CHAPTER FIFTEEN： BLOODMOSS-1
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On, said the alethiometer. Farther, higher.So on they climbed. The witches flew above to spy out the best routes, because the hilly land soon gave way to steeper slopes and rocky footing, and as the sun rose toward noon, the travelers found themselves in a tangled land ullies, cliffs, and boulder-strewn valleys where not a single green leaf grew, and where the stridulation of is was the only sound.
They moved on, stopping only for sips of water from their goatskin flasks, and talking little.
Pantalaimon flew above Lyras head for a while until he tired of that, and then he became a little sure-footed mountain sheep, vain of his horns, leaping among rocks while Lyra scrambled laboriously alongside. Will moved on grimly, screwing up his eyes against the glare, ign the worsening pain from his hand, and finally reag a state in whient alone was good and stillness bad, so that he suffered more from resting than from toiling on. And sihe failure of the witches spell to stop his bleeding, he thought they were regarding him with fear, too, as if he was marked by some curse greater than their own power9９liｂ?s.
At one point they came to a little lake, a patch of intense blue scarcely thirty yards across among the red rocks. They stopped there to drink and refill their flasks, and to soak their ag feet in the icy water. They stayed a few minutes and moved on, and soon afterward, when the sun was at its highest and hottest, Serafina Pekkala darted down to speak to them. She was agitated.
"I must leave you for a while," she said. "Lee Scoresby needs me. I dont know why. But he wouldnt call if he didnt need my help. Keep going, and Ill find you."
"Mr. Scoresby?" said Lyra, excited and anxious. "But where—"
But Serafina was gone, speeding out of sight before Lyra could finish the question. Lyra reached automatically for the alethiometer to ask what had happeo Lee Scoresby, but she let her hand drop, because shed promised to do no more than guide Will.
She looked across to him. He was sitting nearby, his hand held loosely on his knee and still slowly dripping blood, his face scorched by the sun and pale uhe burning.
"Will," she said, "dyou know why you have to find your father?"
"Its what Ive always known. My mother said Id take up my fathers mahats all I know."
"What does that mean, taking up his mantle? Whats a mantle?"
"A task, I suppose. Whatever hes been doing, Ive got to carry on. It makes as much sense as anything else."
He wiped the sweat out of his eyes with his right hand. What he couldnt say was that he longed for his father as a lost child yearns for home. That parison wouldnt have occurred to him, because home was the place he kept safe for his mother, not the place others kept safe for him.
But it had been five years now sihat Saturday m in the supermarket when the pretend game of hiding from the enemies became desperately real, such a long time in his life, and his heart craved to hear the words "Well done, well done, my child; no one oh could have doer; Im proud of you. e a now...."
Will longed for that so much that he hardly knew he did. It was just part of what everythi like. So he couldnt express that to Lyra now, though she could see it in his eyes, and that was new for her, too, to be quite so perceptive. The fact was that where Will was ed, she was developing a new kind of sense, as if he were simply more in focus than anyone shed known before. Everything about him was clear and close and immediate.
And she might have said that to him, but at that moment a witch flew down.
"I see people behind us," she said. "Theyre a long way back, but theyre moving quickly. Shall I go closer and look?"
"Yes, do," said Lyra, "but fly low, and hide, and dohem see you."
Will and Lyra got painfully to their feet again and clambered on.
"I been cold plenty of times," Lyra said, to take her mind off the pursuers, "but I ehis hot, ever. Is it this hot in your world?"
"Not where I used to live. Not normally. But the climates been ging. The summers are hotter than they used to be. They say that people have been interfering with the atmosphere by putting chemicals in it, and the weathers going out of trol."
"Yeah, well, they have," said Lyra, "and it is. And were here in the middle of it."
He was too hot and thirsty to reply, and they climbed ohlessly ihrobbing air.
Pantalaimon was a cricket now, and sat on Lyras shoulder, too tired to leap or fly. From time to time the witches would see a spring high up, too high to climb to, and fly up to fill the childrens flasks. They would soon have died without water, and there was none where they were; any spring that made its way into the air was soon swallowed again among the rocks.
And so they moved on, toward evening.
The witch who flew back to spy was called Le. She flew low, fr t, and as the sun was setting and drawing a wild blood-red out of the rocks, she came to the little blue lake and found a troop of soldiers making camp.
But her first glimpse of them told her more than she wao know; these soldiers had no daemons. And they werent from Wills world, or the world of Cittagazze, where peoples daemons were ihem, and where they still looked alive; these men were from her own world, and to see them without daemons was a gross and siing horror.
Then out of a tent by the lakeside came the explanation. Le saw a woman, a short-life, graceful in her khaki hunting clothes and as full of life as the golden monkey who capered along the waters edge beside>.９9ｌiｂ.</a> her.
Le hid among the rocks above and watched as Mrs. Coulter spoke to the officer in charge, and as his men put up tents, made fires, boiled water.
The witch had been among Serafma Pekkalas troop who rescued the children at Bolvangar, and she loo shoot Mrs. Coulter on the spot; but some fortune roteg the woman, for it was just too far for a bowshot from where she was, and the witch could get no closer without making herself invisible. So she began to make the spell. It took ten minutes of deep tration.
fident at last, Le went down the rocky slope toward the lake, and as she walked through the camp, one or two blank-eyed soldiers glanced up briefly, but found what they saw too hard to remember, and looked away again. The witch stopped outside the tent Mrs. Coulter had goo, and fitted an arrow to her b.
She listeo the low voice through the vas and then moved carefully to the open flap that overlooked the lake.
Ihe tent Mrs. Coulter was talking to a man Le hadnt seen before: an older man, gray-haired and powerful, with a serpent daemon twined around his wrist. He was sitting in a vas chair beside hers, and she was leaning toward him, speaking softly.
"Of course, Carlo," she was saying, "Ill tell you anything you like. What do you want to know?"
"How do you and the Specters?" the man said. "I didnt think it possible, but you have them following you like dogs.... Are they afraid of your bodyguard? What is it?"
"Simple," she said. "They know I give them more nourishment if they let me live than if they e me. I lead them to all the victims their phantom hearts desire. As soon as you described them to me, I knew I could domihem, and so it turns out. And a whole world trembles in the power of these pallid things! But, Carlo," she whispered, "I please you, too, you know. Would you like me to please you even more?"
"Marisa," he murmured, "its enough of a pleasure to be close to you...."
"No, it isnt, Carlo; you know it isnt. You know I please you more than this."
Her daemons little black horny hands were stroking the serpent daemon. Little by little the serpent loosened herself and began to flow along the mans arm toward the monkey. Both the man and the woman were holding glasses of golden wine, and she sipped hers and leaned a little closer to him.
"Ah," said the man as the daemon slipped slowly off his arm a her weight into the golden monkeys hands. The monkey raised her slowly to his fad ran his cheek softly along her emerald skiongue flicked blackly this way and that, and the man sighed.
"Carlo, tell me why youre pursuing the boy," Mrs. Coulter whispered, and her voice was as soft as the monkeys caress. "Why do you o find him?"
"He has something I want. Oh, Marisa—"
"What is it, Carlo? Whats he got?"
He shook his head. But he was finding it hard to resist; his daemon was twined gently around the monkeys breast, and running her head through and through the long, lustrous fur as his hands moved along her fluid length.
Le watched them, standing invisible just two paces from where they sat. Her b was taut, the arrow o it in readiness; she could have pulled and loosed ihan a sed, and Mrs. Coulter would have been dead before she finished drawing breath. But the witch was curious. She stood still and silent and wide-eyed.
But while she was watg Mrs. Coulter, she didnt look behind her across the little blue lake. On the far side of it in the darkness a grove of ghostly trees seemed to have plaself, a grove that shivered every so often with a tremor like a scious iion. But they were not trees, of course; and while all the curiosity of Le and her daemon was directed at Mrs. Coulter, one of the pallid forms detached itself from its fellows and drifted across the surface of the icy water, causing not a single ripple, until it paused a foot from the ro which Les daemon erched.
"You could easily tell me, Carlo," Mrs. Coulter was murmuring. "You could whisper it. You could pretend to be talking in your sleep, and who could blame you for that? Just tell me what the boy has, and why you want it. I could get it for you... .Wouldnt you like me to do that? Just tell me, Carlo. I dont want it. I want the girl. What is it? Just tell me, and you shall have it."
He gave a soft shudder. His eyes were closed. Then he said, "Its a khe subtle knife of Cittagazze. You havent heard of it, Marisa? Some people call it teleutaia makhaira, the last knife of all. Others call it Aesahaettr."
"What does it do, Carlo? Why is it special?"
"Ah ... Its the khat will cut anything. Not even its makers knew what it could do. Nothing, no one, matter, spirit, angel, air—nothing is invulnerable to the subtle knife. Marisa, its mine, you uand?"
"Of course, Carlo. I promise. Let me fill ylass ..."
And as the golden monkey slowly ran his hands along the emerald serpent again and again, squeezing just a little, lifting, stroking as Sir Charles sighed with pleasure, L９9ｌib.e saw what was truly happening: because while the mans eyes were closed, Mrs. Coulter secretly tilted a few drops from a small flask into the glass before filling it again with wine.
"Here, darling," she whispered. "Lets drink, to each other....<big></big>"
He was already intoxicated. He took the glass and sipped greedily, once, again, and again.
And then, without any warning, Mrs. Coulter stood up and turned and looked Le full in the face.
"Well, witch," she said, "did you think I dont know how you make yourself invisible?"
Le was too surprised to move.
Behihe man was struggling to breathe. His chest was heaving, his face was red, and his daemon was limp and fainting in the monkeys hands. The monkey shook her off in pt.
Le tried to swing her bow up, but a fatal paralysis had touched her shoulder. She couldnt make herself do it. This had never happened before, and she uttered a little cry.
"Oh, its too late for that," said Mrs. Coulter. "Look at the lake, witch."
Le turned and saw her snow bunting daemon fluttering and shrieking as if he were in a glass chamber that was beiied of air; fluttering and falling, slumping, failing, his beak opening wide, gasping in panic. The Specter had enveloped him.
"No!" she cried, and tried to move toward it, but was driven back by a spasm of nausea. Even in her sied distress, Le could see that Mrs. Coulter had more for her soul than anyone she had ever seen. It didnt surprise her to see that the Specter was under Mrs. Coulters power; no one could resist that authority. Le turned ba anguish to the woman.
"Let him go! Please let him go!" she cried.
"Well see. Is the child with you? The girl Lyra?"
"Yes!"
"And a boy, too? A boy with a knife?"
"Yes—I beg you—"
"And how many witches have you?"
"Twenty! Let him go, let him go!"
"All in the air? Or do some of you stay on the ground with the children?"
"Most in the air, three or four on the ground always—this is anguish—let him go or kill me now!"
"Ho the mountaihey? Are they moving on, or have they stopped to rest?"
Le told her everything. She could have resisted any torture but what was happening to her dajmon now. When Mrs. Coulter had learned all she wao know about where the witches were, and how they guarded Lyra and Will, she said, "And now tell me this. You witches know something about the child Lyra. I nearly lear from one of your sisters, but she died before I could plete the torture. Well, there is no oo save you now. Tell me the truth about my daughter."
Le gasped, "She will be the mother—she will be life—mother—she will disobey—she will—"
"Name her! You are saying everything but the most important thing! Name her!" cried Mrs. Coulter.
"Eve! Mother of all! Eve, again! Mother Eve!" stammered Le, sobbing.
"Ah," said Mrs. Coulter.
And she breathed a great sigh, as if the purpose of her life was clear to her at last.
Dimly the witch saw what she had done, and through the horror that was enveloping her she tried to cry out: "What will you do to her? What will you do?"
"Why, I shall have to destroy her," said Mrs. Coulter, "to prevent another Fall.... Why didnt I see this before? It was toe to see...."
She clapped her hands together softly, like a child, wide-eyed. Le, whimpering, heard her go on: "Of course. Asriel will make war ohority, and then.... Of course, of course. As before, so again. And Lyra is Eve. And this time she will not fall. Ill see to that."
And Mrs. Coulter drew herself up, and snapped her fio the Specter feeding ochs daemon. The little snow bunting daemon lay twitg on the rock as the Specter moved toward the witch herself, and then whatever Le had undergone before was doubled and trebled and multiplied a hundredfold. She felt a nausea of the soul, a hideous and siing despair, a melancholy weariness so profound that she was going to die of it. Her last scious thought was disgust at life; her senses had lied to her. The world was not made of energy and delight but of foulness, betrayal, and lassitude. Living was hateful, ah was er, and from end to end of the universe this was the first and last and only truth.
Thus she stood, bow in hand, indifferent, dead in life.
So Le failed to see or to care about what Mrs. Coulter did . Ign the gray-haired man slumped unscious in the vas chair and his dull-skinned daemon coiled in the dust, the woman called the captain of the soldiers and ordered them to get ready for a night march up the mountain.
Then she went to the edge of the water and called to the Specters.
They came at her and, gliding like pillars of mist across the water. She raised her arms and made them fet they were earthbound, so that one by ohey rose into the air and floated free like malignant thistledown, drifting up into the night and borne by the air currents toward Will and Lyra and the other witches; but Le saw nothing of it.
The temperature dropped quickly after dark, and when Will and Lyra had eaten the last of their dry bread, they lay down under an ing rock to keep warm and try to sleep. At least Lyra didnt have to try; she was unscious ihan a minute, curled tightly around Pantalaimon, but Will couldnt find sleep, no matter how long he lay there. It artly his hand, which was now throbbing right up to the elbow and unfortably swollen, and partly the hard ground, and partly the cold, and partly utter exhaustion, and partly his longing for his mother.
He was afraid for her, of course, and he knew shed be safer if he was there to look after her; but he wanted her to look after him, too, as shed done when he was very small. He wanted her to bandage him and tuck him into bed and sing to him and take away all the trouble and surround him with all the warmth and softness and mother-kindness he needed so badly; and it was never going to happen. Part of him was only a little boy still. So he cried, but he lay very still as he did, not wanting to wake Lyra.
But he still wasnt asleep. He was more awake than ever. Finally he uncurled his stiff limbs and got up quietly, shivering; and with the k his waist he set off higher up the mountain, to calm his restlessness.
Behind him the sentry witchs robin daemon cocked his head, and she turned from the watch she was keeping to see Will clambering up the rocks. She reached for her pine brand silently took to the air, not to disturb him but to see that he came to no harm.
He didnt notice. He felt such a o move and keep moving that he hardly noticed the pain in his hand anymore. He felt as if he should walk all night, all day, forever, because nothing else would calm this fever in his breast. And as if in sympathy with him, a wind was rising. There were no leaves to stir in this wilderness, but the air buffeted his body and made his hair stream away from his face; it was wild outside him and wild within.
He climbed higher and higher, hardly ohinking of how he might find his way back down to Lyra, until he came out on a little plateau almost at the top of the world, it seemed. All around him, on every horizon, the mountains reached no higher. In the brilliant glare of the moon the only colors were stark blad dead white, and every edge was jagged and every surface bare.
The wild wind must have been bringing clouds overhead, because suddenly the moon was covered, 藏书网and darkness swept over the whole landscape—thick clouds, too, for no gleam of moonlight shohrough them. Ihan a minute Will found himself in nearly total darkness.
And at the same moment Will felt a grip on his right arm.
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