“Niadne said Fork is like it is now because the wizard became disappointed with Valley.”
The other girl shook her head. “The city reflects what exists within its boundaries. It was infused with accommodating magic, for the wizard intended it to be a city that shaped itself to people who lived in it, and their needs. He thought it would go on being lovely and light and beautiful, but he did not reckon on the keepers. Fork altered gradually to match their stony hearts. It became dark, and the black towers started appearing. The bridges fell silent and the birds vanished. Some parts of Fork are very bad,” she added in a low voice. “Especially where blackshirts and keepers gather.”
The pier, Rage thought, remembering the malevolent feel of the city as they had approached the bank. She glanced at a wall and wondered if the city was listening to their words, if it was capable of resenting them or taking revenge. But even if it was, this part of the city seemed less malicious than sorrowful.
“Why do you think the wizard brought people like the keepers here?”
Ania shrugged. “Perhaps for companionship. They were not like they are now, I suppose. But if company was what he wanted, he soon enough regretted it. The witch women say the keepers almost drove him mad, going there and wanting him to decide this or that, or to judge their disputes and mediate their arguments. To keep them away he made Deepwood grow and enchanted it so that it would be almost impossible for anyone to reach his castle.”
Glancing behind, Rage caught sight of Mr. Walker lifting his nose and concentrating intensely. She sniffed, too, and noticed a strong seaweed odor in the air. It must come from the reddish lichen that grew on the walls of the canals just above water level, for there was no other kind of plant life. Certainly, it was not caused by the sea, and yet the smell reminded her vividly of the windswept seaside town where she and Mam had lived before they went to Winnoway. Rage had been small, but she clearly remembered the massive crash of the breaking waves, the cries of the seagulls as they dived for leftover bits of food.
The memory was so clear she seemed to hear the roar of the ocean. Then she realized she was hearing it. “What is it?” she asked.
Ania merely pointed ahead. They came to a corner, and when they turned it, Rage stopped and gaped.
There was a handrail in front of her. It was all that stood between them and a broad, savage river that rushed to the rim of an abyss, then roared in a tumbling white broth over the edge and out of sight. There was nothing at all beyond it. It was like being at the top of the world’s highest waterfall. The air shimmered with a mist that made the river look as if it were steaming, and droplets clung to Rage’s skin and hair. Under her feet the ground vibrated with the sheer force of the water thundering past and under the city.
It was both thrilling and terrifying to witness the elemental force of the river and the waterfall after the quiet of the somber, black city. Rage’s hair blew back from her face in the wind coming off the water. She felt breathless.
Looking back along the river’s banks, she saw that the city was built on platforms that stood on immense pylons sunk into the riverbed. There must once have been many more buildings, but the platforms that supported them had been eroded by the water until they crumbled. Not far away half a building stood sagging on the edge of a platform, and even as she watched, the water tore at its jagged edges.
“Be careful.” Ania pointed to the rail, and Rage saw that it was almost rusted through where she was leaning. She swayed back, the blood draining from her face.
Fear thickened into despair as she saw the end of her quest. The death of hope. No one could sail a boat down the River of No Return and live. It was not possible to reach the Endless Sea. She felt too sick with despair even to be angry at the firecat or to wonder why it had bidden her to do the impossible. Maybe it had hoped there was another solution and that she would be smart enough to find it. But if there was, Rage did not know what it could be.
Ania plucked at her arm and pointed to an unmanned raft careering wildly along the river. There were no passengers aboard, but a dark bundle was lashed to it. The raft was drawn inexorably to the outer edge of the fall, where it teetered at the very brink before being smashed to splinters on hidden rocks. The shattered remnants and the bundle were swept from view over the falls.
A second later the sun fell in orange splendor into the horizon and gray dusk fell like a cobwebbed cloak around them. Ania tugged at her arm. Numb, Rage let herself be led back down the lane and through an open doorway into the ruined shell of a building. There was nothing inside but a mess of moldering timber and wet, broken stone covered in spongy black moss, but the walls cut the din, so they did not need to shout.
“The boats are tethered upstream, near the blackshirt towers. They are used for the execution of ultimate sentences meted out by the High Keeper,” Ania said.
Rage shuddered in horror, thinking of the bundle. “There…there was someone alive on that raft we saw?”
Ania nodded grimly. “Let us go from here. I cannot imagine why you wished to see the boats.”
They abandoned the ruin and went back through the streets and over the canals and bridges to Newfork, the roar of the river slowly fading behind them. Even after they had passed out of hearing of the water, Rage’s ears still hummed, and her heart beat too fast. Now what were they to do?
They came in sight of the Willow Seat Tower, gleaming darkly in the wan light of a rising moon. The city had bent to bring them here quickly. It struck Rage that the moon was exactly the same size as the night before and the one before that. Though it rose and set, it had neither waxed nor waned. What did that mean? Then she wondered what it mattered, since she would never be able to go home again. Never see Mam.
“There will be a search when you do not appear at the banding tomorrow evening,” Ania said. “I removed you from Niadne’s list and from her mind, but I do not know which blackshirts to deal with, and I am not sure their minds would be weak enough to mold.”
Part of Rage still wanted to ask questions about Niadne and about Ania’s use of magic, but the knowledge that there was no hope of returning home kept getting in the way.
Ania broke into the unhappy flow of Rage’s thoughts, saying, “I must go now, but be very careful. The Mother bade me cast a spell to make you hard to see. Give me your hand. The spell will work best if you stand still when you are in danger of being seen.”
Too depressed to speak, Rage offered her hand. Ania took it and dropped to her knees, pulling Rage down with her. She pushed Rage’s hand flat against the earth between the cobbles and spoke a word.
In an instant, Rage was thrown across the lane and against a stone wall. Still kneeling, Ania gaped at her in horrified disbelief. “I—I don’t understand,” she stammered. “I felt something push against the magic…. That couldn’t happen unless you are…a wizard.”
Rage stood up, her head spinning. She felt sick and her whole body tingled, but she was otherwise unhurt. “I promise you, I’m no wizard,” she said shakily. “It’s probably because I’m a stranger to Valley. Thank you for…for trying to help me, but I…I have to go.” She really felt dreadfully ill and had only walked a little distance out of Ania’s sight before she vomited.
Mr. Walker came running up to her. “What did she do to you?”
“She tried only to work some magic, to make me hard to see, but somehow it backfired,” Rage gasped. Then she thought of what she had seen. Mr. Walker must have seen it, too. “It’s hopeless,” she said bitterly. “There is no way we could survive a journey down that river.”
“Let’s go back to the others. Maybe Billy will know what to do,” Mr. Walker said, his tail drooping.
Rage nodded and scooped him up. It took little time to return to the stone park because Rage knew where she wanted to go. But there was no sign of the others. Then Goaty emerged from the shadows and waved frantically. Rage heaved a sigh of relief. But when she was close enough to see him clearly, she saw that his long, thin face was pal
e and he wept.
“What’s the matter?” she demanded, setting Mr. Walker down. “Is it Bear?”
“It’s all of them. Bear and Elle and Billy—they have been taken away!” Goaty cried.
“Who took them?” Rage demanded. She ought never to have left them alone!
“Men in black clothes, like the ones that met the ferry,” Goaty wept.
Blackshirts!
“Tell me exactly what happened,” Rage told him. “Start from where Mr. Walker and I left.”
“We were hungry and Elle wanted to go and search for food, but Billy Thunder said no one must go anywhere until you came back. Bear was awake, but she started coughing and some blood came out of her mouth. Elle said she was going to find you, but Bear said no. Elle tried to leave and Billy ran after her, and then the men in black came and saw them. Elle fought, but there were too many of them. One hit her over the head, and she fell down. Then some more of them came to the trees. I ran back to Bear. I tried to make her get up and run and hide, but she had gone to sleep again and she wouldn’t wake. I was so scared. I…I hid, and I saw them take her, too.”
“They carried her?” Rage said in disbelief.
“They fetched a board and a whole lot of them carried her on it, grunting and groaning. They took her one way, and some other blackshirts took Elle and Billy another way.”
“Did they say where they were taking them?” Mr. Walker asked urgently.
“They said Bear must go to the conservatorium, but Billy and Elle were to be imprisoned. I heard one of them say that the High Keeper would have to decide what is to happen to them, since wild things are supposed to be harmless and Elle bit one of the blackshirts,” Goaty said miserably.
Rage patted his arm, thinking that Bear was safe enough for the moment. Ania had said sick animals were taken to the conservatorium to be healed. “We’d better find Elle and Billy first,” she announced. The blackshirt prison was sure to be close by the place where the rafts carrying condemned prisoners were launched, and she would use her memory of the river to bring them to that side of the city.
“Even if we do find them, how will we free them?” Mr. Walker asked. “There will be blackshirts guarding them, and they might even be in chains!”
“We’ll figure it out once we see where they’re imprisoned,” Rage said. If she had to, she’d find Ania and demand the help that the witch girl had offered on behalf of her mistress.
“I’m coming with you,” Mr. Walker declared.
Rage agreed, but she told Goaty to wait in the park. He hung his head in shame. “It’s because I’m a coward, I know.”
“It’s not that at all. Someone has to be here in case Elle and Billy manage to escape on their own and come here.”
Goaty only looked more depressed than ever.
Rage debated what to do. Her instinct was to rush off at once, but there would still be people awake and out in the streets. Better to wait until later, when the streets would be dark and deserted. Mr. Walker must have been exhausted, for when she told them what she had decided, he immediately curled up and fell asleep.
She heard Goaty sigh, and shifted closer to him. “I don’t think you’re a coward,” she told him. “If you had done anything other than hide, the blackshirts would have taken you away as well. Then no one would have been here to tell Mr. Walker and me what happened. Hiding was the most sensible thing to do.”
“Billy and Elle would not have hidden and let the blackshirts take me,” Goaty said sadly.
Rage took Goaty’s hand and they sat quietly, watching the thin moon rise higher and higher.
She was playing hide-and-seek. She charged at the dogs, and they raced away, barking wildly with excitement. Slipping into the undergrowth, she giggled to think how puzzled they would be, but instead of coming out on the other side of the shrub that ran between Winnoway and the Johnsons’, she found herself caught in a mass of dark, rubbery leaves.
As she pushed deeper into them, their peppery smell grew stronger and the air became hot and damp. The barking of the dogs faded to a dim echo, and Rage saw that the forest was transforming itself around her, growing and thickening.
All at once she came to a clearing amid trees bigger than any she had ever seen. They soared up, their leaves high above linking and twining to block out all but a few stray beams of sunlight. The air was a deep greenish color, and shafts of light sliced through it like cables of radiance anchored to the ground.
Without warning a man stepped into the clearing. Very tall, he was, with dark-tanned, muscular arms. He wore faded jeans, a grubby T-shirt, and battered hiking boots. He carried a big, lumpy, beaten-up backpack with all sorts of things hanging off it. His hair grew down to his shoulders in a wild tangle of curls like Rage’s, except it was black. This was not hair that would lie down and stay in Order, she thought, nor did the man look as if he would be easy to order around. His mouth had a harsh set, and the expression in his eyes was hidden by sunglasses that had been repaired with tape. A sweat-stained hat was pulled low over his forehead.
He stared at Rage in amazement. “Where the hell did you come from?”
His voice was muted, as if it came from behind a thick wall, but she heard it quite clearly. He looked exactly the sort of dangerous man that teachers warned against when they forbade talking to strangers, but Rage didn’t feel afraid of him.
“I’m from Winnoway Farm,” she said, and the man’s mouth fell open with astonishment. “My mam was in a car accident and she can’t wake up, so I’m trying to find some magic that will help her.”
“What is your name?” the man asked urgently.
“I’m Rage Winnoway,” Rage said. “Who are you?”
Before the man could answer he vanished. Billy emerged beside her, but he was no longer a dog.
“We couldn’t find you anywhere,” he said, pushing the toffee-colored lock of hair from his eyes.
Rage hissed at him to be quiet. She could hear a voice calling her name. Was it the dark-haired man?
“What was that?” Billy asked.
“Shh,” Rage whispered. She listened hard. Sometimes when you heard a voice a long way off, it sounded like it was your name being called, even when it wasn’t. But no, she was certain someone was calling her. Thinking about it seemed to make the voice louder. It was a man’s voice.
“Who is it?” Billy whispered.
“Ra-age,” the voice cried again.
“Who’s there?” she shouted. “Who’s calling me?”
The air shimmered, and the long, glowing lines of sunlight penetrating the green dimness wavered and became streamers, winding tighter and tighter into a greater brightness.
“Can…hear me?” The voice was coming out of the twisted sunbeams.
“Who…what are you?” Rage whispered, thinking of the firecat.
Beside her Billy began growling. Suddenly he was a dog again, and all the fur along his back had stiffened into a crest. She rested her hand on his head. He was trembling with tension.
“Don’t trust…” The man’s voice faded into a crackling sound, and there was a loud groan of pain.
“Who are you?” Rage asked again.
“Can’t…,” the voice said haltingly, as if it were in pain. “Spell…”
Rage had read enough stories to know what this must mean. “Someone cast a spell of silence on you?”
“Yes,” the voice said, sounding relieved. “Only…some things…”
“You can’t say some things?”
No answer. She thought for a minute. “What do you want?”
“To tell…to warn…” The voice groaned very loudly. “Break…” Another burst of static drowned out the next words.
“You want me to break the spell that is holding you?” Rage asked.
“Break…break…” The voice faded into a wheezy scream.
“How?” Rage cried.
There was a bright ruby flash of light and a violent hissing sound.
Rage opened her eyes to f
ind she was staring up into Goaty’s thin, worried face. “Are you sick?” he asked. “You were groaning in your sleep.”
Rage sat up feeling very muddled. “I was having a dream,” she said. She had been in a forest that kept changing. Then there had been a man wearing dark glasses, and a voice begging her to break a spell of silence. How peculiar it was that dreams stole bits of the day and wove them into stories that made sense while you were dreaming but none when you woke.
She shrugged, for she had far more serious things to worry about than a dream. Waking Mr. Walker, she told him they must go. Then she hugged Goaty, reminding him again to stay hidden until they returned.
“I’m afraid,” he admitted, nearly weeping again. “I don’t like being alone.”
“Be brave,” Rage said gently. “It gets easier each time you do it. Besides, maybe the others will escape and come back and then you won’t be alone.”
He took a deep breath and straightened his shoulders. “I’ll try.”
The streets were even darker than they had been in the early hours of the morning. A river mist had risen, damp and clammy, blurring the edges of every solid thing with shifting shadows. In the distance the black towers again looked like skyscrapers.
Rage carefully pictured the outer edges of the city and began to walk. Her mind drifted to wondering where the wizard had got the men and women who peopled Valley, and why some of their descendants had ended up being like Ania and others like the ruthless High Keeper. Maybe there was no answer. Sometimes in a family one of the children was nasty and sullen or a bully, while the others were especially nice, but they all had the same parents and lived in the same house.
Rage stiffened as the Willow Seat Tower came into view. Thinking of the High Keeper must have been enough to encourage the city to bring her here. The street seemed too narrow and close around her, and Rage had the eerie sensation that she was being watched by unfriendly eyes. She noticed that the buildings around the Willow Seat Tower looked wrong. It was as if their shadowy outlines were distorted, so that one side of a wall was higher or wider than another, and windows were not properly square or round.
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