“Perhaps they are afraid to talk about those things in case they are taken prisoner again,” Billy suggested gently.
But the girl shook her head. “They don’t want to talk about such things. They don’t care about them anymore.”
“What happens to them inside Stormkeep?” Billy asked.
“We don’t know,” the older boy said. “They don’t remember anything.”
“What does the sun look like?” asked an older girl gravely.
Billy looked at her and Rage saw pity in his soft brown eyes. “It is a hot, bright light, only very big and very far away. It rises in the sky and lights the world like a giant lantern, and all flowers open their petals and turn their faces to drink its warmth.”
Rage stared at him, touched by his gentleness, and by the poetry of his words.
“Then there are flowers,” the little girl declared, and she made a ferocious face at the boy beside her. “I told you!”
“Does the sun make the sky blue?” asked another boy.
“How could it do that?” said the older boy who had been in the tunnel hut. “The sky would be white with all of that brightness.”
“Sometimes it is almost white, but sometimes the sky is blue, too,” Billy said. “Other times it is red as blood and then still other times it is yellow like the palest candlelight.”
“I have dreamed of flowers,” the little girl said. “I have dreamed of how warm it will be when the Lady Elle defeats the Stormlord.”
Rage wondered uneasily what Elle had actually told these people. After all, their task was not to bring sunlight to this world but to find the wizard and close the winter door. But perhaps like Mr. Walker, Elle now had her own plans. One thing was certain: if she had told these people she would help them, then she would not go until she had done so.
Billy went on talking to the children. They drank in his stories of sunlight and warm beaches and butterflies and rainbows. Rage felt sick at the thought that these children might be taken inside Stormkeep to who knew what fate.
“What are you thinking about, Rage?” Billy asked suddenly. An older boy was shooing the children away with the empty plates.
“I was thinking about what will happen to these children. Elle can’t make the sun shine here.”
“Maybe the wizard can if…” Billy’s eyes widened. “Rage, I know what Elle wants you to do!”
“She didn’t ask me to do anything.”
“She didn’t, but she will. She is going to ask you to dream-travel inside Stormkeep!”
“Could you do it?” Elle had returned.
Rage ignored the fear that rose in her throat. “I think I could dream myself to the wizard.”
“I will go, too,” Billy volunteered. Rage felt a fierce love for him because he did not tell her that she could not go, that it was too dangerous or she was too young.
“I can go,” Rage said. “But first I have to wake up in my own world and go back to sleep again. And time passes faster here than there.”
Elle nodded. “I have considered that, but we have no choice. You have seen Stormkeep. We must learn if the wizard is there before we consider trying to get inside to save him.”
The door burst open behind her and both Rage and Billy jumped to their feet. It was the boy Lod. Behind him were Thaddeus and Nomadiel with Rally on her shoulder.
“Where is Mr. Walker?” Billy asked eagerly.
Only then, when Nomadiel and the boy stepped aside, did they see that Thaddeus was carrying Mr. Walker, hanging limp and dreadfully still in his arms.
“What happened?” Rage cried as Thaddeus lay Mr. Walker carefully on the nearest bench seat. The dog-man’s face was clammy pale except for bright spots of color high on his cheeks.
“He would not rest nor eat though I told him that I could smell sickness growing in him,” Nomadiel said. Her eyes were dry but diamond-hard in her heart-shaped face.
“But what happened to him?” Rage asked her. “He can’t just have gotten sick.”
“Well, he did!” Nomadiel snapped. There was a brittleness to her that was not far from tears. “Just as my mother did!”
Rage recoiled from the fury and despair in the girl’s voice and turned back to Mr. Walker. Elle was kneeling at his side now, her hand on his brow. She called his name softly. After an endless moment, the little man’s eyes fluttered and then opened a slit.
“You…,” he breathed.
“Yes, it is me,” Elle said lightly, smiling down at him. “Don’t think you are going to get out of helping us to close the winter door by getting sick!”
His lips curved slightly, and Rage wondered if there was anyone in any world who would not smile at Elle. But the smile faded almost at once, as if the effort of maintaining it was too great. “I’m sorry,” Mr. Walker whispered.
“Don’t dare talk like that,” Elle said with soft mock sternness. “As if you are making a farewell speech! I won’t have it.” She turned to Lod. “Go and see if there is not something we can give him for a fever.” Then she looked back at Mr. Walker. “As for you, rest and get well, for we have need of you.”
Mr. Walker closed his eyes and seemed to lapse back into unconsciousness.
“You must save him!” Nomadiel cried. Then, without waiting for an answer, she turned to Rage. “Where did you go when you vanished? It’s your fault he got sick! You made him lose heart.”
“I awoke back in my world,” Rage said gently, pitying the girl. “It turned out that I had been asleep the whole time I was here after all. I didn’t know because I had fallen and knocked myself out. When I slept again in my world, I tried to will myself to you and Mr. Walker, but I thought of Elle for a moment, and…” She waved her hand at Elle.
Puck glared at Elle. “You might have waited for us, and then we would not have wasted so much time looking for you! We ought to have gone through all together.”
Elle only gathered him up and hugged him. He seemed to enjoy it despite his scowls. “I am glad to see you, for your bad temper is like a warm fire in this wearyingly bland world where no one seems to feel anything very much, and if they do, they are soon taken away.”
“Is it only summerlanders who are taken?” Billy asked as she set Puck down.
“Mostly,” Elle said. She turned her attention now to Nomadiel and held out her hand solemnly. Nomadiel blushed as she laid her own small hand in it.
“I am very glad to see you, Lady,” she said.
“And I you, Noma, though these are difficult days,” Elle said very seriously. “We will have need of your courage on this quest.” She bowed her head gracefully to Rally, who stood on Nomadiel’s shoulder blinking at her. “And we will have need of your wisdom, too, Master Crow.”
The bird gave a pleased squawk and preened slightly. “I am at your service, Lady Elle,” he said.
Elle nodded and rose to face Thaddeus. “It is good to see you again, witch man, though I am surprised your lady spared you.” Puck snorted rudely. “I wish I had realized sooner who was seeking me. When I heard that a big, grim-faced man was asking questions, I thought it must be some agent of the Stormlord. Indeed, I was planning to capture you because you were the first person I had heard of who might be capable of answering questions about the keep.”
“Grim-faced!” Thaddeus echoed indignantly. “I could hardly go about smiling like a great fool here, could I?”
“True,” Elle conceded, grinning. “You have met my summerlander friend?” She nodded at the door through which Lod had gone in search of fever medicine.
“He is a summerlander?” Thaddeus asked incredulously. “Why, he is no more than a child.”
“Almost all of the rebels are young or very young, including their leader,” Elle said. “I do not know why, but they are as brave and determined as any adult warrior could be.”
“Well, that may be,” Thaddeus said, looking unconvinced. “The lad said only that the Lady Elle wanted to see us. So we came at once. But how did you get mixed up with summerland r
ebels anyway?”
“It is they who decided to mix themselves up with me,” Elle said, gesturing to them to sit. “Their leader declared that she knew that I was a great summerland warrior who had come to free this world from endless night. It seems there is some legend here to that effect, and the fact that the earth tremors here seemed to have begun about the time I arrived doesn’t help.”
“You were not stupid enough to let them believe that you were their legendary warrior come to unveil the sun, I hope,” Puck said sourly.
Elle laughed. “I make no promises that I will not keep, little man,” she said. “Now, let us talk seriously. Rage has told me quite a lot, but you must add what you have learned since her departure.”
“Not much,” Thaddeus confessed apologetically. “When we could find no way to confirm that the wizard was here, we put our efforts into finding you.” He added that the only thing they had heard about the wizard was a rather vague rumor of an old man visiting Stormkeep, but when they investigated, the description did not sound like the wizard.
“The man who told us of him did not smell of lies,” Nomadiel added earnestly. Rage noticed that her eyes hardly left Elle’s face as she spoke, as if all hope lay in the lovely dog-woman’s face, which perhaps was true.
“Perhaps he did not lie,” Elle murmured thoughtfully. “The wizard would have known how to prevent anyone marking him as a stranger. I have been unable to find proof that he is here, either, but the fact that the people here believe the master of the keep visits his wrath upon them in the form of storms makes me certain that our wizard would at least have gone to Stormkeep, even if he went somewhere else afterward.”
“You have a plan?” Nomadiel asked, her eyes alight.
Elle nodded. “The bones of one, at least. It is a twofold plan. Rage will be drawn back to her world again when she wakes. Next time when she sleeps, she will dream-travel to the wizard. If he is in Stormkeep, then he will most likely be a prisoner. It may be that Rage will be unable to break the iron circles that will bind him, but at least she will be able to speak to him.”
“Iron circles?” Rage echoed blankly.
“Everyone knows that iron stops magic,” Nomadiel said scornfully.
“Remember the bracelets the High Keeper made girls wear to stop them becoming witch folk?” Thaddeus said.
“I remember, but the wizard was trapped in an hourglass when I was here last, and he couldn’t do magic then…”
“The circles do not have to be about his hands. They can also be either side of him or above and below him,” Nomadiel said.
“The hourglass was capped at both ends with iron circles,” Billy said softly to Rage. “He could manage to reach your dreams as he did because the iron wasn’t actually around his wrists.”
“I think this plan is madness,” Puck announced. “What if the wizard is dead? What if she dream-travels herself under the ground?”
Rage’s skin rose into gooseflesh, but Elle merely shook her head. “He is not dead.”
“What if the Stormlord’s pet wizard is waiting?”
“I am not sure there is a wizard in Stormkeep, but—” Elle began.
“An alarm clock!” Rage broke in. “I can set it so that I will only sleep a little while. That way I won’t be there long enough for anyone to notice me.”
Elle nodded her approval. “A good thought. So Rage will wake, then sleep again as soon as she can manage it, and then she and Billy will return to tell us what they discovered. Our wizard might also be restored to us by then.”
“Puck is right,” Thaddeus protested. “The danger to Rage will be great. You cannot count upon the Stormlord not noticing an intruder, even if she is only there for a short while.”
“That is true, witch man,” Elle replied. “But I will send a message to him announcing that I mean to send one of my minions inside his supposedly impregnable keep to reveal my power. If he captures Rage, he will want to question her about me.”
“You can’t know that,” Puck said.
“He would be a fool if he did otherwise, and I do not think the master of this place is a fool. Yet there is a risk,” Elle admitted. “And Rage has already agreed to take it.”
“It is a better plan than sending Rally or me flying over the walls to see if the wizard is there,” Puck said grudgingly, giving Thaddeus a black look.
“You would have been spotted and shot from the air by arrows, for the watch-walks about the walls are manned by gray fliers,” Elle said.
“And if Rage cannot release the wizard so that he can effect his own escape?” Rally asked.
“I have some thoughts on that, but I am not ready to utter them yet,” Elle said calmly. “Rage, how long do you think before you will wake?”
Rage thought of how tired she had been after her long walk to the dam and back. “I’m afraid it might be a while yet.”
Thaddeus let out a low cry. “I have something that won’t help you wake in your own world, but it might help you sleep, if you can carry it there with you.” He reached into his pocket and pulled out a small pouch. “Sleep dust. The best thing about it is that you won’t sleep for long.”
Rage did not know if things could shift with her dream form, but it would be marvelous if she did have the sleep dust with her when she woke because they would not have to wait to return to Null.
“All right, now we must compose a letter for the Stormlord, and think on how it might be delivered,” Elle said briskly. She looked at Nomadiel. “Since I cannot write, you will have to do it for me.” She rose and Nomadiel followed her.
As they reached the door, Rage had an idea. “Elle, what made you come here so suddenly from Valley? Isn’t it because you dreamed of the firecat?” she cried. Rage felt herself flush as everyone stared at her, including a puzzled-looking Elle. “I’m sorry I yelled,” Rage said, feeling foolish. “I just thought talking about the firecat might make me wake up, because every other time I’ve tried to tell anyone about it, I’ve woken up.”
“A pity it did not work,” Elle said. “But how did you know that I had dreamed of the firecat?”
“You saying that the wizard wasn’t dead made me think of it. Because how could you know that unless the firecat had come to you again?”
Elle laughed. “It is true that the wretched creature plagues my dreams, demanding that I seek out its master, but it can offer no help except to insist that he is here somewhere. For some reason, the firecat is terrified of entering this world. What did it tell you?”
Rage felt the blood in her cheeks drain away. “It said that the wizard was in trouble. But I wouldn’t listen. I thought it was a dream.”
“So that is why it came to me! I did wonder. Well, you shouldn’t trouble yourself about it,” Elle said.
Nomadiel suddenly gave a little scream and everyone turned to her in startled alarm. “He disappeared right in front of my eyes!”
“Who did?” Thaddeus asked.
“That boy. That Billy Thunder.”
Rage swung round, but even as she did so, she experienced the pulling sensation of waking.
She woke to find Billy gnawing her fingertips gently.
“It’s all right! I’m awake!” Rage sat up and gave him a hug, marveling that for once her mind was quite clear about what had been happening. It was pitch dark and she looked at the clock. It read five o’clock. She had been asleep for a long time. She was wide awake, but if she had managed to bring back the sleep dust, she could use it and go right back to sleep. She dug into her pocket but it was empty. She would just have to wait until she was sleepy.
The bedroom was icy cold, which meant the power was out again, but the stove would still be hot. Rage climbed over Billy, who wagged his tail and got down, too. She patted him and told him to be quiet so as not to wake her uncle.
If he had come back.
Rage pulled on her robe and went through the house to the extension. The door was open, which meant he had not come in. Just the same, she went to the fro
nt door and opened it to make sure the car was not in the driveway. Billy slipped past her and padded away around the side of the house. It was too cold to wait for him to come back, so Rage shut the door and went back to the bedroom. She dressed in jeans, two sweaters, and her old zebra-head slippers.
She went to the kitchen, flicking the light switch as she entered. Nothing happened. She checked the fuse box by the back door but it was fine, so the power was out. She opened the flue to the stove and fed in some more wood. She had used the last in the wood box, so she went to get some more from the outside stack, dragging on the old coat hanging on the back of the door as she went though it.
Once the wood box was replenished, Rage scrambled eggs and made tea. Only when she sat down to drink it did she let herself think about what might be happening in Null. She worried most about Mr. Walker, and whether he had recovered. Elle had seemed certain that he would. But something had been wrong with the little dog-man, even before he had gone through the winter door.
Disliking the somber turn of her thoughts, Rage decided that the quickest way to get sleepy would be to tire herself out, so she went to chop some wood. Then she dusted and swept and lit candles around the house, feeling like a seventeenth-century maid. She even mopped the kitchen floor. Then, with nothing else to do, she got out her homework. Spreading it on the floor beside the stove, she immersed herself in reading, but thoughts about her uncle kept creeping in to distract her. Why hadn’t he called?
He iss having accident! whispered the firecat inside her mind.
“What do you want?” Rage snapped aloud, but there was no answer. The firecat voice was merely the voice of her own gnawing doubts and fears.
Billy scratched at the door and she let him inside and fed him, then she forced herself back to her homework. For a time, she managed to concentrate. Finally, she threw the book aside. “Oh, Billy, I can’t bear this waiting,” she cried.
As if in response, the power suddenly came on. At the same time, the phone began to ring. Rage froze in surprise, then she scrambled to her feet and ran across the room. Instinct made her hesitate to lift the receiver. She heard her voice on the answering machine greeting the caller, then came the voice of Mrs. Somersby asking for Uncle Samuel. To her horror, she heard the older woman say that she was sorry to have missed their meeting, but that she looked forward to discussing the program with him as soon as was convenient. Then she hung up.