“Look out!” barked the Dog, and they both jumped aside as a great globe of fire swung past, close enough to choke Lirael with its sudden heat. Coughing, she bent over—and the river chose that moment to try to pull her legs out from under her.
It almost worked. The current’s sudden surge made Lirael slip, but she went down only as far as her waist, then used her sword like a crutch to lever herself up again with a single springing leap.
The Dog had already plunged under to haul her mistress out, and the hound looked very embarrassed when she emerged, soaking, to find Lirael not only still vertical but mostly dry.
“Thought you went in,” she mumbled, then barked at a fire, as much to move the conversation on as to divert the intruder.
“Come on!” said Lirael.
“I’m going to wait and ambush—” the Dog started to say, but Lirael turned on her and grabbed her by the collar. The mulish Dog set her haunches down at once, and Lirael tried to drag her.
“You’re coming with me!” ordered Lirael, her tone of command watered down by the quaver in her voice. “We’ll fight Hedge together—when we have to. For now, let’s hurry!”
“Oh, all right,” grumbled the Dog. She got up and shook herself, splashing copious amounts of the river onto Lirael.
“Whatever happens,” Lirael added quietly, “I want us to be together, Dog.”
The Disreputable Dog looked up at her with a troubled eye but didn’t speak. Lirael almost said something else, but it got choked up in her throat, and then she had to ward off another incursion by floating fires.
When that was done, they strode off side by side and, a few minutes later, stepped confidently into the wall of darkness that was the Eighth Gate. All light vanished, and Lirael could see nothing, hear nothing, and feel nothing, including her own body. She felt as if she had suddenly become a disembodied intelligence that was totally alone, cut off from all external stimuli.
But she had expected it, and though she couldn’t feel her own mouth and lips, and her ears could hear no sound, she spoke the spell that would take them through this ultimate darkness. Through to the Ninth and final Precinct of Death.
The Ninth Precinct was utterly different from all other parts of Death. Lirael blinked as she emerged from the darkness of the Eighth Gate, struck by sudden light. The familiar tug of the river at her knees disappeared as the current faded away. The river now only splashed gently round her ankles, and the water was warm, the terrible chill that prevailed in all other precincts of Death left behind.
Everywhere else in Death always had a closed-in feeling, due to the strange grey light that limited vision. Here it was the opposite. There was a sensation of immensity, and Lirael could see for miles and miles, across a great flat stretch of sparkling water.
For the first time, she could also look up and see more than a grey, depressing blur. Much more. There was a sky above her, a night sky so thick with stars that they overlapped and merged to form one unimaginably vast and luminous cloud. There were no distinguishable constellations, no patterns to pick out. Just a multitude of stars, casting a light as bright as but softer than the living world’s sun.
Lirael felt the stars call to her, and a yearning rose in her heart to answer. She sheathed bell and sword and stretched her arms out, up to the brilliant sky. She felt herself lifted up, and her feet came out of the river with a soft ripple and a sigh from the waters.
Dead rose, too, she saw. Dead of all shapes and sizes, all rising up to the sea of stars. Some went slowly, and some so fast they were just a blur.
Some small part of Lirael’s mind warned that she was answering the Ninth Gate’s call. The veil of stars was the final border, the final death from which there could be no return. That same small conscience shrieked about responsibility, and Orannis, and the Disreputable Dog, and Sam, and Nick, and the whole world of Life. It angrily kicked and screamed against the overwhelming feeling of peace and rest offered by the stars.
Not yet, it cried. Not yet.
That cry was answered, though not by any voice. The stars suddenly retreated, became immeasurably far away. Lirael blinked, shook her head, and fell several feet to splash down next to the Dog, who still gazed up at the luminous sky.
“Why didn’t you stop me?” Lirael asked, made cross by the scare she’d had. Another few seconds and she would have been unable to return, she knew. She would have gone beyond the Ninth Gate forever.
“It is something that all who walk here must face themselves,” whispered the Dog. She still stared up and did not look at Lirael. “For everyone, and everything, there is a time to die. Some do not know it, or would delay it, but its truth cannot be denied. Not when you look into the stars of the Ninth Gate. I’m glad you came back, Mistress.”
“So am I,” said Lirael nervously. She could see Dead emerging all along the dark mass of the Eighth Gate. Every time one came out, she tensed, thinking it must be Hedge. She could feel more Dead than she could see, but they were all simply coming through and immediately falling skywards, to disappear amongst the stars. But Hedge, who must have been only a few minutes behind Lirael and the Dog, did not come through the Eighth Gate.
Still the Dog looked up. Lirael finally noticed, and her heart nearly stopped. Surely the Dog wouldn’t answer the summons of the Ninth Gate?
Finally, the Dog looked down and made a slight woofing sound.
“Not yet my time, either,” she said, and Lirael let out her breath. “Shouldn’t you be doing what we came here for, Mistress?”
“I know,” said Lirael wretchedly, all too conscious of the time wasted. She touched the Dark Mirror in her pouch. “But what if Hedge comes while I’m looking?”
“If he hasn’t come through now, he probably won’t,” replied the Dog, sniffing the river. “Few necromancers risk seeing the Ninth Gate, for their very nature is to deny its call.”
“Oh,” said Lirael, much relieved by this advice.
“He will certainly be waiting for us somewhere on the way back, though,” continued the Dog, bursting that small bubble of relief. “But for now, I will guard you.”
Lirael smiled, a troubled smile that conveyed her love and gratitude. She was twice vulnerable, she thought, with her body out in Life guarded by Sam, and now her spirit here in Death, guarded by the Dog.
But she had to do what must be done, regardless of the risk.
First of all she pricked the point of her finger with Nehima before sheathing the sword again. Then she took out the Dark Mirror and opened it with a decisive snap.
Blood dripped down her finger, and a drop fell. But it flew up towards the sky instead of down to the river. Lirael didn’t notice. She was remembering pages from The Book of Remembrance and Forgetting, concentrating as she held her finger close to the Mirror and touched a single bright drop to its opaque surface. As the drop touched, it spread, to form a thin sheen across the dark surface of the glass.
Lirael lifted the Mirror and held it to her right eye, while still looking out on Death through her left eye. The blood gave the Mirror a faint red tinge, but that quickly faded as she focused, and the darkness began to clear. Once again, Lirael saw through the Mirror into some other place, but she could still also see the sparkling waters of the Ninth Precinct. The two visions merged, and Lirael saw the swirling lights and the sun fleeing backwards somehow through the waters of Death, and she felt herself falling faster and faster into some incredibly distant past.
Now Lirael began to think of what she wanted to see, and her left hand fell to unconsciously touch each of the bells in her bandolier in turn.
“By Right of Blood,” she said, her voice growing stronger and more confident with each word, “by Right of Heritage, by Right of the Charter, and by Right of the Seven who wove it, I would see through the veil of time, to the Beginning. I would witness the Binding and Breaking of Orannis and learn what was and what must become. So let it be!”
Long after she spoke, the suns still ran backwards, and Lirael fell
farther and farther into them, till all the suns were one, blinding her with light. Then the light faded, and she gazed out to a dark void. There was a single point of light within the void, and she fell towards that, and soon it was not a light but a moon and then a huge planet that filled the horizon, and she was falling through its sky and gliding in the air above a desert that stretched from horizon to horizon, a desert that Lirael somehow knew encompassed this whole world. Nothing stirred upon the baked, parched earth. Nothing grew or lived.
The world spun beneath her, faster and faster, and Lirael saw it in earlier times, saw how all life had been extinguished. Then she fell through the suns again and saw another void, another single, struggling world that would become a desert.
Six times, Lirael saw a world destroyed. The seventh time, it was her own world she saw. She knew it, though there was no landmark or feature that told her so. She saw the Destroyer choose it, but this time others chose it too. This would be the battleground where they would confront the Destroyer; this was where sides must be chosen and loyalties decided for all time.
The vision Lirael saw then seemed to last for many days, and many horrors. But at the same time, through her other eye she saw the Dog pacing backwards and forwards, and Lirael knew that little time had passed in Death.
Finally, she saw enough, and could bear to see no more. She shut both eyes, snapped the mirror shut, and slowly sank to her knees, holding the small silver case between her clasped hands. Warm water lapped around her, but it offered no comfort.
When she opened her eyes a moment later, the Dog licked her on the mouth and looked at her with great concern.
“We have to hurry,” said Lirael, pushing herself upright. “I didn’t really understand before. . . . We have to hurry!”
She started back towards the Eighth Gate and drew both sword and bell with new decisiveness. She had seen what Orannis could do now, and it was far worse than she had ever imagined. Truly, It was aptly named the Destroyer. Orannis existed solely to destroy, and the Charter was the enemy that had stopped It doing so. It hated all living things and not only wanted to destroy them—It had the power to do so.
Only Lirael knew how Orannis could be bound anew. It would be difficult—perhaps even impossible. But it was their one chance, and she was full of single-minded determination to get back to Life. She had to make it happen. For herself, for the Dog, Sam, Nick, Major Greene and his men, for the people of Ancelstierre who would die without even knowing their danger, and for all those in the Old Kingdom. Her cousins of the Clayr. Even Aunt Kirrith . . .
Thoughts of them all, and her responsibility, filled her head as she approached the Eighth Gate, the words of the opening spell on her lips. But even as she opened her mouth to speak the words, there was a gout of flame from the darkness of the Gate, directly opposite Lirael and the Dog.
Wreathed in that flame, Hedge lunged through. His sword cut at Lirael’s left arm, and he struck so hard that she dropped Saraneth, its brief jangle quickly swallowed by the river. The clang of ensorcelled steel on gethre plates echoed across the water. The armor held, but even so Lirael’s arm beneath was badly bruised—for the second time in only a few days.
Lirael barely managed to parry the next cut for her head. She leapt back and got in the way of the Dog, who was about to leap forward. Pain coursed through Lirael’s left arm, shooting up through her shoulder and neck. Nevertheless, she reached for a bell.
Hedge was quicker. He had a bell in his hand already, and he rang it. Saraneth, Lirael recognized, and she steeled herself to resist its power. But nothing came with the peal of the bell. No compulsion, no test of wills.
“Sit!” commanded Hedge, and Lirael suddenly realized that Hedge had focused Saraneth’s power upon the Disreputable Dog.
Growling, the Dog froze, halfway back on her haunches, ready to spring. But Saraneth had her in its grip, and she was unable to move.
Lirael circled around the Dog, moving to try to cut at Hedge’s bell arm, as he had cut hers. But he moved, too, circling back the other way. There was something odd about his fighting stance, Lirael noted. She couldn’t think what it was for a moment. Then she realized that he kept his head angled down, and he never looked up. Clearly, Hedge was afraid to see the stars of the Ninth Gate.
He started to move towards her, but she circled back again, keeping the motionless Dog between them. As she passed in front, Lirael saw the hound wink.
“You have led me a long chase,” said Hedge. His voice was flavored with Free Magic, and he sounded much more like something Dead than a living man. He looked like it, too. He towered over Lirael, and there were fires everywhere within him, glowing red in his eyes and mouth, dripping from his fingers and shining through his skin. Lirael wasn’t even sure he was a living man. He was more like a Free Magic spirit himself, only clad in human flesh. “But it is finished now, here and in Life. My master is whole again, and the destruction has begun. Only the Dead walk in the living world, to praise Orannis for Its work. Only the Dead—and I, the faithful vizier.”
His voice had a hypnotic quality about it. Lirael realized he was trying to distract her while he went for a killing blow. He hadn’t tried the bell upon her, which was curious—but then, she’d broken free of Hedge and Saraneth before.
“Look up, Hedge,” she answered, as they circled again. “The Ninth Gate calls. Can’t you feel the summons of the stars?”
She lunged at him on “stars,” but Hedge was ready, and more practiced with a sword. He parried, and his swift riposte cut the fabric of her surcoat directly above her heart.
Quickly, she backed off again, this time circling away from the Dog. Hedge followed, his head still bent, watching her through hooded eyes.
Behind him, the Dog stirred. Slowly, she raised one paw from the shallow river, careful not to make a splash. Then she began to sneak after the necromancer as he stalked towards Lirael.
“I don’t believe you about the Destroyer, either,” said Lirael as she backed away, hoping her voice would cover the sound of the Dog’s advance. “I would know if anything had happened to my body in Life. Besides, you wouldn’t bother with me if It were already free.”
“You are an annoyance, nothing more,” said Hedge. He was smiling now, and the flames on his sword grew brighter, feeding off his expectation of a kill. “It pleases me to finish you. There is no more to it than that. As my Master destroys that which displeases, so do I!”
He slashed viciously down at her. Lirael barely managed to parry and push his sword aside. Then they were locked together, body to body, his head bent over hers and his metallic, flame-ridden breath hot upon her cheek as she turned away.
“But perhaps I will play a little with you first.” Hedge smiled, disengaged, and stepped back.
Lirael struck at him with all her strength and anger. Hedge laughed, parried, stepped back once more—and tumbled over the Disreputable Dog.
He dropped his sword and bell at once, and clapped his hands to his eyes as he struck the water with the hiss and roar of steam. But he was an instant too late. He saw the stars as he fell, and they called to him, overcoming the weight of spells and power that had kept him in the living world for more than a hundred years. Always postponing Death, always searching for something that could let him stay forever under the sun. He thought he had found it, serving Orannis, for he cared nothing about anyone else or any other living thing. The Destroyer had promised him the reward of eternal life and even greater dominion over the Dead. Hedge had done everything he could to earn it.
Now, with a single glimpse of those beckoning stars, it was all stripped away. Hedge’s hands fell back. Starlight filled his eyes with glowing tears, tears that slowly quenched his internal fires. The coils of steam wafted away, and the river grew quiet. Hedge raised his arms and began his own fall towards the sky, the stars, and the Ninth Gate.
The Disreputable Dog picked up Lirael’s bell from the river and took it to her, careful not to let it sound. Lirael accepted it
in silence and put it away. There was no time to savor their triumph over the necromancer. Lirael knew that he was only ever a lesser enemy.
Together they crossed the Eighth Gate, both filled with a terrible fear. The fear that though Hedge’s words were lies, they would become the truth before they could get back to Life.
Lirael was further burdened by the weight of knowledge. Now she knew how to bind the Destroyer anew, but she also knew it couldn’t be done just by her. Sam would need to be the heir of the Wallmakers in truth and not just be entitled to wear their silver trowel on his surcoat.
Others of the Blood would be needed too, and they just weren’t there.
Even worse, the binding was only half of what must be done. Even if Lirael and Sam could somehow manage that, there was the breaking, and that would require more courage than Lirael thought she had.
Chapter Twenty-six
Sam and the Shadow Hands
AS THE DEAD broke free of Saraneth’s hold, Sam blew on the Ranna pipe. But the soft lullaby was too late, and Sam’s breath too hasty. Only a half dozen of the Dead lay down to sleep under Ranna’s spell, and the bell caught several soldiers, too. The other ninety or more Dead Hands charged down out of the fog, to be met by swords, bayonets, silver blades, and the white lightning of the Charter Mages.
For a furious, frenzied minute of hacking and dodging, Sam couldn’t see what was happening. Then the Hand in front of him collapsed, its legs cut away. Sam was surprised to see that he’d done that himself, the Charter marks on his sword blazing with blue-white fury.
“Try the pipes again!” shouted the Major. He stepped in front of Sam to engage the next broken-jawed apparition. “We’ll cover you!”
Sam nodded and brought the pipes to his lips again with new determination. The Dead had driven the defenders back with their charge, and now Lirael was only a few feet behind him, a frozen statue who would be totally vulnerable to attack.