Across The Wall: A Tale of the Abhorsen and Other Stories. Garth Nix
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came so close, Nick thought the little trader was going to hug him. “Let us get out from under the earth. With that—”
“Yes, I agree,” interrupted Nick. He gestured towards the door and met Sergeant Hodgeman’s stare. All the policemen moved closer. Casual steps. A foot slid forward here, a diagonal pace towards Nick.
Lackridge coughed something that might have been “Dorrance”, scuttled to the door leading back to the tunnels, opened it just wide enough to admit his bulk and squeezed through. Nick thought about calling him back but instantly dismissed the idea. He didn’t want to show any weakness.
But with Lackridge gone, there was no longer a witness. Nick knew Malthan didn’t count, not to anyone in Department Thirteen.
Sergeant Hodgeman pushed one heavy-booted foot forward and advanced on Nick and Malthan till his face was inches away from Nick’s. It was an intimidating posture, long beloved of sergeants, and Nick knew it well from his days in the school cadets.
Hodgeman didn’t say anything. He just stared, a fierce stare that Nick realised hid a mind calculating how far he could go to keep Malthan captive, and what he might be able to do to Nicholas Sayre without causing trouble.
“My uncle is the Chief Minister,” Nick whispered very softly. “My father a member of the Moot. Marshal Harngorm is my mother’s uncle. My second cousin is the Hereditary Arbiter himself.”
“As you say, sir,” said Hodgeman loudly. He stepped back, the sound of his heel on the concrete snapping through the tension that had risen in the room. “I’m sure you know what you’re doing.”
That was a warning of consequences to come, Nick knew. But he didn’t care. He wanted to save Malthan, but most of all at that moment he wanted to get out under the sun again. He wanted to stand above ground and put as much earth and concrete and as many locked doors as possible between himself and the creature in the case.
Yet even when the afternoon sunlight was softly warming his face, Nick wasn’t much comforted. He watched Constable Ripton and Malthan leave in a small green van that looked exactly like the sort of vehicle that would be used to dispose of a body in a moving picture about the fictional Department Thirteen. Then, while lurking near the footmen’s side door, he saw several gleaming, expensive cars drive up to disgorge their gleaming, expensive passengers. He recognised most of the guests. None were friends. They were all people he would formerly have described as frivolous and now just didn’t care about at all. Even the beautiful young women failed to make more than a momentary impact. His mind was elsewhere.
Nick was thinking about Malthan and the two messages he carried. One, the obvious one, was addressed to Thomas Garran, Uncle Edward’s principal private secretary. It said:
Garran
Uncle will want to talk to the bearer (Malthan, an Old Kingdom trader) for five minutes or so. Please ensure he is then escorted to the Perimeter by Foxe’s people or Captain Sverenson’s, not D13. Ask Uncle to call me urgently. Word of a Sayre.
Nicholas
The other, more hastily scrawled, said:
Send telegram TO MAGISTRIX WYVERLEY COL LEGE NICK FOUND BAD KINGDOM CREATURE DORRANCE HALL TELL ABHORSEN HELP
There was every possibility neither message would get through, Nick thought. It would all depend on what Dorrance and his minions thought they could get away with. And that depended on what they thought they could do to one Nicholas Sayre before he caused them too much trouble.
Nick shivered and went back inside. As he expected, when he asked to use a telephone, the footman referred him to the butler, who was very apologetic and bowed several times while regretting that the line was down and probably would not be fixed for several days, the telegraph company being notoriously slow in the country.
With that avenue cut off, Nick retreated to his room, ostensibly to dress for dinner. In practice he spent most of the time writing a report to his uncle and another telegram to the Magistrix at Wyverley College. He hid the report in the lining of his suitcase and went in search of a particular valet who he knew would be accompanying one of the guests he had seen arrive, the ageing dandy Hericourt Danjers. The permanent staff of Dorrance Hall would all really be Department Thirteen agents, or informants at the least, but it was much less likely the guests’ servants would be.
Danjers’s valet was famous among servants for his ability with shoe polish, champagne and a secret oil. So neither he nor anyone else in the belowstairs parlour was much surprised when the Chief Minister’s nephew sought him out with a pair of shoes in hand. The valet was a little more surprised to find a note inside the shoes asking him to go out to the village and secretly send a telegram, but as the note was wrapped around four double-guinea pieces, he was happy to do so. When he’d finished his duties, of course.
Back in his room, Nick dressed hastily. As he tied his bow tie, his hands moved automatically while he wondered what else he should be doing. All kinds of plans raced through his head, only to be abandoned as impractical, or foolish, or likely to make matters worse.
With his tie finally done, Nick went to his case and took out a large leather wallet. There were three things inside. Two were letters, both written neatly on thick, linen-rich handmade paper, but in markedly different hands.
The first letter was from Nick’s old friend Prince Sameth. It was concerned primarily with Sam’s current projects and was illustrated in the margins with small diagrams. Judging from the letter, Sam’s time was being spent almost entirely on the fabrication and enchantment of a replacement hand for Lirael, and the planning and design of a fishing hut on an island in the Ratterlin Delta. Sam did not explain why he wanted to build a fishing hut and Nick had not had a reply to his most recent letter seeking enlightenment. This was not unusual. Sam was an infrequent correspondent and there was no regular mail service of any kind between Ancelstierre and the Old Kingdom.
Nick didn’t bother to read Sam’s letter again. He put it aside, carefully unfolded the second letter and read it for the hundredth or two hundredth time, hoping that this time he would uncover some hidden meaning in the innocuous words.
This letter was from Lirael and it was quite short. The writing was so regular, so perfectly spaced and so free of ink splotches that Nick wondered if it had been copied from a rough version. If it had, what did that mean? Did Lirael always make fine copies of her letters? Or had she done it just for him?
Dear Nick,
I trust you are recovering well. I am much better,and Sam says my new hand will be ready soon.Ellimere has been teaching me to play tennis, a gamefrom your country, but I really do need two hands. I have also started to work with the Abhorsen. Sabriel, I mean, though I still find it hard to call her that. I still laugh when I remember you calling her “MrsAbhorsen, Ma’am Sir”. I was surprised by thatlaugh, amidst such sorrow and pain. It was a strangeday, wasn’t it? Waiting for everything to be discussed and sorted and explained just enough so we could all gohome, with the two of us lying side by side on ourstretchers with so much going on all around. You made it better for me, telling me about my friend theDisreputable Dog. I am very grateful for that. That is why I’m writing, really, and Sam said he was sending something so this could go in with it.
Be well.
Lirael, Abhorsen-in-Waiting and Remembrancer
Nick stared at the letter for several minutes after he finished reading it, then gently folded it and returned it to the wallet. He drew out the third thing, which had come in a package with the letters three weeks ago, though it had apparently left the Old Kingdom at least a month before that. It was a small, very plain dagger, the blade and hilt blued steel, with brass wire wound around the grip, the pommel just a big teardrop of metal.
Nick held it up to the light. He could see faint etched symbols upon the blade, but that was all they were. Faint etched symbols. Not living, moving Charter Marks, bright and flowing, all gold and sunshine. That’s what Charter-spelled swords normally looked like, Nick knew, the marks leaping and splashing across the metal.