‘There is no knob on this side,’ she said in a strangely flat voice. ‘I had not noticed that before.’
‘It is to keep unwanted visitors out, I daresay,’ said Dirk. ‘Stand aside.’ He put his right hand to the glinting carved surface, and pushed.
Nothing happened. Cursing under his breath Dirk pushed again, this time with both hands and as hard as he could, but still the Door did not move.
‘Why does it not open?’ Faene cried in panic.
‘There must be a trick to it,’ Dirk panted, running his fingers rapidly over the carving, trying to find a secret trigger. ‘Or perhaps … yes, of course! I have been declared dead! The Door no longer recognises me!’
He looked over his shoulder. ‘Rye! Come and—’
His eyes widened in horror. He was staring beyond Rye, at something behind Rye’s back.
Rye’s stomach lurched. He looked round. Only a few paces away, a giant, mottled shape was peeling from the trunk of a tree. The fell dragon dropped to the ground and raised itself on its hind legs. Its dripping jaws opened, and it seemed to grin.
Only then, with the cries of Dirk, Sonia and Faene ringing in his ears, did Rye remember that he was not wearing the concealing hood. Quick as a thought, he reached up and pulled the silk over his head.
The monstrous lizard hesitated. Then it seemed to decide that a being who could vanish before its eyes was not worth pursuing. It dropped to all fours again and prowled towards Sonia, Dirk and Faene.
Rye lunged forward. All he could think of was reaching his companions, to share the hood with them. Never had he moved so fast. In a blink the bell tree stick was clanging musically on golden carving as his hands slammed against the Door.
And the Door moved. The Door moved beneath his hands. He heard a soft creaking sound …
‘It is opening!’ he yelled. ‘Hold on to me!’
He felt hands grip him. He saw a long, widening strip of blinding white light. He heard the fell dragon bellow in baffled rage. Then he was jerked off his feet, and he, Sonia, Dirk and Faene were swept together through the Door.
3 - A Friend in High Places
They were in the Chamber of the Doors. Rye knew that, even with his eyes screwed shut. The smells of ash and ancient rock were very familiar. His skin was prickling with old magic.
Safe. Rye opened his eyes and gazed at the stone walls, the gaping fireplace, the dusty rock floor. The room looked smaller than he remembered. He felt his companions slipping away from him, but he could not move. For a moment he could do nothing but stand motionless, gripped by the memory of the last time he had been in this place.
It had only been a few days ago, but it seemed like weeks—months! He felt like a different person from the boy who had recklessly lied his way into this secret chamber in the foundations of the Keep of Weld.
Slowly he turned to look behind him.
There were the three magic Doors, side by side. Magnificent gold, elegant silver, sturdy wood bound with brass.
Only a dead leaf on the floor showed that the golden Door had opened to let them in. No sound penetrated from the world outside.
Rye stared at the images carved into the Door’s gleaming surface. On his first visit to the Chamber he had thought they were just elaborate decorations. Now he could see that they were pictures of things that actually existed in the land beyond the Wall. Bloodhogs. Fell dragons. Sea serpents …
He quickly turned away before his eyes could stray to the silver Door. He did not have to think about that yet. Not yet.
‘Rye!’ Sonia was kneeling by the fireplace. He went to her, aware that Dirk and Faene were slowly following him.
Sonia pointed into the shadows at the back of the fireplace and, crouching, Rye saw the dangling end of a rope.
‘The Keep chimneys are a maze, but if you keep hold of the rope you will not get lost,’ Sonia said briskly. ‘It will be a tight squeeze for Dirk, but I daresay he can manage it, and Faene too, if you use the feather to help them.’
‘You do not need help yourself, of course, Sonia?’ Dirk enquired, trying but completely failing to hide his irritation.
‘Oh, no.’ Sonia laughed. ‘I am used to travelling by chimney, and I can climb like a clink.’ Pulling the red scarf over her mouth and nose to protect them from soot, she began recklessly tearing strips from the bottom of her already ragged skirt to make masks for her companions.
‘But where will you take us, Sonia?’ Faene asked anxiously. ‘If no one is to know—’
‘One person must know,’ Sonia said, her voice muffled by the scarf.
‘What?’ Dirk frowned. ‘Who must know?’
‘Let us just say that I have friends in high places,’ Sonia replied. ‘One friend, at least. Do not worry. She can be trusted.’
Even with the feather making them weightless, the climb up the dark chimney was not easy for Rye, Faene and Dirk. Their elbows and knees scraped painfully against the stones as they half scrambled, half floated upward in an awkward chain.
Amid all his discomfort Rye found himself feeling glad that Sonia, moving nimbly ahead of them in the gloom, was showing that she really could climb like a clink. He had never doubted it, but he was sure Dirk had suspected it was an idle boast. Now perhaps Dirk would see that idle boasting was not Sonia’s way.
As they climbed higher, it became clear why Sonia had called the Keep chimneys a maze. The chimney they were using was obviously the oldest and largest, but it had many offshoots leading to fireplaces on other floors. By leaning into these offshoots the climber could hear what was happening in the rooms beyond the fireplaces.
And so it was that, reaching the place where the Keep kitchen chimney joined the main stack, Rye suddenly heard, over the clatter of dishes, his mother’s voice.
‘I do not mind the task,’ Lisbeth was saying. ‘She always thanks me very politely.’
‘By the Wall, and so she should!’ another woman retorted. ‘After you have toiled up all those stairs with a heavy tray!’
Bracing his back against the chimney wall, hissing a warning to Faene that he had stopped, Rye fumbled for the light crystal, and pressed it against the blackened stones. A window appeared, and through it he saw his mother in the room below.
Lisbeth was standing at a table chopping vegetables. An elderly woman was working with her, and a third woman was washing dishes on the other side of the room.
Like the other kitchen workers, Lisbeth was wearing a white apron and a white cap that covered her hair completely. She had deep shadows under her eyes and looked so pale that at first Rye feared she was ill. Then he saw that the old woman was just as pale, and realised that he had grown used to seeing faces browned by a stronger sun than Weld’s.
‘Well, I am very grateful you have taken over carrying the trays, my dear, and you are good to make light of it,’ the old woman said to Lisbeth. ‘I did it for years, but my poor knees would not have taken much more of it.’
The third woman turned from the washing up. ‘It is a wicked waste of time and effort, I say,’ she said sharply. ‘Trays in her room three times a day indeed! If it is good enough for the Warden to eat in the dining room, why is it not good enough for his daughter?’
The old woman snorted. ‘If you had been here as long as I have, Bettina, you would know that the Warden likes his daughter to stay out of the way. The very sight of her makes him uncomfortable, they say, and he prefers other people not to see her either.’
‘What?’ cried Lisbeth. ‘But why—?’
‘Well, she should have been a boy, shouldn’t she?’ the old woman said, frowning over her chopping board. ‘The Warden wanted a son who could take his place as leader of Weld. He has no use for a daughter.’
‘Poor child,’ Lisbeth said in a low voice. And Rye, remembering the proud, closed face of the finely dressed young woman he had seen by chance on his first visit to the Keep, suddenly found that he was sharing his mother’s pity for the Warden’s daughter.