Night Gate (13 page)

“My name is Rage Winnoway,” she said meekly. She had rolled up her sleeves so that it was immediately apparent she had no bands.

“You are almost a woman,” he observed.

“I am from an outer village,” Rage answered, hoping he wouldn’t ask which one.

“Who are you?” the leader of the blackshirts demanded of Billy. Rage crossed her fingers, but he answered well.

“I am Billy Thunder, protector of Rage Winnoway until she is banded. The leader of our village sent me with her to make sure no witch women tried to recruit her.”

The blackshirt nodded approvingly and turned to Rage again. “I will assign two men to escort you to the banding house. The next banding is tomorrow evening at the Willow Seat Tower. You will not need this fellow any longer.”

The obedient part of Rage almost wanted to do what the blackshirt ordered, but the new, stubborn part of her silently asked what right he had to tell her to do anything. Aloud she said calmly, “We are to stay with my uncle.” Behind the blackshirts, she could see the ferryman ordering his crew to make ready to depart. There were no return passengers.

The guard frowned. “Your uncle should be here to collect you, then. Where is he?”

Her heart felt as if it were thudding in her throat. She thought fast, fingering the tiny photographs in her pocket. “I could not tell him exactly when I would come because I did not know how long the journey would take. His name is…Samuel Winnoway. He will be expecting us.” She was afraid that the guard would ask where her uncle lived. She must not be separated from the others, especially with Bear lost.

Pleasepleaseplease
. She willed the blackshirt to let them go on their way. Perhaps if there really was magic in the land, she could draw it up with her longing.
Please let us go.
She grew hot, and a bead of sweat trickled down her spine.

To her stunned delight the blackshirt suddenly shrugged, seeming all at once bored. “Very well. Be with your uncle by nightfall and make sure you register at the nearest banding house early tomorrow.”

Rage felt physically weak with relief as she and Billy walked away from the pier and down the nearest street. The minute they were out of sight of the blackshirts, Billy stopped and said in a hoarse voice, “I must find Mama.”

Rage bade him go ahead and let Mr. Walker out of her pocket. He shook himself, then trotted alongside her as she hurried after Billy, who had vanished around the nearest corner. Despite her concern for Bear, Rage could not help but stare at the houses. They looked like buildings out of an old storybook, except that they were all black. The uneven cobbled road—empty of cars, buses, or even horse-drawn carts—was black as well, and it twisted here and there like an eel. It struck her that there were no lights nor any other signs of life from the houses: no sound, no smoke from a fire, no door closing. The silence of the city was as palpable as the mist coiling along the cobbles.

They made their way back to the riverbank. It was very dark away from the ferry lanterns. Would morning light never come? The bank turned out to be every bit as steep as the ferryman had warned. It was set with big, smooth green-black stones to stop it from eroding. Rage knew there was no way Bear could climb it without help. Yet there was no sign of her in either direction.

Billy sniffed frantically, then said in an anguished voice, “I can’t get her scent!”

They made their way downstream, peering anxiously out into the river, but after some time Billy stopped and turned to look back upriver. Rage guessed he was wondering if Bear had managed to reach the bank closer to the pier. She did not like to say that such a swift river could have carried Bear some considerable distance if she had not got to the shore quickly.

“Maybe she swam to the other bank,” Mr. Walker said, but without great conviction.

“No,” Billy said. “It is too far. We must go back and search nearer the pier.”

There was no point in arguing that they might be seen. As they retraced their footsteps Rage noticed that the houses facing the water had dark windows that showed nothing behind them. She shuddered at the thought of unseen eyes watching them, though she had the queer sense that the houses were empty.

Once the pier and the departing ferry were in sight again, Rage caught hold of Billy. “We must not let the blackshirts see us!”

“I have to find Mama,” Billy cried.

“You know she can swim,” Rage insisted. “It is just a matter of—”

“Look!” Mr. Walker hissed, and they both turned to see a dark bulk move within a mass of shadowy reeds at the waterline, not far from where they stood.

Billy gave a groan of relief. “Mama!”

Bear emerged from the reeds and used her claws to drag her sodden mass onto the flat lip of the bank. It took all of their combined strength to push and drag her the rest of the way up onto the cobbled promenade. By the time they had managed it, their breathing was nearly as labored as hers.

“We have to find somewhere she can rest and get warm,” Rage said, alarmed by Bear’s utter exhaustion.

“I’ll see what I can find,” Billy said determinedly.

He ran off, and Rage reflected on how independent the animals had become. Was that because they had been transformed, or had they always been that way, without her knowing?

Trying to squeeze some of the water from Bear’s thick fur, Rage felt her begin to tremble in shock. How much punishment could the old dog endure without being permanently injured? The journey was clearly taking a harsh toll on her, yet there was nothing Rage could do but push her to continue.

Elle and Goaty arrived, the latter looking deeply relieved.

“It is hard to smell far here,” Elle said. She looked at Bear and sniffed. “She smells bad.”

For once Goaty had nothing awful to add, which made Rage feel even more worried. What did
bad
mean? Sick? Tired? Dying?

“It took us a while to find her,” Rage managed to say calmly. “She was in the water too long.”

There was the sound of running feet and they all froze, but it was only Billy. He had found a small park farther along the riverbank. “It’s not much better than this, but at least there is shelter,” he panted.

Bear was in no state to be moved, but they dared not delay. They roused her enough to get her on her feet and led her to the park. This was filled not with real green trees but with black stone carvings of trees. Of all the things she had so far seen in the city, this horrified Rage the most. Why would anyone prefer black stone trees to living trees? On all sides of the park more of the small houses clustered together like black, crooked teeth. Again, it seemed to her that they were not separate houses but part of the same entity: this black city that seemed to have some sort of malevolent life of its own.

“I don’t smell any people,” Elle whispered uneasily.

Bear cast herself down under a stone tree with an overhang of drooping branches and lay as one dead. She had not said a single word since coming out of the water. Billy lay his jacket over her and lifted her head onto his knee. He stroked her fur, his face haggard with fear.

Rage knelt down beside them. “Billy, stay here with Bear and the others. I’ll go and see if I can find out anything about the wizard.”

Billy looked up at her, eyes brimming with unshed tears. “I’m afraid for Mama,” he whispered.

Rage saw that all of his new power to think, and his delight in it, had been consumed by fear for Bear. She thought of her own mother but dared not dwell on her. She was responsible for herself and the animals being in Valley. It was time for her to think and act instead of letting everyone else do it for her.

“Bear’s old and the water wasn’t good for her, but she’ll be all right if she rests,” Rage told Billy with a mixture of Mrs. Johnson’s kindness and Mr. Johnson’s gruff certainty. She had to be firm because she knew the voice of fear must even now be whispering to Billy. “You must keep her warm. I will be as quick as I can.”

She motioned to the others to withdraw and talk.

“The river did it,” Elle said, looking more troubled than Rage had ever seen her before.

“It got inside her,” Mr. Walker added.

Drawing a deep breath, Rage told them her plan. “I’m going into the city to see if I can find out where the wizard has gone.”

“But we know that already. He has gone to the shore of the Endless Sea,” Mr. Walker argued.

“Yes, but maybe the Endless Sea in the riddle isn’t the real Endless Sea, if there is such a thing. Maybe it’s the name of a place right here in Fork.”

“Wouldn’t those women in the cart have told us if it was?” Elle objected.

Rage shrugged. “It’s a big city. And I asked about the Endless Sea, not about a place called the Endless Sea. Anyway, we have to do something.” She directed a pointed look at Bear.

“All right,” Elle said. “But you’d better not go alone. It might be dangerous.”

“I’ll take Mr. Walker in my pocket,” Rage offered.

“He can’t fight for you! He can’t protect you!” Elle cried, but Rage was firm.

“Mr. Walker can hide in my pocket and come back for help if I get into trouble. Billy will need you here.”

Rage felt a lot less sure than she sounded. But there was no point in burdening the others with her uncertainties. And maybe luck was on her side. She still found it hard to believe that the blackshirts had simply let her find her own way to her uncle’s house.

Once she was out of sight of the park, her steps slowed and she tried to decide which direction to take. All of the houses looked exactly the same, and there was no sign of any people, nor of the circular, black Willow Seat Tower, to which the animals had been directed by the blackshirts.

Rage made up her mind to keep the river at her back and the skyscrapers in front. Surely such imposing buildings would be at the heart of the city, and among them she would be bound to find groups of people in which she could mingle and eavesdrop. She had no fear that she would not be able to find her way back to the others because the river would be her guide.

She had been walking for perhaps an hour when she entered a street that ran up a steep incline. At its apex, a perfectly round black tower stood in the center of a flat, open area paved in blocks of gleaming black marble that glittered as if studded with pieces of mirror: the Willow Seat Tower.

There were no signs of shops or stalls or anyplace where one might buy food or clothes. But here, for the first time, were people. Most of them were clad in long white gowns. Rage guessed these were keepers.

The thought of the High Keeper rejecting the pleas of the sprite and the winged lions made a cold, cruel picture in her head, even if it was true that Valley would be doomed if the wild things were fed any more magic. Still, something drew her toward the tower. Obeying the compulsion, she was careful to stay in the shadows and move as slowly as everyone else.

Rage was close enough now to see that all the people in the white gowns were men. But there were also men, women, and groups of boys and girls in plain gray tunics and trousers. Not a single spot of color was worn by anyone. No one spoke loudly or moved quickly. This crowd of harmoniously dressed people moving slowly and silently ought to have been beautiful, but the scene was strangely stiff and unreal. Everyone moved as if they were part of an old and complicated dance with many rules and tiny, intricate steps. No one looked happy.

This was a dance of obedience, Rage thought, each person doing only and exactly as he or she was bidden. This was Order, and clearly there was no joy in it.

“Have you noticed there have been no streetlights these past few nights?” Rage overheard a man observe to his neighbor in a low voice.

His companion nodded. “I heard there were orders that they should not be switched on, to conserve magic.”

“Powering the lights doesn’t consume magic any more than the enchantments that keep the provinces in Order. Besides, we don’t need to conserve magic. It’s those witches who need to do that.”

There were indeed unlit streetlights—balls of glass on iron stalks attached to the walls lining the streets. Rage was intrigued by the news that there was more than one way to use magic. Apparently the keepers had some way of working it to organize the provinces where natural animals were kept. If what these men said was true, the keepers’ working of magic did not deplete it. Rage wondered if the creation of the wild things was what had used magic up on the other side of the river. It must take more complex enchantments to create a living, thinking being than to organize animal habitats. If she was right, it would explain the keepers’ dislike of wild things. But unless the witches were mad, there had to be more to it than that.

An ornately carved litter, borne on thick poles by eight muscular men, drew up beside the entrance to the tower. Rage watched closely as it was set down carefully by its bearers. Two men emerged from it, both elderly and clad in white. One, bent almost double with the weight of the years he carried, wore a tunic edged in gold trim. A troop of blackshirts marched toward the tower and saluted the two men. Rage scuttled hurriedly into a lane. It was too dangerous to stay here. She turned her back on the circular tower and began to walk in the direction of the black skyscrapers again.

“Where are we going now?” Mr. Walker asked, poking his head out to look around. He was a bit pale, but she supposed it was none too comfortable riding in her pocket.

“I am looking for a place where there are people. A market or a square,” she told him.

“We must find an inn,” Mr. Walker insisted. “You can buy some ale for someone, and they will tell you about the wizard.”

Rage felt exasperated. “I haven’t seen anything that looks like an inn, I don’t know if they have ale here, and I have no money to buy it, even if they would serve someone as young as me!”

Mr. Walker looked disgruntled. “Those sorts of things never matter in stories.”

“Well, this is not a story,” Rage snapped. She had gone only a few more steps when Mr. Walker spoke again.

“You could knock at one of these houses and say you are trying to find your uncle Samuel, who lives near the big market. Then you could get directions.”