chapter 1

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    The rabbit had been run over minutes before. Its pink eyes were glazed and blood stais  white fur. Unnaturally  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 piulation navy blazer. That, coupled ?９9ｌib.h her long skirt, stogs and sensible shoes, identified her as a schoolgirl. A e uhe badge read “Sabriel” and the Roman “VI” and gilt  proclaimed her to be both a member of the Sixth Form and a prefect.

    The rabbit was, uionably, dead. Sabriel looked up from it and back along the bricked drive that left the road and curved up to an imposing pair ht-iron gates. A sign above the gate, in gilt letters of mock Gothinouhat they were the gates to Wyverley College. Smaller letters added that the school was “Established in  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 clag 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, the 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 turo stone. A faint whistling sound came from her slightly parted lips, like the wind heard from far away. Frost formed on her fiips and rimed the asphalt beh her feet and knees.

    The irl, 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 sed later, she had regained her baland 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 hahe rabbit over and blood stained her expet hands.

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

    “A scratch. It’s already closed up.”

    Jath 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 uhe blood,” stammered Jath. “What did you . . .”

    “I didn’t,” snapped Sabriel. “But perhaps you  tell me what you are doing out of bounds?”

    “Chasing Bunny,” replied Jath, 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 Jath. “It’s a reason.”

    “You  explain it to Mrs. Umbrade then.”

    “Oh, Sabriel! You wouldn’t! You know I was only chasing Bunny. I’d never have e out—”

    Sabriel held up her hands in mock defeat, aured back to the gates.

    “If you’re baside within three minutes, I won’t have seen you. And opee this time. They won’t be locked till I go baside.”

    Jath smiled, her whole face beaming, whirled around and sped back up the drive, Bunny clutched against her neck. Sabriel watched till she had gohrough the gate, thehe 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 Jath did love it so much—but what would that lead to? It was no great step fring back a rabbit ting back a person.

    Worse, it had been so easy. She had caught the spirit right at the wellspring of the river, and had retur with barely a gesture of power, patg 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 neancer.

    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, ing first in English, equal first in Music, third in Mathematics, seventh in Sce, sed in Fighting Arts and fourth iiquette. She had also been a runaway first in Magic, but that wasn’t printed on the certificate. Magily worked in thions of Aierre close to the Wall which marked the border with the Old Kingdom. Farther away, it was sidered 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-rouation, 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 b school. He had paid in advance for that first year, in Old Kingdom silver dehat stood up to surreptitious touches with cold iron.

    Thereafter, he had e to visit his daughter twice a year, at Midsummer and Midwinter, staying for several days on each occasion and always bringing more silver.

    Uandably, the Headmistress was very fond of Sabriel. Particularly since she never seemed troubled by her father’s rare visitations, as most irls would be. Once Mrs.

    Umbrade had asked Sabriel if she minded, and had been troubled by the ahat Sabriel saw her father far more often than when he was actually there. Mrs. Umbrade didn’t teach Magid didn’t want to know any more about it other than the pleasant fact that some parents would pay siderable sums to have their daughters schooled in the basics of sorcery and entment.

    Mrs. Umbrade certainly didn’t want to know how Sabriel saw her father. Sabriel, oher  hand, always looked forward to his unofficial visits and watched the moon, trag 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 he same at any oime 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 characteristid rose up, extinguished the fire, put out the electric light and rattled the shutters—all necessary preparations, it seemed, for her father’s phosphorest sending to appear in the spare armchair.

    Sabriel articularly looking forward to her father’s visit that November. It would be his last, because college was about to end and she wao discuss her future. Mrs. Umbrade wanted her to go to uy, 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 bee even less frequent. Oher hand, going to uy 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 iion, particularly with young men, of whiodity there was a distinct she 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 precariousl9９ｌｉb?y on the arm of her chair. It was almost midnight and Abhorsen hadn’t appeared. Sabriel had checked the almanac twid had even opehe shutters to peer out through the glass at the sky. It was defihe 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 owerful sorcerer, but even then . . .

    “Sabriel! Sabriel!”

    A high-pitched voiterrupted her thought, quickly followed by a hasty knod a rattle of the doorknob. Sabriel sighed, pushed herself out of her chair, caught the teacup and unlocked the door.

    A young girl stood oher 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 Rebed 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 Rebed 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 a. She ig 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 cresdoing to an hysterical chorus. There were firls in the dormitory—most of the First Form, all uhe 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 en. 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 ures at all, but the head quested from side to side, as if whatever se did possess worked in a narre.

    Curiously, it carried an absolutely mundane sa one four-fingered hand, the rough-woven cloth in stark trast to its own surreal flesh.

    Sabriel’s hands moved in a plicated gesture, drawing the symbols of the Charter that intimated sleep, quiet a. 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 bato her bed.

    The creature’s head stopped moving and Sabriel ks attention was now tered 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 ohin carpet. As it passed each bed, the electric lights above them flared ond went out.

    Sabriel let her hands fall to her side and focused her eyes on the ter of the creature’s torso, feeling the stuff of which it was made. She had e 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 oruder.

    The river flowed around her legs, cold as always. The light, grey and without warmth, still stretched to airely 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 ed in the aura of death which it carried to the living world. It was an Old Kingdom denizen, vaguely humanoid, but more like ahan 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 bad ran into the river.

    Somewhere, beyond the First Gate, or even further, that umbilical rested in the hands of a. As long as the thread existed the creature would be totally uhe trol of its master, who could use its senses and spirit as it saw fit.

    Something tugged at Sabriel’s physical body, and she relutly 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 ba the creature. It was halfway down the dorm, still single-mindedly rolling one leg after the other. “Without free will.

    Somethi it back to the living world. It’s trolled 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, f oongue—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 w over the possibilities. She was used to explaining purely neantic aspeagiiss Greenwood. The Magistrix had taught her Charter Magic, but neancy was definitely not on the syllabus. Sabriel had learned more than she wao know about neancy 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 dahe 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 eg for lohan 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 fli 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 thied 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 searg 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 surfad 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 pletely 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<dfn>..</dfn> to slog back against the current to a point where she could easily return to life. The sa her hand was heavy and there was a leaden feeling iomach. If the messenger was truly Abhorsen’s, then he himself was uo 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 <u>９９ｌiｂ?</u>feel the Magistrix’s hand on her shoulder, but her attention was fastened on the sack she held in her hand. She didn’t o look to know that the creature was gos maion 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 m.

    “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 opehe 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 o 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  was an old brow, a hand’s-breadth wide, which always smelled faintly of beeswax. Seven tubular leather pouches hung from it, starting with ohe size of a small pill bottle; growing larger, till the seventh was almost the size of a jar. The bandolier was desigo be worn across the chest, with the pouches hanging down. Sabriel opehe 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 hat somehow lingered in the mind, even after the sound was gone.

    “Father’s instruments,” whispered Sabriel.

    “The tools of a neancer.”

    “But there are Charter marks engraved on the bell . . . and the handle!” interjected the Magistrix, who was looking down with fasation.

    “Neancy is Free Magiot 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.”

    “Yoing to be leaving us, aren’t you?”

    the Magistrix said suddenly, as Sabriel replaced the bell and stood up, sword in one hand, bandolier iher. “I just saw it, in the refle of the bell. You were crossing the Wall . . .”

    “Yes. Into the Old Kingdom,” said Sabriel, with sudden realization. “Something has happeo 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 a, trying to fix her mind on the practicalities of the journey, rather than on what could have happeo her father.

    She would take a cab as early as possible into Bain, the own, and then a bus to the Aierre perimeter that faced the９9ｌｉb? Wall. With luck, she would be there by early afternoon . . .

    Behind these plans, her thoughts kept jumping back to Abhorsen. What could have happeo trap him ih? And what could she really hope to do about it, even if she did get to the Old Kingdom?

百度搜索 Sabriel (The Abhorsen Trilogy) 天涯 或 Sabriel (The Abhorsen Trilogy) 天涯在线书库 即可找到本书最新章节.