The Amber Spyglass (His Dark Materials 3)

“Well, you cut through last night all right,” she said.

“Yeah, because I was tired, I think. Well, we’ll see. Just follow the knife?”

“That’s all it said.”

“Might as well go now, then. Except there’s not much food left. We ought to find something to take with us, bread and fruit or something. So first I’ll find a world where we can get food, and then we’ll start looking properly.”

“All right,” said Lyra, quite happy to be moving again, with Pan and Will, alive and awake.

They made their way back to the spies, who were sitting alertly by the knife, packs on their backs.

“We should like to know what you intend,” said Salmakia.

“Well, we’re not coming to Lord Asriel anyway,” said Will. “We’ve got something else to do first.”

“And will you tell us what that is, since it’s clear we can’t stop you from doing it?”

“No,” said Lyra, “because you’d just go and tell them. You’ll have to come along without knowing where we’re going. Of course you could always give up and go back to them.”

“Certainly not,” said Tialys.

“We want some kind of guarantee,” said Will. “You’re spies, so you’re bound to be dishonest, that’s your trade. We need to know we can trust you. Last night we were all too tired and we couldn’t think about it, but there’d be nothing to stop you waiting till we were asleep and then stinging us to make us helpless and calling up Lord Asriel on that lodestone thing. You could do that easily. So we need to have a proper guarantee that you won’t. A promise isn’t enough.”

The two Gallivespians trembled with anger at this slur on their honor.

Tialys, controlling himself, said, “We don’t accept one-sided demands. You must give something in exchange. You must tell us what your intentions are, and then I shall give the lodestone resonator into your care. You must let me have it when I want to send a message, but you will always know when that happens, and we shall not be able to use it without your agreement. That will be our guarantee. And now you tell us where you are going, and why.”

Will and Lyra exchanged a glance to confirm it.

“All right,” Lyra said, “that’s fair. So here’s where we’re going: we’re going to the world of the dead. We don’t know where it is, but the knife’ll find it. That’s what we’re going to do.”

The two spies were looking at her with openmouthed incredulity.

Then Salmakia blinked and said, “What you say doesn’t make sense. The dead are dead, that’s all. There is no world of the dead.”

“I thought that was true, as well,” said Will. “But now I’m not sure. At least with the knife we can find out.”

“But why?”

Lyra looked at Will and saw him nod.

“Well,” she said, “before I met Will, long before I was asleep, I led this friend into danger, and he was killed. I thought I was rescuing him, only I was making things worse. And while I was asleep I dreamed of him and I thought maybe I could make amends if I went where he’s gone and said I was sorry. And Will wants to find his father, who died just when he found him before. See, Lord Asriel wouldn’t think of that. Nor would Mrs. Coulter. If we went to him we’d have to do what he wants, and he wouldn’t think of Roger at all—that’s my friend who died—it wouldn’t matter to him. But it matters to me. To us. So that’s what we want to do.”

“Child,” said Tialys, “when we die, everything is over. There is no other life. You have seen death. You’ve seen dead bodies, and you’ve seen what happens to a dæmon when death comes. It vanishes. What else can there be to live on after that?”

“We’re going to go and find out,” said Lyra. “And now we’ve told you, I’ll take your resonator lodestone.”

She held out her hand, and leopard-Pantalaimon stood, tail swinging slowly, to reinforce her demand. Tialys unslung the pack from his back and laid it in her palm. It was surprisingly heavy—no burden for her, of course, but she marveled at his strength.

“And how long do you think this expedition will take?” said the Chevalier.

“We don’t know,” Lyra told him. “We don’t know anything about it, any more than you do. We’ll just go there and see.”

“First thing,” Will said, “we’ve got to get some water and some more food, something easy to carry. So I’m going to find a world where we can do that, and then we’ll set off.”

Tialys and Salmakia mounted their dragonflies and held them quivering on the ground. The great insects were eager for flight, but the command of their riders was absolute, and Lyra, watching them in daylight for the first time, saw the extraordinary fineness of the gray silk reins, the silvery stirrups, the tiny saddles.

Will took the knife, and a powerful temptation made him feel for the touch of his own world: he had the credit card still; he could buy familiar food; he could even telephone Mrs. Cooper and ask for news of his mother—

The knife jarred with a sound like a nail being drawn along rough stone, and his heart nearly stopped. If he broke the blade again, it would be the end.

After a few moments he tried again. Instead of trying not to think of his mother, he said to himself: Yes, I know she’s there, but I’m just going to look away while I do this . . .

And that time it worked. He found a new world and slid the knife along to make an opening, and a few moments later all of them were standing in what looked like a neat and prosperous farmyard in some northern country like Holland or Denmark, where the stone-flagged yard was swept and clean and a row of stable doors stood open. The sun shone down through a hazy sky, and there was the smell of burning in the air, as well as something less pleasant. There was no sound of human life, though a loud buzzing, so active and vigorous that it sounded like a machine, came from the stables.

Lyra went and looked, and came back at once, looking pale.

“There’s four”—she gulped, hand to her throat, and recovered—“four dead horses in there. And millions of flies . . .”

“Look,” said Will, swallowing, “or maybe better not.”

He was pointing at the raspberry canes that edged the kitchen garden. He’d just seen a man’s legs, one with a shoe on and one without, protruding from the thickest part of the bushes.

Lyra didn’t want to look, but Will went to see if the man was still alive and needed help. He came back shaking his head, looking uneasy.

The two spies were already at the farmhouse door, which was ajar.

Tialys darted back and said, “It smells sweeter in there,” and then he flew back over the threshold while Salmakia scouted further around the outbuildings.

Will followed the Chevalier. He found himself in a big square kitchen, an old-fashioned place with white china on a wooden dresser, and a scrubbed pine table, and a hearth where a black kettle stood cold. Next door there was a pantry, with two shelves full of apples that filled the whole room with fragrance. The silence was oppressive.

Lyra said quietly, “Will, is this the world of the dead?”

The same thought had occurred to him. But he said, “No, I don’t think so. It’s one we haven’t been in before. Look, we’ll load up with as much as we can carry. There’s sort of rye bread, that’ll be good—it’s light—and here’s some cheese . . .”

When they had taken what they could carry, Will dropped a gold coin into the drawer in the big pine table.

“Well?” said Lyra, seeing Tialys raise his eyebrows. “You should always pay for what you take.”

At that moment Salmakia came in through the back door, landing her dragonfly on the table in a shimmer of electric blue.

“There are men coming,” she said, “on foot, with weapons. They’re only a few minutes’ walk away. And there is a village burning beyond the fields.”

And as she spoke, they could hear the sound of boots on gravel, and a voice issuing orders, and the jingle of metal.

“Then we should go,” said Will.

He felt in the air with the knifepoint. And at once he was aware of a new kind of sensation. The blade seemed to be sliding along a very smooth surface, like a mirror, and then it sank through slowly until he was able to cut. But it was resistant, like heavy cloth, and when he made an opening, he blinked with surprise and alarm: because the world he was opening into was the same in every detail as the one they were already standing in.