Lirael

by Garth Nix

  “I hope so,” replied Sameth. He could sense the Dead on the road behind them now, coming up quickly. There seemed to be no hope of safety anywhere ahead. No stout farmhouse or barn, or a stream, whose running water the Dead couldn’t cross. In fact, the road went down to become a sunken lane, even darker and more closed in, a perfect site for an ambush.

  As Sam thought of that, he felt his sense of Death suddenly alter. It disoriented him at first, till he realized what it was. A Dead spirit had just risen in front of them, somewhere in the darkness around the high-banked road. Worse than that, it was new, brought out of Death at that very moment. These were no self-willed Dead spirits that had infiltrated through the Perimeter. They were Dead Hands, raised by a necromancer on the Ancelstierran side of the Wall. Controlled by the necromancer’s mind, they were much more dangerous than rogue spirits.

  “Stop!” screamed Sam, his voice cutting through the beat of rain and footsteps on the asphalt. “They’re ahead of us. We have to leave the road!”

  “Who are ahead, boy?” shouted Cochrane, furious again. “This has gone quite far enough. . . .”

  His voice faltered as a figure stumbled out of the shad-ows ahead, out into the middle of the road. It was human, or had once been human, but now its arms were hanging threads of flesh, and its head was mostly bare skull, all deep eye hollows and shining teeth. It was unquestionably dead, and the reek of decomposition rolled off it, over the soft smell of the rain. Clods of earth fell from it as it moved, showing that it had just dug itself out of the ground.

  “Left!” shouted Sam, pointing. “Everyone go left!”

  His shout broke the silent tableau into action, boys leaping over the stone wall that bordered the road. Cochrane was one of the first over, throwing his umbrella aside.

  The Dead thing moved, too, breaking into a shambling run as it sensed the Life it craved. The sergeant propped himself against the wall and waited till it was ten feet away. Then he emptied his heavy .455 revolver into the creature’s torso, five shots in quick succession, accompanied by a gasp of relief that the weapon actually worked.

  The creature was knocked back and finally down, but the sergeant didn’t wait. He’d been on the Perimeter long enough to know that it would get back up again. Bullets could stop Dead Hands, but only if the creatures were shredded to pieces. White phosphorus grenades worked better, burning them to ash—when they worked. Guns and grenades and all such standards of Ancelstierran military technology tended to fail the closer they got to the Wall and the Old Kingdom.

  “Up the hill!” shouted Sam, pointing to a rise in the ground ahead, where the forest thinned out. If they could make it there, at least they could see what was coming and have the slight advantage of high ground.

  A harsh, inhuman cry rose behind them as they ran, a sound like a broken bellows accidentally trodden on, more squeal than scream. Sam knew it came from the desiccated lungs of a Dead Hand. This one was farther to the right than the one the sergeant had shot. At the same time, he sensed others, moving around to the right and left, beginning to encircle the hill.

  “There’s a necromancer back there,” he said as they ran. “And there must be a lot of dead bodies, not too far gone.”

  “A truck full of those Southerlings . . . ran off the road near here, six weeks ago,” said the sergeant, speaking rapidly between breaths. “Nineteen killed. Bit of a . . . mystery where they was going . . . anyway . . . churchwarden at Archell wouldn’t . . . have ’em . . . the Army crematorium neither . . . so they was buried next to the road.”

  “Stupid!” cried Sameth. “It’s too close to the Wall! They should have been burnt!”

  “Bloody paper-pushers,” puffed the sergeant, nimbly ducking under a branch. “Regulations say no burying within the . . . Perimeter. But this is . . . outside, see?”

  Sameth didn’t answer. They were climbing the hill itself now, and he needed all his breath. He sensed there were at least twelve Dead Hands behind them now, and three or four on each side, going wide. And there was something, some presence that was probably the necromancer, back where the bodies were—or had been—buried.

  The top of the hill was clear of trees, save for a few wind-blown saplings. Before they reached it, the sergeant called a halt, just short of the crest.

  “Right! Get in close. Are we missing anyone? How many—”

  “Sixteen, including Mr. Cochrane,” said Nick, who was a lightning calculator. Cochrane glared at him but was silent, ducking his head back down as he tried to get his breath back. “Everyone’s here.”

  “How long have we got, sir?” the sergeant asked Sam, as they both looked back down into the trees. It was hard to see anything. Visibility was reduced by both the increasingly heavy rain and the onset of night.

  “The first two or three will be on us in a few minutes,” said Sameth grimly. “The rain will slow them a little. We’ll have to knock them down and run stumps through them, to try to keep them pinned. Nick, organize everyone into groups of three. Two batsmen and someone to hold the stumps ready. No, Hood—go with Asmer. When they come, I’ll distract them with a . . . I’ll distract them. Then the batsman must hit as hard as they can straight off, in the legs, and then hammer a stump through each arm and leg.”

  Sameth paused as he saw one of the boys eyeing the two-and-a-half-foot-long wooden stump with its metal spike on the end. From the expression on the boy’s face, it was clear he couldn’t imagine hammering it through anything.

  “These are not people!” Sam shouted. “They’re already Dead. If you don’t fight them, they will kill us. Think of them as wild animals, and remember, we’re fighting for our lives!”

  One of the boys started crying, without making a noise, the tears falling silently down his face. At first Sam thought it was the rain, till he noticed the despairing stare that signified complete and utter terror.

  He was about to try some more encouraging words when Nick pointed downhill and shouted, “Here they come!”

  Three Dead Hands were coming out from the treeline, shambling like drunks, their arms and legs clearly not fully under control. The bodies had been too broken up in the crash, Sam thought, gauging their strength. That was good. It would make them slower and more uncoordinated.

  “Nick, your team can take the one on the left,” he commanded, speaking quickly. “Ted, yours the middle, and Jack’s the right. Go for their knees and hammer the stumps home as soon as you get them down. Don’t let them get a grip on you—they’re much stronger than they look. Everyone else—including you, please, Sergeant, and Mr. Cochrane—hold back and help any team that gets in trouble.”

  “Yes, sir!” replied the sergeant. Cochrane merely nodded dumbly, staring at the approaching Dead Hands. For the first time in Sam’s memory, the man’s face was not flushed red. It was white, almost as white as the sickeningly pallid flesh of the approaching Dead.

  “Wait for my order,” shouted Sam. At the same time, he reached into the Charter. It was impossible to reach in most of Ancelstierre, but this close to the Wall, it was merely difficult, rather like trying to swim down to the bottom of a deep river.

  Sameth found the Charter and took a moment’s comfort from the familiar touch of it, its permanence and its totality linking him to everything in existence. Then he summoned the marks he wanted, holding them in his mind while he formed their names in his throat. When he had everything ready, he punched out his right hand, three fingers splayed, each finger indicating one of the approaching Dead creatures.

  “Anet! Calew! Ferhan!” he spat, and the marks flew from his fingers as shining silver blades, whistling through the air quicker than any eye could follow. Each one struck a Dead Hand, blowing a fist-sized hole straight through decaying flesh. All three staggered back, and one fell down, waving its arms and legs like a beetle thrown on its back.

  “Bloody hell!” exclaimed one of the boys next to Sam.

  “Now!” shouted Sam, and the schoolboys rushed forward with a roar, waving their mak
eshift weapons. Sam and the sergeant went with them, but Cochrane struck out on his own, running down the hill at a right angle to everyone else.

  Then there was a blur of screaming, bats rising and falling, the dull thud of stumps being driven through Dead flesh and into the sodden ground.

  Sam experienced it all in a strange frenzy, such a tangled mess of sound, images, and emotion that he was never really sure what happened. He seemed to come out of this concentrated fury to find himself helping Druitt Minor hammer a stump through the forearm of a writhing creature. Even with a stump through each limb, it still struggled, breaking one stump and almost getting free, before some of the boys in reserve cleverly rolled a boulder over the loose arm.

  Everyone was cheering, Sam realized, as he stepped back and wiped the rain off his face. Everyone except him, because he could sense more Dead, coming up from the road and on the other side of the hill. A quick survey showed that there were only three stumps left, and two of the five bats were broken.

  “Get back,” he ordered, quelling the cheering. “There’s more on the way.”

  As they moved back, Nick and the sergeant came up close to Sam. Nick spoke first, quietly asking, “What do we do now, Sam? Those things are still moving! They’ll get free within half an hour.”

  “Troops from the Perimeter will be here before then,” muttered Sam, glancing at the sergeant, who nodded in affirmation. “It’s the new ones coming up I’m worried about. The only thing I can think of doing . . .”

  “What?” asked Nick, as Sam stopped in mid-sentence.

  “These are all Dead Hands, not free-willed Dead,” replied Sam. “Newly made ones. The spirits in them are just whatever the necromancer could call quickly, so they’re neither powerful nor smart. If I could get to the necromancer who’s controlling them, they would probably attack each other, or wander in circles. Quite a few might even snap back into Death.”

  “Well, let’s get this necromancer chap!” declared Nick stoutly. His voice was steady, but he couldn’t help a nervous look back down the hill.

  “It’s not as easy as that,” said Sam absently. Most of his attention was on the Dead Hands he could sense around them. There were ten down near the road, and six on the other side of the hill somewhere. Both groups were getting themselves into ragged lines. Obviously, the necromancer planned to have them all attack at once, from both sides.

  “It’s not so easy,” Sam repeated. “The necromancer is down there somewhere, physically at least. But he’s almost certainly in Death, leaving his body protected by a spell or some sort of bodyguard. To get at him, I’ll have to go into Death myself—and I don’t have a sword, or bells, or anything.”

  “Go into Death?” asked Nick, his voice rising half an octave. He was clearly about to say something else but he looked down at the staked-out Dead Hands and shut up.

  “Not even time to cast a diamond of protection,” Sam muttered to himself. He had never actually been into Death by himself before. He’d gone only with his mother, the Abhorsen. Now he wished desperately that she were here. But she wasn’t, and he couldn’t think of anything else to do. He could almost certainly get away himself, but he couldn’t leave the others.

  “Nick,” he said, making up his mind. “I am going to go into Death. While I’m there, I won’t be able to see or sense anything here. My body will seem to be frozen, so I’ll need you—and you, sergeant—to guard me as best you can. I plan to be back before the Dead get here, but if I’m not, try to slow them down. Throw cricket balls, stones, and anything else you can find. If you can’t stop them, grab my shoulder, but don’t touch me otherwise.”

  “Right-oh,” replied Nick. He was clearly puzzled, and afraid, but he put out his hand. Sam took it, and they shook hands, while the other boys looked at them curiously, or stared out into the rain. Only the sergeant moved, handing Sam his sword, hilt first.

  “You’ll need this more than I do, sir,” he said. Then, echoing Sam’s own thoughts, he added, “I wish your mum was here. Good luck, sir.”

  “Thanks,” said Sam, but he handed the sword back. “I’m afraid only a spelled sword would help me. You keep it.”

  The sergeant nodded and took the sword. Sam dropped into a boxer’s defensive stance and closed his eyes. He felt for the boundary between Life and Death and found it easily, for a moment experiencing the strange sensation of rain falling down the back of his neck while his face was hit by the terrible chill of Death, where it never rained.

  Exerting all his willpower, Sam pushed towards the cold, making his spirit cross into Death. Then, without warning, he was there, and the cold was all around him, not just on his face. His eyes flashed open, and he saw the flat grey light of Death and felt the tug of the river’s current at his legs. In the distance, he heard the roar of the First Gate, and shivered.

  Back in Life, Nick and the sergeant saw Sam’s entire body stiffen suddenly. A fog came from nowhere, twining up his legs like a vine. As they kept staring, frost formed on his face and hands—an icy coat that was not washed off by the rain.

  “I’m not sure I can believe what I’m seeing,” whispered Nick, as he looked away from Sam and down at the approaching Dead.

  “You’d better believe it,” said the sergeant grimly. “Because they’ll kill you whether you believe in them or not.”

  Chapter Sixteen

  Into Death

  Apart from the distant roar of the waterfall that marked the First Gate, it was completely silent in Death. Sam stood still, staying close to the border with Life, listening and looking. But he couldn’t see very far in the peculiar grey light that seemed to flatten everything out and warp perspective. All he could see was the river around him, the water completely dark save where it rushed in white rapids around his knees.

  Carefully, Sam began to walk along the very edge of Death, fighting the current that tried to suck him under and carry him off. He guessed that the necromancer would also be staying close to the border with Life, though there was no guarantee that Sam was going in the right direction to find him, or her. He wasn’t skilled enough to know where he was in Death in relation to Life, except for the point where he would return to his own body.

  He moved much more warily than he had when last in Death. That was a year past, with his mother, the Abhorsen, at his side. It felt very different now that he was alone and unarmed. It was true he could gain some control over the Dead by whistling or clapping his hands, but without the bells he could neither command nor banish them. And while he was a more than proficient Charter Mage, this necromancer could easily be a Free Magic adept, completely outclassing him.

  His only real chance would be to creep up on the necromancer and catch him unawares, and that would be possible only if the necromancer were totally focused on finding and binding Dead spirits. Even worse, Sam realized, he was making a lot of noise by wading at right angles to the current. No matter how slowly he tried to wade, he couldn’t help splashing. It was hard work, too, physically and mentally, as the river tugged at him and filled him with thoughts of weariness and defeat. It would be easier to lie down and let the river take him; he could never win. . . .

  Sameth scowled and forced himself to keep wading, suppressing the morbid pressure on his mind. There was still no sign of the necromancer, and Sam began to worry that his enemy might not be in Death at all. Perhaps he was out there in Life even now, directing the Dead to attack. Nick and the sergeant would do their best to protect his body, Sam knew, but they would be defenseless against the Free Magic of the necromancer.

  For a moment, Sam thought about going back—then a slight sound returned all his attention to Death. He heard a distant, pure note that seemed far away at first but was moving rapidly towards him. Then he saw the ripples that accompanied the sound, ripples that ran at a right angle to the flow of the river—straight towards him!

  Sam clapped his hands to his ears, grinding his palms into his head. He knew that long, clear call. It came from Kibeth, the third of the
seven bells. Kibeth, the Walker.

  The single note slid between Sam’s fingers and into his ears, filling his mind with its strength and purity. Then the note changed and became a whole series of sounds that were almost the same, but not. Together they formed a rhythm that shot through Sam’s limbs, tweaking a muscle here and a muscle there, rocking him forward, whether he liked it or not.

  Desperately, Sam tried to purse his lips, to whistle a counter-spell or even just a random noise that might disrupt the bell’s call. But his cheeks wouldn’t move, and his legs were already stumping through the water, carrying him quickly towards the source of the sound, towards the wielder of the bell.

  Too quickly, for the river found its chance in Sam’s sudden clumsiness. The current surged and wove itself between Sam’s feet. Caught on one leg, he teetered for a moment, then went over like a bowling pin, crashing into the river. The cold stabbed into him like a thousand thin knives, all over his body.

  Kibeth’s call was cut off in that moment, but it still held him, as if he were a fish on a line. Kibeth tried to walk him back, even as the current tried to keep him in its grip. Sam himself fought only to get his head clear, to get a breath of air before he was forced to take a breath of water. But the effects of the bell and the current were too much, locking him in a struggle in which he could not control his body. And while he could no longer hear Kibeth, his whole body trembled, shot through with the tremendous power of the First Gate, the waterfall that was sucking him deeper and closer with every second.

  Desperately, Sam thrust his face towards the surface, and for a moment he broke free to snatch a breath. But at that instant, he heard the roar of the Gate rise to a crescendo. He was too close, he knew, and at any moment he would be swept through the Gate. Without bells, he would be easy prey for any denizen of the Second Precinct. Even if he escaped them, he was probably already too weak to resist the pull of the river. It would take him on, all the way through to the Ninth Gate and the ultimate death that lay beyond.