silver ring, with a ruby

gripped between two silver claws that grew out

of the band.

“Old,” replied Mogget, enigmatically. “You’ll

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know if you need to use it. Put it on.”

Sabriel looked at it closely, holding it between

two fingers as she slanted it towards the light. It

felt, and looked, quite ordinary. There were no

Charter marks on the stone or band; it seemed to

have no emanations or aura. She put it on.

It felt cold as it slipped down her finger, then

hot, and suddenly she was falling, falling into

infinity, into a void that had no end and no

beginning. Everything was gone, all light, all

substance. Then Charter marks suddenly

exploded all around her and she felt gripped by

them, halting her headlong fall into nothing,

accelerating her back up, back into her body,

back to the world of life and death.

“Free Magic,” Sabriel said, looking down at

the ring gleaming on her finger. “Free Magic,

connected to the Charter. I don’t understand.”

“You’ll know if you need to use it,” Mogget

repeated, almost as if it were some lesson to be

learned by rote. Then, in his normal voice:

“Don’t worry about it till then. Come—the

Paperwing is ready.”

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chapter xi

The Paperwing sat on a juryrigged

platform of freshly sawn pine planks, teetering

out over the eastern wall. Six sendings

clustered around the craft, readying it for flight.

Sabriel looked up at it as she climbed the stairs,

an unpleasant feeling rising with her. She had

been expecting something similar to the aircraft

that had begun to be common in Ancelstierre,

like the biplane that had performed aerobatics

at the last Wyverley College Open Day.

Something with two wings, rigging and a propeller—

though she had assumed a magical

engine rather than a mechanical one.

But the Paperwing didn’t look anything like an

Ancelstierran airplane. It most closely resembled

a canoe with hawk-wings and a tail. On closer

inspection, Sabriel saw that the central fuselage

was probably based on a canoe. It was tapered at

each end and had a central hole for a cockpit.

Wings sprouted on each side of this canoe

shape—long, swept-back wings that looked very

flimsy. The wedge-shaped tail didn’t look much

better.

Sabriel climbed the last few steps with sinking

expectations. The construction material was

now clear and so was the craft’s name—the

whole thing was made up from many sheets of

paper, bonded together with some sort of laminate.

Painted powder-blue, with silver bands

around the fuselage and silver stripes along the

wings and tail, it looked pretty, decorative and

not at all airworthy.

Only the yellow falcon eyes painted on its

pointed prow hinted at its capacity for flight.

Sabriel looked at the Paperwing again, and

then out at the waterfall beyond. Now, fed by

floodwaters, it looked even more frightening

than usual. Spray exploded for tens of yards

above its lip—a roaring mist the Paperwing

would have to fly through before it reached the

open sky beyond. Sabriel didn’t even know if it

was waterproof.

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“How often has this . . . thing . . . flown

before?” she asked, nervously. Intellectually, she

accepted that she would soon be sitting in this

craft, to be launched out towards the crashing

waters—but her subconscious, and her stomach,

seemed very keen to stay firmly on the ground.

“Many times,” replied Mogget, easily jumping

from the platform to the cockpit. His voice echoed

there for a moment, till he climbed back up, furry

cat-face propped on the rim. “The Abhorsen who

made it once flew it to the sea and back, in a single

afternoon. But she was a great weather-witch

and could work the winds. I don’t suppose—”

“No,” said Sabriel, made aware of another gap

in her education. She knew that wind-magic was

largely whistled Charter marks, but that was all.

“No. I can’t.”

“Well,” continued Mogget, after a thoughtful

pause, “the Paperwing does have some elementary

charms to ride the wind. You’ll have to whistle

them, though. You can whistle, I trust?”

Sabriel ignored him. All necromancers had to be

musical, had to be able to whistle, to hum, to sing.

If they were caught in Death without bells, or

other magical instruments, their vocal skills were

a weapon of last recourse.

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A sending came and took her pack, helping her

to wrestle it off, then stowing it at the rear of the

cockpit. Another took Sabriel’s arm and directed

her to what appeared to be a leather halfhammock

strung across the cockpit—obviously

the pilot’s seat. It didn’t look terribly safe either,

but Sabriel forced herself to climb in, after giving

her scabbarded sword into the hands of yet

another sending.

Surprisingly, her feet didn’t go through the

paper-laminated floor. The material even felt reassuringly

solid and, after a minute of squirming,

swaying and adjustment, the hammock-seat was

very comfortable. Sword and scabbard were slid

into a receptacle at her side and Mogget took up

a position on top of the straps holding down her

pack, just behind her shoulders, for the seat made

her recline so far she was almost lying down.

From her new eye level, Sabriel saw a small,

oval mirror of silvered glass, fixed just below

the cockpit rim. It glittered in the late afternoon

sun, and she felt it resonate with Charter Magic.

Something about it prompted her to breathe

upon it, her hot breath clouding the glass. It

stayed misted for a moment, then a Charter

mark slowly appeared, as if a ghostly finger was

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drawn across the clouded mirror.

Sabriel studied it carefully, absorbing its purpose

and effect. It told her of the marks that

would follow; marks to raise the lifting winds,

marks for descending in haste, marks to call the

wind from every corner of the compass rose.

There were other marks for the Paperwing and, as

Sabriel absorbed them, she saw that the whole

craft was lined with Charter Magic, infused with

spells. The Abhorsen who made it had labored

long, and with love, to create something that was

more like a magical bird than an aircraft.

Time passed, and the last mark faded. The mirror

cleared to be only a plate of silver glass shining

in the sun. Sabriel sat, silent, fixing the Charter

marks in her memory, marveling at the power and

the skill that had made the Paperwing and had

thought of this method of instruction. Perhaps

one day, she too would have the mastery to create

such a thing.

“The Abhorsen who made this,” Sabriel asked.

“Who was she? I mean, in relation to me?”

“A cousin,” purred Mogget, close to her ear.

“Your great-great-great-great-grandmother’s cousin.

The last of that line. She had no children.”

Maybe the Paperwing was her child, Sabriel

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thought, running her hand along the sleek surface

of the fuselage, feeling the Charter marks quiescent

in the fabric. She felt a lot better about their

forthcoming flight.

“We’d best hurry,” Mogget continued. “It will

be dark all too soon. Do you have the marks

remembered?”

“Yes,” replied Sabriel firmly. She turned to the

sendings, who were now lined up behind the

wings, anchoring the Paperwing till it was time

for it to be unleashed upon the sky. Sabriel wondered

how many times they’d performed this task,

and for how many Abhorsens.

“Thank you,” she said to them. “For all your

care and kindness. Goodbye.”

With that last word, she settled back in the

hammock-seat, gripped the rim of the cockpit

with both hands, and whistled the notes of the

lifting wind, visualizing the requisite string of

Charter marks in her mind, letting them drip

down into her throat and lips, and out into the air.

Her whistle sounded clear and true, and a wind

rose behind to match it, growing stronger as

Sabriel exhaled. Then, with a new breath, she

changed to a merry, joyous trill. Like a bird revelling

in flight, the Charter marks flowing from

169

pursed lips out into the Paperwing itself. With this

whistling, the blue and silver paint seemed to

come alive, dancing down the fuselage, sweeping

across the wings, a gleaming, lustrous plumage.

The whole craft shook and shivered, suddenly

flexible and eager to begin.

The joyous trill ended with one single long, clear

note, and a Charter mark that shone like the sun.

It danced to the Paperwing’s prow and sank into

the laminate. A second later, the yellow eyes

blinked, grew fierce and proud, looking up to the

sky ahead.

The sendings were struggling now, barely able

to hold the Paperwing back. The lifting wind grew

stronger still, plucking at the silver-blue plumage,

thrusting it forward. Sabriel felt the Paperwing’s

tension, the contained power in its wings, the

exhilaration of that last moment when freedom is

assured.

“Let go!” she cried, and the sendings complied,

the Paperwing leaping up into the arms of the

wind, out and upward, splashing through the

spray of the waterfall as if it were no more than a

spring shower, flying out into the sky and the

broad valley beyond.

It was quiet, and cold, a thousand feet or more

170

above the valley. The Paperwing soared easily, the

wind firm behind it, the sky clear above, save for

the faintest wisps of cloud. Sabriel reclined in her

hammock-seat, relaxing, running the Charter

marks she’d leaned over and over in her mind,

making sure she had them properly pigeonholed.

She felt free, and somehow clean, as if the dangers

of the last few days were dirt, washed away by the

following wind.

“Turn more to the north,” Mogget’s voice suddenly

said behind her, disturbing her carefree

mood. “Do you recall the map?”

“Yes,” replied Sabriel. “Shall we follow the

river? The Ratterlin, it’s called, isn’t it? It runs nornor-

east most of the time.”

Mogget didn’t reply at once, though Sabriel

heard his purring breath close by. He seemed to

be thinking. Finally, he said, “Why not? We may

as well follow it to the sea. It branches into a delta

there, so we can find an island to camp on

tonight.”

“Why not just fly on?” asked Sabriel cheerily.

“We could be in Belisaere by tomorrow night, if I

summon the strongest winds.”

“The Paperwing doesn’t like to fly at night,”

Mogget said, shortly. “Not to mention that you

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would almost certainly lose control of the

stronger winds—it is much more difficult than it

seems at first. And the Paperwing is much too

conspicuous, anyway. Have you no common

sense, Abhorsen?”

“Call me Sabriel,” Sabriel replied, equally

shortly. “My father is Abhorsen.”

“As you wish, mistress,” said Mogget. The

“mistress” sounded extremely sarcastic.

The next hour passed in belligerent silence,

but Sabriel, for her part, soon lost her anger in

the novelty of flight. She loved the scale of it

all, to see the tiny patchworked fields and

forests below, the dark strip of the river, the

occasional tiny building. Everything was so

small and seemed so perfect, seen from afar.

Then the sun began to sink, and though the

red wash of its fading light made the aerial

perspective even prettier, Sabriel felt the

Paperwing’s desire to descend, felt the yellow

eyes focusing on green earth, rather than blue

sky. As the shadows lengthened, Sabriel felt

that same desire and began to look as well.

The river was already breaking up into

the myriad streams and rivulets that would

form the swampy Ratterlin delta, and far off,

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Sabriel could see the dark bulk of the sea. There

were many islands in the delta, some as large as

football fields covered with trees and shrubs,

others no bigger than two armspans of mud.

Sabriel picked out one of the medium-sized

ones, a flattish diamond with low, yellow grass,

a few leagues ahead, and whistled down the

wind.

It faded gradually with her whistle and the

Paperwing began to descend, occasionally

nudged this way or that by Sabriel’s control of

the wind, or its own tilt of a wing. Its yellow

eyes, and Sabriel’s deep-brown eyes, were

fixed on the ground below. Only Mogget,

being Mogget, looked behind them and above.

Even so, he didn’t see their pursuers until

they came wheeling out of the sun, so his

yowling cry gave only a few seconds’ warning,

just long enough for Sabriel to turn and see

the hundreds of fast-moving shapes diving

down upon them. Instinctively, she conjured

Charter marks in her mind, mouth pursed,

whistling the wind back up, turning them to

the north.

“Gore crows!” hissed Mogget, as the flapping

shapes checked their dive and wheeled to pursue

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their suddenly enlivened prey.

“Yes,” shouted Sabriel, though she wasn’t sure

why she answered. Her attention was all on the

gore crows, trying to gauge whether they’d intercept

or not. She could already feel the wind testing

the edges of her control, as Mogget had

prophesied, and to whip it up further might have

unpleasant results. But she could also feel the

presence of the gore crows, feel the admixture of

Death and Free Magic that gave life to their rotten,

skeletal forms.

Gore crows didn’t last very long in sun and

wind—these must have been made the previous

night. A necromancer had trapped quite ordinary

crows, killing them with ritual and ceremony,

before infusing the bodies with the

broken, fragmented spirit of a single dead man

or woman. Now they were truly carrion birds,

birds guided by a single, if stupid, intelligence.

They flew by force of Free Magic, and killed

by force of numbers.

Despite her quickness in calling the wind, the

flock was still closing rapidly. They’d dived from

high above and kept their speed, the wind stripping

feathers and putrid flesh from their spellwoven

bones.

174

For a moment, Sabriel considered turning the

Paperwing back into the very center of this great

murder of crows, like an avenging angel, armed

with sword and bells. But there were simply too

many gore crows to fight, particularly from an

aircraft speeding along several hundred feet above

the ground. One overeager sword thrust would

mean a fatal fall—if the gore crows didn’t kill her

on the way down.

“I’ll have to summon a greater wind!” she

yelled at Mogget, who was now sitting right up

on her pack, fur bristling, yowling challenges at

the crows. They were very close now, flying in an

eerily exact formation—two long lines, like arms

outstretched to snatch the fleeing Paperwing

from the sky. Very little of their once-black

plumage had survived their rushing dive, white

bone shining through in the last light of the sun.

But their beaks were still glossily black and

gleaming sharp, and Sabriel could now see the

red glints of the fragmented Dead spirit in the

empty sockets of their eyes.

Mogget didn’t reply. Possibly, he hadn’t even

heard her above his yowling, and the gore crows’

cawing as they closed the last few yards to attack,

a strange, hollow sound, as dead as their flesh.

175

For a second of panic, Sabriel felt her dry lips

unable to purse, then she wet them and the whistle

came, slow and erratic. The Charter marks

felt clumsy and difficult in her head, as if she

were trying to push a heavy weight on badly

made rollers—then, with a last effort, they came

easily, flowing into her whistled notes.

Unlike her earlier, gradual summonings, this

wind came with the speed of a slamming door,

howling up behind them with frightening violence,

picking up the Paperwing and shunting

it forward like a giant wave lifting up a slender

boat. Suddenly, they were going so fast

that Sabriel could barely make out the ground

below, and the individual islands of the delta

merged into one continuous blur of motion.

Eyes closed to protective slits, she craned her

head around, the wind striking her face like a

vicious slap. The pursuing gore crows were all

over the sky now, formation lost, like small

black stains against the red and purple sunset.

They were flapping uselessly, trying to come

back together, but the Paperwing was already

a league or more away. There was no chance

they could catch up.

Sabriel let out a sigh of relief, but it was a sigh

176

177

tempered with new anxieties. The wind was

carrying them at a fearful pace, and it was starting

to veer northwards, which it wasn’t supposed

to do. Sabriel could see the first stars twinkling

now, and they were definitely turning towards

the Buckle.

It was an effort to call up the Charter marks

again, and whistle the spell to ease the wind, and

turn it back to the east, but Sabriel managed to

cast it. But the spell failed to work—the wind

grew stronger, and shifted more, till they were

careening straight towards the Buckle, directly

north.

Sabriel, hunkered down in the cockpit, eyes

and nose streaming and face frozen, tried again,

using all her willpower to force the Charter

marks into the wind. Even to her, her whistle

sounded feeble, and the Charter marks once

again vanished into what had now become a

gale. Sabriel realized she had totally lost control.

In fact, it was almost as if the spell had the

opposite effect, for the wind grew wilder, snatching

the Paperwing up in a great spiral, like a ball

thrown between a ring of giants, each one taller

than the last. Sabriel grew dizzy, and even colder,

and her breath came fast and shallow, trying to

salvage enough air to keep her alive. She tried to

calm the winds again, but couldn’t gain the

breath to whistle, and the Charter marks slipped

from her mind, till all she could do was desperately

hang on to the straps in the hammock-seat

as the Paperwing tried its best to ride the storm.

Then, without warning, the wind ceased its

upward dance. It just dropped, and with it went

the Paperwing. Sabriel fell upwards, straps suddenly

tight, and Mogget almost clawed through

the pack in his efforts to stay connected with the

aircraft. Jolted by this new development, Sabriel

felt her exhaustion burn away. She tried to whistle

the lifting wind, but it too was beyond her

power. The Paperwing seemed unable to halt its

headlong descent. It fell, nose tilting further and

further forward till they were diving almost vertically,

like a hammer rushing to the anvil of the

ground below.

It was a long way down. Sabriel screamed

once, then tried to put some of her fear-found

strength into the Paperwing. But the marks

flowed into her whistle without effect, save for a

golden sparkle that briefly illuminated her white,

wind-frozen face. The sun had completely set,

and the dark mass of the ground below looked

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all too much like the grey river of Death—the

river their spirits would cross into in a few short

minutes, never to return to the warm light of

Life.

“Loose my collar,” mewed a voice at Sabriel’s

ear, followed by the curious sensation of Mogget

digging his claws into her armor as he clambered

into her lap. “Loose my collar!”

Sabriel looked at him, at the ground, at the

collar. She felt stupid, starved of oxygen, unable

to decide. The collar was part of an ancient

binding, a terrible guardian of tremendous

power. It would only be used to contain an inexpressible

evil, or uncontrollable force.

“Trust me!” howled Mogget. “Loose my collar,

and remember the ring!”

Sabriel swallowed, closed her eyes, fumbled

with the collar and prayed that she was doing

the right thing. “Father, forgive me,” she

thought, but it was not just to her father that she

spoke, but to all the Abhorsens who had come

before her—especially the one who had made

the collar so long ago.

Surprisingly for such an ancient spell, she felt

little more than pins and needles as the collar

came free. Then it was open, and suddenly

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heavy, like a lead rope, or a ball and chain.

Sabriel almost dropped it, but it became light

again, then insubstantial. When Sabriel opened

her eyes, the collar had simply ceased to exist.

Mogget sat still, on her lap, and seemed

unchanged—then he seemed to glow with an

internal light and expand, till he became frayed

at the edges, and the light grew and grew. Within

a few seconds, there was no cat-shape left, just a

shining blur too bright to look at. It seemed to

hesitate for a moment and Sabriel felt its attention

flicker between aggression towards her and

some inner struggle. It almost formed back into

the cat-shape again, then suddenly split into four

shafts of brilliant white. One shot forward, one

aft, and two seemed to slide into the wings.

Then the whole Paperwing shone with fierce

white brilliance, and it abruptly stopped its

headlong dive and leveled out. Sabriel was flung

violently forward, body checked by straps, but

her nose almost hit the silver mirror, neck muscles

cording out with an impossible effort to

keep her head still.

Despite this sudden improvement, they were

still falling. Sabriel, hands now clasped behind

her savagely aching neck, saw the ground rushing

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up to fill the horizon. Treetops suddenly appeared

below, the Paperwing imbued with the

strange light, just clipping through the upper

branches with a sound like hail on a tin roof.

Then, they dropped again, skimming scant yards

above what looked like a cleared field, but still

too fast to land without total destruction.

Mogget, or whatever Mogget had become,

braked the Paperwing again, in a series of shuddering

halts that added bruises on top of bruises.

For the first time, Sabriel felt the incredible relief

of knowing that they would survive. One more

braking effort and the Paperwing would

be safely down, to skid a little in the long, soft

grass of the field.

Mogget braked, and Sabriel cheered as the

Paperwing gently lay its belly on the grass and

slid to what should have been a perfect landing.

But the cheer suddenly became a shriek of alarm,

as the grass parted to reveal the lip of an enormous

dark hole directly in their path.

Too low to rise, and now too slow to glide over

a hole at least fifty yards across, the Paperwing

reached the edge, flipped over and spiraled

towards the bottom of the hole, hundreds of

feet below.

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chapter xii

Sabriel regained consciousness

slowly, her brain fumbling for connections to

her senses. Hearing came first, but that only

caught her own labored breathing, and the

creak of her armored coat as she struggled to sit

up. For the moment, sight eluded her, and she

was panicked, afraid of blindness, till memory

came. It was night, and she was at the bottom of

a sinkhole—a great, circular shaft bored into the

ground, by either nature or artifice. From her

brief glimpse of it as they’d fallen, she guessed it

was easily fifty yards in diameter and a hundred

deep. Daylight would probably illuminate its

murky depths, but starlight was insufficient.

Pain came next, hard on the heels of memory. A

thousand aches and bruises, but no serious injury.

Sabriel wiggled her toes and fingers, flexed muscles

in arms, back and legs. They all hurt, but

everything seemed to work.

She vaguely recalled the last few seconds

before impact—Mogget, or the white force,

slowing them just before they hit—but the actual

instant of the crash might never have been, for

she couldn’t remember it. Shock, she thought to

herself, in an abstract way, almost like she was

diagnosing someone else.

Her next thought came some time later, and

with it the realization that she must have passed

out again. With this awakening, she felt a little

sharper, her mind catching some slight breeze to

carry her out of the mental doldrums. Working by

touch, she unstrapped herself and felt behind her

for the pack. In her current state, even a simple

Charter-spell for light was out of the question, but

there were candles there, and matches, or the

clockwork igniter.

As the match flared, Sabriel’s heart sank. In

the small, flickering globe of yellow light, she

saw that only the central cockpit portion of the

Paperwing survived—the sad blue and silver

corpse of a once marvelous creation. Its wings

lay torn and crumpled underneath it, and the

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entire nose section lay some yards away, shorn

off completely. One eye stared up at the circular

patch of sky above, but it was no longer fierce

and alive. Just yellow paint and laminated paper.

Sabriel stared at the wreckage, regret and sorrow

coursing like influenza in her bones, till the

match burnt her fingers. She lit another, and then

a candle, expanding both her light and field of

vision.

More small pieces of the Paperwing were strewn

over a large, open, flat area. Groaning with the

effort of motivating bruised muscles, Sabriel levered

herself out of the cockpit to have a closer

look at the ground.

This revealed the flat area to be man-made; flagstones,

carefully laid. Grass had long grown

between the stones, and lichen upon them, so it

was clearly not recent work. Sabriel sat on the

cool stones and wondered why anyone would do

such work at the bottom of a sinkhole.

Thinking about that seemed to kickstart her

befuddled wits and she started to wonder about a

few other things. Where, for instance, was the

force that had once been Mogget? And what was

it? That reminded her to fetch her sword and

check the bells.

184

Her turbanned helmet had rotated around on

her head and was almost back-to-front. Slowly,

she slid it around, feeling every slight movement

all the way down her now very stiff neck.

Balancing her first candle on the paving in a

pool of cooling wax, she dragged her pack and

weapons out of the wreckage and lit another two

candles. She put one down near the first and took

the other to light her way, walking around the

destroyed Paperwing, searching for any sign of

Mogget. At the dismembered prow of the craft,

she gently touched the eyes, wishing she could

close them.

“I am sorry,” she whispered. “Perhaps I will be

able to make a new Paperwing one day. There

should be another, to carry on your name.”

“Sentiment, Abhorsen?” said a voice somewhere

behind her, a voice that managed to sound

like Mogget and not at all like him at the same

time. It was louder, harsher, less human, and

every word seemed to crackle, like the electric

generators she’d used in Wyverley College

Science classes.

“Where are you?” asked Sabriel, swiftly turning.

The voice had sounded close, but there was

nothing visible within the sphere of candlelight.

185

She held her own candle higher, and transferred

it to her left hand.

“Here,” snickered the voice, and Sabriel saw

lines of white fire run out from under the ruined

fuselage, lines that lit the paper laminate as they

ran, so that, within a second, the Paperwing was

burning fiercely, yellow-red flames dancing

under thick white smoke, totally obscuring

whatever had emerged from under the stricken

craft.

No Death sense twitched, but Sabriel could

almost smell the Free Magic; tangy, unnatural,

nerve-jangling, tainting the thick odor of natural

smoke. Then she saw the white fire-lines again,

streaming out, converging, roiling, coming

together—and a blazing, blue-white creature

stepped out from the funeral pyre of the

Paperwing.

Sabriel couldn’t look at it directly, but from the

corners of her arm-shielded eyes, she saw something

human in shape, taller than her, and thin,

almost starved. It had no legs, the torso and head

balanced upon a column of twisting, whirling

force.

“Free, save for the blood price,” it said,

advancing. All trace of Mogget’s voice was lost

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now, submerged in zapping, crackling menace.

Sabriel had no doubt about the meaning of a

blood price and who would pay it. Summoning

all her remaining energies, she called three

Charter marks to the forefront of her mind, and

hurled them towards the thing, shouting their

names.

“Anet! Calew! Ferhan!”

The marks became silver blades as they left her

hand, mind and voice, flashing through the air

swifter than any thrown dagger—and went

straight through the shining figure, apparently

without effect.

It laughed, a series of rises and falls like a dog

screaming in pain, and lazily slid forward. Its

languid motion seemed to declare it would have

no more trouble disposing of Sabriel than it had

in burning the Paperwing.

Sabriel drew her sword and backed away,

determined not to panic as she had done when

faced by the Mordicant. Her head flicked backwards

and forwards, neck pain forgotten, checking

the ground behind her and marking her

opponent. Her mind raced, considering options.

Perhaps one of the bells—but that would mean

dropping her candle. Could she count on the

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creature’s blazing presence to light her way?

Almost as if it could read her mind, the creature

suddenly started to lose its brilliance, sucking

darkness into its swirling body like a sponge

soaking up ink. Within a few seconds, Sabriel

could barely make it out—a fearful silhouette,

back-lit by the orange glow of the burning

Paperwing.

Desperately, Sabriel tried to remember what

she knew of Free Magic elementals and constructs.

Her father had rarely mentioned them,

and Magistrix Greenwood had only lightly

delved into the subject. Sabriel knew the binding

spells for two of the lesser kindred of Free Magic

beings, but the creature before her was neither

Margrue nor Stilken.

“Keep thinking, Abhorsen,” laughed the creature,

advancing again. “Such a pity your head

doesn’t work too well.”

“You saved it from not working forever,”

Sabriel replied warily. It had braked the

Paperwing, after all, so perhaps there was some

good in it somewhere, some remnant of Mogget,

if only it could be brought out.

“Sentiment,” the thing replied, still silently

sliding forward. It laughed again and a dark,

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tendril-like arm suddenly unleashed itself, snapping

across the intervening space to strike

Sabriel across the face.

“A memory, now purged,” it added, as Sabriel

staggered back from a second attack, sword

flashing across to parry. Unlike the silver spell

darts, the Charter-etched blade did connect with

the unnatural flesh of the creature, but had no

effect apart from jarring Sabriel’s arm.

Her nose was bleeding too, a warm and salty

flow, stinging her wind-chafed lips. She tried to

ignore it, tried to use the pain of what was probably

a broken nose to get her mind back to full

operational speed.

“Memories, yes, many memories,” continued

the creature. It was circling around her now,

pushing her back the way they’d come, back

towards the fading fire of the Paperwing. That

would burn out soon, and then there would only

be darkness, for Sabriel’s candle was now a lump

of blown-out wax, falling forgotten from her

hand.

“Millenia of servitude, Abhorsen. Chained by

trickery, treachery . . . captive in a repulsive, fixedflesh

shape . . . but there will be payment, slow

payment—not quick, not quick at all!”

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A tendril lashed out, low this time, trying to

trip her. Sabriel leapt over it, blade extended,

lunging for the creature’s chest. But it shimmied

aside, extruding extra arms as she tried to jump

back, catching her in mid-leap, drawing her

close.

Sword-arm pinioned at her side, it tightened its

grip, till she was close against its chest, her face

a finger-width from its boiling, constantly moving

flesh, as if a billion tiny insects buzzed behind

a membrane of utter darkness.

Another arm gripped the back of her helmet,

forcing her to look up, till she saw its head,

directly above her. A thing of most basic anatomy,

its eyes were like the sinkhole, deep pits

without apparent bottom. It had no nose, but a

mouth that split the horrid face in two, a mouth

slightly parted to reveal the burning blue-white

glare that it had first used as flesh.

All Charter Magic had fled from Sabriel’s

mind. Her sword was trapped, the bells likewise,

and even if they weren’t, she didn’t know

how to use them properly against things not

Dead. She ran over them mentally anyway, in

a frantic, lightning inventory of anything that

might help.

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191

It was then her tired, concussed mind remembered

the ring. It was on her left hand, her free

hand, cool silver on the index finger.

But she didn’t know what to do with it—and

the creature’s head was bowing down towards

her own, its neck stretching impossibly long, till

it was like a snake’s head rearing above her, the

mouth opening wider, growing brighter, fizzing

with white-hot sparks that fell upon her helmet

and face, burning cloth and skin, leaving tiny,

tattoo-like scars. The ring felt loose on her finger.

Sabriel instinctively curled her hand, and the

ring felt looser still, slipping down her finger,

expanding, growing, till without looking, Sabriel

knew she held a silver hoop as wide or wider

than the creature’s slender head. And she suddenly

knew what to do.

“First, the plucking of an eye,” said the thing,

breath as hot as the falling sparks, scorching her

face with instant sunburn. It tilted its head sideways

and opened its mouth still wider, lower jaw

dislocating out.

Sabriel took one last, careful look, screwed her

eyes tight against the terrible glare, and flipped

the silver hoop up, and she hoped, over the

thing’s neck.

For a second, as the heat increased and she felt

a terrible burning pain against her eye, Sabriel

thought she’d missed. Then the hoop was

wrenched from her hand and she was thrown

away, hurled out like an angry fisherman’s

rejected minnow.

On the cool flagstones again, she opened her

eyes, the left one blurry, sore and swimming with

tears—but still there and still working.

She had put the silver hoop over the thing’s

head, and it was slowly sliding down that long,

sinuous neck. The ring was shrinking again as it

slid, impervious to the creature’s desperate

attempts to get it off. It had six or seven hands

now, formed directly from its shoulders, all

squirming about, trying to force fingers under the

ring. But the metal seemed inimical to the creature’s

substance, like a hot pan to human fingers,

for the fingers flinched and danced around it, but

could not take hold for longer than a second.

The darkness that stained it was ebbing too,

draining down through its thrashing, twisting

support, leaving glowing whiteness behind. Still

the creature fought with the ring, blazing hands

forming and re-forming, body twisting and turning,

even bucking, as if it could throw the ring

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like a rider from a horse.

Finally, it gave up and turned towards Sabriel,

screaming and crackling. Two long arms sprang

out from it, reaching towards Sabriel’s sprawling

body, talons growing from the hands, raking the

stone with deep gouges as they scrabbled

towards her, like spiders scuttling to their prey—

only to fall short by a yard or more.

“No!” howled the thing, and its whole twisting,

coiling body lurched forward, killing arms

outstretched. Again, the talons fell short, as

Sabriel crawled, rolled and pushed herself away.

Then the silver ring contracted once more, and

a terrible shout of anguish, rage and despair

came from the very center of the white-flaming

thing. Its arms suddenly shrank back to its torso;

the head fell into the shoulders, and the whole

body sank into an amorphous blob of shimmering

white, with a single, still-large silver band

around the middle, the ruby glittering like a

drop of blood.

Sabriel stared at it, unable to look aside, or do

anything else, even quell the flow from her bleeding

nose, which now covered half her face and

chin, her mouth glued shut with dried and clotting

blood. It seemed to her that something was

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left undone, something that she had to provide.

Nervously crawling closer, she saw that there

were now marks on the ring, Charter marks that

told her what she must do. Wearily, she got

up on her knees and fumbled with the bellbandolier.

Saraneth was heavy, almost beyond

her strength, but she managed to draw it out,

and the deep, compelling voice rang through the

sinkhole, seeming to pierce the glowing, silverbound

mass.

The ring hummed in answer to the bell and

exuded a pear-shaped drop of its own metal,

which cooled to become a miniature Saraneth.

At the same time, the ring changed color and

consistency. The ruby’s color seemed to run,

and a red wash spread through the silver. It was

now dull and ordinary, no longer a silver band,

but a red leather collar, with a miniature silver

bell.

With this change, the white mass quivered,

and shone bright again, till Sabriel had to shield

her eyes once more. When the shadows grew

together again, she looked back, and there was

Mogget, collared in red leather, sitting up and

looking like he was about to throw up a hairball.

It wasn’t a hairball, but a silver ring, the ruby

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reflecting Mogget’s internal light. It rolled to

Sabriel, tinkling across the stone. She picked it

up and slid it back on her finger.

Mogget’s glow faded, and the burning Paperwing

was now only faint embers, sad memories

and ash. Darkness returned, cloaking Sabriel,

wrapping her up with all her hurts and fears. She

sat, silent, not even thinking.

A little later, she felt a soft cat nose against

her folded hands, and a candle, damp from

Mogget’s mouth.

“Your nose is still bleeding,” said a familiar,

didactic voice. “Light the candle, pinch your

nose, and get some blankets out for us to sleep.

It’s getting cold.”

“Welcome back, Mogget,” whispered Sabriel.

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chapter xiii

Neither Sabriel nor Mogget

mentioned the happenings of the previous night

when they awoke. Sabriel, bathing her seriously

swollen nose in an inch of water from her canteen,

found that she didn’t particularly want to

remember a waking nightmare, and Mogget

was quiet, in an apologetic way. Despite what

happened later, freeing Mogget’s alter ego, or

whatever it was, had saved them from certain

destruction by the wind.

As she’d expected, dawn had brought some

light to the sinkhole, and as the day progressed,

this had grown to a level approximating twilight.

Sabriel could read and see things close by

quite clearly, but they merged into indistinct

gloom twenty or thirty yards away.

Not that the sinkhole was much larger than

that—perhaps a hundred yards in diameter, not

the fifty she’d guessed at when she was coming

down. The entire floor of it was paved, with a

circular drain in the middle, and there were

several tunnel entrances into the sheer rock

walls—tunnels which Sabriel knew she would

eventually have to take, as there was no water

in the sinkhole. There seemed little chance of

rain, either. It was cool, but nowhere near as

cold as the plateau near Abhorsen’s House.

The climate was mitigated by proximity to the

ocean, and an altitude that could easily be sealevel

or below, for in daylight Sabriel could see

that the sinkhole was at least a hundred yards

deep.

Still, with a half-full canteen of water gurgling

by her side, Sabriel was quite content to slouch

upon her slightly scorched pack and apply herbal

creams to her bruises, and a poultice of evilsmelling

tanmaril leaves to her strange sunburn.

Her nose was a different matter when it came

to treatment. It wasn’t broken—merely hideous,

swollen and encrusted with dried blood, which

hurt too much to clean off completely.

Mogget, after an hour or so of sheepish silence,

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sauntered off to explore, refusing Sabriel’s offer

of hard cakes and dried meat for breakfast. She

expected he’d find a rat, or something equally

appetizing, instead. In a way, she was quite

pleased he was gone. The memory of the Free

Magic beast that lay within the little white cat

was still disturbing.

Even so, when the sun had risen to become a

little disc surrounded by the greater circumference

of the sinkhole’s rim, she started to wonder

why he hadn’t come back. Levering herself

up, she limped over to the tunnel he’d chosen,

using her sword as a walking stick and complaining

quietly as every bruise reminded her of

its location.

Of course, just as she was lighting a candle at

the tunnel entrance Mogget reappeared behind

her.

“Looking for me?” he mewed, innocently.

“Who else?” replied Sabriel. “Have you found

anything? Anything useful, I mean. Water, for

instance.”

“Useful?” mused Mogget, rubbing his chin

back along his two outstretched front legs.

“Perhaps. Interesting, certainly. Water? Yes.”

“How far away?” asked Sabriel, all too aware

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of her bruise-limited mobility. “And what does

interesting mean? Dangerous?”

“Not far, by this tunnel,” replied Mogget.

“There is a little danger getting there—a trap

and a few other oddments, but nothing that will

harm you. As to the interesting part, you will

have to see for yourself, Abhorsen.”

“Sabriel,” said Sabriel automatically, as she

tried to think ahead. She needed at least two

days’ rest, but no more than that. Every day lost

before she found her father’s corporeal body

might mean disaster. She simply had to find him

soon.

A Mordicant, Shadow Hands, gore crows—it

was now all too clear that some terrible enemy

was arrayed against both father and daughter.

That enemy had already trapped her father, so it

had to be a very powerful necromancer, or some

Greater Dead creature. Perhaps this Kerrigor . . .

“I’ll get my pack,” she decided, trudging back,

Mogget slipping backwards and forwards across

her path like a kitten, almost tripping her, but

always just getting out of the way. Sabriel put

this down to inexplicable catness, and didn’t

comment.

As Mogget had promised, the tunnel wasn’t

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long, and its well-made steps and cross-hatched

floor made passage easy, save for the part where

Sabriel had to follow the little cat exactly across

the stones, to avoid a cleverly concealed pit.

Without Mogget’s guidance, Sabriel knew she

would have fallen in.

There were magical wardings too. Old, inimical

spells lay like moths in the corners of the

tunnel, waiting to fly up at her, to surround and

choke her with power—but something checked

their first reaction and they settled again. A few

times, Sabriel experienced a ghostly touch, like

a hand reaching out to brush the Charter mark

on her forehead, and almost at the end of the

tunnel, she saw two guard sendings melting

into the rock, the tips of their halberds glinting

in her candlelight before they, too, merged into

stone.

“Where are we going?” she whispered, nervously,

as the door in front of them slowly

creaked open—without visible means of propulsion.

“Another sinkhole,” Mogget said, matter-offactly.

“It is where the First Blood . . . ach . . .”

He choked, hissed, and then rephrased his sentence

rather drably, with “It is interesting.”

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“What do you mean—” Sabriel began, but she

fell silent as they passed the doorway, magical

force suddenly tugging at her hair, her hands, her

surcoat, the hilt of her sword. Mogget’s fur

stood on end, and his collar rotated halfway

around of its own accord, till the Charter marks

of binding were uppermost and clearly readable,

bright against the leather.

Then they were out, standing at the bottom of

another sinkhole, in a premature twilight, for

the sun was already slipping over the circumscribed

horizon of the sinkhole rim.

This sinkhole was much wider than the first—

perhaps a mile across, and deeper, say six or

seven hundred feet. Despite its size, the entire

vast pit was sealed off from the upper air by a

gleaming, web-thin net, which seemed to merge

into the rim wall about a quarter of the way

down from the surface. Sunlight had given it

away, but even so, Sabriel had to use her telescope

to see the delicate diamond-pattern weave

clearly. It looked flimsy, but the presence of several

dessicated bird-corpses indicated considerable

strength. Sabriel guessed the unfortunate

birds had dived into the net, eyes greedily intent

on food below.

201

In the sinkhole itself, there was considerable, if

uninspiring vegetation—mostly stunted trees

and malformed bushes. But Sabriel had little

attention to spare for the trees, for in between

each of these straggling patches of greenery,

there were paved areas—and on each of these

paved areas rested a ship.

Fourteen open-decked, single-masted longboats,

their black sails set to catch a nonexistent

wind, oars out to battle an imaginary tide. They

flew many flags and standards, all limp against

mast and rigging, but Sabriel didn’t need to see

them unfurled to know what strange cargo these

ships might bear. She’d heard of this place, as had

every child in the Northern parts of Ancelstierre,

close to the Old Kingdom. Hundreds of tales

of treasure, adventure and romance were woven

around this strange harbor.

“Funerary ships,” said Sabriel. “Royal ships.”

She had further confirmation that this was so,

for there were binding spells woven into the very

dirt her feet scuffed at the tunnel entrance, spells

of final death that could only have been laid by an

Abhorsen. No necromancer would ever raise any

of the ancient rulers of the Old Kingdom.

“The famous burial ground of the First . . .

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ckkk . . . the Kings and Queens of the Old

Kingdom,” pronounced Mogget, after some difficulty.

He danced around Sabriel’s feet, then

stood on his hind legs and made expansive gestures,

like a circus impresario in white fur.

Finally, he shot off into the trees.

“Come on—there’s a spring, spring, spring!” he

caroled, as he leaped up and down in time with

his words.

Sabriel followed at a slower pace, shaking her

head and wondering what had happened to make

Mogget so cheerful. She felt bruised, tired and

depressed, shaken by the Free Magic monster, and

sad about the Paperwing.

They passed close by two of the ships on their

way to the spring. Mogget led her a merry dance

around both of them, in a mad circumnavigation

of twists, leaps and bounds, but the sides were too

high to look in and she didn’t feel like shinning up

an oar. She did pause to look at the figureheads—

imposing men, one in his forties, the other somewhat

older. Both were bearded, had the same

imperious eyes, and wore armor similar to

Sabriel’s, heavily festooned with medallions,

chains and other decorations. Each held a sword

in his right hand, and an unfurling scroll that

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turned back on itself in their left—the heraldic

representation of the Charter.

The third ship was different. It seemed shorter

and less ornate, with a bare mast devoid of black

sails. No oars sprang from its sides, and as Sabriel

reached the spring that lay under its stern, she saw

uncaulked seams between the planking, and realized

that it was incomplete.

Curious, she dropped her pack by the little pool

of bubbling water and walked around to the bow.

This was different too, for the figurehead was a

young man—a naked young man, carved in perfect

detail.

Sabriel blushed a little, for it was an exact likeness,

as if a young man had been transformed

from flesh to wood, and her only prior experience

of naked men was in clinical cross-sections from

biology textbooks. His muscles were lean and

well-formed, his hair short and tightly curled

against his head. His hands, well-shaped and elegant,

were partly raised, as if to ward off some

evil.

The detail even extended to a circumcised

penis, which Sabriel glanced at in an embarrassed

way, before looking back at his face. He

was not exactly handsome, but not displeasing.

204

It was a responsible visage, with the shocked

expression of someone who has been betrayed

and only just realized it. There was fear there,

too, and something like hatred. He looked more

than a little mad. His expression troubled her,

for it seemed too human to be the result of a

woodcarver’s skill, no matter how talented.

“Too life-like,” Sabriel muttered, stepping back

from the figurehead, hand falling to the hilt of her

sword, her magical senses reaching out, seeking

some trap or deception.

There was no trap, but Sabriel did feel something

in or around the figurehead. A feeling similar

to that of a Dead revenant, but not the same—

a niggling sensation that she couldn’t place.

Sabriel tried to identify it, while she looked over

the figurehead again, carefully examining him

from every angle. The man’s body was an intellectual

problem now, so she looked without

embarrassment, studying his fingers, fingernails

and skin, noting how perfectly they were carved,

right down to the tiny scars on his hands, the

product of sword and dagger practice. There was

also the faint sign of a baptismal Charter mark on

his forehead, and the pale trace of veins on his

eyelids.

205

That inspection led her to certainty about what

she’d detected, but she hesitated about the action

that should be taken, and went in search of

Mogget. Not that she put a lot of faith in advice

or answers from that quarter, given his present

propensity towards behaving as a fairly silly

cat—though perhaps this was a reaction to his

brief experience of being a Free Magic beast

again, something that might not have happened

for a millennium. The cat form was probably a

welcome relief.

In fact, no advice at all could be had from

Mogget. Sabriel found him asleep in a field of

flowers near the spring, his tail and paddy-paws

twitching to a dream of dancing mice. Sabriel

looked at the straw-yellow flowers, sniffed one,

scratched Mogget behind the ears, then went

back to the figurehead. The flowers were catbalm,

explaining both Mogget’s previous mood

and his current somnolence. She would have to

make up her own mind.

“So,” she said, addressing the figurehead like a

lawyer before a court. “You are the victim of

some Free Magic spell and necromantic trickery.

Your spirit lies neither in Life nor Death, but

somewhere in between. I could cross into Death,

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and find you near the border, I’m sure—but I

could find a lot of trouble as well. Trouble I can’t

deal with in my current pathetic state. So what

can I do? What would Father—Abhorsen . . . or

any Abhorsen—do in my place?”

She thought about it for a while, pacing backwards

and forwards, bruises temporarily forgotten.

That last question seemed to make her

duty clear. Sabriel felt sure her father would

free the man. That’s what he did, that was what

he lived for. The duty of an Abhorsen was to

remedy unnatural necromancy and Free Magic

sorcery.

She didn’t think further than that, perhaps due

to the injudicious sniffing of the catbalm. She

didn’t even consider that her father would probably

have waited until he was fitter—perhaps till

the next day. After all, this young man must

have been incarcerated for many years, his physical

body transformed into wood, and his spirit

somehow trapped in Death. A few days would

make no difference to him. An Abhorsen didn’t

have to immediately take on any duty that presented

itself . . .

But for the first time since she’d crossed the

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Wall, Sabriel felt there was a clear-cut problem

for her to solve. An injustice to be righted and

one that should involve little more than a few

minutes on the very border of Death.

Some slight sense of caution remained with

her, so she went and picked up Mogget, placing

the dozing cat near the feet of the figurehead.

Hopefully, he would wake up if any physical

danger threatened—not that this was likely,

given the wards and guards on the sinkhole.

There were even barriers that would make it difficult

to cross into Death, and more than difficult

for something Dead to follow her back. All in

all, it seemed like the perfect place to undertake

a minor rescue.

Once more, she checked the bells, running her

hands over the smooth wood of the handles, feeling

their voices within, eagerly awaiting release.

This time, it was Ranna she freed from its leather

case. It was the least noticeable of the bells, its

very nature lulling listeners, beguiling them to

sleep or inattention.

Second thoughts brushed at her like doubting

fingers, but she ignored them. She felt confident,

ready for what would only be a minor stroll in

Death, amply safeguarded by the protections of

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this royal necropolis. Sword in one hand, bell in

the other, she crossed into Death.

Cold hit her, and the relentless current, but she

stood where she was, still feeling the warmth of

Life on her back. This was the very interface

between the two realms, where she would normally

plunge ahead. This time, she planted her

feet against the current, and used her continuing

slight contact with Life as an anchor to hold her

own against the waters of Death.

Everything seemed quiet, save for the constant

gurgling of the water about her feet, and the faroff

crash of the First Gate. Nothing stirred, no

shapes loomed up in the grey light. Cautiously,

Sabriel used her sense of the Dead to feel out

anything that might be lurking, to feel the slight

spark of the trapped, but living, spirit of the

young man. Back in Life, she was physically close

to him, so she should be near his spirit here.

There was something, but it seemed further

into Death than Sabriel expected. She tried to see

it, squinting into the curious greyness that made

distance impossible to judge, but nothing was

visible. Whatever was there lurked beneath the

surface of the water.

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Sabriel hesitated, then walked towards it, carefully

feeling her way, making sure of every footfall,

guarding against the gripping current. There

was definitely something odd out there. She

could feel it quite strongly—it had to be the

trapped spirit. She ignored the little voice at the

back of her mind that suggested it was a fiercely

devious Dead creature, strong enough to hold its

own against the race of the river . . .

Nevertheless, when she was a few paces back

from whatever it was, Sabriel let Ranna sound—

a muffled, sleepy peal that carried the sensation

of a yawn, a sigh, a head falling forward, eyes

heavy—a call to sleep.

If there was a Dead thing there, Sabriel reasoned,

it would now be quiescent. She put her

sword and bell away, edged forward to a good

position, and reached down into the water.

Her hands touched something as cold and

hard as ice, something totally unidentifiable.

She flinched back, then reached down again, till

her hands found something that was clearly a

shoulder. She followed this up to a head, and

traced the features. Sometimes a spirit bore little

relation to the physical body, and sometimes

living spirits became warped if they spent too

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long in Death, but this one was clearly the

counterpart of the figurehead. It lived too,

somehow encased and protected from Death,

as the living body was preserved in wood.

Sabriel gripped the spirit-form under the arms

and pulled. It rose up out of the water like a

killer whale, pallid white and rigid as a statue.

Sabriel staggered backwards, and the river, evereager,

wrapped her legs with tricksome eddies—

but she steadied herself before it could drag her

down.

Changing her hold a little, Sabriel began to

drag the spirit-form back towards Life. It was

hard going, much harder than she’d expected.

The current seemed far too strong for this side of

the First Gate, and the crystallized spirit—or

whatever it was—was much, much heavier than

any spirit should be.

With nearly all her concentration bent on staying

upright and heading in the right direction,

Sabriel almost didn’t notice the sudden cessation

of noise that marked the passage of something

through the First Gate. But she’d learned to be

wary over the last few days, and her conscious

fears had become enshrined in subconscious

caution.

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She heard, and listening carefully, caught the

soft slosh-slosh of something half-wading, halfcreeping,

moving as quietly as it could against

the current. Moving towards her. Something

Dead was hoping to catch her unawares.

Obviously, some alarm or summons had gone

out beyond the First Gate, and whatever was

stalking towards her had come in answer to it.

Inwardly cursing herself for stupidity, Sabriel

looked down at her spirit burden. Sure enough,

she could just make out a very thin black line,

fine as cotton thread, running from his arm into

the water—and thence to the deeper, darker

regions of Death. Not a controlling thread, but

one that would let some distant Adept know the

spirit had been moved. Fortunately, sounding

Ranna would have slowed the message, but was

she close enough to Life . . .

She increased her speed a little, but not too

much, pretending she hadn’t noticed the hunter.

Whatever it was, it seemed quite reluctant to

close in on her.

Sabriel quickened her pace a little more, adrenaline

and suspense feeding her strength. If it

rushed her, she would have to drop the spirit—

and he would be carried away, lost forever.

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213

Whatever magic had preserved his living spirit

here on the boundary couldn’t possibly prevail if

he went past the First Gate. If that happened,

Sabriel thought, she would have precipitated a

murder rather than a rescue.

Four steps to Life—then three. The thing was

closing now—Sabriel could see it, low in the

water, still creeping, but faster now. It was obviously

a denizen of the Third, or even some later

Gate, for she couldn’t identify what it once had

been. Now it looked like a cross between a hog

and a segmented worm, and it moved in a series

of scuttles and sinuous wriggles.

Two steps. Sabriel shifted her grip again,

wrapping her left arm completely around the

spirit’s chest and balancing the weight on her

hip, freeing her right arm, but she still couldn’t

draw her sword, or clear the bells.

The hog-thing began to grunt and hiss, breaking

into a diving, rushing gallop, its long, yellowcrusted

tusks surfing through the water, its long

body undulating along behind.

Sabriel stepped back, turned, and threw herself

and her precious cargo headfirst into Life, using

all her will to force them through the wards on

the sinkhole. For an instant, it seemed that they

would be repulsed, then, like a pin pushing

through a rubber band, they were through.

Shrill squealing followed her, but nothing else.

Sabriel found herself facedown on the ground,

hands empty, ice crystals crunching as they fell

from her frosted body. Turning her head, she met

the gaze of Mogget. He stared at her, then closed

his eyes and went back to sleep.

Sabriel rolled over, and got to her feet, very,

very slowly. She felt all her pains come back and

wondered why she’d been so hasty to perform

deeds of derring-do and rescue. Still, she had

managed it. The man’s spirit was back where it

belonged, back in Life.

Or so she thought, till she saw the figurehead.

It hadn’t changed at all to outward sight, though

Sabriel could now feel the living spirit in it.

Puzzled, she touched his immobile face, fingers

tracing the grain of the wood.

“A kiss,” said Mogget sleepily. “Actually, just

a breath would do. But you have to start kissing

someone sometime, I suppose.”

Sabriel looked at the cat, wondering if this was

the latest symptom of catbalm-induced lunacy.

But he seemed sober enough, and serious.

“A breath?” she asked. She didn’t want to kiss

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just any wooden man. He looked nice enough,

but he might not be like his looks. A kiss seemed

very forward. He might remember it, and make

assumptions.

“Like this?” She took a deep breath, leaned

forward, exhaled a few inches from his nose and

mouth, then stepped back to see what would

happen—if anything.

Nothing did.

“Catbalm!” exclaimed Sabriel, looking at

Mogget. “You shouldn’t—”

A small sound interrupted her. A small, wheezing

sound, that didn’t come from her or Mogget.

The figurehead was breathing, air whistling

between carved wooden lips like the issue from

an aged, underworked bellows.

The breathing grew stronger, and with it, color

began to flow through the carving, dull wood

giving way to the luster of flesh. He coughed,

and the carven chest became flexible, suddenly

rising and falling as he began to pant like a

recovering sprinter.

His eyes opened and met Sabriel’s. Fine grey

eyes, but muzzy and unfocused. He didn’t seem

to see her. His fingers clenched and unclenched,

and his feet shuffled, as if he were running in

215

place. Finally, his back peeled away from the

ship’s hull. He took one step forward, and fell

into Sabriel’s arms.

She lowered him hastily to the ground, all too

aware that she was embracing a naked young

man—in circumstances considerably different

than the various scenarios she’d imagined with

her friends at school, or heard about from the

earthier and more privileged day-girls.

“Thank you,” he said, almost drunkenly, the

words terribly slurred. He seemed to focus on

her—or her surcoat—for the first time, and

added, “Abhorsen.”

Then he went to sleep, mouth curling up at

the corners, frown dissolving. He looked

younger than he did as a fixed-expression figurehead.

Sabriel looked down at him, trying to ignore

curiously fond feelings that had appeared from

somewhere. Feelings similar to those that had

made her bring back Jacinth’s rabbit.

“I suppose I’d better get him a blanket,” she

said reluctantly, as she wondered what on earth

had possessed her to add this complication

to her already confusing and difficult circumstances.

She supposed she would have to get him

216

to safety and civilization, at the very least—if

there was any to be found.

“I can get a blanket if you want to keep staring

at him,” Mogget said slyly, twining himself

around her ankles in a sensuous pavane.

Sabriel realized she really was staring, and

looked away.

“No. I’ll get it. And my spare shirt, I suppose.

The breeches might fit him with a bit of work, I

guess—we’d be much the same height. Keep

watch, Mogget. I’ll be back in a minute.”

Mogget watched her hobble off, then turned

back to the sleeping man. Silently, the cat

padded over and touched his pink tongue to the

Charter mark on the man’s forehead. The mark

flared, but Mogget didn’t flinch, till it grew dull

again.

“So,” muttered Mogget, tasting his own

tongue by curling it back on itself. He seemed

somewhat surprised, and more than a little

angry. He tasted the mark again, and then shook

his head in distaste, the miniature Saraneth on

his collar ringing a little peal that was not of

celebration.

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chapter xiv

Grey mist coiling upwards,

twining around him like a clinging vine, gripping

arms and legs, immobilizing, strangling,

merciless. So firmly grown about his body there

was no possibility of escape, so tight his muscles

couldn’t even flex under skin, his eyelids

couldn’t blink. And nothing to see but patches

of darker grey, crisscrossing his vision like windblown

scum upon a fetid pool.

Then, suddenly, fierce red light, pain exploding

everywhere, rocketing from toes to brain and

back again. The grey mist clearing, mobility

returning. No more grey patches, but blurry colors,

slowly twisting into focus. A woman, looking

down at him, a young woman, armed and

armored, her face . . . battered. No, not a

woman. The Abhorsen, for she wore the blazon

and the bells. But she was too young, not the

Abhorsen he knew, or any of the family . . .

“Thank you,” he said, the words coming out

like a mouse creeping from a dusty larder.

“Abhorsen.”

Then he fainted, his body rushing gladly to

welcome real sleep, true unconsciousness and

sanity-restoring rest.

He awoke under a blanket, and felt a

moment’s panic when the thick grey wool

pressed upon his mouth and eyes. He struggled

with it, threw it back with a gasp, and relaxed as

he felt fresh air on his face and dim sunlight filtering

down from above. He looked up and saw

from the reddish hue that it must be soon after

dawn. The sinkhole puzzled him for a few seconds—

disoriented, he felt dizzy and stupid, till

he looked at the tall masts all around, the black

sails, and the unfinished ship nearby.

“Holehallow,” he muttered to himself, frowning.

He remembered it now. But what was he

doing here? Completely naked under a rough

camping blanket?

He sat up, and shook his head. It was sore and

his temples were throbbing, seemingly from the

219

battering-ram effect of a severe hangover. But he

felt certain he hadn’t been drinking. The last

thing he remembered was going down the steps.

Rogir had asked him . . . no . . . the last thing

was the fleeting image of a pale, concerned face,

bloodied and bruised, black hair hanging out in

a fringe under her helmet. A deep blue surcoat,

with the blazon of silver keys. The Abhorsen.

“She’s washing at the spring,” said a soft voice,

interrupting his faltering recollection. “She got

up before the sun. Cleanliness is a wonderful

thing.”

The voice did not seem to belong to anything

visible, till the man looked up at the nearby ship.

There was a large, irregular hole in the bow,

where the figurehead should have been and a

white cat was curled up in the hole, watching

him with an unnaturally sharp, green-eyed gaze.

“What are you?” said the man, his eyes cautiously

flickering from side to side, looking for

a weapon. A pile of clothes was the only thing

nearby, containing a shirt, trousers and some

underwear, but it was weighted down with a largish

rock. His hand sidled out towards the rock.

“Don’t be alarmed,” said the cat. “I’m but

a faithful retainer of the Abhorsen. Name of

220

Mogget. For the moment.”

The man’s hand closed on the rock, but he

didn’t lift it. Memories were slowly sidling back

to his benumbed mind, drawn like grains of iron

to a magnet. There were memories of various

Abhorsens among them—memories that gave

him an inkling of what this cat-creature was.

“You were bigger when we last met,” he hazarded,

testing his guess.

“Have we met?” replied Mogget, yawning.

“Dear me. I can’t recall it. What was the name?”

A good question, thought the man. He

couldn’t remember. He knew who he was, in

general terms, but his name eluded him. Other

names came easily though, and some flashes of

memory concerning what he thought of as his

immediate past. He growled, and grimaced as

they came to him, and clenched his fists in pain

and anger.

“Unusual name,” commented Mogget. “More

of a bear’s name, that growl. Do you mind if I

call you Touchstone?”

“What!” the man exclaimed, affronted. “That’s

a fool’s name! How dare—”

“Is it unfitting?” interrupted Mogget, coolly.

“You do remember what you’ve done?”

221

The man was silent then, for he suddenly did

remember, though he didn’t know why he’d

done it, or what the consequences had been. He

also remembered that since this was the case,

there was no point trying to remember his name.

He was no longer fit to bear it.

“Yes, I remember,” he whispered. “You may

call me Touchstone. But I shall call you—”

He choked, looked surprised, then tried again.

“You can’t say it,” Mogget said. “A spell tied

to the corruption of—but I can’t say it, nor tell

anyone the nature of it, or how to fix it. You

won’t be able to talk about it either and there may

be other effects. Certainly, it has affected me.”

“I see,” replied Touchstone, somberly. He

didn’t try the name again. “Tell me, who rules

the Kingdom?”

“No one,” said Mogget.

“A regency, then. That is perhaps—”

“No. No regency. No one reigns. No one rules.

There was a regency at first, but it declined . . .

with help.”

“What do you mean, ‘at first’?” asked

Touchstone. “What exactly has happened?

Where have I been?”

“The regency lasted for one hundred and

222

eighty years,” Mogget announced callously.

“Anarchy has held sway for the last twenty,

tempered by what a few remaining loyalists

could do. And you, my boy, have been adorning

the front of this ship as a lump of wood for the

last two hundred years.”

“The family?”

“All dead and past the Final Gate, save one,

who should be. You know who I mean.”

For a moment, this news seemed to return

Touchstone to his wooden state. He sat frozen,

only the slight movement of his chest showing

continued life. Then tears started in his eyes, and

his head slowly fell to meet his upturned hands.

Mogget watched without sympathy, till the

young man’s back ceased its heaving and the

harsh in-drawn gasps between sobs became

calmer.

“There’s no point crying over it,” the cat said

harshly. “Plenty of people have died trying to put

the matter to rights. Four Abhorsens have fallen

in this century alone, trying to deal with the

Dead, the broken stones and the—the original

problem. My current Abhorsen certainly isn’t

lying around crying her eyes out. Make yourself

useful and help her.”

223

“Can I?” asked Touchstone bleakly, wiping his

face with the blanket.

“Why not?” snorted Mogget. “Get dressed,

for a start. There are some things aboard here for

you as well. Swords and suchlike.”

“But I’m not fit to wield royal—”

“Just do as you’re told,” Mogget said firmly.

“Think of yourself as Abhorsen’s sworn swordhand,

if it makes you feel better, though in this

present era, you’ll find common sense is more

important than honor.”

“Very well,” Touchstone muttered, humbly.

He stood up and put on the underclothes and

shirt, but couldn’t get the trousers past his heavily

muscled thighs.

“There’s a kilt and leggings in one of the

chests back here,” Mogget said, after watching

Touchstone hopping around on one leg, the

other trapped in too-tight leather.

Touchstone nodded, divested himself of the

trousers, and clambered up through the hole,

taking care to keep as far away from Mogget as

possible. Halfway up, he paused, arms braced on

either side of the gap.

“You won’t tell her?” he asked.

“Tell who? Tell what?”

224

“Abhorsen. Please, I’ll do all I can to help. But

it wasn’t intentional. My part, I mean. Please,

don’t tell her—”

“Spare me the pleadings,” said Mogget, in a

disgusted tone. “I can’t tell her. You can’t tell her.

The corruption is wide and the spell rather indiscriminatory.

Hurry up—she’ll be back soon. I’ll

tell you the rest of our current saga while you

dress.”

Sabriel returned from the spring feeling healthier,

cleaner and happier. She’d slept well and the

morning’s ablutions had cleared off the blood.

The bruises, swellings and sunburn had all

responded well to her herbal treatments. All in

all, she felt about eighty percent normal, rather

than ten percent functional, and she was looking

forward to having some company at breakfast

other than the sardonic Mogget. Not that he

didn’t have his uses, such as guarding unconscious

or sleeping humans. He’d also assured

her that he had tested the Charter mark on the

figurehead-man, finding him to be unsullied by

Free Magic, or necromancy.

She’d expected the man to still be asleep, so

she felt a faint frisson of surprise and suspense

when she saw a figure standing by the ship’s bow,

225

facing the other way. For a second, her hand

twitched to her sword, then she saw Mogget

nearby, precariously draped on the ship’s rail.

She approached nervously, her curiosity tempered

by the need to be wary of strangers. He

looked different dressed. Older and somewhat

intimidating, particularly since he seemed to

have scorned her plain clothing for a kilt of

gold-striped red, with matching leggings of redstriped

gold, disappearing into turned-down

thigh boots of russet doeskin. He was wearing

her shirt, though, and preparing to put on a red

leather jerkin. It had detachable, lace-up sleeves,

which seemed to be giving him some problems.

Two swords lay in three-quarter scabbards near

his feet, stabbing points shining four inches out

of the leather. A wide belt with the appropriate

hooks already encircled his waist.

“Curse these laces,” he said, when she was

about ten paces away. A nice voice, quite deep,

but currently frustrated and peaking with temper.

“Good morning,” said Sabriel.

He whirled around, dropping the sleeves,

almost ducking to his swords, before recovering

to transform the motion into a bow, culminating

in a descent to one knee.

226

“Good morning, milady,” he said huskily,

head bowed, carefully not meeting her gaze. She

saw that he’d found some earrings, large gold

hoops clumsily pushed through pierced lobes,

for they were bloodied. Apart from them, all she

could see was the top of his curly-haired head.

“I’m not ‘milady,’” said Sabriel, wondering

which of Miss Prionte’s etiquette principles

applied to this situation. “My name is Sabriel.”

“Sabriel? But you are the Abhorsen,” the man

said slowly. He didn’t sound overly bright,

Sabriel thought, with sinking expectations.

Perhaps there would be very little conversation

at breakfast after all.

“No, my father is the Abhorsen,” she said,

with a stern look at Mogget, warning him not

to interfere. “I’m a sort of stand-in. It’s a bit

complicated, so I’ll explain later. What’s your

name?”

He hesitated, then mumbled, “I can’t remember,

milady. Please, call me . . . call me

Touchstone.”

“Touchstone?” asked Sabriel. That sounded

familiar, but she couldn’t place it for a moment.

“Touchstone? But that’s a jester’s name, a fool’s

name. Why call you that?”

227

“That’s what I am,” he said dully, without

inflection.

“Well, I have to call you something,” Sabriel

continued. “Touchstone. You know, there is the

tradition of a wise fool, so perhaps it’s not so

bad. I guess you think you’re a fool because

you’ve been imprisoned as a figurehead—and in

Death, of course.”

“In Death!” exclaimed Touchstone. He looked

up and his grey eyes met Sabriel’s. Surprisingly,

he had a clear, intelligent gaze. Perhaps there is

some hope for him after all, she thought, as she

explained: “Your spirit was somehow preserved

just beyond the border of Death, and your body

preserved as the wooden figurehead. Both necromantic

and Free Magic would have been

involved. Very powerful magic, on both counts.

I am curious as to why it was used on you.”

Touchstone looked away again, and Sabriel

sensed a certain shiftiness, or embarrassment.

She guessed that the forthcoming explanation

would be a half-truth, at best.

“I don’t remember very well,” he said, slowly.

“Though things are coming back. I am . . . I

was . . . a guardsman. The Royal Guard. There

was some sort of attack upon the Queen . . .

228

an ambush in the—at the bottom of the stairs.

I remember fighting, with blade and Charter

Magic—we were all Charter Mages, all the

guard. I thought we were safe, but there was

treachery . . . then . . . I was here. I don’t know

how.”

Sabriel listened carefully, wondering how

much of what he said was true. It was likely

that his memory was impaired, but he possibly

was a royal guard. Perhaps he had cast a diamond

of protection . . . that could have been

why his enemies could only imprison him,

rather than kill. But, surely they could have

waited till it failed. Why the bizarre method of

imprisonment? And, most importantly, how

did the figurehead manage to get placed in this

most protected of places?

She filed all these questions for later investigation,

for another thought had struck her. If he

really was a royal guard, the Queen he had

guarded must have been dead and gone for at

least two hundred years and, with her, everyone

and everything he knew.

“You have been a prisoner for a long time,” she

said gently, uncertain about how to break the

news. “Have you . . . I mean did you . . . well,

229

what I mean is it’s been a very long time—”

“Two hundred years,” whispered Touchstone.

“Your minion told me.”

“Your family . . .”

“I have none,” he said. His expression was set,

as immobile as the carved wood of the previous

day. Carefully, he reached over and drew one of

his swords, offering it to Sabriel hilt-first.

“I would serve you, milady, to fight against the

enemies of the Kingdom.”

Sabriel didn’t take the sword, though his plea

made her reflexively reach out. But a moment’s

thought closed her open palm, and her arm fell

back to her side. She looked at Mogget, who

was watching the proceedings with unabashed

interest.

“What have you told him, Mogget?” she asked,

suspicion wreathing her words.

“The state of the Kingdom, generally speaking,”

replied the cat. “Recent events. Our descent

here, more or less. Your duty as Abhorsen to remedy

the situation.”

“The Mordicant? Shadow Hands? Gore crows?

The Dead Adept, whoever it may be?”

“Not specifically,” said Mogget, cheerfully. “I

thought he could presume as much.”

230

231

“As you see,” Sabriel said, rather angrily, “my

‘minion’ has not been totally honest with you. I

was raised across the Wall, in Ancelstierre, so

I have very little idea about what is going on. I

have huge gaps in my knowledge of the Old

Kingdom, including everything from geography

to history to Charter Magic. I face some dire enemies,

probably under the overall direction of one

of the Greater Dead, a necromantic adept. And

I’m not out to save the Kingdom, just to find my

father, the real Abhorsen. So I don’t want to take

your oath or service or anything like that, particularly

as we’ve only just met. I am happy for you

to accompany us to the nearest approximation of

civilization, but I have no idea what I will be

doing after that. And, please remember that my

name is Sabriel. Not milady. Not Abhorsen. Now,

I think it’s time for breakfast.”

With that, she stalked over to her pack, and

started getting out some oatmeal and a small

cooking pot.

Touchstone stared after her for a moment, then

picked himself up, attached his swords, put on the

sleeveless jerkin, tied the sleeves to his belt and

wandered off to the nearest clump of trees.

Mogget followed him there, and watched him

pick up dead branches and sticks for a fire.

“She really did grow up in Ancelstierre,” said

the cat. “She doesn’t realize refusing your oath is

an insult. And it’s true enough about her ignorance.

That’s one of the reasons she needs your

help.”

“I can’t remember much,” said Touchstone,

snapping a branch in half with considerable ferocity.

“Except my most recent past. Everything else

is like a dream. I’m not sure if it’s real or not,

learned or imagined. And I wasn’t insulted. My

oath isn’t worth much.”

“But you’ll help her,” said Mogget. It wasn’t a

question.

“No,” said Touchstone. “Help is for equals. I’ll

serve her. That’s all I’m good for.”

As Sabriel feared, there was little conversation

over breakfast. Mogget went off in search of his

own, and Sabriel and Touchstone were hindered

by the sole cooking pot and single spoon, so they

took it in turns to eat half the porridge. Even

allowing for this difficulty, Touchstone was

uncommunicative. Sabriel started asking a lot of

questions, but as his standard response was, “I’m

sorry, I can’t remember,” she soon gave up.

“I don’t suppose you can remember how to get

232

out of this sinkhole, either,” she asked in exasperation,

after a particularly long stretch of silence.

Even to her, this sounded like a prefect addressing

a miscreant twelve-year-old.

“No, I’m sorry . . .” Touchstone began automatically,

then he paused, and the corner of his

mouth quirked up with a momentary spasm of

pleasure. “Wait! Yes—I do remember! There’s

a hidden stair, to the north of King Janeurl’s

ship . . . oh, I can’t remember which one that

is . . .”

“There’s only four ships near the northern rim,”

Sabriel mused. “It won’t be too hard to find.

How’s your memory for other geography? The

Kingdom, for instance?”

“I’m not sure,” replied Touchstone, guardedly,

bowing his head again. Sabriel looked at him

and took a deep breath to calm the eel-like writhings

of anger that were slowly getting bigger and

bigger inside her. She could excuse his faulty

memory—after all, that was due to magical incarceration.

But the servile manner that went

with it seemed to be an affectation. He was like

a bad actor playing the butler—or rather, a nonactor

trying to impersonate a butler as best he

could. But why?

233

“Mogget drew me a map,” she said, talking

as much to calm herself as for any real communication.

“But, as he apparently has only left

Abhorsen’s House for a few weekends over the

last thousand years, even two-hundred-year-old

memories . . .”

Sabriel paused, and bit her lip, suddenly aware

that her annoyance with him had made her spiteful.

He looked up as she stopped speaking, but no

reaction showed on his face. He might as well still

be carved from wood.

“What I mean is,” Sabriel continued carefully,

“it would be very helpful if you could advise me

on the best route to Belisaere, and the important

landmarks and locations on the way.”

She got the map out of the special pocket in

the pack and removed the protective oilskin.

Touchstone took one end as she unrolled it, and

weighted his two corners with stones, while

Sabriel secured hers with the telescope case.

“I think we’re about here,” she said, tracing her

finger from Abhorsen’s House, following the

Paperwing’s flight from there to a point a little

north of the Ratterlin river delta.

“No,” said Touchstone, sounding decisive

for the first time, his finger stabbing the map an

234

inch to the north of Sabriel’s own. “This is

Holehallow, here. It’s only ten leagues from the

coast and at the same latitude as Mount

Anarson.”

“Good!” exclaimed Sabriel, smiling, her anger

slipping from her. “You do remember. Now,

what’s the best route to Belisaere, and how long

will it take?”

“I don’t know the current conditions, mi . . .

Sabriel,” Touchstone replied. His voice grew

softer, more subdued. “From what Mogget

says, the Kingdom is in a state of anarchy. Towns

and villages may no longer exist. There will be

bandits, the Dead, Free Magic unbound, fell

creatures . . .”

“Ignoring all that,” Sabriel asked, “which way

did you normally go?”

“From Nestowe, the fishing village here,”

Touchstone said, pointing at the coast to the

east of Holehallow. “We’d ride north along the

Shoreway, changing horses at post houses. Four

days to Callibe, a rest day there. Then the interior

road up through Oncet Pass, six days

all told to Aunden. A rest day in Aunden, then

four days to Orchyre. From there, it would be

a day’s ferry passage, or two days’ riding, to the

235

Westgate of Belisaere.”

“Even without the rest days, that’d be eighteen

days’ riding, at least six weeks’ walking. That’s

too long. Is there any other way?”

“A ship, or boat, from Nestowe,” interrupted

Mogget, stalking up behind Sabriel, to place his

paw firmly on the map. “If we can find one and if

either of you can sail it.”

236

chapter xv

The stair was to the north of the

middle ship of the four. Concealed by both

magic and artifice, it seemed to be little more

than a particularly wet patch of the damp limestone

that formed the sinkhole wall, but you

could walk right through it, for it was really an

open door with steps winding up behind.

They decided to take these steps the next

morning, after another day of rest. Sabriel was

eager to move on, for she felt that her father’s

peril could only be increasing, but she was realistic

enough to assess her own need for recovery

time. Touchstone, too, probably needed a rest,

she thought. She’d tried to coax more information

out of him while they’d searched for the

steps, but he was clearly reluctant to even open

his mouth, and when he did, Sabriel found his

humble apologies ever more irritating. After the

door was found she gave up altogether, and sat

in the grass near the spring, reading her father’s

books on Charter Magic. The Book of the Dead

stayed wrapped in oilskin. Even then, she felt its

presence, brooding in her pack . . .

Touchstone stayed at the opposite end of

the ship, near the bow, performing a series of

fencing exercises with his twin swords, and

some stretches and minor acrobatics. Mogget

watched him from the undergrowth, green eyes

glittering, as if intent on a mouse.

Lunch was a culinary and conversational failure.

Dried beef strips, garnished with watercress

from the fringes of the spring, and monosyllabic

responses from Touchstone. He even went back

to “milady,” despite Sabriel’s repeated requests

to use her name. Mogget didn’t help by calling

her Abhorsen. After lunch, everyone went back

to their respective activities. Sabriel to her book,

Touchstone to his exercises and Mogget to his

watching.

Dinner was not something anyone had looked

forward to. Sabriel tried talking to Mogget,

but he seemed to be infected with Touchstone’s

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reticence, though not with his servility. As soon

as they’d eaten, everyone left the raked-together

coals of the campfire—Touchstone to the west,

Mogget north and Sabriel east—and went to

sleep on as comfortable a stretch of ground as

could be discovered.

Sabriel woke once in the night. Without getting

up, she saw that the fire had been rekindled

and Touchstone sat beside it, staring into the

flames, his eyes reflecting the capering, gold-red

light. His face looked drawn, almost ill.

“Are you all right?” Sabriel asked quietly,

propping herself up on one elbow.

Touchstone started, rocked back on his heels,

and almost fell over. For once, he didn’t sound

like a sulky servant.

“Not really. I remember what I would not, and

forget what I should not. Forgive me.”

Sabriel didn’t answer. He had spoken the last

two words to the fire, not to her.

“Please, go back to sleep, milady,” Touchstone

continued, slipping back to his servile role. “I

will wake you in the morning.”

Sabriel opened her mouth to say something

scathing about the arrogance of pretended

humility, then shut it, and subsided back under

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her blanket. Just concentrate on rescuing Father,

she told herself. That is the one important thing.

Rescue Abhorsen. Don’t worry about Touchstone’s

problems, or Mogget’s curious nature.

Rescue Abhorsen. Rescue Abhorsen. Rescue

Abhors . . . rescue . . .

“Wake up!” Mogget said, right in her ear. She

rolled over, ignoring him, but he leapt across her

head and repeated it in her other ear. “Wake

up!”

“I’m awake,” grumbled Sabriel. She sat up

with the blanket wrapped around her, feeling the

pre-dawn chill on her face and hands. It was still

extremely dark, save for the uneven light of the

fire and the faintest brushings of dawn light

above the sinkhole. Touchstone was already

making the porridge. He’d also washed, and

shaved—using a dagger from the look of the

nicks and cuts on his chin and neck.

“Good morning,” he said. “This will be ready

in five minutes, milady.”

Sabriel groaned at that word again. Feeling

like a shambling, blanket-shrouded excuse for a

human being, she picked up her shirt and

trousers and staggered off to find a suitable bush

en route to the spring.

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The icy water of the spring completed the

waking up process without kindness, Sabriel

exposing herself to it and the marginally warmer

air for no more than the ten seconds it took to

shed undershirt, wash and get dressed again.

Clean, awake and clothed, she returned to the

campfire and ate her share of the porridge. Then

Touchstone ate, while Sabriel buckled on armor,

sword and bells. Mogget lay near the fire, warming

his white-furred belly. Not for the first time,

Sabriel wondered if he needed to eat at all. He

obviously liked food, but he seemed to eat for

amusement, rather than sustenance.

Touchstone continued being a servant after

breakfast, cleaning pot and spoon, quenching

the fire and putting everything away. But when

he was about to swing the pack on his back,

Sabriel stopped him.

“No, Touchstone. It’s my pack. I’ll carry it,

thank you.”

He hesitated, then passed it to her and would

have helped her put it on, but she had her arms

through the straps and the pack swung on before

he could take the weight.

Half an hour later, perhaps a third of the

way up the narrow, stone-carved stair, Sabriel

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regretted her decision to take the pack. She still

wasn’t totally recovered from the Paperwing

crash and the stair was very steep, and so narrow

that she had difficulty negotiating the spiraling

turns. The pack always seemed to jam

against the outside or inside wall, no matter

which way she turned.

“Perhaps we should take it in turns to carry

the pack,” she said reluctantly, when they

stopped at a sort of alcove to catch their breath.

Touchstone, who had been leading, nodded and

came back down a few steps to take the pack.

“I’ll lead, then,” Sabriel added, flexing her back

and shoulders, shuddering slightly at the packinduced

layer of sweat on her back, greasy under

armor, tunic, shirt and undershirt. She picked up

her candle from the bench and stepped up.

“No,” said Touchstone, stepping in her way.

“There are guards—and guardians—on this

stair. I know the words and signs to pass them.

You are the Abhorsen, so they might let you

past, but I am not sure.”

“Your memory must be coming back,” Sabriel

commented, slightly peeved at being thwarted.

“Tell me, is this stair the one you mentioned

when you said the Queen was ambushed?”

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“No,” Touchstone replied flatly. He hesitated,

then added, “That stair was in Belisaere.”

With that, he turned, and continued up the

stairs. Sabriel followed, Mogget at her heels. Now

that she wasn’t lumbered by her pack, she felt

more alert. Watching Touchstone, she saw him

pause occasionally and mutter some words under

his breath. Each time, there was the faint, featherlight

touch of Charter Magic. Subtle magic, much

cleverer than in the tunnel below. Harder to detect

and probably much more deadly, Sabriel thought.

Now she knew it was there, she also picked up the

faint sensation of Death. This stair had seen

killings, a long, long, time ago.

Finally, they came to a large chamber, with a

set of double doors to one side. Light leaked

in from a large number of small, circular holes

in the roof, or as Sabriel soon saw, through an

overgrown lattice that had once been open to

air and sky.

“That’s the outside door,” Touchstone said,

unnecessarily. He snuffed out his candle, took

Sabriel’s, now little more than a stub of wax, and

put both in a pocket stitched to the front of his

kilt. Sabriel thought of joking about the hot wax

and the potential for damage, but thought better

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of it. Touchstone was not the lighthearted type.

“How does it open?” asked Sabriel, indicating

the door. She couldn’t see any handle, lock or

key. Or any hinges, for that matter.

Touchstone was silent, eyes unfocused and

staring, then he laughed, a bitter little chuckle.

“I don’t remember! All the way up the stair, all

the words and signals . . . and now useless!

Useless!”

“At least you got us up the steps,” Sabriel

pointed out, alarmed by the violence of his selfloathing.

“I’d still be sitting by the spring, watching

it bubble, if you hadn’t come along.”

“You would have found the way out,”

Touchstone muttered. “Or Mogget would.

Wood! Yes, that’s what I deserve to be—”

“Touchstone,” Mogget interrupted, hissing.

“Shut up. You’re to be useful, remember?”

“Yes,” replied Touchstone, visibly calming his

breathing, composing his face. “I’m sorry,

Mogget. Milady.”

“Please, please, just Sabriel,” she said tiredly.

“I’ve only just left school—I’m only eighteen!

Calling me milady seems ridiculous.”

“Sabriel,” Touchstone said tentatively. “I will

try to remember. ‘Milady’ is a habit . . . it

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245

reminds me of my place in the world. It’s easier

for me—”

“I don’t care what’s easier for you!” Sabriel

snapped. “Don’t call me milady and stop acting

like a halfwit! Just be yourself. Behave normally. I

don’t need a valet, I need a useful . . . friend!”

“Very well, Sabriel,” Touchstone said, with

careful emphasis. He was angry now, but at least

that was an improvement over servile, Sabriel

thought.

“Now,” she said to the smirking Mogget.

“Have you got any ideas about this door?”

“Just one,” replied Mogget, sliding between

her legs and over to the thin line that marked the

division between the two leaves of the door.

“Push. One on each side.”

“Push?”

“Why not?” said Touchstone, shrugging. He

took up a position, braced against the left side of

the door, palms flat on the metal-studded wood.

Sabriel hesitated, then did the same against the

right.

“One, two, three, push!” announced Mogget.

Sabriel pushed on “three” and Touchstone on

“push,” so their combined effort took several

seconds to synchronize. Then the doors creaked

slowly open, sunshine spilling through in a

bright bar, climbing from floor to ceiling, dust

motes dancing in its progress.

“It feels strange,” said Touchstone, the wood

humming beneath his hands like plucked lute

strings.

“I can hear voices,” exclaimed Sabriel at the

same time, her ears full of half-caught words,

laughter, distant singing.

“I can see time,” whispered Mogget, so softly

that his words were lost.

Then the doors were open. They walked

through, shielding their eyes against the sun,

feeling the cool breeze sharp on their skin, the

fresh scent of pine trees clearing their nostrils of

underground dust. Mogget sneezed quickly three

times, and ran about in a tight circle. The doors

slid shut behind them, as silently and inexplicably

as they’d opened.

They stood in a small clearing in the middle of

a pine forest, or plantation, for the trees were

regularly spaced. The doors behind them stood

in the side of a low hillock of turf and stunted

bushes. Pine needles lay thick on the ground,

pinecones peeking through every few paces, like

skulls ploughed up on some ancient battleground.

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“The Watchwood,” said Touchstone. He took

several deep breaths, looked at the sky, and

sighed. “It is Winter, I think—or early Spring?”

“Winter,” replied Sabriel. “It was snowing

quite heavily, back near the Wall. It seems much

milder here.”

“Most of the Wall, the Long Cliffs, and

Abhorsen’s House, are on, or part of, the

Southern Plateau,” Mogget explained. “The

plateau is between one and two thousand feet

above the coastal plain. In fact, the area around

Nestowe, where we are headed, is mostly below

sea level and has been reclaimed.”

“Yes,” said Touchstone. “I remember. Long

Dyke, the raised canals, the wind pumps to raise

the water—”

“You’re both very informative for a change,”

remarked Sabriel. “Would one of you care to tell

me something I really want to know, like what

are the Great Charters?”

“I can’t,” Mogget and Touchstone said together.

Then Touchstone continued, haltingly,

“There is a spell . . . a binding on us. But someone

who is not a Charter Mage, or otherwise

closely bound to the Charter, might be able to

speak. A child, perhaps, baptized with the

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Charter mark, but not grown into power.”

“You’re cleverer than I thought,” commented

Mogget. “Not that that’s saying much.”

“A child,” said Sabriel. “Why would a child

know?”

“If you’d had a proper education, you’d know

too,” said Mogget. “A waste of good silver, that

school of yours.”

“Perhaps,” agreed Sabriel. “But now that I

know more of the Old Kingdom, I suspect being

at school in Ancelstierre saved my life. But

enough of that. Which way do we go now?”

Touchstone looked at the sky, blue above the

clearing, dark where the pines circled. The sun

was just visible above the trees, perhaps an hour

short of its noon-time zenith. Touchstone

looked from it to the shadows of the trees, then

pointed: “East. There should be a series of

Charter Stones, leading from here to the eastern

edge of the Watchwood. This place is heavily

warded with magic. There are . . . there were,

many stones.”

The stones were still there, and after the first,

some sort of animal track that meandered from

one stone to the next. It was cool under the pines,

but pleasant, the constant presence of the Charter

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Stones a reassuring sensation to Sabriel and

Touchstone, who could sense them like lighthouses

in a sea of trees.

There were seven stones in all, and none of

them broken, though Sabriel felt a stab of nervous

tension every time they left the ambience of one

and moved to another, a stark picture always

flashing into her head—the bloodstained, riven

stone of Cloven Crest.

The last stone stood on the very edge of the pine

forest, atop a granite bluff thirty or forty yards

high, marking the forest’s eastern edge and the

end of high ground.

They stood next to the stone and looked out,

out towards the huge expanse of blue-grey sea,

white-crested, restless, always rolling in to shore.

Below them were the flat, sunken fields of

Nestowe, maintained by a network of raised

canals, pumps and dykes. The village itself lay

three-quarters of a mile away, high on another

granite bluff, the harbor out of sight on the other

side.

“The fields are flooded,” said Touchstone, in a

puzzled tone, as if he couldn’t believe what he was

seeing.

Sabriel followed his gaze, and saw that what

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she had taken for some crop was actually silt

and water, sitting tepidly where food once grew.

Windmills, power for the pumps, stood silent,

trefoil-shaped vanes still atop scaffolding towers,

even though a salt-laden breeze blew in

from the sea.

“But the pumps were Charter-spelled,”

Touchstone exclaimed. “To follow the wind, to

work without care . . .”

“There are no people in the fields—no one on

this side of the village,” Mogget added, his eyes

keener than the telescope in Sabriel’s pack.

“Nestowe’s Charter Stone must be broken,”

Sabriel said, mouth tight, words cold. “And I can

smell a certain stench on the breeze. There are

Dead in the village.”

“A boat would be the quickest way to

Belisaere, and I am reasonably confident of my

sailing,” Touchstone remarked. “But if the Dead

are there, shouldn’t we . . .”

“We’ll go down and get a boat,” Sabriel

announced firmly. “While the sun is high.”

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chapter xvi

There was a built-up path through

the flooded fields, but it was submerged to

ankle-depth, with occasional thigh-high slippages.

Only the raised canal drains stood well

above the brackish water, and they all ran

towards the east, not towards the village, so

Sabriel and Touchstone were forced to wade

along the path. Mogget, of course, rode, his

lean form draped around Sabriel’s neck like a

white fox fur.

Water and mud, coupled with an uncertain

path, made it slow going. It took an hour to

cover less than a mile, so it was later in the

afternoon than Sabriel would have wished

when they finally climbed out of the water,

up onto the beginnings of the village’s rocky

mount. At least the sky is clear, Sabriel

thought, glancing up. The winter sun wasn’t

particularly hot and couldn’t be described as

glaring, but it would certainly deter most kindred

of the Lesser Dead from venturing out.

Nevertheless, they walked carefully up to the

village, swords loose, Sabriel with a hand to her

bells. The path wound up in a series of steps

carved from the rock, reinforced here and there

with bricks and mortar. The village proper nestled

on top of the bluff—about thirty cozy brick

cottages, with wood-tile roofs, some painted

bright colors, some dull, and some simply grey

and weatherbeaten.

It was completely silent, save for the odd

gust of wind, or the mournful cry of a gull,

slipping down through the air above. Sabriel

and Touchstone drew closer together, walking

almost shoulder-to-shoulder up what passed

for a main street, swords out now, eyes flickering

across closed doors and shuttered windows.

Both felt uneasy, nervous—a nasty, tingling,

creeping sensation climbing up from spine,

to nape of neck, to forehead Charter mark.

Sabriel also felt the presence of Dead things.

Lesser Dead, hiding from sunlight, lurking

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somewhere nearby, in house or cellar.

At the end of the main street, on the highest

point of the bluff, a Charter Stone stood on a

patch of carefully tended lawn. Half of the stone

had been sheared away, pieces broken and tumbled,

dark stone on green turf. A body lay in

front of the stone, hands and feet bound, the

gaping cut across the throat a clear sign of where

the blood had come from—the blood for the sacrifice

that broke the stone.

Sabriel knelt by the corpse, eyes averted from

the broken stone. It was only recently ruined,

she felt, but already the door to Death was

creaking open. She could almost feel the cold of

the currents beyond, leaking out around the

stone, sucking warmth and life from the air.

Things lurked there too, she knew, just beyond

the border. She sensed their hunger for life, their

impatience for night to fall.

As she expected, the corpse was of a Charter

Mage, dead but three or four days. But she hadn’t

expected to find the dead person was a woman.

Wide shoulders and a muscular build had deceived

her for a moment, but there was a middleaged

woman before her, eyes shut, throat cut,

short brown hair caked with sea salt and blood.

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“The village healer,” said Mogget, indicating

a bracelet on her wrist with his nose. Sabriel

pushed the rope bindings aside for a better

look. The bracelet was bronze with inlaid

Charter marks of greenstone. Dead marks

now, for blood dried upon the bronze, and no

pulse beat in the skin under the metal.

“She was killed three or four days ago,”

Sabriel announced. “The stone was broken at

the same time.”

Touchstone looked back at her and nodded

grimly, then resumed watching the houses

opposite. His swords hung loosely in his

hands, but Sabriel noticed that his entire body

was tense, like a compressed jack-in-the-box,

ready to spring.

“Whoever . . . whatever . . . killed her and

broke the stone, didn’t enslave her spirit,”

Sabriel added quietly, as if thinking to herself.

“I wonder why?”

Neither Mogget nor Touchstone answered.

For a moment, Sabriel considered asking the

woman herself, but her impetuous desire for

journeys into Death had been soundly dampened

by recent experience. Instead, she cut the

woman’s bonds, and arranged her as best she

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could, ending up with a sort of curled-up sleeping

position.

“I don’t know your name, Healer,” Sabriel

whispered. “But I hope you go quickly beyond

the Final Gate. Farewell.”

She stood back and drew the Charter marks

for the funeral pyre above the corpse, whispering

the names of the marks as she did so—but

her fingers fumbled and words went awry. The

baleful influence of the broken stone pressed

against her, like a wrestler gripping her wrists,

clamping her jaw. Sweat beaded on her forehead,

and pain shot through her limbs, her

hands shaking with effort, tongue clumsy, seeming

swollen in her suddenly dry mouth.

Then she felt assistance come, strength flowing

through her, reinforcing the marks, steadying her

hands, clearing her voice. She completed the

litany, and a spark exploded above the woman,

became a twisting flame, then grew to a fierce,

white-hot blaze that spread the length of the

woman’s body, totally consuming it, to leave

only ash, light cargo for the sea winds.

The extra strength came through Touchstone’s

hand, his open palm lightly resting on her shoulder.

As she straightened up, the touch was lost.

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When Sabriel turned around, Touchstone was

just drawing his right-hand sword, eyes fixed on

the houses—as if he’d had nothing to do with

helping her.

“Thank you,” said Sabriel. Touchstone was a

strong Charter Mage, perhaps as strong as she

was. This surprised her, though she couldn’t

think why. He’d made no secret of being a

Charter Mage—she’d just assumed he would

only know a few of the more fighting-related

marks and spells. Petty magics.

“We should move on,” said Mogget, prowling

backwards and forwards in agitation, carefully

avoiding the fragments from the broken stone.

“Find a boat, and put to sea before nightfall.”

“The harbor is that way,” Touchstone added

quickly, pointing with his sword. Both he and

the cat seemed very keen to leave the area

around the broken stone, thought Sabriel. But

then, so was she. Even in bright daylight, it

seemed to dull the color around it. The lawn was

already more yellow than green, and even the

shadows looked thicker and more abundant

than they should. She shivered, remembering

Cloven Crest and the thing called Thralk.

The harbor lay on the northern side of the

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bluff, reached by another series of steps in the

rocky hill, or in the case of cargo, via one of

the shear-legged hoists that lined the edge of the

bluff. Long wooden jetties thrust out into

the clear blue-green water, sheltered under the

lee of a rocky island, a smaller sibling of the village

bluff. A long breakwater of huge boulders

joined island and shore, completing the harbor’s

protection from wind and wave.

There were no boats moored in the harbor,

tied up to the jetties, or at the harbor wall. Not

even a dinghy, hauled up for repair. Sabriel stood

on the steps, looking down, mind temporarily

devoid of further plans. She just watched the

swirl of the sea around the barnacled piles of the

jetties; the moving shadows in the blue, marking

small fish schooling about their business.

Mogget sat near her feet, sniffing the air, silent.

Touchstone stood higher, behind her, guarding

the rear.

“What now?” asked Sabriel, generally indicating

the empty harbor below, her arm moving

with the same rhythm as the swell, in its perpetual

tilt against wood and stone.

“There are people on the island,” Mogget

said, eyes slitted against the wind. “And boats

257

tied up between the two outcrops of rock on the

southwest.”

Sabriel looked, but saw nothing, till she extracted

the telescope from the pack on

Touchstone’s back. He stood completely still

while she ferreted around, silent as the empty

village. Playing wooden again, Sabriel thought,

but she didn’t really mind. He was being helpful,

without metaphorically tugging his forelock

every few minutes.

Through the telescope, she saw that Mogget

was right. There were several boats partly hidden

between two spurs of rock, and some slight

signs of habitation: a glimpse of a washing line,

blown around the corner of a tall rock; the

momentary sight of movement between two of

the six or seven ramshackle wooden buildings

that nestled on the island’s south-western side.

Shifting her gaze to the breakwater, Sabriel followed

its length. As she’d half expected, there was

a gap in the very middle of it, where the sea

rushed through with considerable force. A pile of

timber on the island side of the breakwater indicated

that there had once been a bridge there, now

removed.

“It looks like the villagers fled to the island,”

258

she said, shutting the telescope down. “There’s a

gap in the breakwater, to keep running water

between the island and shore. An ideal defense

against the Dead. I don’t think even a Mordicant

would risk crossing deep tidal water—”

“Let’s go then,” muttered Touchstone. He

sounded nervous again, jumpy. Sabriel looked at

him, then above his head, and saw why he was

nervous. Clouds were rolling in from the southeast,

behind the village—dark clouds, laden with

rain. The air was calm, but now she saw the

clouds, Sabriel recognized it was the calm before

heavy rain. The sun would not be guarding them

for very much longer and night would be an early

guest.

Without further urging, she set off down the

steps, down to the harborside, then along to the

breakwater. Touchstone followed more slowly,

turning every few steps to watch the rear. Mogget

did likewise, his small cat-face continually looking

back, peering up at the houses.

Behind them, shutters inched open and fleshless

eyes watched from the safety of shadows,

watched the trio marching out to the breakwater,

still washed in harsh sunlight, flanked by swiftmoving

waves of terrible water. Rotten, corroded

259

teeth ground and gnashed in skeletal mouths.

Farther back from the windows, shadows darker

than ones ever cast by light whirled in frustration,

anger—and fear. They all knew who had passed.

One such shadow, selected by lot and compelled

by its peers, gave up its existence in Life

with a silent scream, vanishing into Death. Their

master was many, many leagues away, and the

quickest way to reach him lay in Death. Of

course, message delivered, the messenger would

fall through the Gates to a final demise. But the

master didn’t care about that.

The gap in the breakwater proved to be at least

fifteen feet wide, and the water was twice Sabriel’s

height, the sea surging through with a rough

aggression. It was also covered by archers from

the island, as they discovered when an arrow

struck the stones in front of them and skittered off

into the sea.

Instantly, Touchstone rushed in front of Sabriel,

and she felt the flow of Charter Magic from him,

his swords sketching a great circle in the air in

front of them both. Glowing lines followed the

swords’ path, till a shining circle hung in the air.

Four arrows curved through the air from the

island. One, striking the circle, simply vanished.

260

261

The other three missed completely, striking stones

or sea.

“Arrow ward,” gasped Touchstone. “Effective,

but hard to keep going. Do we retreat?”

“Not yet,” replied Sabriel. She could feel the

Dead stirring in the village behind them and she

could also see the archers now. There were four

of them, two pairs, each behind one of the large,

upthrust stones that marked where the breakwater

joined the island. They looked young, nervous

and were already proven to be of little

threat.

“Hold!” shouted Sabriel. “We are friends!”

There was no reply, but the archers didn’t loose

their nocked arrows.

“What’s the village leader’s title—usually, I

mean? What are they called?” Sabriel whispered

hurriedly to Touchstone, once again wishing

she knew more about the Old Kingdom and its

customs.

“In my day . . .” Touchstone replied slowly,

his swords retracing the arrow ward, attention

mostly on that, “in my day—Elder—for this size

of village.”

“We wish to speak with your Elder!” shouted

Sabriel. She pointed at the cloud-front advancing

behind her, and added, “Before darkness falls!”

“Wait!” came the answer, and one of the

archers scampered back from the rocks, up

towards the buildings. Closer to, Sabriel realized

they were probably boathouses or something

like that.

The archer returned in a few minutes, an older

man hobbling over the rocks behind him. The

other three archers, seeing him, lowered their

bows and returned shafts to quivers. Touchstone,

seeing this, ceased to maintain the arrow ward. It

hung in the air for a moment, then dissipated,

leaving a momentary rainbow.

The Elder was named in fact, as well as title, they

saw, as he limped along the breakwater. Long

white hair blew like fragile cobwebs around his

thin, wrinkled face, and he moved with the deliberate

intention of the very old. He seemed

unafraid, perhaps possessed of the disinterested

courage of one already close to death.

“Who are you?” he asked, when he reached

the gap, standing above the swirling waters like

some prophet of legend, his deep orange cloak

flapping around him from the rising breeze.

“What do you want?”

Sabriel opened her mouth to answer, but

262

Touchstone had already started to speak. Loudly.

“I am Touchstone, sworn swordsman for the

Abhorsen, who stands before you. Are arrows

your welcome for such folk as we?”

The old man was silent for a moment, his

deep-set eyes focused on Sabriel, as if he could

strip away any falsity or illusion by sight alone.

Sabriel met his gaze, but out of the corner of her

mouth she whispered to Touchstone.

“What makes you think you can speak for me?

Wouldn’t a friendly approach be better? And

since when are you my sworn—”

She stopped, as the old man cleared his throat

to speak and spat into the water. For a moment,

she thought that this was his response, but as

neither the archers nor Touchstone reacted, it

was obviously of no account.

“These are bad times,” the Elder said. “We

have been forced to leave our firesides for the

smoking sheds, warmth and comfort for seawinds

and the stench of fish. Many of the people

of Nestowe are dead—or worse. Strangers

and travelers are rare in such times, and not

always what they seem.”

“I am the Abhorsen,” Sabriel said, reluctantly.

“Enemy of the Dead.”

263

“I remember,” replied the old man, slowly.

“Abhorsen came here when I was a young

man. He came to put down the haunts that the

spice merchant brought, Charter curse him.

Abhorsen. I remember that coat you’re wearing,

blue as a ten-fathom sea, with the silver

keys. There was a sword, also . . .”

He paused, expectantly. Sabriel stood, silently,

waiting for him to go on.

“He wants to see the sword,” Touchstone said,

voice flat, after the silence stretched too far.

“Oh,” replied Sabriel, flushing.

It was quite obvious. Carefully, so as not to

alarm the archers, she drew her sword, holding

it up to the sun, so the Charter marks could

clearly be seen, silver dancers on the blade.

“Yes,” sighed the Elder, old shoulders sagging

with relief. “That is the sword. Charter-spelled.

She is the Abhorsen.”

He turned and tottered back towards the

archers, worn voice increasing to the ghost of

a fisherman’s cross-water hail. “Come on, you

four. Quick with the bridge. We have visitors!

Help at last!”

Sabriel glanced at Touchstone, raising her

eyebrows at the implication of the old man’s

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last three words. Surprisingly, Touchstone met

her gaze, and held it.

“It is traditional for someone of high rank,

such as yourself, to be announced by their sworn

swordsman,” he said quietly. “And the only

acceptable way for me to travel with you is as

your sworn swordsman. Otherwise, people will

assume that we are, at best, illicit lovers. Having

your name coupled to mine in such a guise

would lower you in most eyes. You see?”

“Ah,” replied Sabriel, gulping, feeling the flush

of embarrassment come back and spread from

her cheeks to her neck. It felt a lot like being on

the receiving end of one of Miss Prionte’s severest

social put-downs. She hadn’t even thought

about how it would look, the two of them traveling

together. Certainly, in Ancelstierre, it

would be considered shameful, but this was the

Old Kingdom, where things were different. But

only some things, it seemed.

“Lesson two hundred and seven,” muttered

Mogget from somewhere near her feet. “Three

out of ten. I wonder if they’ve got any freshcaught

whiting? I’d like a small one, still flopping—”

“Be quiet!” Sabriel interrupted. “You’d better

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pretend to be a normal cat for a while.”

“Very well, milady. Abhorsen,” Mogget

replied, stalking away to sit on the other side of

Touchstone.

Sabriel was about to reply scathingly when

she saw the faintest curve at the corner of

Touchstone’s mouth. Touchstone? Grinning? Surprised,

she misplaced the retort on her tongue,

then forgot it altogether, as the four archers

heaved a plank across the gap, the end smacking

down onto stone with a startling bang.

“Please cross quickly,” the Elder said, as the

men steadied the plank. “There are many fell

creatures in the village now, and I fear the day is

almost done.”

True to his words, cloud-shadow fell across

them as he spoke, and the fresh scent of closing

rain mingled with the wet and salty smell of the

sea. Without further urging, Sabriel ran quickly

across the plank, Mogget behind her, Touchstone

bringing up the rear.

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chapter xvii

All the survivors of Nestowe

were gathered in the largest of the fish-smoking

sheds, save for the current shift of archers

who watched the breakwater. There had been

one hundred and twenty-six villagers the week

before—now there were thirty-one.

“There were thirty-two until this morning,”

the Elder said to Sabriel, as he passed her a cup

of passable wine and a piece of dried fish atop a

piece of very hard, very stale bread. “We

thought we were safe when we got to the island,

but Monjer Stowart’s boy was found just after

dawn today, sucked dry like a husk. When we

touched him, it was like . . . burnt paper, that

still holds its shape . . . we touched him, and he

crumbled into flakes of . . . something like ash.”

Sabriel looked around as the old man spoke,

noting the many lanterns, candles and rush

tapers that added both to the light and the

smoky, fishy atmosphere of the shed. The survivors

were a very mixed group—men, women

and children, from very young to the Elder

himself. Their only common characteristic

was the fear pinching their faces, the fear

showing in their nervous, staccato movement.

“We think one of them’s here,” said a woman,

her voice long gone beyond fear to fatalism. She

stood alone, accompanied by the clear space of

tragedy. Sabriel guessed she had lost her family.

Husband, children—perhaps parents and siblings,

too, for she wasn’t over forty.

“It’ll take us, one by one,” the woman continued,

matter-of-fact, her voice filling the

shed with dire certainty. Around her, people

shuffled, twitchily, not looking at her, as if to

meet her gaze would be to accept her words.

Most looked at Sabriel and she saw hope in

their eyes. Not blind faith, or complete confidence,

but a gambler’s hope that a new horse

might change a run of losses.

“The Abhorsen who came when I was young,”

the Elder continued—and Sabriel saw that at his

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age, this would be his memory alone, of all the

villagers—“this Abhorsen told me that it was his

purpose to slay the Dead. He saved us from the

haunts that came in the merchant’s caravan. Is it

still the same, lady? Will Abhorsen save us from

the Dead?”

Sabriel thought for a moment, her mind

mentally flicking through the pages of The

Book of the Dead, feeling it stir in the backpack

that sat by her feet. Her thoughts strayed

to her father; the forthcoming journey to

Belisaere; the way in which Dead enemies

seemed to be arrayed against her by some controlling

mind.

“I will ensure this island is free of the Dead,”

she said at last, speaking clearly so all could

hear her. “But I cannot free the mainland village.

There is a greater evil at work in the

Kingdom—that same evil that has broken your

Charter Stone—and I must find and defeat it as

soon as I can. When that is done, I will return—

I hope with other help—and both village and

Charter Stone will be restored.”

“We understand,” replied the Elder. He

seemed saddened, but philosophic. He continued,

speaking more to his people than to

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Sabriel. “We can survive here. There is the

spring, and the fish. We have boats. If Callibe

has not fallen to the Dead, we can trade, for

vegetables and other stuffs.”

“You will have to keep watching the breakwater,”

Touchstone said. He stood behind

Sabriel’s chair, the very image of a stern bodyguard.

“The Dead—or their living slaves—

may try to fill it in with stones, or push across

a bridge. They can cross running water by

building bridges of boxed grave dirt.”

“So, we are besieged,” said a man to the front

of the mass of villagers. “But what of this Dead

thing already here on the island, already preying

upon us? How will you find it?”

Silence fell as the questioner spoke, for this was

the one answer everyone wanted to hear. Rain

sounded loud on the roof in the absence of human

speech, steady rain, as had been falling since late

afternoon. The Dead disliked the rain, Sabriel

thought inconsequentially, as she considered this

question. Rain didn’t destroy, but it hurt and irritated

the Dead. Wherever the Dead thing was on

the island, it would be out of the rain.

She stood up with that thought. Thirty-one

pairs of eyes watched her, hardly blinking, despite

270

the cloying smoke from too many lanterns, candles

and tapers. Touchstone watched the villagers;

Mogget watched a piece of fish; Sabriel

closed her eyes, questing outward with other

senses, trying to feel the presence of the Dead.

It was there—a faint, concealed emanation,

like an untraceable whiff of something rotten.

Sabriel concentrated on it, followed it, and

found it, right there in the shed. The Dead was

somehow hiding among the villagers.

She opened her eyes slowly, looking straight at

the point where her senses told her the Dead

creature lurked. She saw a fisherman, middleaged,

his salt-etched face red under sun-bleached

hair. He seemed no different than the others

around him, listening intently for her reply, but

there was definitely something Dead in him, or

very close by. He was wearing a boat cloak,

which seemed odd, since the smoking shed was

hot from massed humanity and the many lights.

“Tell me,” Sabriel said. “Did anyone bring

a large box with them out to the island?

Something, say, an arm-span square a side, or

larger? It would be heavy—with grave dirt.”

Murmurs and enquiries met this question,

neighbors turning to each other, with little

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flowerings of fear and suspicion. As they

talked, Sabriel walked out through them, surreptitiously

loosening her sword, signaling

Touchstone to stay close by her. He followed

her, eyes flickering across the little groups of

villagers. Mogget, glancing up from his fish,

stretched and lazily stalked behind Touchstone’s

heels, after a warning glare at the two

cats who were eyeing the half-consumed head

and tail of his fishy repast.

Careful not to alarm her quarry, Sabriel took a

zigzag path through the shed, listening to the villagers

with studied attention, though the blond

fisherman never left the corner of her eye. He

was deep in discussion with another man, who

seemed to be growing more suspicious by the

second.

Closer now, Sabriel was sure that the fisherman

was a vassal of the Dead. Technically, he was still

alive, but a Dead spirit had suppressed his will,

riding on his flesh like some shadowy stringpuller,

using his body as a puppet. Something

highly unpleasant would be half-submerged in his

back, under the boat cloak. Mordaut, they were

called, Sabriel remembered. A whole page was

devoted to these parasitical spirits in The Book of

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the Dead. They liked to keep a primary host

alive, slipping off at night to sate their hunger

from other living prey—like children.

“I’m sure I saw you with a box like that,

Patar,” the suspicious fisherman was saying. “Jall

Stowart helped you get it ashore. Hey, Jall!”

He shouted that last, turning to look at someone

else across the room. In that instant, the

Dead-ridden Patar exploded into action, clubbing

his questioner with both forearms, knocking

him aside, running to the door with the silent

ferocity of a battering ram.

But Sabriel had expected that. She stood

before him, sword at the ready, her left hand

drawing Ranna, the sweet sleeper, from the bandolier.

She still hoped to save the man, by quelling

the Mordaut.

Patar slid to a halt and half-turned, but

Touchstone was there behind him, twin swords

glowing eerily with shifting Charter marks and

silver flames. Sabriel eyed the blades in surprise,

she hadn’t known they were spelled. Past time

she asked, she realized.

Then Ranna was free in her hand—but the

Mordaut didn’t wait for the unavoidable lullaby.

Patar suddenly screamed, and stood rigid, the

273

redness draining from his face, to be replaced

by grey. Then his flesh crumpled and fell apart,

even his bones flaking away to soggy ash as the

Mordaut sucked all the life out of him in one

voracious instant. Newly fed and strengthened,

the Dead slid out from the falling cloak, a pool of

squelching darkness. It took shape as it moved,

becoming a large, disgustingly elongated sort of

rat. Quicker than any natural rat, it scuttled

towards a hole in the wall and escape!

Sabriel lunged, her blade striking chips from the

floor planks, missing the shadowy form by a scant

instant.

Touchstone didn’t miss. His right-hand sword

sheared through the creature just behind the head,

the left-wielded blade impaling its sinuous midsection.

Pinned to the floor, the creature writhed

and arched, its shadow-stuff working away from

the blades. It was remaking its body, escaping the

trap.

Quickly, Sabriel stood over it, Ranna sounding

in her hand, sweet, lazy tone echoing out into the

shed.

Before the echoes died, the Mordaut ceased

to writhe. Form half-lost by its shifting from

the swords, it lay like a lump of charred liver,

274

quivering on the floor, still impaled.

Sabriel replaced Ranna, and drew the eager

Saraneth. Its forceful voice snapped out, sound

weaving a net of domination over the foul

creature. The Mordaut made no effort to

resist, even to make a mouth to whine its

cause. Sabriel felt it succumb to her will, via the

medium of Saraneth.

She put the bell back, but hesitated as her hand

fell on Kibeth. Sleeper and Master had spoken

well, but Walker sometimes had its own ideas,

and it was stirring suspiciously under her hand.

Best to wait a moment, to calm herself, Sabriel

thought, taking her hand away from the bandolier.

She sheathed her sword, and looked

around the shed. To her surprise, everyone

except Touchstone and Mogget was asleep. They

had only caught the echoes of Ranna, which

shouldn’t have been enough. Of course, Ranna

could be tricksome too, but its trickery was far

less troublesome.

“This is a Mordaut,” she said to Touchstone,

who was stifling a half-born yawn. “A weak

spirit, catalogued as one of the Lesser Dead. They

like to ride with the Living—cohabiting the body

to some extent, directing it, and slowly sipping

275

the spirit away. It makes them hard to find.”

“What do we do with it now?” asked

Touchstone, eyeing the quivering lump of

shadow with distaste. It clearly couldn’t be cut

up, consumed by fire, or anything else he could

think of.

“I will banish it, send it back to die a true

death,” replied Sabriel. Slowly, she drew Kibeth,

using both hands. She still felt uneasy, for the bell

was twisting in her grasp, trying to sound of its

own accord, a sound that would make her walk

in Death.

She gripped it harder and rang the orthodox

backwards, forwards and figure eight her father

had taught her. Kibeth’s voice rang out, singing a

merry tune, a capering jig that almost had

Sabriel’s feet jumping too, till she forced herself

to be absolutely still.

The Mordaut had no such free will. For a

moment, Touchstone thought it was getting

away, the shadow form suddenly leaping

upwards, unreal flesh slipping up his blades

almost to the cross-hilts. Then, it slid back down

again—and vanished. Back into Death, to bob

and spin in the current, howling and screaming

with whatever voice it had there, all the way

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through to the Final Gate.

“Thanks,” Sabriel said to Touchstone. She

looked down at his two swords, still deeply

embedded in the wooden floor. They were no

longer burning with silver flames, but she could

see the Charter marks moving on the blades.

“I didn’t realize your swords were ensorcelled,”

she continued. “Though I’m glad they are.”

Surprise crossed Touchstone’s face, and confusion.

“I thought you knew,” he said. “I took them

from the Queen’s ship. They were a Royal

Champion’s swords. I didn’t want to take them,

but Mogget said you—”

He stopped in mid-sentence, as Sabriel let out a

heartfelt sigh.

“Well, anyway,” he continued. “Legend has

it that the Wallmaker made them, at the same

time he—or she, I suppose—made your sword.”

“Mine?” asked Sabriel, her hand lightly touching

the worn bronze of the guard. She’d never

thought about who’d made the sword—it just

was. “I was made for Abhorsen, to slay those

already Dead,” the inscription said, when it said

anything lucid at all. So it probably was forged

long ago, back in the distant past when the Wall

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was made. Mogget would know, she thought.

Mogget probably wouldn’t, or couldn’t, tell

her—but he would know.

“I suppose we’d better wake everybody up,”

she said, dismissing speculation about swords

for the immediate present.

“Are there more Dead?” asked Touchstone,

grunting as he pulled his swords free of the floor.

“I don’t think so,” replied Sabriel. “That

Mordaut was very clever, for it had hardly

sapped the spirit of poor . . . Patar . . . so its

presence was masked by his life. It would have

come to the island in that box of grave dirt, having

impressed the poor man with instructions

before they left the mainland. I doubt whether

any others would have done the same. I can’t

sense any here, at least. I guess I should check

the other buildings, and walk around the island,

just to be sure.”

“Now?” asked Touchstone.

“Now,” confirmed Sabriel. “But let’s wake

everyone up first, and organize some people to

carry lights for us. We’d also better talk to the

Elder about a boat for the morning.”

“And a good supply of fish,” added Mogget,

who’d slunk back to the half-eaten whiting, his

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voice sharp above the heavy drone of snoring

fisher-folk.

There were no Dead on the island, though the

archers reported seeing strange lights moving in

the village, during brief lulls in the rain. They’d

heard movement on the breakwater too, and

shot fire arrows onto the stones, but saw nothing

before the crude, oily rag–wrapped shafts

guttered out.

Sabriel advanced out on the breakwater, and

stood near the sea gap, her oilskin coat loosely

draped over her shoulders, shedding rain to the

ground and down her neck. She couldn’t see

anything through the rain and dark, but she

could feel the Dead. There were more than she

had sensed earlier, or they had grown much

stronger. Then, with a sickening feeling, she realized

that this strength belonged to a single creature,

only now emerging from Death, using the

broken stone as a portal. An instant later, she

recognized its particular presence.

The Mordicant had found her.

“Touchstone,” she asked, fighting to keep the

shivers from her voice. “Can you sail a boat by

night?”

“Yes,” replied Touchstone, his voice impersonal

279

again, face dark in the rainy night, the

lantern-light from the villagers behind him lighting

only his back and feet. He hesitated, as if he

shouldn’t be offering an opinion, then added,

“But it would be much more dangerous. I don’t

know this coast, and the night is very dark.”

“Mogget can see in the dark,” Sabriel said

quietly, moving closer to Touchstone so the villagers

couldn’t hear her.

“We have to leave immediately,” she whispered,

while pretending to adjust her oilskin. “A

Mordicant has come. The same one that pursued

me before.”

“What about the people here?” asked Touchstone,

so softly the sound of the rain almost

washed his words away—but there was the

faint sound of reproof under his business-like

tone.

“The Mordicant is after me,” muttered

Sabriel. She could sense it moving away from the

stone, questing about, using its otherwordly

senses to find her. “It can feel my presence, as I

feel it. When I go, it will follow.”

“If we stay till morning,” Touchstone whispered

back, “won’t we be safe? You said even a

Mordicant couldn’t cross this gap.”

280

281

“I said, ‘I think,’” faltered Sabriel. “It has

grown stronger. I can’t be sure—”

“That thing back in the shed, the Mordaut, it

wasn’t very difficult to destroy,” Touchstone

whispered, the confidence of ignorance in his

voice. “Is this Mordicant much worse?”

“Much,” replied Sabriel shortly.

The Mordicant had stopped moving. The rain

seemed to be dampening both its senses and its

desire to find her and slay. Sabriel stared vainly

out into the darkness, trying to peer past the

sheets of rain, to gain the evidence provided by

sight, as well as her necromantic senses.

“Riemer,” she said, loudly now, calling to

the villager who was in charge of their lanternholders.

He came forward quickly, gingery hair

plastered flat on his rounded head, rainwater

dripping down from a high forehead to catapult

itself off the end of his pudgy nose.

“Riemer, have the archers keep very careful

watch. Tell them to shoot anything that comes

onto the breakwater—there is nothing living out

there now. Only the Dead. We need to go back

and talk to your Elder.”

They walked back in silence, save for the

sloshing of boots in puddles and the steady

finger-applause of the rain. At least half of

Sabriel’s attention stayed with the Mordicant; a

malign, stomachache-inducing presence across

the dark water. She wondered why it was waiting.

Waiting for the rain to stop, or perhaps

for the now-banished Mordaut to attack from

within. Whatever its reasons, it gave them a little

time to get to a boat, and lead it away. And

perhaps, there was always the chance that it

couldn’t cross the breakwater gap.

“What time is low tide?” she asked Riemer, as

a new thought struck.

“Ah, just about an hour before dawn,” replied

the fisherman. “About six hours, if I’m any

judge.”

The Elder awoke crankily from his second

sleep. He was loath for them to go in the night,

though Sabriel felt that at least half of his reluctance

was due to their need for a boat. The villagers

only had five left. The others had been

sunk in the harbor, drowned and broken by the

stones hurled down by the Dead, eager to stop

the escape of their living prey.

“I’m sorry,” Sabriel said again. “But we must

have a boat and we need it now. There is a terrible

Dead creature in the village—it tracks like a

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hunting dog, and the trail it follows is mine. If I

stay, it will try and come here—and, at the ebb,

it may be able to cross the gap in the breakwater.

If I go, it will follow.”

“Very well,” the Elder agreed, mulishly. “You

have cleansed this island for us; a boat is a little

thing. Riemer will prepare it with food and

water. Riemer! The Abhorsen will have

Landalin’s boat—make sure it is stocked and

seaworthy. Take sails from Jaled, if Landalin’s is

short or rotten.”

“Thank you,” said Sabriel. Tiredness weighed

down on her, tiredness and the weight of awareness.

Awareness of her enemies, like a darkness

always clouding the edge of her vision. “We will

go now. My good wishes stay with you, and my

hopes for your safety.”

“May the Charter preserve us all,” added

Touchstone, bowing to the old man. The Elder

bowed back, a bent, solemn figure, so much

smaller than his shadow, looming tall on the

wall behind.

Sabriel turned to go, but a long line of villagers

was forming on the way to the door. All of them

wanted to bow or curtsey before her, to mutter

shy thank-yous and farewells. Sabriel accepted

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them with embarrassment and guilt, remembering

Patar. True, she had banished the dead, but

another life had been lost in the doing. Her

father would not have been so clumsy . . .

The second-to-last person in the line was a little

girl, her black hair tied in two plaits, one on

either side of her head. Seeing her made Sabriel

remember something Touchstone had said. She

stopped, and took the girl’s hands in her own.

“What is your name, little one?” she asked,

smiling. A feeling of déjà vu swept over her as

the small fingers met hers—the memory of a

frightened first-grader hesitantly reaching out to

the older pupil who would be her guide for the

first day at Wyverley College. Sabriel had experienced

both sides, in her time.

“Aline,” said the girl, smiling back. Her eyes

were bright and lively, too young to be dimmed by

the frightened despair that clouded the adults’

gaze. A good choice, Sabriel thought.

“Now, tell me what you have learned in your

lessons about the Great Charter,” Sabriel said,

adopting the familiar, motherly and generally

irrelevant questioning tone of the School

Inspector who’d descended on every class in

Wyverley twice a year.

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“I know the rhyme . . .” replied Aline, a little

doubtfully, her small forehead crinkling. “Shall

I sing it, like we do in class?”

Sabriel nodded.

“We dance around the stone, too,” Aline

added, confidingly. She stood up straighter, put

one foot forward, and took her hands away to

clasp them behind her back.

Five Great Charters knit the land

together linked, hand in hand

One in the people who wear the crown

Two in the folk who keep the Dead down

Three and Five became stone and mortar

Four sees all in frozen water.

“Thank you, Aline,” Sabriel said. “That was

very nice.”

She ruffled the child’s hair and hastened

through the final farewells, suddenly keen to get

out of the smoke and the fish-smell, out into the

clean, rainy air where she could think.

“So now you know,” whispered Mogget,

jumping up into her arms to escape the puddles.

“I still can’t tell you, but you know one’s

in your blood.”

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“Two,” replied Sabriel distantly. “‘Two in the

folk who keep the Dead down.’ So what is

the . . . ah . . . I can’t talk about it either!”

But she thought about the questions she’d like

to ask, as Touchstone helped her aboard the

small fishing vessel that lay just off the tiny,

shell-laden beach that served the island as a

harbor.

One of the Great Charters lay in the royal

blood. The second lay in Abhorsen’s. What were

three and five, and four that saw all in frozen

water? She felt certain that many answers could

be found in Belisaere. Her father could probably

answer more, for many things that were bound

in Life were unraveled in Death. And there was

her mother-sending, for that third and final questioning

in this seven years.

Touchstone pushed off, clambered aboard

and took the oars. Mogget leapt out of Sabriel’s

arms, and assumed a figurehead position near

the prow, serving as a night-sighted lookout,

while mocking Touchstone at the same time.

Back on shore, the Mordicant suddenly

howled, a long, piercing cry that echoed far

across the water, chilling hearts on both boat

and island.

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“Bear a bit more to starboard,” said Mogget,

in the silence after the howl faded. “We need

more sea-room.”

Touchstone was quick to comply.

287

chapter xviii

By the morning of the sixth day

out of Nestowe, Sabriel was heartily tired of

nautical life. They’d sailed virtually non-stop all

that time, only putting into shore at noon for

fresh water, and only then when it was sunny.

Nights were spent under sail, or, when exhaustion

claimed Touchstone, hove-to with a sea

anchor, the unsleeping Mogget standing watch.

Fortunately, the weather had been kind.

It had been a relatively uneventful five days.

Two days from Nestowe to Beardy Point, an

unprepossessing peninsula whose only interesting

features were a sandy-bottomed beach and a

clear stream. Devoid of life, it was also devoid of

the Dead. Here, for the first time, Sabriel could

no longer sense the pursuing Mordicant. A good,

strong, south-easterly had propelled them,

reaching northwards, at too fast a pace for it to

follow.

Three days from Beardy Point to the island of

Ilgard, its rocky cliffs climbing sheer from the

sea, a grey and pockmarked tenement, home to

tens of thousands of seabirds. They passed it late

in the afternoon, their single sail stretched to

bursting, clinker-built hull heeling well over,

bow slicing up a column of spray that salted

mouths, eyes and bodies.

It was half a day from Ilgard to the Belis

Mouth, that narrow strait that led to the Sea of

Saere. But that was tricky sailing, so they spent

the night hove-to just out of sight of Ilgard, to

wait for the light of day.

“There is a boom-chain across the Belis

Mouth,” Touchstone explained, as he raised

the sail and Sabriel hauled the sea anchor in

over the bow. The sun was rising behind him,

but had not yet pulled itself out of the sea, so

he was no more than a dim shadow in the

stern. “It was built to keep pirates and suchlike

out of the Sea of Saere. You won’t believe the

size of it—I can’t imagine how it was forged, or

strung across.”

289

“Will it still be there?” Sabriel asked, cautiously,

not wanting to prevent Touchstone’s

strangely talkative mood.

“I’m sure of it,” replied Touchstone. “We’ll see

the towers on the opposite shores first. Winding

Post, to the south, and Boom Hook to the north.”

“Not very imaginative names,” commented

Sabriel, unable to help herself from interrupting.

It was just such a pleasure to talk! Touchstone

had lapsed back into non-communication for

most of the voyage, though he did have a good

excuse—handling the fishing boat for eighteen

hours a day, even in good weather, didn’t leave

much energy for conversation.

“They’re named after their purpose,” replied

Touchstone. “Which makes sense.”

“Who decides whether to let vessels past the

chain?” asked Sabriel. Already, she was thinking

ahead, wondering about Belisaere. Could it be

like Nestowe—the city abandoned, riddled with

the Dead?

“Ah,” said Touchstone. “I hadn’t thought

about that. In my time, there was a Royal Boom

Master, with a force of guards and a squadron of

small, picket ships. If, as Mogget says, the city

has fallen into anarchy . . .”

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“There may also be people working for, or in

alliance with, the Dead,” Sabriel added thoughtfully.

“So even if we cross the boom in daylight,

there could be trouble. I think I’d better reverse

my surcoat and hide my helmet wrapping.”

“What about the bells?” asked Touchstone.

He leaned past her, to draw the main sheet

tighter, right hand slightly nudging the tiller to

take advantage of a shift in the wind. “They’re

fairly obvious, to say the least.”

“I’ll just look like a necromancer,” Sabriel

replied. “A salty, unwashed necromancer.”

“I don’t know,” said Touchstone, who couldn’t

see that Sabriel was joking. “No necromancer

would be let into the city, or would stay alive,

in—”

“In your day,” interrupted Mogget, from his

favorite post on the bow. “But this is now, and I

am sure that necromancers and worse are not

uncommon sights in Belisaere.”

“I’ll wear a cloak—” Sabriel started to say.

“If you say so,” Touchstone said, at the same

time. Clearly, he didn’t believe the cat. Belisaere

was the royal capital, a huge city, home to at

least fifty thousand people. Touchstone couldn’t

imagine it fallen, decayed and in the hands of the

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Dead. Despite his own inner fears and secret

knowledge, he couldn’t help but be confident

that the Belisaere they were sailing towards

would be little different from the two-hundredyear-

old images locked in his memory.

That confidence took a blow as the Belis

Mouth towers became visible above the blue line

of the horizon, on opposite shores of the strait.

At first, the towers were no more than dark

smudges, that grew taller as wind and wave carried

the boat towards them. Through her telescope,

Sabriel saw that they were made from a

beautiful, rosy-pink stone that once must have

been magnificent. Now they were largely blackened

by fire; their majesty vanished. Winding

Post had lost the top three storys, from seven;

Boom Hook stood as tall as ever, but sunlight

shone through gaping holes, showing the interior

to be a gutted ruin. There was no sign of any garrison,

toll collector, windlass mules, or anything

alive.

The great boom-chain still stretched across the

strait. Huge iron links, each as wide and long

as the fishing boat, rose green and barnaclebefouled

out of the water and up into each of

the towers. Glimpses of it could be seen in the

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middle of the Mouth, when the swell dipped,

and a length of chain shone slick and green in

the wave trough, like some lurking monster of

the deep.

“We’ll have to go in close to the Winding Post

tower, unstep the mast and row under the chain

where it rises,” Touchstone declared, after

studying the chain for several minutes through

the telescope, trying to gauge whether it had

sunk enough to allow them passage. But even

with their relatively shallow-draft boat, it

would be too risky, and they daren’t wait for

high tide, late in the afternoon. At some time in

the past, perhaps when the towers were abandoned,

the chain had been winched up to its

maximum tension. The engineers who’d made it

would have been pleased, for there seemed to be

no noticeable slippage.

“Mogget, go to the bow and keep a lookout

for anything in the water. Sabriel, could you

please watch the shore and the tower, to guard

against attack.”

Sabriel nodded, pleased that Touchstone’s stint

as captain of their small vessel had done a lot to

remove the servant nonsense out of him and

make him more like a normal person. Mogget,

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for his part, jumped up to the bow without

protest, despite the spray that occasionally burst

over his head as they cut diagonally across the

swell—towards the small triangle of opportunity

between shore, sea and chain.

They came in as close as they dared before

unstepping the mast. The swell had diminished,

for the Belis Mouth was well-sheltered by the

two arms of land, but the tide had turned, and a

tidal race was beginning to run from the ocean

to the Saere Sea. So, even without mast and sail,

they were borne rapidly towards the chain;

Touchstone rowing with all his strength just to

keep steerage way. After a moment, this clearly

became impossible, so Sabriel took one of the

oars, and they rowed together, with Mogget

yowling directions.

Every few seconds, at the end of a full stroke,

her back nearly level with the thwarts, Sabriel

snatched a glimpse over her shoulder. They were

headed for the narrow passage, between the high

but crumbling seawall of Winding Post, and the

enormous chain rising out of the swift-flowing

sea in a swath of white froth. She could hear the

melancholy groaning of the links, like a chorus

of pained walruses. Even that gargantuan chain

294

moved at the sea’s whim.

“Port a little,” yowled Mogget. Touchstone

backed his oar for a moment, then the cat

jumped down, yelling, “Ship oars and duck!”

The oars came rattling, splashing in, both

Sabriel and Touchstone simply lying down on

their backs, with Mogget somewhere between

them. The boat rocked and plunged, and the

groan of the chain sounded close and terrible.

Sabriel, one moment looking up at the clear, blue

sky, in the next saw nothing but green, weedstrewn

iron above her. When the swell lifted the

boat up, she could have reached out and touched

the great boom-chain of Belis Mouth.

Then they were past, and Touchstone was

already pushing out his oar, Mogget moving to

the bow. Sabriel wanted to lie there, just looking

up at the sky, but the collapsed seawall of

Winding Post was no more than an oar-length

away. She sat up and resumed her duty as a

rower.

The water changed color in the Sea of Saere.

Sabriel trailed her hand in it, marveling at its

clear turquoise sheen. For all its color, it was

incredibly transparent. The water was very deep,

but she could see down the first three or four

295

fathoms, watching small fish dance under the

bubbles of their boat’s wake.

She felt relaxed, momentarily carefree, all the

troubles that lay ahead and behind her temporarily

lost in single-minded contemplation of

the clear blue-green water. There was no Dead

presence here, no constant awareness of the

many doors to Death. Even Charter Magic was

dissipated at sea. For a few minutes, she forgot

about Touchstone and Mogget. Even her father

faded from her mind. There was only the sea’s

color, and its coolness on her hand.

“We’ll be able to see the city soon,” Touchstone

said, interrupting her mental holiday. “If

the towers are still standing.”

Sabriel nodded thoughtfully, and slowly took

her hand from the sea, as if she were parting

from a dear friend.

“It must be difficult for you,” she said, almost

to herself, not really expecting him to answer.

“Two hundred years gone, the Kingdom slowly

falling into ruin while you slept.”

“I didn’t really believe it, till I saw Nestowe,

and then the Belis Mouth towers,” replied

Touchstone. “Now I am afraid—even for a great

city that I never believed could really change.”

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“No imagination,” said Mogget, sternly. “No

thinking ahead. A flaw in your character. A fatal

flaw.”

“Mogget,” Sabriel said indignantly, angry at

the cat for crushing yet another possible conversation.

“Why are you so rude to Touchstone?”

Mogget hissed and the fur bristled on his back.

“I am accurate, not rude,” he snapped, turning

his back to them with studied scorn. “And he

deserves it.”

“I’m sick of this!” announced Sabriel. “Touchstone,

what does Mogget know that I don’t?”

Touchstone was silent, knuckles white on the

tiller, eyes focused on the distant horizon, as if he

could already see the towers of Belisaere.

“You’ll have to tell me eventually,” said

Sabriel, a touch of the prefect entering her voice.

“It can’t be that bad, surely?”

Touchstone wet his lips, hesitated, then spoke.

“It was stupidity on my part, not evil, milady.

Two hundred years ago, when the last Queen

reigned . . . I think . . . I know that I am partly

responsible for the failing of the Kingdom, the

end of the royal line.”

“What!” exclaimed Sabriel. “How could you

be?”

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“I am,” continued Touchstone miserably, his

hands shaking so much the tiller moved, giving

the boat a crazy zigzag wake. “There was a . . .

that is . . .”

He paused, took a deep breath, sat up a little

straighter, and continued, as if reporting to a

senior officer.

“I don’t know how much I can tell you,

because it involves the Great Charters. Where

do I start? With the Queen, I guess. She had

four children. Her oldest son, Rogir, was a

childhood playmate of mine. He was always the

leader, in all our games. He had the ideas—we

followed them. Later, when we were growing

up, his ideas became stranger, less nice. We

grew apart. I went into the Guard; he pursued

his own interests. Now I know that those interests

must have included Free Magic and necromancy—

I never suspected it then. I should

have, I know, but he was secretive, and often

away.

“Towards the end . . . I mean a few months

before it happened . . . well, Rogir had been

away for several years. He came back, just

before the Midwinter Festival. I was glad to see

him, for he seemed to be more like he was as a

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child. He’d lost interest in the bizarrities that

had attracted him. We spent more time together

again; hawking, riding, drinking, dancing.

“Then, late one afternoon—one cold, crisp

afternoon, near sunset—I was on duty, guarding

the Queen and her ladies. They were playing

Cranaque. Rogir came to her, and asked her to

come with him down to the place where the

Great Stones are . . . hey, I can say it!”

“Yes,” interrupted Mogget. He looked tired,

like an alley cat that has suffered one kick too

many. “The sea washes all things clear, for a time.

We can speak of the Great Charters, at least for a

little while. I had forgotten it was so.”

“Go on,” said Sabriel, excitedly. “Let’s take

advantage of it while we can. The Great Stones

would be the stones and mortar of the rhyme—

the Third and Fifth Great Charter?”

“Yes,” replied Touchstone, remotely, as if

reciting a lesson, “with the Wall. The people, or

whatever they were who made the Great

Charters, put three in bloodlines and two in

physical constructions: the Wall and the Great

Stones. All the lesser stones draw their power

from one or the other.

“The Great Stones . . . Rogir came and said

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there was something amiss there, something the

Queen must look into. He was her son, but she

did not take great account of his wisdom, or

believe him when he spoke of trouble with the

Stones. She was a Charter Mage and felt nothing

wrong. Besides, she was winning at Cranaque, so

she told him to wait till morning. Rogir turned

to me, asked me to intercede, and, Charter help

me, I did. I believed Rogir. I trusted him and my

belief convinced the Queen. Finally, she agreed.

By that time, the sun had set. With Rogir, myself,

three guards and two ladies-in-waiting, we went

down, down into the reservoir where the Great

Stones are.”

Touchstone’s voice faded to a whisper as he

continued, and grew hoarse.

“There was terrible wrong down there, but it

was Rogir’s doing, not his discovery. There are

six Great Stones and two were just being broken,

broken with the blood of his own sisters,

sacrificed by his Free Magic minions as we

approached. I saw their last seconds, the faint

hope in their clouding eyes, as the Queen’s barge

came floating across the water. I felt the shock

of the Stones breaking and I remember Rogir,

stepping up behind the Queen, a saw-edged

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301

dagger striking so swiftly across her throat. He

had a cup, a golden cup, one of the Queen’s

own, to catch the blood, but I was too slow, too

slow . . .”

“So the story you told me at Holehallow wasn’t

true,” Sabriel whispered, as Touchstone’s voice

cracked and faded, and the tears rolled down his

face. “The Queen didn’t survive . . .”

“No,” mumbled Touchstone. “But I didn’t

mean to lie. It was all jumbled up in my head.”

“What did happen?”

“The other two guards were Rogir’s men,”

Touchstone continued, his voice wet with tears,

muffled with sorrow. “They attacked me, but

Vlare—one of the ladies-in-waiting—threw

herself across them. I went mad, battle-mad,

berserk. I killed both guards. Rogir had jumped

from the barge and was wading to the Stones,

holding the cup. His four sorcerers were waiting,

dark-cowled, around the third stone, the

next to be broken. I couldn’t reach him in time,

I knew. I threw my sword. It flew straight

and true, taking him just above the heart. He

screamed, the echo going on and on and he

turned back towards me! Transfixed by my

sword, but still walking, holding that vile cup

of blood up, as if offering me a drink.

“‘You may tear this body,’ he said, as he

walked. ‘Rip it, like some poor-made costume.

But I cannot die.’

“He came within an arm’s length of me, and I

could only look into his face, look at the evil that

lay so close behind those familiar features . . .

then there was blinding white light, the sound of

bells—bells like yours, Sabriel—and voices,

harsh voices . . . Rogir flinching back, the cup

dropped, blood floating on the water like oil. I

turned, saw guardsmen on the stairs; a burning,

twisting column of white fire; a man with sword

and bells . . . then I fainted, or was knocked

unconscious. When I came to, I was in

Holehallow, seeing your face. I don’t know how

I got there, who put me there . . . I still only

remember in shreds and patches.”

“You should have told me,” Sabriel said,

trying to put as much compassion in her voice

as she could. “But perhaps it had to wait for

the sea’s freeing of that binding spell. Tell me,

the man with the sword and bells, was it the

Abhorsen?”

“I don’t know,” replied Touchstone. “Probably.”

“Almost definitely, I would say,” added Sabriel.

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She looked at Mogget, thinking of that column

of twisting fire. “You were there too, weren’t

you, Mogget? Unbound, in your other form.”

“Yes, I was there,” said the cat. “With the

Abhorsen of that time. A very powerful Charter

Mage, and a master of the bells, but a little too

good-hearted to deal with treachery. I had terrible

trouble getting him to Belisaere, and in the

end, we were not timely enough to save the

Queen or her daughters.”

“What happened?” whispered Touchstone.

“What happened?”

“Rogir was already one of the Dead when he

came back to Belisaere,” Mogget said wearily, as

if he were telling a cynical yarn to a crew of

hard-bitten cronies. “But only an Abhorsen

would have known it, and he wasn’t there.

Rogir’s real body was hidden somewhere . . . is

hidden somewhere . . . and he wore a Free Magic

construct for his physical form.

“Somewhere along the path of his studies,

he’d swapped real Life for power and, like all

the Dead, he needed to take life all the time to

stay out of Death. But the Charter made it very

difficult for him to do that anywhere in the

Kingdom. So he decided to break the Charter.

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He could have confined himself to breaking a

few of the lesser stones, somewhere far away, but

that would only give him a tiny area to prey on,

and the Abhorsen would soon hunt him down.

So he decided to break the Great Stones, and for

that he needed royal blood—his own family’s

blood. Or Abhorsen’s, or the Clayr’s, of course,

but that would be much harder to get.

“Because he was the Queen’s son, clever, and

very powerful, he almost achieved his aims. Two

of the six Great Stones were broken. The Queen

and her daughters were killed. Abhorsen intervened

a little too late. True, he did manage to

drive him deep into Death—but since his true

body has never been found, Rogir has continued

to exist. Even from Death, he has overseen

the dissolution of the Kingdom—a kingdom

without a royal family, with one of the Great

Charters crippled, corrupting and weakening

all the others. He wasn’t really beaten that

night, in the reservoir. Just delayed, and for two

hundred years he’s been trying to come back,

trying to re-enter Life—”

“He’s succeeded, hasn’t he?” interrupted

Sabriel. “He’s the thing called Kerrigor, the one

Abhorsens have been fighting for generations,

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trying to keep in Death. He is the one who

came back, the Greater Dead who murdered

the patrol near Cloven Crest, the master of the

Mordicant.”

“I do not know,” replied Mogget. “Your father

thought so.”

“It is him,” Touchstone said, distantly.

“Kerrigor was Rogir’s childhood nickname. I

made it up, on the day we had the mud fight.

His full ceremonial name was Rogirek.”

“He—or his servants—must have lured my

father to Belisaere just before he emerged from

Death,” Sabriel thought aloud. “I wonder why

he came out into Life so near the Wall?”

“His body must be near the Wall. He would

need to be close to it,” Mogget said. “You

should know that. To renew the master spell that

prevents him from ever passing beyond the Final

Gate.”

“Yes,” replied Sabriel, remembering the passages

from The Book of the Dead. She shivered,

but suppressed it, before it became a racking

sob. Inside, she felt like screaming, crying. She

wanted to flee back to Ancelstierre, cross the

Wall, leave the Dead and magic behind, go as far

south as possible. But she quelled these feelings,

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and said, “An Abhorsen defeated him once. I can

do so again. But first, we must find my father’s

body.”

There was silence for a moment, save for the

wind in the canvas and the quiet hum of the rigging.

Touchstone wiped his hand across his eyes

and looked at Mogget.

“There is one thing I would like to ask. Who

put my spirit in Death, and made my body the

figurehead?”

“I never knew what happened to you,” replied

Mogget. His green eyes met Touchstone’s gaze,

and it wasn’t the cat who blinked. “But it must

have been Abhorsen. You were insane when we

got you out of the reservoir. Driven mad, probably

by the breaking of the Great Stones. No

memory, nothing. It seems two hundred years

is not too long for a rest cure. He must have seen

something in you—or the Clayr saw something

in the ice . . . ah, that was hard to say. We must

be nearing the city, and the sea’s influence

lessens. The binding resumes . . .”

“No, Mogget!” exclaimed Sabriel. “I want to

know, I need to know, who you are. What’s

your connection with the Great . . .”

Her voice locked up in her throat and a star-

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tled gargle was the only thing that came out.

“Too late,” said Mogget. He started cleaning

his fur, pink tongue darting out, bright color

against white fur.

Sabriel sighed, and looked out at the turquoise

sea, then up at the sun, yellow disc on a field of

white-streaked blue. A light breeze filled the sail

above her, ruffling her hair in passing. Gulls rode

it on ahead, to join a squawking mass of their

brethren, feeding from a school of fish, sharp silver

bursting near the surface.

Everything was alive, colorful, full of the

joy of living. Even the salt tang on her skin,

the stink of fish and her own unwashed body,

was somehow rich and lively. Far, far removed

from Touchstone’s grim past, the threat of

Rogir/Kerrigor and the chilling greyness of

Death.

“We shall have to be very careful,” Sabriel said

at last, “and hope that . . . what was it you said

to the Elder of Nestowe, Touchstone?”

He knew immediately what she meant.

“Hope that the Charter preserves us all.”

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chapter xix

Sabriel had expected Belisaere to be

a ruined city, devoid of life, but it was not so. By

the time they saw its towers, and the truly

impressive walls that ringed the peninsula on

which the city stood, they also saw fishing

boats, of a size with their own. People were fishing

from them—normal, friendly people, who

waved and shouted as they passed. Only their

greeting was telling of how things might be in

Belisaere. “Good sun and swift water” was not

the typical greeting in Touchstone’s time.

The city’s main harbor was reached from the

west. A wide, buoyed channel ran between two

hulking defensive outworks, leading into a vast

pool, easily as big as twenty or thirty playing

fields. Wharves lined three sides of the pool, but

most were deserted. To the north and south,

warehouses rotted behind the empty wharves,

broken walls and holed roofs testimony to long

abandonment.

Only the eastern dock looked lively. There

were none of the big trading vessels of bygone

days, but many small coastal craft, loading and

unloading. Derricks swung in and out; longshoremen

humped packages along gangplanks;

small children dived and swam in between

the boats. No warehouses stood behind these

wharves—instead, there were hundreds of

open-topped booths, little more than brightly

decorated frameworks delineating a patch of

space, with tables for the wares, and stools

for the vendors and favored customers. There

seemed to be no shortage of customers in general,

Sabriel noted, as Touchstone steered for

a vacant berth. People were swarming everywhere,

hurrying about as if their time was sadly

limited.

Touchstone let the mainsheet go slack, and

brought the boat into the wind just in time for

them to lose way and glide at an oblique angle

into the fenders that lined the wharf. Sabriel

threw up a line, but before she could leap ashore

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and secure it to a bollard, a street urchin did it

for her.

“Penny for the knot,” he cried, shrill voice

piercing through the hubbub from the crowd.

“Penny for the knot, lady?”

Sabriel smiled, with effort, and flicked a silver

penny at the boy. He caught it, grinned and disappeared

into the stream of people moving along

the dock. Sabriel’s smile faded. She could feel

many, many Dead here . . . or not precisely here,

but further up in the city. Belisaere was built

upon four low hills, surrounding a central valley,

which lay open to the sea at this harbor. As far

as Sabriel’s senses could tell, only the valley was

free of the Dead—why, she didn’t know. The

hills, which made up at least two-thirds of the

city’s area, were infested with them.

This part of the city, on the other hand, could

truly be said to be infested with life. Sabriel

had forgotten how noisy a city could be. Even in

Ancelstierre, she had rarely visited anything

larger than Bain, a town of no more than ten

thousand people. Of course, Belisaere wasn’t a

big city by Ancelstierran standards, and it didn’t

have the noisy omnibuses and private cars that

had been significantly adding to Ancelstierran

310

noise for the last ten years, but Belisaere made

up for it with the people. People hurrying,

arguing, shouting, selling, buying, singing . . .

“Was it like this before?” she shouted at

Touchstone, as they climbed up onto the wharf,

making sure they had all their possessions with

them.

“Not really,” answered Touchstone. “The

Pool was normally full, with bigger ships—and

there were warehouses here, not a market. It was

quieter, too, and people were in less of a rush.”

They stood on the edge of the dock, watching

the stream of humanity and goods, hearing the

tumult, and smelling all the new odors of the

city replacing the freshness of the sea breeze.

Cooking food, wood smoke, incense, oil, the

occasional disgusting whiff of what could

only be sewage . . .

“It was also a lot cleaner,” added Touchstone.

“Look, I think we’d best find an inn or

hostelry. Somewhere to stay for the night.”

“Yes,” replied Sabriel. She was reluctant

to enter the human tide. There were no Dead

among them, as far as she could sense, but

they must have some kind of accommodation

or agreement with the Dead and that stank to

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her far more than sewage.

Touchstone snagged a passing boy by the

shoulder as Sabriel continued to eye the

crowd, nose wrinkling. They spoke together

for a moment, a silver penny changed hands,

then the boy slid into the rush, Touchstone

following. He looked back, saw Sabriel staring

absently, and grabbed her by the hand, dragging

both her and the lazy, fox-fur-positioned

Mogget after him.

It was the first time Sabriel had touched him

since he’d been revived and she was surprised by

the shock it gave her. Certainly, her mind had

been wandering, and it was a sudden grab . . .

his hand felt larger than it should, and interestingly

calloused and textured. Quickly, she

slipped her hand out of his, and concentrated on

following both him and the boy, weaving across

the main direction of the crowd.

They went through the middle of the opentopped

market, along one street of little

booths—obviously the street of fish and fowl.

The harbor end was alive with boxes and boxes

of fresh-caught fish, clear-eyed and wriggling.

Vendors yelled their prices, or their best buy,

and buyers shouted offers or amazement at the

312

price. Baskets, bags and boxes changed hands,

empty ones to be filled with fish or lobster,

squid or shellfish. Coins went from palm to

palm, or, occasionally, whole purses disgorged

their shining contents into the belt-pouches of

the stallholders.

Towards the other end it grew a little quieter.

The stalls here had cages upon cages of chickens,

but their trade was slower, and many of the

chickens looked old and stunted. Sabriel, seeing

an expert knife-man beheading row after row of

chickens and dropping them to flop headless in

a box, concentrated on shutting out their bewildered

featherbrained experience of death.

Beyond the market there was a wide swath

of empty ground. It had obviously been intentionally

cleared, first with fire, then with mattock,

shovel and bar. Sabriel wondered why,

till she saw the aqueduct that ran beyond and

parallel to this strip of wasteland. The city folk

who lived in the valley didn’t have an agreement

with the Dead—their part of the city was

bounded by aqueducts, and the Dead could no

more walk under running water than over it.

The cleared ground was a precaution, allowing

the aqueducts to be guarded—and sure

313

enough, Sabriel saw a patrol of archers marching

atop it, their regularly moving shapes silhouetted,

shadow puppets against the sky. The

boy was leading them to a central arch, which

rose up through two of the aqueduct’s four

tiers, and there were more archers there.

Smaller arches continued on each side, supporting

the aqueduct’s main channel, but these

were heavily overgrown with thornbushes, to

prevent unauthorized entry by the living,

while the swift water overhead held back the

Dead.

Sabriel drew her boat cloak tight as they

passed under the arch, but the guards paid

them no more attention than was required to

extort a silver penny from Touchstone. They

seemed very third-rate—even fourth-rate—

soldiers, who were probably more constables

and watchkeepers than anything else. None

bore the Charter mark, or had any trace of

Free Magic.

Beyond the aqueduct, streets wound chaotically

from an unevenly paved square, complete

with an eccentrically spouting fountain—the

water jetted from the ears of a statue, a statue of

an impressively crowned man.

314

“King Anstyr the Third,” said Touchstone,

pointing at the fountain. “He had a strange

sense of humor, by all accounts. I’m glad it’s still

there.”

“Where are we going?” asked Sabriel. She

felt better now that she knew the citizenry

weren’t in league with the Dead.

“This boy says he knows a good inn,” replied

Touchstone, indicating the ragged urchin who

was grinning just out of reach of the alwaysexpected

blow.

“Sign of Three Lemons,” said the boy. “Best in

the city, lord, lady.”

He had just turned back from them to go on,

when a loud, badly cast bell sounded from somewhere

towards the harbor. It rang three times,

the sound sending pigeons racketing into flight

from the square.

“What’s that?” asked Sabriel. The boy looked

at her, open-mouthed. “The bell.”

“Sunfall,” replied the boy, once he knew what

she was asking. He said it as if stating the blindingly

obvious. “Early, I reckon. Must be cloud

coming, or somefing.”

“Everyone comes in when the sunfall bell

sounds?” asked Sabriel.

315

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“Course!” snorted the boy. “Otherwise the

haunts or the ghlims get you.”

“I see,” replied Sabriel. “Lead on.”

Surprisingly, the Sign of Three Lemons was

quite a pleasant inn. A whitewashed building

of four storys, it fronted onto a smaller square

some two hundred yards from King Anstyr’s

Fountain Square. There were three enormous

lemon trees in the middle of the square, somehow

thick with pleasant-smelling leaves and copious

amounts of fruit, despite the season. Charter

Magic, thought Sabriel, and sure enough, there

was a Charter Stone hidden amongst the trees,

and a number of ancient spells of fertility,

warmth and bountitude. Sabriel sniffed the

lemon-scented air gratefully, thankful that her

room had a window fronting the square.

Behind her, a maid was filling a tin bath with

hot water. Several large buckets had already

gone in—this would be the last. Sabriel closed

the window and came over to look at the stillsteaming

water in anticipation.

“Will that be all, miss?” asked the maid, halfcurtseying.

“Yes, thank you,” replied Sabriel. The maid

edged out the door, and Sabriel slid the bar

across, before divesting herself of her cloak, and

then the stinking, sweat- and salt-encrusted

armor and garments that had virtually stuck

to her after almost a week at sea. Naked, she

rested her sword against the bath’s rim—in

easy reach—then sank gratefully into the water,

taking up the lump of lemon-scented soap to

begin removing the caked grime and sweat.

Through the wall, she could hear a man’s—

Touchstone’s—voice. Then water gurgling, that

maid giggling. Sabriel stopped soaping and concentrated

on the sound. It was hard to hear, but

there was more giggling, a deep, indistinct male

voice, then a loud splash. Like two bodies in a

bath rather than one.

There was silence for a while, then more

splashing, gasps, giggles—was that Touchstone

laughing? Then a series of short, sharp, moans.

Womanly ones. Sabriel flushed and gritted

her teeth at the same time, then quickly lowered

her head into the water so she couldn’t hear,

leaving only her nose and mouth exposed. Underwater,

all was silent, save for the dull booming

of her heart, echoing in her flooded ears.

What did it matter? She didn’t think of Touchstone

in that way. Sex was the last thing

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on her mind. Just another complication—

contraception—messiness—emotions. There were

enough problems. Concentrate on planning.

Think ahead. It was just because Touchstone

was the first young man she’d met out of school,

that was all. It was none of her business. She

didn’t even know his real name . . .

A dull tapping noise on the side of the bath

made her raise her head out of the water, just in

time to hear a very self-satisfied, masculine and

drawn-out moan from the other side of the wall.

She was about to stick her head back under,

when Mogget’s pink nose appeared on the rim.

So she sat up, water cascading down her face,

hiding the tears she told herself weren’t there.

Angrily, she crossed her arms across her breasts

and said, “What do you want?”

“I just thought that you might like to know

that Touchstone’s room is that way,” said

Mogget, indicating the silent room opposite the

one with the noisy couple. “It hasn’t got a bathtub,

so he’d like to know if he can use yours

when you’re finished. He’s waiting downstairs in

the meantime, getting the local news.”

“Oh,” replied Sabriel. She looked across at the

far, silent wall, then back to the close wall, where

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the human noises were now largely lost in the

groaning of bedsprings. “Well, tell him I won’t

be long.”

Twenty minutes later, a clean Sabriel, garbed

in a borrowed dress made incongruous by her

sword-belt (the bell-bandolier lay under her bed,

with Mogget asleep on top of it), crept on slippered

feet through the largely empty common

room and tapped the salty, begrimed Touchstone

on the back, making him spill his beer.

“Your turn for the bath,” Sabriel said cheerily,

“my evil-smelling swordsman. I’ve just had it

refilled. Mogget’s in the room, by the way. I

hope you don’t mind.”

“Why would I mind?” asked Touchstone, as

much puzzled by her manner as the question. “I

just want to get clean, that’s all.”

“Good,” replied Sabriel, obscurely. “I’ll organize

for dinner to be served in your room, so we

can plan as we eat.”

In the event, the planning didn’t take long, nor

was it slow in dampening what was otherwise a

relatively festive occasion. They were safe for the

moment, clean, well-fed—and able to forget past

troubles and future fears for a little while.

But, as soon as the last dish—a squid stew,

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with garlic, barley, yellow squash and tarragon

vinegar—was cleared, the present reasserted

itself, complete with cares and woe.

“I think the most likely place to find my

father’s body will be at . . . that place, where the

Queen was slain,” Sabriel said slowly. “The

reservoir. Where is it, by the way?”

“Under the Palace Hill,” replied Touchstone.

“There are several different ways to enter. All lie

beyond this aqueduct-guarded valley.”

“You are probably right about your father,”

Mogget commented from his nest of blankets

in the middle of Touchstone’s bed. “But that

is also the most dangerous place for us to go.

Charter Magic will be greatly warped, including

various bindings—and there is a chance

that our enemy . . .”

“Kerrigor,” interrupted Sabriel. “But he may

not be there. Even if he is, we may be able to

sneak in—”

“We might be able to sneak around the edges,”

said Touchstone. “The reservoir is enormous,

and there are hundreds of columns. But wading

is noisy, and the water is very still—sound carries.

And the six . . . you know . . . they are in the

very center.”

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“If I can find my father and bring his spirit

back to his body,” Sabriel said stubbornly, “then

we can deal with whatever confronts us. That is

the first thing. My father. Everything else is just

a complication that’s followed on.”

“Or preceded it,” said Mogget. “So, I take it

your master plan is to sneak in, as far as we can,

find your father’s body, which will hopefully be

tucked away in some safe corner, and then see

what happens?”

“We’ll go in the middle of a clear, sunny

day . . .” Sabriel began.

“It’s underground,” interrupted Mogget.

“So we have sunlight to retreat to,” Sabriel

continued in a quelling tone.

“And there are light shafts,” added Touchstone.

“At noon, it’s a sort of dim twilight down

there, with patches of faint sun on the water.”

“So, we’ll find Father’s body, bring it back to

safety here,” said Sabriel, “and . . . and take

things from there.”

“It sounds like a terribly brilliant plan to me,”

muttered Mogget. “The genius of simplicity . . .”

‘‘Can you think of anything else?” snapped

Sabriel. “I’ve tried, and I can’t. I wish I could go

home to Ancelstierre and forget the whole

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thing—but then I’d never see Father again, and

the Dead would just eat up everything living in

this whole rotten Kingdom. Maybe it won’t

work, but at least I’ll be trying something, like

the Abhorsen I’m supposed to be and you’re

always telling me I’m not!”

Silence greeted this sally. Touchstone looked

away, embarrassed. Mogget looked at her,

yawned and shrugged.

“As it happens, I can’t think of anything else.

I’ve grown stupid over the millennia—even stupider

than the Abhorsens I serve.”

“I think it’s as good a plan as any,” Touchstone

said, unexpectedly. He hesitated, then added,

“Though I am afraid.”

“So am I,” whispered Sabriel. “But if it’s a

sunny day tomorrow, we will go there.”

“Yes,” said Touchstone. “Before we grow too

afraid.”

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chapter xx

Leaving the safe, aqueductbounded

quarter of Belisaere proved to be a

more difficult business than entering it, particularly

through the northern archway, which

led out to a long-abandoned street of derelict

houses, winding their way up towards the

northern hills of the city.

There were six guards at the archway, and

they looked considerably more alert and efficient

than the ones who guarded the passage

from the docks. There was also a group of

other people ahead of Sabriel and Touchstone

waiting to be let through. Nine men, all with

the marks of violence written in their expressions,

in the way they spoke and moved. Every

one was armed, with weapons ranging from

daggers to a broad-bladed axe. Most of them

also carried bows—short, deeply curved bows,

slung on their backs.

“Who are these people?” Sabriel asked

Touchstone. “Why are they going out into the

Dead part of the city?”

“Scavengers,” replied Touchstone. “Some of

the people I spoke to last night mentioned them.

Parts of the city were abandoned to the Dead

very quickly, so there is still plenty of loot to be

found. A risky business, I think . . .”

Sabriel nodded thoughtfully and looked back at

the men, most of whom were sitting or squatting

by the aqueduct wall. Some of them looked back

at her, rather suspiciously. For a moment, she

thought they’d seen the bells under her cloak and

recognized her as a necromancer, then she realized

that she and Touchstone probably looked like

rival scavengers. After all, who else would want to

leave the protection of swift water? She felt a bit

like a hard-bitten scavenger. Even freshly cleaned

and scrubbed, her clothes and armor were not

the sweetest items of wear. They were also still

slightly damp, and the boat cloak that covered her

up was on the borderline between damp and wet,

because it hadn’t been hung up properly after

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washing. On the positive side, everything had the

scent of lemon, for the Sign of Three Lemons

washerfolk used lemon-scented soap.

Sabriel thought the scavengers had been waiting

for the guards, but clearly they had been

waiting for something else, which they’d suddenly

sighted behind her. The sitting or squatting

men picked themselves up, grumbling and cursing,

and shuffled together into something resembling

a line.

Sabriel looked over her shoulder to see what

they saw—and froze. For coming towards the

arch were two men, and about twenty children;

children of all ages between six and sixteen. The

men had the same look as the other scavengers,

and carried long, four-tongued whips. The children

were manacled at the ankles, the manacles

fastened to a long central chain. One man held

the chain, leading the children down the middle

of the road. The other followed behind, plying

the air above the small bodies idly with his whip,

the four tongues occasionally licking against an

ear or the top of a small head.

“I heard of this too,” muttered Touchstone,

moving up closer to Sabriel, his hands falling on

his sword hilts. “But I thought it was a beer

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story. The scavengers use children—slaves—as

decoys, or bait, for the Dead. They leave them in

one area, to draw the Dead away from where

they intend to search.”

“This is . . . disgusting!” raged Sabriel.

“Immoral! They’re slavers, not scavengers! We

have to stop it!”

She started forward, mind already forming a

Charter-spell to blind and confuse the scavengers,

but a sharp pain in her neck halted her.

Mogget, riding on her shoulders, had dug his

claws in just under her chin. Blood trickled down

in hairline traces, as he hissed close to her ear.

“Wait! There are nine scavengers and six

guards, with more close by. What will it profit

these children, and all the others who may come,

if you are slain? It is the Dead who are at the

root of this evil, and Abhorsen’s business is with

the Dead!”

Sabriel stood still, shuddering, tears of rage and

anger welling up in the corners of her eyes. But she

didn’t attack. Just stood, watching the children.

They seemed resigned to their fate, silent, without

hope. They didn’t even fidget in their chains,

standing still, heads bowed, till the scavengers

whipped them up again and they broke into a

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dispirited shuffle towards the archway.

Soon, they were beyond the arch, heading up

the ruined street, the scavenging team walking

slowly behind them. The sun shone bright on the

cobbled street and reflected from armor and

weapons—and, briefly, from a little boy’s blond

head. Then they were gone, turning right, taking

the way towards Coiner’s Hill.

Sabriel, Touchstone and Mogget followed after

ten minutes spent negotiating with the guards. At

first, the leader, a large man in a gravy-stained

leather cuirass, wanted to see an “official scavenger’s

license,” but this was soon translated as a

request for bribes. Then it was merely a matter of

bargaining, down to the final price of three silver

pennies each for Sabriel and Touchstone, and one

for the cat. Strange accounting, Sabriel thought,

but she was glad Mogget stayed silent, not voicing

the opinion that he was being undervalued.

Past the aqueduct, and the soothing barrier of

running water, Sabriel felt the immediate presence

of the Dead. They were all around, in the ruined

houses, in cellars and drains, lurking anywhere

the light didn’t reach. Dormant. Waiting for the

night, while the sun shone.

In many ways, the Dead of Belisaere were direct

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counterparts of the scavengers. Hiding by day,

they took what they could by night. There were

many, many Dead in Belisaere, but they were

weak, cowardly and jealous. Their combined

appetite was enormous, but the supply of victims

sadly limited. Every morning saw scores of them

lose their hold on Life, to fall back into Death.

But more always came . . .

“There are thousands of Dead here,” Sabriel

said, eyes darting from side to side. “They’re

weak, for the most part—but so many!”

“Do we go straight on to the reservoir?”

Touchstone asked. There was an unspoken question

there, Sabriel knew. Should they—could

they—save the children first?

She looked at the sky, and the sun, before

answering. They had about four hours of

strong sunlight, if no clouds intervened. Little

enough time, anyway. Assuming that they

could defeat the scavengers, could they leave

finding her father till tomorrow? Every day

made it less likely his spirit and body could be

brought back together. Without him, they

couldn’t defeat Kerrigor—and Kerrigor had to

be defeated for them to have any hope of

repairing the stones of the Great Charter—

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banishing the Dead across the Kingdom . . .

“We’ll go straight to the reservoir,” Sabriel

said, heavily, trying to blank out a sudden fragment

of visual memory; sunlight on that little

boy’s head, the trudging feet . . .

“Perhaps we . . . perhaps we will be able to

rescue the children on the way back.”

Touchstone led the way with confidence, keeping

to the middle of the streets, where the sun

was bright. For almost an hour, they strode up

empty, deserted streets, the only sound the clacking

of their boot-nails on the cobbles. There

were no birds, or animals. Not even insects. Just

ruin and decay.

Finally, they reached an iron-fenced park that

ran around the base of Palace Hill. Atop the hill,

blackened, burnt-out shells of tumbled stone

and timber were all that remained of the Royal

Palace.

“The last Regent burned it,” said Mogget, as

all three stopped to look up. “About twenty

years ago. It was becoming infested with the

Dead, despite all the guards and wards that various

visiting Abhorsens put up. They say the

Regent went mad and tried to burn them out.”

“What happened to him?” asked Sabriel.

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“Her, actually,” replied Mogget. “She died in

the fire—or the Dead took her. And that marked

the end of any attempt at governing the

Kingdom.”

“It was a beautiful building,” Touchstone

reminisced. “You could see out over the Saere. It

had high ceilings, and a clever system of vents

and shafts to catch the light and the sea breeze.

There was always music and dancing somewhere

in the Palace, and Midsummer dinner on the

garden roof, with a thousand scented candles

burning . . .”

He sighed, and pointed at a hole in the park

fence.

“We might as well go through here. There’s an

entrance to the reservoir in one of the ornamental

caves in the park. Only fifty steps down to the

water, rather than the hundred and fifty from the

Palace proper.”

“One hundred and fifty-six,” said Mogget. “As

I recall.”

Touchstone shrugged, and climbed through the

hole, onto the springy turf of the park. There was

no one—and no thing—in sight, but he drew his

swords anyway. There were large trees nearby,

and accordingly, shadows.

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Sabriel followed, Mogget jumping down from

her shoulders to saunter forward and sniff the air.

Sabriel drew her sword too, but left the bells.

There were Dead about, but none close. The park

was too open in daylight.

The ornamental caves were only five minutes’

walk away, past a fetid pond that had once

boasted seven water-spouting statues of bearded

tritons. Now their mouths were clogged with

rotten leaves, and the pond was almost solid

with yellow-green slime.

There were three cave entrances, side by side.

Touchstone led them to the largest, central

entrance. Marble steps led down the first three or

four feet, and marble pillars supported the

entrance ceiling.

“It only goes back about forty paces into the

hill,” Touchstone explained, as they lit their candles

by the entrance, sulphur matches adding

their own noisome stench to the dank air of the

cave. “They were built for picnics in high summer.

There is a door at the back of this one. It

may be locked, but should yield to a Charterspell.

The steps are directly behind, and pretty

straight, but there are no light shafts. And it’s

narrow.”

331

332

“I’ll go first then,” said Sabriel, with a firmness

that belied the weakness in her legs and the fluttering

in her stomach. “I can’t sense any Dead,

but they could be there . . .”

“Very well,” said Touchstone, after a moment’s

hesitation.

“You don’t have to come, you know,” Sabriel

suddenly burst out, as they stood in front of the

cave, candles flickering foolishly in the sunshine.

She suddenly felt awfully responsible for him. He

looked scared, much whiter than he should,

almost as pale as a Death-leeched necromancer.

He’d seen terrible things in the reservoir, things

that had once driven him mad, and despite his

self-accusation, Sabriel didn’t believe it was his

fault. It wasn’t his father down there. He wasn’t

an Abhorsen.

“I do have to,” Touchstone replied. He bit his

lower lip nervously. “I have to. I’ll never be free

of my memories, otherwise. I have to do something,

make new memories, better ones. I need

to . . . seek redemption. Besides, I am still a

member of the Royal Guard. It is my duty.”

“So be it,” said Sabriel. “Anyway, I’m glad

you’re here.”

“I am too—in a strange sort of way,” said

Touchstone, and he almost, but not quite,

smiled.

“I’m not,” interrupted Mogget, decidedly.

“Let’s get on with it. We’re wasting sunlight.”

The door was locked, but opened easily to

Sabriel’s spell, the simple Charter symbols of

unlocking and opening flowing from her mind

through to her index finger, which lay against

the keyhole. But though the spell was successful,

it had been difficult to cast. Even up here, the

broken stones of the Great Charter exerted an

influence that disrupted Charter Magic.

The faint candlelight showed damp, crumbly

steps, leading straight down. No curves or turns,

just a straight stair leading into darkness.

Sabriel trod gingerly, feeling the soft stone

crumble under her heavy boots, so she had to

keep her heels well back on each step. This made

for slow progress, with Touchstone close behind

her, the light from his candle casting Sabriel’s

shadow down the steps in front, so she saw herself

elongated and distorted, sliding into the

dark beyond the light.

She smelled the reservoir before she saw it,

somewhere around the thirty-ninth step. A chill,

damp smell that cut into her nose and lungs, and

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filled her with the impression of a cold expanse.

Then the steps ended in a doorway on the

edge of a vast, rectangular hall—a giant chamber

where stone columns rose up like a forest to

support a roof sixty feet above her head, and

the floor before her wasn’t stone, but water as

cold and still as stone. Around the walls, pallid

shafts of sunlight thrust down in counterpoint

to the supporting columns, leaving discs of light

on the water. These made the rim of the reservoir

a complex study of light and shade, but the

center remained unknown, cloaked in heavy

darkness.

Sabriel felt Touchstone touch her shoulder,

then she heard his whisper.

“It’s about waist-deep. Try and slip in as quietly

as possible. Here—I’ll take your candle.”

Sabriel nodded, passed the candle back,

sheathed her sword, and sat down on the last

step, before slowly easing herself into the

water.

It was cold, but not unbearable. Despite

Sabriel’s care, ripples spread out from her, silver

on the dark water, and there had been the tiniest

splash. Her feet touched the bottom, and she

only half stifled a gasp. Not from the cold, but

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from the sudden awareness of the two broken

stones of the Great Charter. It hit her like the

savage onset of gastric flu, bringing stomach

cramps, sudden sweat and dizziness. Bent over,

she clutched at the step, till the first pains subsided

to a dull ache. It was much worse than

the lesser stones, broken at Cloven Crest and

Nestowe.

“What is it?” whispered Touchstone.

“Ah . . . the broken stones,” Sabriel muttered.

She took a deep breath, willing the pain and discomfort

away. “I can stand it. Be careful when

you get in.”

She drew her sword, and took her candle back

from Touchstone, who prepared to enter the

water. Even forewarned, she saw him flinch as

his feet touched the bottom, and sweat broke

out in lines on his forehead, mirroring the ripples

that spread from his entry.

Sabriel expected Mogget to jump up on

her shoulder, given his apparent dislike for

Touchstone, but he surprised her, leaping to the

man. Touchstone was clearly startled too, but

recovered well. Mogget draped himself around

the back of Touchstone’s neck, and mewed

softly.

335

“Keep to the edges, if you can. The corruption—

the break—will have even more unpleasant

effects near the center.”

Sabriel raised her sword in assent and led off,

following the left wall, trying to break the surface

tension of the water as little as possible. But

the quiet slosh-slosh of their wading seemed very

loud, echoing and spreading up and out through

the cistern, adding to the only other noise—the

regular dripping of water, plopping loudly from

the roof, or more sedately sliding down the

columns.

She couldn’t sense any Dead, but she wasn’t

sure how much that was due to the broken

stones. They made her head hurt, like a constant,

too-loud noise; her stomach cramped; her mouth

was full of the acrid taste of bile.

They had just reached the north-western corner,

directly under one of the light shafts, when

the light suddenly dimmed, and the reservoir

grew dark in an instant, save for the tiny, soft

glow of the candles.

“A cloud,” whispered Touchstone. “It will

pass.”

They held their breath, looking up, up to the

tiny outline of light above, and were rewarded

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when sunlight came pouring back down.

Relieved, they began to wade again, following

the long west-east wall. But it was short-lived

relief. Another cloud crossed the sun, somewhere

in that fresh air so high above them, and

darkness returned. More clouds followed, till

there were only brief moments of light interspersed

by long stretches of total dark.

The reservoir seemed colder without the sun,

even a sun diluted by passage down long shafts

through the earth. Sabriel felt the cold now,

accompanied by the sudden, irrational fear that

they had stayed too long, and would emerge

to a night full of waiting, life-hungry Dead.

Touchstone felt the chill too, made more bitter

by his memories of two hundred years past,

when he’d waded in this same water, and seen

the Queen and her two daughters sacrificed and

the Great Stones broken. There had been blood

on the water then, and he still saw it—a single

frozen moment of time that would not get out of

his head.

Despite these fears, it was the darkness that

helped them. Sabriel saw a glow, a faint luminescence

off to her right, somewhere towards

the center. Shielding her eyes from the candle’s

337

glare, she pointed it out to Touchstone.

“There’s something there,” he agreed, his voice

so low Sabriel barely heard it. “But it’s at least

forty paces towards the center.”

Sabriel didn’t answer. She’d felt something

from that faint light, something like the slight

sensation across the back of her neck that came

when her father’s sending visited her at school.

Leaving the wall, she pushed out through the

water, a V-line of ripples behind her. Touchstone

looked again, then followed, fighting the nausea

that rose in him, coming in waves like repeated

doses of an emetic. He was dizzy too, and could

no longer properly feel his feet.

They went about thirty paces out, the pain and

the nausea growing steadily worse. Then Sabriel

suddenly stopped, Touchstone lifting his sword

and candle, eyes searching for an attack. But

there was no enemy present. The luminous light

came from a diamond of protection, the four

cardinal marks glowing under the water, lines of

force sparkling between them.

In the middle of the diamond, a man-shaped

figure stood, empty hands outstretched, as if he

had once held weapons. Frost rimed his clothes

and face, obscuring his features, and ice girdled

338

the water around his middle. But Sabriel had no

doubt about who it was.

“Father,” she whispered, the whisper echoing

across the dark water, to join the faint sounds of

the ever-present dripping.

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chapter xxi

“The diamond is complete,” said

Touchstone. “We won’t be able to move him.”

“Yes. I know,” replied Sabriel. The relief

that had soared inside her at the sight of her

father was ebbing, giving way to the sickness

caused by the broken stones. “I think . . . I

think I’ll have to go into Death from here, and

fetch his spirit back.”

“What!” exclaimed Touchstone. Then, quieter,

as the echoes rang, “Here?”

“If we cast our own diamond of protection . . .”

Sabriel continued, thinking aloud. “A large one,

around both of us and Father’s diamond—that

will keep most danger at bay.”

“Most danger,” Touchstone said grimly,

looking around, trying to peer past the tight

confines of their candle’s little globe of light.

“It will also trap us here—even if we can cast

it, so close to the broken stones. I know that I

couldn’t do it alone, at this point.”

“We should be able to combine our strengths.

Then, if you and Mogget keep watch while I

am in Death, we should manage.”

“What do you think, Mogget?” asked Touchstone,

turning his head, so his cheek brushed

against the little animal on his shoulder.

“I have my own troubles,” grumbled Mogget.

“And I think this is probably a trap. But since

we’re here, and the—Abhorsen Emeritus, shall

we say, does seem to be alive, I suppose there’s

nothing else to be done.”

“I don’t like it,” whispered Touchstone.

Just standing this close to the broken stones

took most of his strength. For Sabriel to enter

Death seemed madness, tempting fate. Who

knew what might be lurking in Death, close

by the easy portal made by the broken stones?

For that matter, who knew what was lurking

in or around the reservoir?

Sabriel didn’t answer. She moved closer to her

father’s diamond of protection, studying the

cardinal marks under the water. Touchstone

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followed reluctantly, forcing his legs to move in

short steps, minimizing the splash and ripple of

his wake.

Sabriel snuffed out her candle, thrust it

through her belt, then held out her open palm.

“Put your sword away and give me your

hand,” she said, in a tone that did not invite

conversation or argument. Touchstone hesitated—

his left hand held only a candle, and he

didn’t want both his swords scabbarded—then

he complied. Her hand was cold, colder than the

water. Instinctively, he gripped a little tighter, to

give her some of his warmth.

“Mogget—keep watch,” Sabriel instructed.

She closed her eyes, and began to visualize the

East mark, the first of the four cardinal wards.

Touchstone took a quick look around, then

closed his eyes too, drawn in by the force of

Sabriel’s conjuration.

Pain shot through his hand and arm, as he

added his will to Sabriel’s. The mark seemed

blurry in his head, and impossible to focus. The

pins and needles that had already plagued his

feet spread up above his knees, shooting them

through with rheumatic pains. But he blocked off

the pain, narrowing his consciousness to just one

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thing: the creation of a diamond of protection.

Finally, the East mark flowed down Sabriel’s

blade and took root in the reservoir floor.

Without opening their eyes, the duo shuffled

around to face the south, and the next mark.

This was harder still, and both of them

were sweating and shaking when it finally

began its glowing existence. Sabriel’s hand was

hot and feverish now, and Touchstone’s flesh

ricocheted violently between sweating heat and

shivering cold. A terrible wave of nausea hit

him, and he would have been sick, but Sabriel

gripped his hand, like a falcon its prey, and

lent him strength. He gagged, dry-retched once,

then recovered.

The West mark was simply a trial of endurance.

Sabriel lost concentration for a

moment, so Touchstone had to hold the mark

alone for a few seconds, the effort making him

feel drunk in the most unpleasant way, the

world spinning inside his head, totally out of

control. Then Sabriel forced herself back and

the West mark flowered under the water.

Desperation gave them the North mark. They

struggled with it for what seemed like hours,

but was only seconds, till it almost squirmed

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from them uncast. But at that moment, Sabriel

spent all the force of her desire to free her father,

and Touchstone pushed with the weight of two

hundred years of guilt and sorrow.

The North mark rolled brightly down the

sword and grew to brilliance, brilliance dulled

by the water. Lines of Charter-fire ran from it to

the East mark, from East mark to South mark to

West mark and back again. The diamond was

complete.

Immediately, they felt a lessening of the terrible

presence of the broken stones. The high-pitched

pain in Sabriel’s head dimmed; normal feeling

returned to Touchstone’s legs and feet. Mogget

stirred and stretched, the first significant movement

he’d made since taking up position around

Touchstone’s neck.

“A good casting,” Sabriel said quietly, looking

at the marks through eyes half-lidded in weariness.

“Better than the last one I cast.”

“I don’t know how we did it,” muttered

Touchstone, staring down at the lines of Charterfire.

He suddenly became aware that he was still

holding Sabriel’s hand, and slumping like an

aged wood collector under a heavy burden. He

straightened up suddenly, dropping her hand as

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if it were the fanged end of a snake.

She looked at him, rather startled, and he

found himself staring at the reflection of his

candle-flame in her dark eyes. Almost for the

first time, he really looked at her. He saw the

weariness there, and the incipient lines of care,

and the way her mouth looked a little sad

around the edges. Her nose was still swollen,

and there were yellowing bruises on her cheekbones.

She was also beautiful and Touchstone

realized that he had thought of her only in terms

of her office, as Abhorsen. Not as a woman at

all . . .

“I’d better be going,” said Sabriel, suddenly

embarrassed by Touchstone’s stare. Her left

hand went to the bell-bandolier, fingers feeling

for the straps that held Saraneth.

“Let me help,” said Touchstone. He stood

close, fumbling with the stiff leather, hands

weakened by the effort spent on the diamond of

protection, his head bowed over the bells.

Sabriel looked down on his hair, and was

strangely tempted to kiss the exact center, a tiny

part marking the epicenter where his tight

brown curls radiated outwards. But she didn’t.

The strap came undone, and Touchstone

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stepped back. Sabriel drew Saraneth, carefully

stilling the bell.

“It probably won’t be a long wait for you,” she

said. “Time moves strangely in Death. If . . . if I’m

not back in two hours, then I probably . . . I’ll

probably be trapped too, so you and Mogget

should leave . . .”

“I’ll be waiting,” replied Touchstone firmly.

“Who knows what time it is down here anyway?”

“And I’ll wait, it seems,” added Mogget.

“Unless I want to swim out of here. Which I

don’t. May the Charter be with you, Sabriel.”

“And with you,” said Sabriel. She looked

around the dark expanse of the reservoir. She

still couldn’t sense any of the Dead out there—

and yet . . .

“We’ll need it to be with us,” Mogget replied

sourly. “One way or another.”

“I hope not,” whispered Sabriel. She checked

the pouch at her belt for the small things she’d

prepared back at the Sign of Three Lemons, then

turned to face the North mark and started to

raise her sword, beginning her preparations to

enter Death.

Suddenly, Touchstone sloshed forward and

quickly kissed her on the cheek—a clumsy,

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dry-lipped peck that almost hit the rim of her

helmet rather than her cheek.

“For luck,” Touchstone said nervously.

“Sabriel.”

She smiled, and nodded twice, then looked

back to the north. Her eyes focused on something

not there and waves of cold air billowed

from her motionless form. A second later, ice

crystals began to crack out of her hair, and frost

ran in lines down the sword and bell.

Touchstone watched, close by, till it grew too

cold, then he retreated to the far southern vertice

of the diamond. Drawing one sword, he turned

outwards, holding his candle high, and started

to wade around inside the lines of Charter-fire as

if he were patrolling the battlements of a castle.

Mogget watched too, from his shoulder, his

green eyes lit with their own internal luminescence.

Both of them often turned to gaze at

Sabriel.

The crossing into Death was made easy—far

too easy—by the presence of the broken stones.

Sabriel felt them near her, like two yawning

gates, proclaiming easy entry to Life for any

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Dead nearby. Fortunately, the other effect of

the stones—the sickening illness—disappeared

in Death. There was only the chill and tug of the

river.

Sabriel started forward immediately, carefully

scanning the grey expanse before her. Things

moved at the edge of her vision; she heard

movement in the cold waters. But nothing came

towards her, nothing attacked, save the constant

twining and gripping of the current.

She came to the First Gate, halting just beyond

the wall of mist that stretched out as far as she

could see to either side. The river roared beyond

that mist, turbulent rapids going through to

the Second Precinct, and on to the Second Gate.

Remembering pages from The Book of the

Dead, Sabriel spoke words of power. Free Magic,

that shook her mouth as she spoke, jarring

her teeth, burning her tongue with raw power.

The veil of mist parted, revealing a series of

waterfalls that appeared to drop into an unending

blackness. Sabriel spoke some more words,

and gestured to the right and left with her sword.

A path appeared, parting the waterfall like a finger

drawn through butter. Sabriel stepped out

onto it, and walked down, the waters crashing

harmlessly on either side. Behind her, the mist

closed up and, as her rearmost heel lifted to

make her next step, the path disappeared.

The Second Precinct was more dangerous than

the First. There were deep holes, as well as the

ever-present current. The light was worse too.

Not the total darkness promised at the end of

the waterfalls, but there was a different quality

in its greyness. A blurring effect, that made it difficult

to see further than you could touch.

Sabriel continued carefully, using her sword

to probe the ground ahead. There was an easy

way through, she knew, a course mapped and

plotted by many necromancers and not a few

Abhorsens, but she didn’t trust her memory to

tread confidently ahead at speed.

Always, her senses quested for her father’s

spirit. He was somewhere in Death, she was positive

of that. There was always the faintest trace

of him, a lingering memory. But it was not this

close to Life. She would have to go on.

The Second Gate was essentially an enormous

hole, at least two hundred yards across, into

which the river sank like sinkwater down a

drain. Unlike a normal drain, it was eerily silent,

and with the difficult light, easy for the unwary

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to walk up to its rim. Sabriel was always particularly

careful with this Gate—she had learned to

sense the feel of its tug against her shins at an

early age. She stopped well back when the tug

came, and tried to focus on the silently raging

whirlpool.

A faint squelching sound behind her made her

turn, sword scything around at full arm-stretch,

a great circle of Charter-spelled steel. It struck

Dead spirit-flesh, sparks flying, a scream of rage

and pain filling the silence. Sabriel almost

jumped back, at that scream, but she held her

ground. The Second Gate was too close.

The thing she’d hit stepped back, its head

hanging from a mostly severed neck. It was

humanoid in shape, at least to begin with, but

had arms that trailed down below its knees, into

the river. Its head, now flopping on one shoulder,

was longer than it was wide or tall, possessed a

mouth with several rows of teeth. It had flaming

coals in its eyepits, a characteristic of the deep

Dead, from beyond the Fifth Gate.

It snarled and brought its long, skewer-thin

fingers up out of the water to try and straighten

its head, attempting to rest it back atop the

cleanly hewn neck.

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Sabriel struck again, and the head and one

hand flew off, splashing into the river. They

bobbed on the surface for a moment, the head

howling, eyes flaming with hate across the

water. Then it was sucked down, down into the

hurly-burly of the Second Gate.

The headless body stood where it was for a

second, then started to cautiously step sideways,

its remaining hand groping around in front of it.

Sabriel watched it cautiously, debating whether

to use Saraneth to bind it to her will, and then

Kibeth to send it on its way to final death. But

using the bells would alert everything Dead

between here and the First and Third Gates at

least—and she didn’t want that.

The headless thing took another step, and fell

sideways into a deep hole. It scrabbled there, long

arms thrashing the water, but couldn’t pull itself

up and out. It only succeeded in getting across

into the full force of the current, which snatched

it up and threw it into the whirlpool of the Gate.

Once again, Sabriel recited words of Free Magic

power, words impressed into her mind long ago

from The Book of the Dead. The words flowed

out of her, blistering her lips, strange heat in this

place of leeching cold.

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With the words, the waters of the Second Gate

slowed and stilled. The whirling vortex separated

out into a long spiral path, winding downwards.

Sabriel, checking for a few last holes near the

edge, gingerly strode out to this path and started

down. Behind and above her, the waters began to

swirl again.

The spiral path looked long, but to Sabriel it

seemed only a matter of minutes before she was

passing through the very base of the whirlpool,

and out into the Third Precinct.

This was a tricksome place. The water was

shallow here, only ankle-deep, and somewhat

warmer. The light was better too—still grey, but

you could see farther out. Even the ubiquitous

current was no more than a bit of a tickle

around the feet.

But the Third Precinct had waves. For the first

time, Sabriel broke into a run, sprinting as fast

as she could towards the Third Gate, just visible

in the distance. It was like the First Gate—a

waterfall concealed in a wall of mist.

Behind her, Sabriel heard the thunderous

crashing that announced the wave, which had

been held back by the same spell that gave her

passage through the whirlpool. With the wave

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came shrill cries, shrieks and screams. There

were clearly many Dead around, but Sabriel

didn’t spare them a thought. Nothing and no

one could withstand the waves of the Third

Precinct. You simply ran as fast as possible,

hoping to reach the next gate—whichever way

you were going.

The thunder and crashing grew louder, and one

by one the various screams and shouts were submerged

in the greater sound. Sabriel didn’t look,

but only ran faster. Looking over her shoulder

would lose a fraction of a second, and that might

be enough for the wave to reach her, pick her up

and hurl her through the Third Gate, stunned

flotsam for the current beyond . . .

Touchstone stared out past the southern vertice,

listening. He had heard something, he was sure,

something besides the constant dripping.

Something louder, something slow, attempting

to be surreptitious. He knew Mogget had heard

it too, from the sudden tensing of cat paws on

his shoulder.

“Can you see anything?” he whispered, peering

out into the darkness. The clouds were still

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blocking the light from the sun-shafts, though

he thought the intervals of sunlight were growing

longer. But, in any case, they were too far

away from the edge to benefit from a sudden

return of sun.

“Yes,” whispered Mogget. “The Dead. Many

of them, filing out of the main southern stair.

They’re lining up each side of the door, along

the reservoir walls.”

Touchstone looked at Sabriel, now covered in

frost, like a wintering statue. He felt like shaking

her shoulder, screaming for help . . .

“What kind of Dead are they?” he asked. He

didn’t know much about the Dead, except that

Shadow Hands were the worst of the normal

variety, and Mordicants, like the one that had

followed Sabriel, were the worst of them all.

Except for what Rogir had become. Kerrigor,

the Dead Adept . . .

“Hands,” muttered Mogget. “All Hands, and

pretty putrescent ones, too. They’re falling apart

just walking.”

Touchstone stared again, trying by sheer force

of will to see—but there was nothing, save

darkness. He could hear them, though, wading,

squelching through the still water. Too still for

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his liking—suddenly he wondered if the reservoir

had a drainhole and a plug. Then he dismissed

it as a foolish notion. Any such plug or

drain cover would have long since rusted shut.

“What are they doing?” he whispered anxiously,

fingering his sword, tilting the blade this

way and that. His left hand seemed to hold the

candle steady, but the little flame flickered, clear

evidence of the tiny shakes that ran down his

arm.

“Just lining up along the walls, in ranks,”

Mogget whispered back. “Strange—almost like

an honor guard . . .”

“Charter preserve us,” Touchstone croaked,

with a weight in his throat of absolute dread

and terrible foreboding. “Rogir . . . Kerrigor.

He must be here . . . and he’s coming . . .”

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chapter xxii

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.

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.

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.

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 was either here in the Fourth Precinct,

or past the Fourth Gate, in the Fifth Precinct.

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 . . .

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.

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.

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

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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.

What would be the point? Everyone went into

Death or out of it. Not sideways, save at the

border with Life, where walking along 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.

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.

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.

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“They’re coming down the east and west stairs,

too,” said Mogget. “More Hands.”

“What about the south—where we came in?”

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.

“Not yet,” replied Mogget. “That stair ends

in sunlight, remember? They’d have to go

through the park.”

“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.

“When . . . when do you think he will come?”

asked Touchstone. Mogget didn’t need to ask

who “he” was.

“Soon,” replied the cat, in a matter-of-fact tone.

“I always said it was a trap.”

“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

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horse, careless of the noise—but there was Sabriel,

frosted over, immobile . . .

“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.”

“What can we do?”

“Defend ourselves if we’re attacked, I suppose,”

drawled Mogget, as if stating the obvious to a tiresome

child. “Hope. Pray to the Charter that

Kerrigor doesn’t come before Sabriel returns.”

“What if he does?” asked Touchstone, staring

white-eyed out into the darkness. “What if he

does?”

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.

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.

Somehow imprisoned within the Gate itself, so

only his head was visible above the rush of the

water.

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“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 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 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.

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

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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.

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.

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.

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.

They would probably expect to find a foolish,

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half-trained necromancer, but even so, they

would be dangerous. Ranna twitched in her

hand, expectantly, like a child waking at her

touch.

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.

“Sabriel! I both hoped and feared you would

come.”

“Father . . .” Sabriel began, looking at his

trapped spirit rather than the creature.

“Father . . .”

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?”

“In the reservoir,” sniffed Sabriel. “Next to

yours. Inside a diamond of protection.”

“And the Dead? Kerrigor?”

“There was no sign of them there, but

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Kerrigor is somewhere in Life. I don’t know

where.”

“Yes, I knew he had emerged,” muttered

Abhorsen, via the thing’s mouth. “He will be

near the reservoir, I fear. We must move quickly.

Sabriel, do you remember how to ring two bells

simultaneously? Mosrael and Kibeth?”

“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.

The Book of the Dead.”

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 . . .

“Yes,” said Sabriel, slowly. “I remember.

Mosrael and Kibeth. Will they free you?”

The answer was slow in coming.

“Yes. For a time. Enough, I hope, to do what

must be done. Quickly, now.”

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

364

long from his body, and too deep in the realm of

Death. He could never truly live again.

Consciously, she chose to barricade this knowledge

from her mind.

She sheathed her sword, replaced Ranna, and

drew Mosrael and Kibeth. Dangerous bells,

both, and more so in combination than alone.

She stilled her mind, emptying herself of all

thought and emotion, concentrating solely on

the bells. Then, she rang them.

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.

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

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366

sound of the bells filling her ears, forcing her

onwards.

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.

“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!”

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.

“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?”

“Here?” asked Abhorsen, without slowing.

“In Death?”

“You know what I mean,” protested Sabriel.

“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?”

“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.

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.”

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“Why?” asked Sabriel.

“Kerrigor’s body,” replied Abhorsen. “Or

Rogir’s, to give him his original name. He could

never be made truly dead because his body 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?”

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.

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.

“Ready to run?” asked Abhorsen. He took her

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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.

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.

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.

“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.”

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“Who’s we?” asked Sabriel. All this information

was coming too quickly, particularly when given

at the run.

“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.”

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.

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.

“So,” continued Abhorsen. “We finally have

the chance to finish Kerrigor once and for all.

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

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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?”

“A bastard son, actually, and possibly crazy,”

Abhorsen said, without really listening. “But he

has the blood. What? Oh, yes, yes he is . . . you

said was . . . you mean—”

“Yes,” said Sabriel, unhappily. “He calls himself

Touchstone. And he’s waiting in the reservoir.

Near the Stones. With Mogget.”

Abhorsen paused for the first time, clearly

taken aback.

“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.

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.

But now, if the Prince is there, he has another

source of blood to break the Great Charter—”

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“He’s in the diamond of protection,” Sabriel

said, suddenly feeling afraid for Touchstone.

“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.

But tell me of the Prince’s companion. Who is

Mogget?”

“Mogget?” repeated Sabriel, surprised again.

“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.”

“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.”

“I thought we were!” snapped Sabriel, as he

started off again. She didn’t mean to be bad-

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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.

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.

“I have not been an ideal parent, I know,”

Abhorsen said quietly. “None of us ever are.

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.

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.”

“A hundred hundred heartbeats . . .” whispered

Sabriel, tears falling down her face. She

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gently pushed herself out of his embrace, and

they started forward together, towards the First

Gate, the First Precinct, Life—and then, the

reservoir.

374

chapter xxiii

Touchstone could see the Dead

now, and had no difficulty hearing them. They

were chanting and clapping, decayed hands

meeting together in a steady, slow rhythm that

put all the hair on the back of his head on edge.

A ghastly noise, hard sounds of bone on bone,

or the liquid thumpings of decomposed, jellying

flesh. The chanting was even worse, for

very few of them had functioning mouths.

Touchstone had never seen or heard a shipwreck—

now he knew the sound of a thousand

sailors drowning, all at once, in a quiet sea.

The lines of the Dead had marched out close to

where Touchstone stood, forming a great mass

of shifting shadow, spread like a choking fungus

around the columns. Touchstone couldn’t make

out what they were doing, till Mogget, with his

night-sight, explained.

“They’re forming up into two lines, to make

a corridor,” the little cat whispered, though the

need for silence was long gone. “A corridor of

Dead Hands, reaching from the northern stair to

us.”

“Can you see the doorway of the stair?”

Touchstone asked. He was no longer afraid, now

he could see and smell the putrescent, stinking

corpses lined up in mockery of a parade. I should

have died in this reservoir long ago, he thought.

There has just been a delay of two hundred

years . . .

“Yes, I can,” continued Mogget, his eyes green

with sparkling fire. “A tall beast has come, its

flesh boiling with dirty flames. A Mordicant. It’s

crouching in the water, looking back and up like

a dog to its master. Fog is rolling down the stairs

behind it—a Free Magic trick, that one. I wonder

why he has such an urge to impress?”

“Rogir always was flamboyant,” Touchstone

stated, as if he might be commenting on someone

at a dinner party. “He liked everyone to be

looking at him. He’s no different as Kerrigor, no

different Dead.”

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“Oh, but he is,” said Mogget. “Very different.

He knows you’re here, and the fog’s for vanity.

He must have been terribly rushed making the

body he wears now. A vain man—even a Dead

one—would not like this body looked at.”

Touchstone swallowed, trying not to think

about that. He wondered if he could charge out

of the diamond, flèche with his swords into that

fog, a mad attack—but even if he got there,

would his swords, Charter-spelled though they

were, have any effect on the magical flesh

Kerrigor now wore?

Something moved in the water, at the limits of

his vision, and the Hands increased the tempo of

their drumming, the frenzied gurgle-chanting rising

in volume.

Touchstone squinted, confirming what he

thought he’d seen—tendrils of fog, lazily drifting

across the water between the lines of the Dead,

keeping to the corridor they’d made.

“He’s playing with us,” gasped Touchstone, surprised

by his own lack of breath for speech. He felt

like he’d already sprinted a mile, his heart going

thump-thump-thump-thump . . .

A terrible howl suddenly rose above the Dead

drumming, and Touchstone leapt back, nearly

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dislodging Mogget. The howl rose and rose,

becoming unbearable, and then a huge shape

broke out of the fog and darkness, stampeding

towards them with fearful power, great swaths

of spray exploding around it as it ran.

Touchstone shouted, or screamed—he wasn’t

sure—threw away his candle, drew his left

sword and thrust both blades out, crouching to

receive the charge, knees so bent he was chestdeep

in the water.

“The Mordicant!” yelled Mogget, then he was

gone, leaping from Touchstone to the still-frosted

Sabriel.

Touchstone barely had time to absorb this

information, and a split-second image of something

like an enormous, flame-shrouded bear,

howling like the final scream of a sacrifice—then

the Mordicant collided with the diamond of protection,

and Touchstone’s out-thrust swords.

Silver sparks exploded with a bang that

drowned the howling, throwing both Touchstone

and the Mordicant back several yards. Touchstone

lost his footing, and went under, water

bubbling into his nose and still-screaming mouth.

He panicked, thinking the Mordicant would be

on him in a second, and flipped himself back up

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with unnecessary force, savagely ripping his

stomach muscles.

He almost flew out of the water, swords at

guard again, but the diamond was intact, and the

Mordicant retreating, backing away along the

corridor of Hands. They’d stopped their noise,

but there was something else—something

Touchstone didn’t recognize, till the water

drained out of his ears.

It was laughter, laughter echoing out of the

fog, which now billowed across the water,

coming closer and closer, till the retreating

Mordicant was enveloped in it, and lost to

sight.

“Did my hound scare you, little brother?” said

a voice from within the fog.

“Ow!” exclaimed Sabriel, feeling Mogget’s claws

on her physical body. Abhorsen looked at her,

raising one silvery eyebrow questioningly.

“Something touched my body in Life,” she

explained. “Mogget, I think. I wonder what’s

happening?”

They stood at the very edge of Death, on the

border with Life. No Dead had tried to stop them,

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and they’d passed easily through the First Gate.

Perhaps any Dead would quail from the sight of

two Abhorsens . . .

Now they waited. Sabriel didn’t know why.

Somehow, Abhorsen seemed to be able to see into

Life, or to work out what was happening. He

stood like an eavesdropper, body slightly bent, ear

cocked to a non-existent door.

Sabriel, on the other hand, stood like a soldier,

keeping watch for the Dead. The broken

stones made this part of Death an attractive

high road into Life, and she had expected to

find many Dead here, trying to take advantage

of the “hole.” But it was not so. They seemed

to be alone in the grey, featureless river, their

only neighbors the swells and eddies of the

water.

Abhorsen closed his eyes, concentrating even

harder, then opened them to a wide-eyed stare

and touched Sabriel lightly on the arm.

“It is almost time,” he said gently. “When we

emerge, I want you to take . . . Touchstone . . .

and run for the southern stairs. Do not stop for

anything, anything at all. Once outside, climb up

to the top of the Palace Hill, to the West Yard.

It’s just an empty field now—Touchstone will

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381

know how to get there. If the Clayr are watching

properly, and haven’t got their whens mixed

up, there’ll be a Paperwing there—”

“A Paperwing!” interrupted Sabriel. “But I

crashed it.”

“There are several around,” replied Abhorsen.

“The Abhorsen who made it—the forty-sixth, I

think—taught several others how to construct

them. Anyway, it should be there. The Clayr will

also be there, or a messenger, to tell you where

to find Kerrigor’s body in Ancelstierre. Fly as

close to the Wall as possible, cross, find the

body—and destroy it!”

“What will you be doing?” whispered Sabriel.

“Here is Saraneth,” replied Abhorsen, not

meeting her gaze. “Give me your sword, and . . .

Astarael.”

The seventh bell. Astarael the Sorrowful.

Weeper.

Sabriel didn’t move, made no motion to hand

over bell or blade. Abhorsen pushed Saraneth

into its pouch, and did up the strap. He started

to undo the strap that held Astarael, but Sabriel’s

hand closed on his, gripping it tightly.

“There must be another way,” she cried. “We

can all escape together—”

“No,” said Abhorsen firmly. He gently pushed

her hand away. Sabriel let go, and he took

Astarael carefully from the bandolier, making

sure it couldn’t sound. “Does the walker choose

the path, or the path the walker?”

Numbly, Sabriel handed him her sword . . . his

sword. Her empty hands hung open by her sides.

“I have walked in Death to the very precipice of

the Ninth Gate,” Abhorsen said quietly. “I know

the secrets and horrors of the Nine Precincts. I do

not know what lies beyond, but everything that

lives must go there, in the proper time. That is

the rule that governs our work as the Abhorsen,

but it also governs us. You are the fifty-third

Abhorsen, Sabriel. I have not taught you as well

as I should—let this be my final lesson. Everyone

and everything has a time to die.”

He bent forward, and kissed her forehead, just

under the rim of her helmet. For a moment, she

stood like a stringed puppet at rest, then she flung

herself against his chest, feeling the soft fabric of

his surcoat. She seemed to diminish in size, till

once again she was a little girl, running to his

embrace at the school gates. As she could then,

she heard the slow beating of his heart. Only

now, she heard the beats as grains in a time-

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piece, counting his hard-won hundred hundreds,

counting till it was time for him to die.

She hugged him tightly, her arms meeting

around his back, his arms outstretched like a

cross, sword in one hand, bell in the other. Then,

she let go.

They turned together, and plunged out into

Life.

Kerrigor laughed again, an obscene cackle that

rose to a manic crescendo, before suddenly cutting

to an ominous silence. The Dead resumed

their drumming, softer now, and the fog drifted

forward with horrible certainty. Touchstone,

drenched and partly drowned, watched it with

the taut nerves of a mouse captivated by a gliding

snake. Somewhere in the back of his mind,

he noted that it was easier to see the whiteness

of the fog. Up above, the clouds had gone, and

the edges of the reservoir were once again lit by

filtered sunlight. But they were forty paces or