Abhorsen (24 page)

“Everything is as you left it,” replied Coelle. “We have no real trouble yet. Felicity! Please have the Abhorsen’s trunk brought up from the cellar. Pippa and Zettie . . . and whoever is hall monitor today . . . can help you. As to news, I have messages and—”

“Messages! From Ellimere or Sameth?” asked Touchstone urgently.

Coelle took two folded pieces of paper from her sleeve and passed them across. Touchstone grabbed them eagerly and stood close to Sabriel to read them, as Felicity and her cohorts surged past and disappeared through one of the heavy, highly polished doors.

The first message was written in blue pencil on a torn piece of letterhead that had the same bugle-and-scroll symbol that had adorned the side of the postal van. Touchstone and Sabriel read it through carefully, deep frowns appearing on both their foreheads. Then they read it again and looked at each other, deep surprise clear on their faces.

“One of our old girls sent that,” contributed Coelle nervously, as no one said anything. “Lornella Acren-Janes, who is assistant to the Postmaster General. A copy of a telegram, obviously. I don’t know if it ever went to your embassy.”

“Can it be trusted?” asked Touchstone. “Aunt Lirael? Abhorsen-in-Waiting? Is this some other ploy to cloud our minds?”

Sabriel shook her head.

“It sounds like Sam,” she said. “Even though I don’t understand it. Clearly much has been going on in the Old Kingdom. I do not think we will quickly come to the root of it all.”

She unfolded the second piece of paper. Unlike the first, this was thick, handmade paper, and there were only three symbols upon it. Quiescent Charter marks, dark on the white page. Sabriel ran her palm across them, and they sprang into bright, vivid life, almost leaping into her hand. With them came Ellimere’s voice, clear and strong as if she stood next to them.

“Mother! Father! I hope you get this very quickly. The Clayr have Seen much more, too much to tell in this message. There is great danger, beyond our imagining. I am at Barhedrin with the Guard, the Trained Bands, and a Seven Hundred and Eighty-Four of the Clayr. The Clayr are trying to See what we must do. They say Sam is alive and fighting, and that whatever we do, you must get to Barhedrin by Anstyr’s Day or it will be too late. We have to take the Paperwings somewhere. Oh—I have an aunt, apparently your half-sister . . . What? Don’t interrupt—”

Ellimere’s voice stopped mid word. The Charter marks faded back into the paper.

“An interruption mid spell,” said Touchstone with a frown. “It’s unlike Ellimere not to redo it. Whose half-sister? She cannot be mine—”

“The important fact is that the Clayr have finally Seen something,” said Sabriel. “Anstyr’s Day . . . we need to consult an almanac. That must be soon . . . very soon . . . we will have to go on immediately.”

“I’m not sure you’ll be able to,” said Coelle nervously. “That message got here only this morning. A Crossing Point Scout brought it. He was in a hurry to get back. Apparently there has been some sort of attack from across the Wall, and—”

“An attack from across the Wall!” interrupted Sabriel and Touchstone together. “What kind of attack?”

“He didn’t know,” stammered Coelle, taken aback at the ferocity of the question, Sabriel and Touchstone both leaning in close to her. “It was in the far west. But there is also trouble at the Crossing Point. Apparently General Kingswold, the visiting Inspector General, has declared for the Our Country government, but General Tindall refuses to recognize it or Kingswold. Various units have taken sides, some with Tindall, some with Kingswold—”

“So Corolini has openly tried to seize power?” asked Sabriel. “When did this happen?”

“It was in this morning’s paper,” replied Coelle. “We haven’t had the afternoon edition. There is fighting in Corvere. . . . You didn’t know?”

“We’ve got this far by hidden ways, avoiding contact with Ancelstierrans as much as possible,” said Touchstone. “There hasn’t been a lot of time to read the papers.”

“The
Times
said the Chief Minister still controls the Arsenal, Decision Palace, and Corvere Moot,” said Coelle.

“If he holds the Palace, then he still controls the Hereditary Arbiter,” said Touchstone. He looked at Sabriel for confirmation. “Corolini cannot form a government without the Arbiter’s blessing, can he?”

“Not unless everything has crumbled,” said Sabriel decisively. “But it doesn’t matter. Corolini, the attempted coup—it is all a sideshow. Everything that has happened here is the work of some power from the Old Kingdom—our kingdom. The continental wars, the influx of Southerling refugees, the rise of Corolini, everything has been orchestrated, planned for some purpose we do not know. But what can a power from our Kingdom want in Ancelstierre? I can understand sowing confusion in Ancelstierre to facilitate an attack across the Wall. But for what? And who?”

“Sam’s telegram mentions Chlorr,” said Touchstone.

“Chlorr is only a necromancer, though a powerful one,” said Sabriel. “It must be something else. ‘Evil updug . . . I mean dug up . . . near Edge—‘”

Sabriel stopped in mid sentence as Felicity and her three cohorts staggered in, carrying a long, brassbound trunk. They put it down in the middle of the floor. Charter marks drifted in lazy lines along the lid and across the keyhole. They flared into brilliant life as Sabriel touched the lock and whispered some words under her breath. There was a snick, the lid lifted a finger’s breadth, then Sabriel flung it open to reveal clothes, armor, swords, and her bell-bandolier. Sabriel ignored these, digging down one side to pull out a large, leather-bound book. Embossed gold type on the cover declared the book to be
An Alamanac of the Two Countries and the Region of the Wall
. She flicked quickly through its thick pages till she came to a series of tables.

“What is today?” she asked. “The date?”

“The twentieth,” said Coelle.

Sabriel ran her finger down one table and then across. She stared at the result, and her finger ran again through the numbers as she quickly rechecked it.

“When is it?” asked Touchstone. “Anstyr’s Day?”

“Now,” said Sabriel. “Today.”

Silence greeted her words. Touchstone rallied a moment later.

“It should still be morning in the Kingdom,” he said. “We can make it.”

“Not by road, not with the Crossing Point uncertain,” said Sabriel. “We are too far south to call a Paperwing—”

Her eyes flashed at a sudden idea. “Magistrix, does Hugh Jorbert still lease the school’s west paddock for his flying school?”

“Yes,” replied Coelle. “But the Jorberts are on holiday. They won’t be back for a month.”

“We can’t fly in an Ancelstierran machine,” protested Touchstone. “The wind is from the north. The engine will die within ten miles of here.”

“If we get high enough, we should be able to glide over,” said Sabriel. “Though not without a pilot. How many of the girls are taking flying lessons?”

“A dozen perhaps,” said Coelle reluctantly. “I don’t know if any of them can fly alone—”

“I have my solo rating,” interrupted Felicity eagerly. “My father used to fly with Colonel Jorbert in the Corps. I have two hundred hours in our Humbert trainer at home and fifty in the Beskwith here. I’ve done emergency landings, night flying, and everything. I can fly you over the Wall.”

“No, you cannot,” said Magistrix Coelle. “I forbid it!”

“These are not ordinary times,” said Sabriel, quelling Coelle with a glance. “We all must do whatever we can. Thank you, Felicity. We accept. Please go and get everything ready, while we get changed into more suitable clothes.”

Felicity let out an excited yell and raced out, her followers close behind. Coelle made a motion as if to restrain her but did not follow through. Instead, she sat down on the closest armchair, took a handkerchief out of her sleeve, and wiped her forehead. The Charter mark there glowed faintly as the cloth passed over it.

“She’s a student,” protested Coelle. “What will I tell her parents if . . . if she doesn’t . . .”

“I don’t know,” said Sabriel. “I have never known what to tell anybody. Except that it is better to do something than nothing, even if the cost is great.”

She did not look at Coelle as she spoke, but out through the window. In the middle of the lawn there was an obelisk of white marble, twenty feet high. Its sides were carved with many names. They were too small to be read from the window, but Sabriel knew most of the names anyway, even when she had not known the people. The obelisk was a memorial to all those who had fallen on a terrible night nearly twenty years before, when Kerrigor had come across the Wall with a horde of Dead. There were the names of Colonel Horyse, many other soldiers, schoolgirls, teachers, policemen, two cooks, a gardener . . .

A flash of color beyond the obelisk caught Sabriel’s eye. A white rabbit ran across the lawn, hotly pursued by a young girl, her pigtails flying as she vainly tried to capture her pet. For a moment Sabriel was lost in time, taken back to another fleeing rabbit, another pigtailed schoolgirl.

Jacinth and Bunny.

Jacinth was one of the names on the obelisk, but the rabbit outside might well be some distant descendant of Bunny. Life did go on, though it was never without struggle.

Sabriel turned away from the window and from the past. The future was what concerned her now. They had to reach Barhedrin within twelve hours. She startled Coelle by ripping off her blue coveralls, revealing that she was naked underneath. When Touchstone began to unbutton his coveralls, Coelle squealed and fled the room.

Sabriel and Touchstone looked at each other and laughed. Just for an instant, before they began to dress rapidly in the clothes from the trunk. Soon they looked and felt like themselves again, in good linen underwear, woolen shirt and leggings, and armored coats and surcoats. Touchstone had his twin swords, Sabriel her Abhorsen’s blade, and most important of all, she once again wore her bandolier of bells.

“Ready?” asked Sabriel as she settled the bandolier across her chest and adjusted the strap.

“Ready,” confirmed Touchstone. “Or as ready as I’m going to get. I hate flying at the best of times, let alone in one of those unreliable Ancelstierran machines.”

“I expect it’s going to be worse than usual,” said Sabriel. “But I don’t think we have any choice.”

“Of course,” sighed Touchstone. “I hesitate to ask—in what particular way will it be worse than usual?”

“Because, unless I miss my guess,” said Sabriel, “Jorbert will have flown his wife out in the two-seater Beskwith. That will leave his single-seater Humbert Twelve. We are going to have to lie on the wings.”

“I am always amazed at what you know,” said Touchstone. “I am at a loss with these machines. All of Jorbert’s flying conveyances looked the same to me.”

“Unfortunately they are not,” said Sabriel. “But there is no other way home that I can think of. Not if we are to make Barhedrin before the end of Anstyr’s Day. Come on!”

She strode out of the room and did not pause to look back to see if Touchstone was following. Of course, he was.

Jorbert’s flying school was a very small affair, not much more than a hobby for the retired Flying Corps colonel. There was a single hangar a hundred yards from his comfortable extended farmhouse. The hangar sat on the corner of Wyverley College’s West Field, which, suitably lined with yellow-painted oil drums, served as the runway.

Sabriel was correct about the aeroplane. There was only one, a boxy green single-seater biplane that to Touchstone looked as if it depended far too much on its many supporting struts and wires all holding together.

Felicity, almost unrecognizable in helmet, goggles, and fur flying suit, was already in the cockpit. Another girl stood by the propeller, and there were two more crouched by the wheels under the fuselage.

“You’ll have to lie on the wings,” shouted Felicity cheerfully. “I forgot that the Colonel took the Beskwith. Don’t worry, it’s not that difficult. There are handholds. I’ve done it heaps of times . . . well, twice . . . and I’ve wing walked, too.”

“Handholds,” muttered Touchstone. “Wing walking.”

“Quiet,” ordered Sabriel. “Don’t upset our pilot.”

She climbed nimbly up the left side and laid herself across the wing, taking a secure hold on the two handgrips. Her bells were a nuisance, but she was used to that.

Touchstone climbed less nimbly up the right side—and almost put his foot through the wing. Disturbed to find it was only fabric stretched over a wooden frame, he lay down with extreme care and tugged hard on the handholds. They didn’t come off, as he had half-expected they might.

“Ready?” asked Felicity.

“Ready!” shouted Sabriel.

“I suppose so,” muttered Touchstone. Then, much louder, he called out a hearty “Yes!”

“Contact!” ordered Felicity. The girl at the front spun the propeller expertly and stepped back. The prop swung around as the engine coughed, faltered for a moment, then sped up into a blur as the engine caught.

“Chocks away!”

The other girls pulled at their ropes, dragging out to either side the chocks that held the wheels. The plane rocked forward, then slowly bumped around in a slow arc till it was lined up on the runway and facing the wind. The sound of the engine rose higher, and the plane started forward, bumping even more, as if it were an ungainly bird that needed to jump and flap a long way to get airborne.

Touchstone watched the ground ahead, his eyes watering as their speed increased. He had expected the plane to take off like a Paperwing—fairly quickly and with ease and elan. But as they sped down the field, and the low stone wall at the northern end grew closer and closer, he realized that he knew nothing about Ancelstierran aircraft. Obviously they would leap into the sky sharply at the very end of the field.

Or not, he thought a few seconds later. They were still on the ground and the wall was only twenty or thirty paces in front of them. He started to think it would be better to let go and try and jump away from the imminent wreck. But he couldn’t see Sabriel on the other wing, and he wasn’t going to jump without her.

The plane lurched sideways and bounced up into the air. Touchstone sighed with relief as they cleared the wall with inches to spare, then yelled as they went back down again. The ground came up hard, and he was too winded to do anything else as they bounced again and then were finally climbing into the sky.