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Clariel nodded. Whatever Mogget said, she was sure Bel would not try to stop her, particularly not when she was going against Kilp and Aronzo, to save the King.
‘Fly carefully,’ she instructed the composite beast. ‘Do not allow me to fall, but go swiftly.’
‘First to find the sword?’ asked the dragon. Interestingly, its voice now was not a combination of the two Free Magic creatures, but Baazalanan’s alone.
‘Where is it?’ asked Clariel. ‘And how fast can you fly? It is near two hundred leagues to Belisaere.’
‘The sword lies on the foothills of Mount Aunden; we can be there soon after the dawn. We must rest then, under the height of the sun, but can then reach Belisaere by an hour after dusk.’
‘But what is your intention, Mistress?’
The voice now changed to Aziminil’s.
‘We are strong and may pass the water channels, but there are many Charter Stones and many Charter Mages in the city … We cannot travel as we are, and should we be seen, they could imprison us once again.’
‘I am not sure,’ said Clariel slowly. She frowned, the movement making her mask move as well. It was sticking to her forehead again. ‘I need to see what is happening. Perhaps we will drop down outside Belisaere, find travellers or farmers, ask what is going on … I will decide later. Fly now!’
‘Yes, Mistress,’ carolled the dragon, in its composite voice. It extended its wings, the tips unfolding to a far greater length than Clariel had suspected, beat down with them and began a lurching run along the pebbled beach, the powerful hindquarters driving it forward at considerable speed. Just before the beach ended in a tall, overgrown bank, the dragon pumped its wings again and lurched into the sky, with Clariel and Mogget holding on for dear life in the iron chair.
Back in the Abhorsen’s House, there came a great pounding on the gate. The guard sending hastened to open it, to admit Bel, fully armed and armoured in helmet and gethre plate hauberk. He was even paler than ever and clutched his left shoulder. A message-hawk was asleep on his right shoulder, its head tucked under a wing.
‘What in the Charter’s name is going on?’ asked Bel. There was still smoke billowing up from the now-extinguished fruit trees in the orchard, a drift of it gathered about the House, pale under the moonlight. A line of sendings holding buckets, bowls and even a firkin stretched from the orchard to the pump in the rose garden. ‘What’s this about Clariel and Mogget? Where are they?’
The guard sending gestured downwards, and made several quick signs, Bel watching his flashing fingers.
‘They went down and out through the waterfall?’ asked Bel sharply. There was none of his amiable chatter now, no hint of any smile in his mouth or eyes. ‘Both of them?’
The sending held up four fingers, then slowly made four signs, one of them a claw.
‘Two Free Magic creatures!’ exclaimed Bel. He bit his lip and groaned. He guessed at once that one must be the creature in the bottle he had brought from Belisaere. Kargrin had warned him not to let Clariel touch the bottle, that her previous contact with the creature could have made her crave more. But another one as well? It had to be one of the chained, and that was beyond bad news.
‘Clariel, what have you done?’ he said, tears starting in his eyes. But he wiped them away immediately, for there was no time for tears. He had to do something. But what was there he could do?
A sending tugged at his elbow. Charter marks from its fingers flowed through those in his armoured coat, warming the skin beneath. Bel looked at the cowled figure, who inclined its head and offered him an ink-stained piece of paper. He took it, held it up to the moonlight and read it. For a moment he felt relieved that at least Clariel had written a note.
But something had happened below, for the sending reported two Free Magic creatures gone … and there was Mogget. Out of the House without permission, and unrestrained …
Bel took a deep breath, and stood as tall as he could.
‘Ready a Paperwing to launch as soon as possible from the platform,’ he said, desperately hoping the sendings would obey. He was not the Abhorsen, nor the Abhorsen’s heir, but surely they would recognise that he was the only one who had the spirit of an Abhorsen?
‘Bring me the sword Cleave and … and a set of bells.’
The guard sending knelt and bent its head, and the cowled one followed, and then the whole bucket line of sendings knelt as well. Belatiel felt the hair stand up on the back of his neck, and from somewhere deep beneath his feet he thought he heard the distant echo of a sorrowful bell.
Already some half-dozen leagues away on dragon-back, Mogget sat up in Clariel’s lap and turned his head to the south, ears pricking up.
‘What is it?’ asked Clariel. She could not sleep, for the wind sped past too briskly, it was cold, and the dragon did not fly as smoothly as a Paperwing and she was afraid of falling out.
‘A change,’ said Mogget thoughtfully. ‘Not unexpected, but sooner than I thought. It is as well we left when we did.’
‘What do you mean?’ asked Clariel.
But Mogget was silent, and did not answer.
chapter thirty
an ancient treasure
Clariel came to the foothills of Mount Aunden in the early morning, well before noon. The mountain itself loomed up to their right, a great hulking mass of granite, its snow-capped peak gleaming in the sun. In winter, its upper slopes would all be under snow, but now bare rock shone there, above the conifer forests that thronged below the winter snowline.
The dragon tilted its wings and began a long glide down, aiming for a long flat shelf of grey-green rock, a little way above the treeline. Just before it seemed to Clariel that they would simply fly straight into it and all be killed, it beat its wings furiously, so that they almost stopped in mid-air. Then, with its rear legs running fast before they even made contact with the ground, the dragon landed in a lurching gallop that ended not, as Clariel feared, over the edge of the rocky ledge, but some
twenty or thirty paces short. Whichever Free Magic creature was the guiding force behind the shape the two had assumed, it knew how to use it.
Clariel climbed stiffly off the chair, stood on the footrest and leaped clear of the dragon, Mogget at her heels. Clapping her hands together, she jumped on the spot, for despite the hooded robe and mask over her hunting leathers, she was cold. They had flown high and fast and the chair definitely did not have the warming spells of a Paperwing.
‘We will divide,’ said the dragon, ‘if you permit, Mistress.’
‘Do so,’ said Clariel. She pushed her hood back and continued to stomp and clap her hands as she walked around the ledge. She could smell the pine sap of the trees below, a clean, welcome scent that she drew into her lungs. Once she’d got warm in the sun Clariel thought she might walk down under those trees, since they were going to stay for some hours anyway to allow the Free Magic creatures to rest.
She looked up at the rocks above, more ledges interspersed between high crags, and wondered where the ancient cache of weapons Baazalanan had mentioned might be. There were no obvious caves, nor was this the kind of rock that lent itself to the formation of such things.
‘I should have stayed in the House,’ said Mogget sourly from behind her. ‘Not even a field mouse to eat up here.’
‘It’s wonderful,’ said Clariel, stretching out her arms. ‘No people, the forest just below, the sun on my face …’
She faltered and stopped, and lifted her hand to touch the mask. She’d forgotten she was wearing it, and for a moment could have sworn she had felt the sun on her face, without the barrier of the mask at all.
‘Mistress, the cache is still here.’
Baazalanan’s whisper, close behind her, made Clariel turn swiftly on the spot. The creature was back in its regular form, looming above her, its blue skin bright in the sunlight, though its eyes remained pools of darkness. Aziminil squatted nearby, legs folded twice.
‘Where?’ asked Clariel.
Baazalanan stamped the ground with one of his clublike feet. An echo came back, indicating a hollow space beneath the apparently solid slab of stone.
