Night Gate (17 page)

“What about them? A place for everything and everything in its place, that’s what the provinces are about. The keepers say that is what Order means. They made the provinces so that each animal has its own place. Habitat magic in the land keeps any animal from hurting another or straying out of its own territory. But it is no different from cages. We witch folk think all creatures, natural and magical, should be left to run wild and free. There should be no keeping and no territories but the ones animals carve for themselves. The Mother says that is what nature and the wizard intended. The keepers ask, what are keepers for if not to keep Order?”

Poor Mr. Walker began to fidget violently in Rage’s pocket, which was his way of saying he needed to get out. When they turned the next corner Rage hung back and set the little man down, whispering for him to follow but stay out of sight.

“What is the matter?” Ania called back.

“A stone in my shoe,” Rage answered, and caught up with her.

A group of adolescent boys in white robes came out of a street. Several glanced at them, frowning.

“Why did they look at us like that?” Rage asked when they had gone out of sight.

“They’re keeper apprentices, and they looked like that because we are girls. They’ve been taught that the seed of dis-Order is in all females.”

This did not accord with what Niadne had said about the keepers saying girls were naturally weak and obedient. It made Rage see all over again that the High Keeper’s rules were shaped to punish girls who were strong. In a way, Mam had done the same thing in telling her over and over to be quiet and good, Rage thought sadly.

She was so busy with her thoughts that she did not notice it was getting more and more damp until she slipped on the wet cobbles. Before she could ask if they were nearing the river, a man in a black robe crossed the street in front of them, leading an elephant and its baby. Rage was dumbstruck by the sight. It was only after the trio had vanished down another street that she saw the hides of both elephants were marred by livid, scabby patches.

“They were sick,” she murmured, remembering what the ferryman had said about sickness in the provinces, and wondering if the fading of magic was the cause of that as well.

“Animals are brought in from the provinces to be treated at the conservatorium when they are ill so that if they are contagious, an entire species won’t be wiped out,” Ania murmured.

Another group of boys entered the street and marched slowly toward them. One smiled fleetingly at Ania, though the rest gave her disapproving looks.

“That was my friend,” Ania said shyly when they had gone.

“A keeper’s apprentice is your friend?”

“Not all of them think keeping is about controlling and Ordering. Some, like my friend, think it just means watching over and healing. He became a keeper because he believes you can’t change things from the outside. Maybe he’s right, but I’m afraid that by the time he’s high enough in keeper ranks to make a difference, it will be too late for all of us.”

Rage was very much surprised to hear that all keepers were not harsh and controlling. “Does he know that the flow of magic is dwindling here?”

Ania shook her head and looked troubled. “The Mother has forbidden us to speak of this to anyone but witch folk. I do not know why.”

The street they were walking along ended suddenly at the edge of a wide canal running swiftly with water. Ania turned and followed the path running alongside the canal until they reached a small bridge that allowed them to cross to the other side. They had not gone far when they came to another canal, and then another. All of the canals were bridged and before long it seemed to Rage that there were more canals than streets.

“This part of Fork is built over the river,” Ania explained.

Rage lost count of the canals and bridges they crossed after that. The air and the buildings became increasingly wet, and in some places the stone was so eroded that it had a diseased look. As they moved deeper into the canal district of Fork, there were fewer of the forbidding stone towers and more buildings with turrets, cupolas, differently shaped windows, and funny flights of stairs and balconies. The stone here seemed less black than gray, and the area was more run-down than the rest of Fork. Rage wondered why the city had not repaired itself, but perhaps it did not see the erosion as ugly. Nor was it, any more than the wrinkles of an old woman made her ugly. In truth, Rage thought the area far nicer than any other part of the city she had visited.

“This is Old Fork,” Ania said. “The new part, where the Willow Seat Tower stands, is called Outer Fork or Newfork. Then there’s Lower Fork, which goes down to the wetland provinces, and a section that goes up to the desert and mountain provinces, called Upper Fork. I like this part best because even though it is so damp and crumbling, there are no people living here anymore and the city may be whatever it chooses.”

“Is it true that the wizard made Fork?” Rage asked, again wondering about the mind that had created such a city. Niadne had said it was beautiful in the beginning. Did the degeneration of the city mirror that of the wizard?

“Don’t judge the wizard by what Fork has become,” Ania said, seeming to read her mind. “It was very different when he made it. There were gardens and trees and lawns, white cobbles rather than black ones, and all of the buildings were different. They say it was so lovely a melding of nature and city that bridges sang and natural animals lived in it as easily as in a forest.”

“Niadne said Fork is like it is now because the wizard became disappointed with Valley.”

The other girl shook her head. “The city reflects what exists within its boundaries. It was infused with accommodating magic, for the wizard intended it to be a city that shaped itself to people who lived in it, and their needs. He thought it would go on being lovely and light and beautiful, but he did not reckon on the keepers. Fork altered gradually to match their stony hearts. It became dark, and the black towers started appearing. The bridges fell silent and the birds vanished. Some parts of Fork are very bad,” she added in a low voice. “Especially where blackshirts and keepers gather.”

The pier,
Rage thought, remembering the malevolent feel of the city as they had approached the bank. She glanced at a wall and wondered if the city was listening to their words, if it was capable of resenting them or taking revenge. But even if it was, this part of the city seemed less malicious than sorrowful.

“Why do you think the wizard brought people like the keepers here?”

Ania shrugged. “Perhaps for companionship. They were not like they are now, I suppose. But if company was what he wanted, he soon enough regretted it. The witch women say the keepers almost drove him mad, going there and wanting him to decide this or that, or to judge their disputes and mediate their arguments. To keep them away he made Deepwood grow and enchanted it so that it would be almost impossible for anyone to reach his castle.”

Glancing behind, Rage caught sight of Mr. Walker lifting his nose and concentrating intensely. She sniffed, too, and noticed a strong seaweed odor in the air. It must come from the reddish lichen that grew on the walls of the canals just above water level, for there was no other kind of plant life. Certainly, it was not caused by the sea, and yet the smell reminded her vividly of the windswept seaside town where she and Mam had lived before they went to Winnoway. Rage had been small, but she clearly remembered the massive crash of the breaking waves, the cries of the seagulls as they dived for leftover bits of food.

The memory was so clear she seemed to hear the roar of the ocean. Then she realized she
was
hearing it. “What is it?” she asked.

Ania merely pointed ahead. They came to a corner, and when they turned it, Rage stopped and gaped.

There was a handrail in front of her. It was all that stood between them and a broad, savage river that rushed to the rim of an abyss, then roared in a tumbling white broth over the edge and out of sight. There was nothing at all beyond it. It was like being at the top of the world’s highest waterfall. The air shimmered with a mist that made the river look as if it were steaming, and droplets clung to Rage’s skin and hair. Under her feet the ground vibrated with the sheer force of the water thundering past and under the city.

It was both thrilling and terrifying to witness the elemental force of the river and the waterfall after the quiet of the somber, black city. Rage’s hair blew back from her face in the wind coming off the water. She felt breathless.

Looking back along the river’s banks, she saw that the city was built on platforms that stood on immense pylons sunk into the riverbed. There must once have been many more buildings, but the platforms that supported them had been eroded by the water until they crumbled. Not far away half a building stood sagging on the edge of a platform, and even as she watched, the water tore at its jagged edges.

“Be careful.” Ania pointed to the rail, and Rage saw that it was almost rusted through where she was leaning. She swayed back, the blood draining from her face.

Fear thickened into despair as she saw the end of her quest. The death of hope. No one could sail a boat down the River of No Return and live. It was not possible to reach the Endless Sea. She felt too sick with despair even to be angry at the firecat or to wonder why it had bidden her to do the impossible. Maybe it had hoped there was another solution and that she would be smart enough to find it. But if there was, Rage did not know what it could be.

Ania plucked at her arm and pointed to an unmanned raft careering wildly along the river. There were no passengers aboard, but a dark bundle was lashed to it. The raft was drawn inexorably to the outer edge of the fall, where it teetered at the very brink before being smashed to splinters on hidden rocks. The shattered remnants and the bundle were swept from view over the falls.

A second later the sun fell in orange splendor into the horizon and gray dusk fell like a cobwebbed cloak around them. Ania tugged at her arm. Numb, Rage let herself be led back down the lane and through an open doorway into the ruined shell of a building. There was nothing inside but a mess of moldering timber and wet, broken stone covered in spongy black moss, but the walls cut the din, so they did not need to shout.

“The boats are tethered upstream, near the blackshirt towers. They are used for the execution of ultimate sentences meted out by the High Keeper,” Ania said.

Rage shuddered in horror, thinking of the bundle. “There…there was someone alive on that raft we saw?”

Ania nodded grimly. “Let us go from here. I cannot imagine why you wished to see the boats.”

They abandoned the ruin and went back through the streets and over the canals and bridges to Newfork, the roar of the river slowly fading behind them. Even after they had passed out of hearing of the water, Rage’s ears still hummed, and her heart beat too fast. Now what were they to do?

They came in sight of the Willow Seat Tower, gleaming darkly in the wan light of a rising moon. The city had bent to bring them here quickly. It struck Rage that the moon was exactly the same size as the night before and the one before that. Though it rose and set, it had neither waxed nor waned. What did that mean? Then she wondered what it mattered, since she would never be able to go home again. Never see Mam.

“There will be a search when you do not appear at the banding tomorrow evening,” Ania said. “I removed you from Niadne’s list and from her mind, but I do not know which blackshirts to deal with, and I am not sure their minds would be weak enough to mold.”

Part of Rage still wanted to ask questions about Niadne and about Ania’s use of magic, but the knowledge that there was no hope of returning home kept getting in the way.

Ania broke into the unhappy flow of Rage’s thoughts, saying, “I must go now, but be very careful. The Mother bade me cast a spell to make you hard to see. Give me your hand. The spell will work best if you stand still when you are in danger of being seen.”

Too depressed to speak, Rage offered her hand. Ania took it and dropped to her knees, pulling Rage down with her. She pushed Rage’s hand flat against the earth between the cobbles and spoke a word.

In an instant, Rage was thrown across the lane and against a stone wall. Still kneeling, Ania gaped at her in horrified disbelief. “I—I don’t understand,” she stammered. “I felt something push against the magic…. That couldn’t happen unless you are…a wizard.”

Rage stood up, her head spinning. She felt sick and her whole body tingled, but she was otherwise unhurt. “I promise you, I’m no wizard,” she said shakily. “It’s probably because I’m a stranger to Valley. Thank you for…for trying to help me, but I…I have to go.” She really felt dreadfully ill and had only walked a little distance out of Ania’s sight before she vomited.

Mr. Walker came running up to her. “What did she do to you?”

“She tried only to work some magic, to make me hard to see, but somehow it backfired,” Rage gasped. Then she thought of what she had seen. Mr. Walker must have seen it, too. “It’s hopeless,” she said bitterly. “There is no way we could survive a journey down that river.”

“Let’s go back to the others. Maybe Billy will know what to do,” Mr. Walker said, his tail drooping.

Rage nodded and scooped him up. It took little time to return to the stone park because Rage knew where she wanted to go. But there was no sign of the others. Then Goaty emerged from the shadows and waved frantically. Rage heaved a sigh of relief. But when she was close enough to see him clearly, she saw that his long, thin face was pale and he wept.

“What’s the matter?” she demanded, setting Mr. Walker down. “Is it Bear?”

“It’s all of them. Bear and Elle and Billy—they have been taken away!” Goaty cried.