The Amber Spyglass (His Dark Materials)

By Philip Pullman

Chapter 29

By Alec Boucher

The Silver Key

It was a warm midsummer day in Oxford. Amongst the trees and plants of the beautiful botanic garden was Lyra Silvertounge. Her and her trustful dæmon Pan were sitting on a bench, the same bench that Lyra knew that Will was sitting on at the same time in his world. It had been four years since Lyra had last seen him and she still missed him greatly. "Oh Pan I still miss him so much. I wish I could see him again but I know it will never happen", Lyra said sadly. " I am sure that Will misses you a lot still as well, but it has been four years and even though it is very sad we must learn to move on." Pan said in a sympathetic voice. "I don't wanna move on!" exclaimed Lyra.

They had sat there for about an hour now so Lyra was starting to doze off and she was getting very tired. She thought it would be okay if she got some rest now. She would need to have enough energy for later when Lyra would attend classes with Dame Hannah on how to read the alethiometer. She was getting better at but she was still nowhere near as good as she once was. Lyra also now needed to carry heavy and old books which now lay in a pile on the ground right next to her.

Before Lyra fell asleep, out of the corner of her eye she saw the bushes shake. Out of the bushes came a cat. Lyra thought "could it be?" Her answer came immediately. Out of the bushes came a boy which Lyra knew at once was Will. "WILL!" she screamed. Lyra ran as fast as she could, with her arms outstretched, to Will. They embraced so tightly that not even the mighty bear king Iorek Byrnison could pull them apart. They kissed and hugged for about a half an hour, each one of them not wishing to let go.

When they had stopped Lyra quickly questioned Will, "Oh Will I am so glad you are here but how did you get here? Did you get your mother back? Did you miss me? I missed you so much." Will waited till Lyra was done and then spoke. "Of course I missed you. I have thought about you everyday. I found my mother and she is okay but it has been tough. There are many men after me to trying to put me in an orphanage but Mary has helped a lot." "How is Mary?" questioned Lyra. "She is good." "But how did you get here?" Lyra said. Will stood up and took a silver instrument out of his pocket. When Lyra saw it more in detail she could see it was a key. Will held it out in front of him and said "Mary made this for me. It is made out of the melted parts of the knife. It can open a door between worlds without letting dust go out and creating specters." "Wow that is great we could go to Cittàgazze and we could get married and have children and spend the rest of our lives together. Lyra could barely hold back her excitement. "That is great and all but we must go to the world of the Mulefa first. This key requires the seedpod oil to work so we must go there first."

"Yes, that would be okay but where is Mary?" Out of the bush came women that Lyra had recognized as Dr. Mary Malone. "Mary" Lyra said excitingly they hugged and said hello. "Mary how long have you been waiting in the bush?" said Lyra. "Since Will came out" said Mary. "Oh it would have been okay to come out when Will came out" Lyra said in an almost shy tone. "Well I wanted to give you your privacy" said Mary "Well I think we should get going now" said Will. They all agreed.

Will put the key in the air and Lyra could see the deep concentration that Will had use to use to open the windows with his knife, but now used it to open a door to the world of the Mulefa with the key. Out of nowhere an opening appeared and inside of it was a landscape of grass-covered hills and in the distance there were the enormous trees that towered above the landscape. They all decided to go to the village of Mary's friend Atal which was not far away from were they were. So they walked on one of the nearest stone roads to the village. While they were walking Lyra was talking to Mary and Will on what she had been doing for the last couple years. She had talked about the alethiometer lessons that she was receiving from Dame Hannah and the boarding school that she was attending. "In school I don't have many friends so it can get very lonely some times" Lyra said in a very sad voice. "But it is okay now because I have you two now." Lyra smiled and they kept on walking.

Finally when they were about 500 yards away from the village Mary could sense something was wrong. As they got closer they saw that there was something definitely wrong. The entire village was destroyed. Mary knew at once who was the culprit. Mary was screaming and waving her arms in a language that Will and Lyra could not understand. After about five minutes a group of mulefa in the group was a mulefa that Mary knew as Atal. They embraced and started talking "Mary" said Atal. "It is so nice to see you. You came right on time the tulapi have just left but this time they attacked more fiercely than ever you must find a way to stop them and quickly before they come back. They have killed ten mulefa in my village already. You must hurry up." Mary was shocked, she had never heard about tulapies killing anyone before. Mary felt like some one dropped a heavy stone in her stomach. She turned around to Will and Lyra and told them what was going on. "So you see, I must stay here and help the mulefa. You two must go in to the forest and find a seedpod and then run back to the door we came out of earlier." explained Mary. Both children highly disagreed "But Mary we dealt with more dangers and risky things before" Lyra begged. "Come on Mary we could think of away to stop the tulapi together" said Will. "No" said Mary. "I promised the mulefa that I would stop the tulapi a long time ago and only I will stop the tulapi. I am sorry." Will and Lyra both knew they had been beat. So they walked off into the woods.

As they got deep in the woods they saw a large seedpod and picked up and walked out of the forest of enormous trees. The trip back seemed to be longer than before. The sun was low in the sky and Lyra felt like she was forgetting something. "My alethiometer lessons" Lyra screamed. "What time is it?" Lyra asked Will. "I don know." Will replied. He remembered that he had a watch in his pocket and quickly took it out. It showed 6:05. "I'm late!" Lyra yelled. They both started to sprint as fast as they could to the barley visible door. When they got in the door Will said "you go on I'll stay here and wait for Mary." "okay." Lyra said, feeling sad that she had to leave Will.

Marry was sitting down and thinking. She had no clue how she was going to stop the tulapi and the tulapi were reported to be attacking in a near by village. Then it hit her. She would build a giant net and catch the tulapi then kill the tulapi. She ran off to go tell the others.

EILOGUE

The last telling

…..78 years later. Will and Lyra were walking toward harpies in the land of the dead. They had spent a lifetime together and they were still as in love as the day they married. As they got to the harpy, they noticed that it was "no name". When they stood next to her, she said "I have been expecting you." They both nodded. "Well then, tell me your story." Will and Lyra both looked at each other and then looked back at the harpy. They told there story for the last time. When they were done the harpy said "Well come on now. Do you remember the way?" they nodded. "I will go with you." They crossed the plains and climbed the mountains till they finally got to the window. "Good bye my friends" said the harpy. They both took a step into the window. When they went thought the window they looked at each other. Then they turned into a thousand golden particles. Every particle of Will was linked with Lyra and vise versa and they floated off together for the rest of eternity.