PathFinder (31 page)

“A
PathFinder
compass!” she cried. “Where did you steal that from?”

Tod’s eyes blazed with anger. “This belongs to me.
This
is my inheritance. My father gave it to me. It was his father’s before him.” She remembered Dan’s words in the Circle and decided that she would have to tell a little bit of the secret. But not the big, important part about the gills –
that
she would never tell. “My people have great skills navigating what were called the Ancient Ways,” she said. “For this we are revered and called PathFinders.”

Princess Driffa stepped back, astonished. “You are from the mythical PathFinder tribe?”

“I am a PathFinder,” Tod said coldly. “And we are not mythical.” She turned away from Driffa. “Ready?” she asked Lucy, Ferdie and Oskar.

Ferdie and Oskar looked dumbstruck – how did Tod know this stuff?

“Ready, Tod,” they said meekly.

But Lucy shook her head. “Tod, how do you know where to go?”

“This will show me,” said Tod.

“OK, I get that. But what I mean is, does the
PathFinder
thingy know you want to go to the Eastern SnowPlains?”

The confidence drained from Tod. She hadn’t thought of that. She was about to admit defeat, when Driffa stepped in.

“That,” Princess Driffa told Lucy snappily, “is a very stupid question. It doesn’t
know
. You have to
show
it where you want to go.”

“How?” Lucy retorted. With some difficulty, she resisted adding
Miss Princess Fancy-Pants Know-It-All
.

It seemed to Tod that Driffa knew something useful about the
PathFinder
. “Princess Driffa –” Tod said quickly, before Lucy could annoy Driffa any more – “please, do you know how to show the
PathFinder
where to go?”

Driffa turned her back on Lucy and addressed Tod. “I do. I know this because we have a
PathFinder
in the Ancient Artefact room in my palace. It is so precious that it lives beneath a glass dome and we are not allowed to touch it. We learn about these ancient
Magykal Charms
when we are children. We were told that you must touch the
PathFinder
to something from the earth of the place you wish to go.”

Tod looked at her in despair. “But I don’t have anything.”

Princess Driffa smiled. “But I do.” She held out her hand to show her big blue stone ring. “This is lapis from our
Enchanted
Blue Pinnacle. It will guide you to the Heart of the Ways.”

Tod looked at the beautiful lapis streaked with gold and she knew that Driffa spoke the truth. “Thank you,” she said.

The Princess put her hands behind her back. “
If
you let me come with you,” she said.

Tod knew she had no choice. “All right,” she said.

“And my horse,” said Driffa.

Tod sighed. “OK.
And
your horse.”

Princess Driffa took off her lapis ring and handed it to Tod. Tod touched the tip of the PathFinder arrow to it and the arrow swung around and pointed to the arch with
XI
inscribed into the keystone.

“It’s right so far,” said Tod, remembering the broken
Seal
hanging down from Way XI after Driffa had smashed through it. She turned to Ferdie, Oskar and Lucy. “We should hold on to each other,” she said. “So we stay together.” They formed a chain of hands and Driffa took hold of the Royal Horse’s bridle. Tod knew that she was going to have to trust what Snorri had told her – that Ullr would follow her anywhere. She placed the little cat on to the floor and said, “
Komme
, Ullr.” Then, holding the
PathFinder
in her right hand and Oskar’s hand in her left, Tod took a deep breath and stepped into Way XI.

PathFinding

As Lucy walked through
arch XI, she remembered how a ribbon had led Tod and Oskar to Ferdie. She let go of Ferdie’s hand for a moment, pulled a ribbon from her sleeve and dropped it at the entrance to the Way so that Simon would see where she had gone.

“OK?” Tod called from the front.

“Yes. Sorry!” said Lucy. She took hold of Ferdie’s hand and once more they set off into the tunnel.

Tod went forward, feeling the pull of everyone behind her. She had never had so many people depending on her before – but it felt right. Tod, who hated the cramped earthen burrows beneath her village, realised that these beautiful tunnels with their flashes of blue and gold veined through the stone were somewhere she felt at home. Confidently, she held the
PathFinder
out before her and walked slowly towards the
Vanishing Point
. When she reached the swirling, eerie white mist Tod halted and looked back at the chain of people – and one horse – behind her.
“OK?” she asked.

There were nervous murmurs of assent and the Royal Horse gave a snort.

“Let’s go.” Tod took a deep breath and stepped into the mist. With a suddenness that made her jump, a stream of light poured from the
PathFinder
. It enveloped her in a silver bubble and as each person walked through the
Vanishing Point
, the bubble expanded to encase them, too. Another step … another … Tod went ever deeper into the mist, which swirled outside the silvery skin of light that surrounded her. She wondered how she would know when everyone was through the
Vanishing Point
, but she dared not look around – her eyes were fixed on the
PathFinder
, which sat steadily on its sphere of lapis, pointing forward. But there was no mistaking the moment when at last the bubble of light closed over the tip of the Royal Horse’s tail and they were all encased within. Suddenly a sensation of travel­ling at breakneck speed kicked in. Tod was still walking slowly and steadily, but she felt as though the world were rushing past. This was very different from the quick trips through Way VII with Marcia – it made her head spin. Concentrating hard on the
PathFinder
, Tod watched the lapis dome shimmer in the light and the silver pointer move sedately on its gimbal: up and down, a little to the left, a little to the right – as the Way took them.

Before long Tod realised she could see the dark shape of an archway ahead. A moment later she was walking out of the
Vanishing Point
, leaving the silver bubble behind. When the Royal Horse’s tail cleared the last of the mist, the bubble disappeared with a tiny
pop
and they were plunged into darkness.

“Argh!” A loud squeal came from Lucy.

Tod knew she must stay calm. “Oskie,” she said, “have you got a light stick?”

“Yes. Can I let go of your hand?” Oskar whispered.

“Yeah, we’re out now.”

Oskar broke open his last light stick. The glow illuminated the archway before them and they walked out of the Way into a Hub full of dim greenness.

“Oh no!” cried Lucy. “This isn’t what it’s supposed to look like!” Lucy felt like a coiled spring; she could take no more setbacks. She rounded on Tod. “You’ve taken us to the wrong Hub! Oh, what are we going to
doooo
?”

Lucy’s certainty that she had led them through the wrong Way threw Tod. Once again, Driffa came to her rescue.

“Lucy Heap, stop fussing,” Driffa said severely. “To reach the Heart of the Ways we must pass through many different Hubs. You must trust the
PathFinder
.”

Lucy said no more; she stared around at the Hub, an expression of dismay set firmly in her face – the more Hubs they had to go through, the longer it would take to reach William.

The Hub was the same size as the one they had just left, but it was utterly derelict. Where Marcia’s scrubbed white stairs would have been was a pile of rubble. Rivulets of water ran across the earthen floor, which was scattered with small animal skeletons, probably rats. The roof was falling in, held together only by thick strands of a dark green creeper that had covered most of the stone inside. The place smelled dank and dead. It felt, Lucy thought, like a tomb.

The
PathFinder
swung around and pointed to a creeper-covered arch. While everyone pulled the vines away from the entrance to reveal the number II, Oskar checked the number of the arch they had just come out of – it was VII – and began a memory map. He wanted to be sure of getting home again, with or without the
PathFinder
.

As they walked into the next Way, Lucy pulled another ribbon from her sleeve and dropped it at the entrance. At the
Vanishing Point
, the silver light enclosed them and they set off once more in their bubble of speed.

The next Hub was very different. They were greeted by a blast of heat, and as they walked along the tunnel to the oddly small but brilliantly bright archway, sand crunched under their feet. As they reached the arch they saw why it looked so small – it was half blocked with drifting sand.

Ullr leaped lightly up on to the gap at the top of the sand and mewed encouragingly, but it took them a long half-hour to dig their way out – although it would have been much less had it not been for having to get the Royal Horse out. When they eventually emerged – hot, sticky and all, bar Driffa, annoyed with the horse – the heat hit them like a hammer. They stumbled into the open and were greeted by the scorching sun high in a brilliant blue sky. The bleached white stone of the Hub intensified the light and heat so it was almost unbearable. They waded through the drifts of sand, following the
PathFinder
to the next Way. Oskar looked at the arch they had come out of and added XI to his mind map, then he helped to dig their way into the welcome cool of the next Way and its tunnel beyond.

As they traversed the Ancient Ways, a feeling of awe descended upon Tod. She began to understand that she was leading Oskar, Ferdie, Lucy and Driffa – not to mention Ullr and Nona – on a long and complex journey. She was a true PathFinder. The sense of speed within the
PathFinder
’s silver bubble was exhilarating, and each time Tod walked into another Hub, the world had changed.

Tod led them through a Hub full of small, writhing green snakes, through a Hub deep in a cave, through one covered in snow and ice, through one used as an aviary for exotic birds and one that was, to their shock, a busy market. Each was different. As were the smells: spicy, rank, fragrant, earthy. And the background sounds: sibilant whispering, distant shouts, raucous screams of birds and once, the clash of a battle not so very far away. The temperature ran from unbearably hot and humid to piercingly dry cold. Some were light, some dark, but each Hub gave Tod the thrilling sensation that she had taken another giant stride across the world. Strangely, except for the market, all were empty of humans bar the last one, where a lone old woman sat knitting and followed the sound of hooves with wide, sightless eyes. As they went past they bade the woman hello and followed the
PathFinder
as it led them to yet another Way. Some minutes later, Tod and a small orange cat stepped into the Heart of the Ways.

The Heart of the Ways

A sudden blaze of torches
bursting into flame greeted Tod and Ullr as they walked into their destination. Both human and cat stopped and gazed in wonder.

The Heart of the Ways was magnificent.

Although it was recognisably a Hub – the typical circular chamber with the twelve Ways – it was huge. About, Tod reckoned, twelve times bigger than a normal Hub. Every detail outshone all Hubs they had seen before. The entire space was carved from deep-blue lapis stone with brilliant streaks of gold. The arches that led to the Ways were built from great blocks of pale blue lapis edged with silver. The numbers incised in their keystones were inlaid with gold, and in between each Way was a burning torch set into a silver holder. These were
Magykally
primed to light whenever a
PathFinder
was brought into the Heart of the Ways.

As Tod carefully placed the
PathFinder
back into its lapis box and murmured her thanks to it for guiding them safely, she heard the
ooh
s,
aah
s and
wow
s of those emerging behind her. A
clip-clop
of hooves told Tod that the Royal Horse was out. She turned to Driffa and gave back her ring. “Thank you,” Tod said, her voice echoing eerily in the chamber.