Night Gate (25 page)

She pointed to a picnic cloth laid with buttered scones in a silver tin and more teacups, a plate piled with thick sandwiches, and another with rock buns and little iced cakes with cherries on the top. “You need not fear that it will bind you or enslave you, as so many stories claim of magicked food.” She addressed these words to Mr. Walker, who had drawn back in alarm.

Her words rekindled a question that had occurred to Rage when she first heard Puck’s name. “How do you know so much about fairy tales and plays from my world?”

Rue quirked an eyebrow at her. “I know nothing of the stories from your world. I spoke only of stories here. Perhaps the same stories are told in all worlds,” she said lightly. “Or maybe the wizard learned them from your world and taught them to the first people he brought here. My ancestors.”

“There are no wizards or magic in my world,” Rage said.

“Our wizard must have been in your world for some time if he created a magical gateway there,” Rue said as a sprite poured more tea from a flowered teapot. “And perhaps there are others of his kind in your world. After all, wizards are only people who have discovered how to draw on the power that flows between all matter.”

Rage tried to ask about the firecat, but again she was unable to say a word. She gave up and asked, “Why do you think the wizard left Valley?”

Rue shrugged. “I do not think he was evil. If he knew what had happened here, I have no doubt that he would return.” She gestured to the food again. “Now, eat!”

Elle and the others did not have to be asked twice. In no time the picnic had been consumed down to the last crumb. Rage managed only to nibble at it politely. It seemed to her that hours had already passed, and all she could think of was that the decision made would decide whether or not she would see her mother again. She refused to contemplate that they would not survive the journey. Rue would not let them go unless there was a good chance they would succeed.

As if she felt Rage’s thoughts, the witch woman looked up. Then she said, “I would ask something of you. I sensed that there had been images inside the locket. May I see them?”

Rage groped in her pocket until she found the two tiny photographs, and she handed them to Rue.

“This is the boy for whom your mother grieved so deeply,” Rue murmured, looking at one.

“That is my uncle,” Rage said, leaning closer. “It was taken a long time ago. He went away and never came back.” She wanted to ask if the witch could see where he was and what he was doing, but having learned the cost of looking into the future, she knew she could not.

The witch examined the other photograph with a strange expression. “This is your grandmother?” Rage nodded. “I thought so. This woman is connected to the wizard.”

“But—but that’s not possible,” Rage stammered.

“I sensed it before I saw this image. But now I am positive,” Rue said. “Perhaps they met when he was in your world.”

Rage tried to explain that the photograph of Grandmother Reny had been in the same pocket as the wizard’s hourglass, but again she was unable to utter the words. She tried to take the hourglass from her pocket but could not. The effort made her so hot she began to sweat.

“I do not know why I cannot see the connection clearly.” The witch sighed as she gave the photographs back.

“Someone comes,” Puck announced, and Rage looked up to see the renegade keeper they had met in the blackshirt prison. Accompanying him were a sprite, a timber wolf with an enormous ruff of silvery fur at his throat, and a witch bearing a lantern.

“Thaddeus,” Rue said, and her sharp face was softened by a new warmth. She stood and embraced the man. “It has been too long.”

“Too long indeed. I have not seen you since you were a girl fighting Order in Fork. I never knew you had become the Mother to whom I sent my secret messages. The fairies I brought here told me. Do you know, it was you who originally made me begin to wonder about the provinces? All your endless questions. I was just now on my way to Wildwood, having escaped the blackshirts, when I met a witch who told me that the long-planned meeting was to take place. I hastened here with her, thinking I would speak of what I had seen in the provinces, but I am told you have a more important voice than mine to testify to what is being done to the natural beasts.”

“No less than Hermani. I did not dare hope he would be brave enough to come to this meeting.”

“He is not a coward. He found himself in an agonizing position, having to kill natural beasts for the High Keeper.”

“He continued to support the High Keeper though he knew him to be evil,” Rue said coldly.

“He was not evil in the beginning,” Thaddeus said.

“Few are, but his nature was clearly flawed. It was madness to name him High Keeper.”

“Peace, dear one,” Thaddeus responded gently, and he kissed her palm. “He was brilliant and full of zealotry and bright ideals. He made us feel that we were doing something worthwhile and beautiful in keeping Order. Something necessary and honorable.”

“How some people do love to control the worlds they live in,” Rue said with sudden bitterness. “Ever does it lead to repression and pain.”

Thaddeus shook his head. “Rue, at the time he seemed the answer to our lost sense of purpose.”

“It is a pity you could not simply live,” she said coolly.

He sighed. “People can change. Even keepers. Am I not proof of that? But tell me, how is your brother?”

“Sweet-hearted and stubborn as ever. He would be glad to see you. Come and eat. You have missed the meeting but not the picnic.” All at once the plates were piled with food again, only there was more of it, and even a cake with cream and strawberries.

“A magic tablecloth!” Mr. Walker sighed ecstatically, and reverently took another iced cake.

“I am pleased to see you have come to safe hands,” the man said to Rage. He looked back at Rue. “Is it true what they have been telling me? This child and her companions are our only hope of reaching the wizard?”

“What you have been told is true, but let us leave speaking of these things. I am weary with speculating most of all.”

“I don’t understand about the animals in the provinces,” Billy said. “The ferryman said there was sickness among them.”

The renegade keeper gave him a sorrowful look. “It is true, but it is not magic’s fading that hurts them. It is nothing more than that they are natural beasts and do not thrive while penned away from one another, protected, sterilized, and controlled. It has been so since the provinces were created, I am afraid. It was thought they would adjust in time. But natural animals must be wild, and things grew steadily worse. They breed badly and do not thrive in captivity. This was why the High Keeper’s practices found favor.”

“I don’t understand why the High Keeper just went on pretending it was the witches’ fault that magic was fading in Fork. He must have known that wiping out witches and wild things wouldn’t save Valley,” Billy said.

“I don’t think he was capable of reason by the time Fork began to be affected,” Rue said. “You heard Hermani. In the beginning the High Keeper was no more than a zealot. Once he drank the shining waters, I doubt he was able to see beyond his hatred for those who opposed him.”

Rage wanted to ask where the keepers had come from and why they had been given charge of natural animals in the first place, but Rue stood. “They are ready. Let us return to the clearing.”

Rage’s heart thumped as she followed in the Mother’s wake. If the folk of Valley voted not to help her find the wizard, she would never see Mam again. But if they voted to help them, then she and the others faced a terrifying journey into the unknown. And what if they got to the Endless Sea and the wizard was not there?

There was silence as the Mother walked to the center of the clearing to stand by the fire. “You have made your decision. Is it unanimous?”

A chorus of voices confirmed that it was.

“Who shall speak for you?” she asked.

“I will,” the centaur said in his deep, thrumming voice. He stepped forward. “It has been agreed that Rage Winnoway and her companions shall be given the means to travel down the River of No Return in search of the wizard.”

A group of wild things and witches appeared, carrying what looked like three enormous soap bubbles. Rage stared at them in disbelief. Surely these were not the invulnerable vessels whose creation had reduced the life span of Valley to mere days!

Rue ordered that the bubbles be set down by the cavern wall. Everyone gathered to examine them.

“This is what the magic produced?” Thaddeus asked worriedly.

“It is,” Rue said. “I asked for a mode of travel that would survive the journey and keep those within safe.”

“Perhaps there was not enough magic,” Hermani murmured.

“There was enough. But Valley has only two days remaining.”

Rage looked around at the people of Valley, understanding that it had taken great courage to agree to help them. She and the animals were about to undertake a possibly fatal journey, but in a way all of Valley would share the danger. Their sole hope was for her to find the wizard and convince him to return to Valley. And it had to happen within two days.

Rage ran her hand over the surface of the nearest bubble. It gave beneath her fingers, and she quailed inwardly at the thought of facing the savage River of No Return in such a flimsy vessel. Beside her, Goaty was as pale as his ringlets and trembling visibly. She could not think of a thing to say to comfort him.

Elle went to him and put her arm around his shoulders, looking as fearless as ever. She whispered something in his ear and, surprisingly, he ceased shivering and gave her a shy smile.

“They don’t look very strong,” Mr. Walker muttered.

“No more are they,” Rue said tartly. “The raft boats are strongly made, but they are smashed to pieces. The secret of the river is that one cannot fight and master it, for it is too powerful. One must accept its strength and bend to it. One must face all of its magnificent power with humility. These bubbles are the humblest of crafts, and they will carry you safely with the flow of the river. There is magic in their making that will allow them to bear your weight and keep upright. You will have to ride two apiece.”

Looking at the transparent spheres, Rage thought of how fragile they were to carry such a weight of hopes. Yet Rue’s words made sense: one could not oppose violence with violence. Rage had only to remember Grandfather. He had fought the sorrow of losing his brother with a harshness that had only driven his son and daughter away.

The tops of the bubbles were lifted away. Rage watched as Elle, Mr. Walker, and Billy tried them out. Bear watched Billy, her expression impossible to read. After some rearranging, it was decided that Goaty and Elle would go in one bubble, Mr. Walker and Bear in another, and Billy and Rage in the last. Rage got in when the others were settled. The bubble felt hard and slippery, like a glass in soapy water.

“Will you magic the bubbles to the river from here?” Elle asked Rue when they had climbed out to say goodbye.

“There is no need,” Rue told her. “The river passes on the other side of this wall of stone. I will open the wall with magic.”

“Won’t water pour into the cavern?” Mr. Walker asked anxiously.

“Will it be dark under the river?” Goaty asked in a tremulous voice.

“What if the bubbles hit something?” Billy asked, moving closer to Rage.

“You will see,” the witch said. She looked at Rage. “Are you ready?”

Rage swallowed a lump of fear lodged in her throat. “I’m ready,” she said.

“Then I will open the way.” The witch knelt and pressed one hand to the earth.

Rage heard a loud ripping sound as the stone wall opened in a wide seam and out of it came a deafening roar. The lanterns flared, and all at once she could see the river thundering by, cloudy with froth and debris. But it was not flowing horizontally. It was flowing downward.

It took some seconds for Rage to realize the water was falling rather than flowing. Then she understood. They were looking out onto the underside of the waterfall.

The witch woman came to stand beside her, and the wind from the falling water blew her hair into a dark halo as she turned. “Thank you,” Rage said.

“It is I who thank you, Rage Winnoway,” Rue responded serenely, and that was all.

Rage had half expected a speech. “I will do my best to find the wizard and make him listen,” she promised, wishing that she had been able to speak of the hourglass and the firecat. “I will tell him everything that I have seen and heard.”

“Let us hope it does not take long,” Rue said. “Make yourselves ready.”

Rage and Billy settled themselves as best they could in a shape with no bottom or sides, and Rue motioned for the top to be replaced. As it sealed seamlessly with the rest of the bubble all exterior sound was cut off, including the roar of the river.

“I hope there is enough air in this,” Billy said to Rage. His voice sounded thin and strange in the enclosed space.

“I wish it were over already.” Rage felt half suffocated.

All three bubbles were carried carefully to the brink of the opening. Rage experienced a moment of pure mindless terror as she looked down into the black abyss.