"Lyra, please hurry, we have no time to loose
"Lyra, please hurry, we have no time to loose!" Pantalaimon cried from up ahead. I spun my head wildly around to try to find him. I could hear footsteps behind me, they were none other than Billy Costa's. Even though we were both eighteen now, we still did everything we could to make it seem as if everything were the way it was when I was twelve.
"Found you!" Billy shouted. He and a band of other Gyptian kids pelted me with cherry pits. One hit the back of my head as I tried to escape. Pantalaimon's red-gold fur was in sight, he had the perfect hiding spot. His large lion-like figure loomed ahead. I scrambled into the thicket after him.
"She's going in the thorn bushes!" A kid screamed. This was followed by a chorus of loud groans. I snickered. It had been tough to catch me for the Gyptians. I was quite a player.
"Alright, we loose." Billy said. He had become my closest friend after my old best friend had died. And especially after I was forced to leave Will in the world of specters. I had nearly given up on all of my duties after I had left Will. I still went to our secret Botanic Garden every midsummer's day at midnight. There I could imagine him sitting next to me. But it wasn't the same. Six years ago it didn't matter if you switched worlds. It didn't matter if specters came to life with every cut the subtle knife made. Now it mattered. Only one cut was allowed in all of the universes. One cut that led the poor trapped people of the so called 'heaven' and the world of prehistoric leopards on wheels. There the little spirits could be set free and fly in the air as dust, individual thoughts and feelings.
"I win again!" I laughed. Billy waited for me to crawl back out of the bushes while the others had gone to find the rest of my team. Billy walked with me in silence for a few minutes. I had time to think about how wretched the heaven was. It wasn't what good souls deserved after so long. The souls should be set free, and they were. At least they would be until I built the Republic of Heaven. Then all souls would be allowed to either flow in the air like dust, or they could live happily in the new heaven.
"Lyra, now that I'm leaving in a few days, I wanted to ask you something. I'm not sure if you'll agree though." Billy said in his British accent. I stopped walking to look at him.
"Yes, Billy? What is it?" I asked, trying to be patient as he thought out his question.
"I'd like to well…I want to help you build the Republic, if you don't mind. I've already asked my mother! She said it was a great idea, holy, you know." Billy stammered. I smiled.
"Is that all, Billy?" I laughed. He nodded sheepishly. I took his hand.
"That would be perfect! I really need things to go faster in the Republic. You see, you have to use your demon to pass on to the dust world, sort of, then you have to kind of build the actual ground and stuff in the spirit world using dust. The dust you can see through an amber spyglass. It's pretty complicated actually. Even I barley understand it. I'm the only one who works on it, so it should go twice as fast with you there!" I said in a rushed but happy voice. I could sense Billy's relief at this. He had gotten sick of regular life all the time. He had once told me a year ago that he wanted adventures like we once had six years ago. This would be another challenge for him to pass.
"I'll meet you at Jordan College at six and then you can show me the dust, right?" He asked, still unsure of my building theory.
"Sure thing, Billy." I smiled. Then Pantalaimon and I ran off into the clearing. This time, I stayed low to the ground, making sure I would not be pelted with rock hard pits again. Pantalaimon was scouting up ahead.
"Lyra! Come on, get up, nobody's there." Pantalaimon argued. I hesitated, but then I stuck my head up to look over the waist high prairie grass. Everything was quiet. Nobody was waiting to hit me. So I stood up and started walking towards Jordan College.
"Good morning, Lyra." The master of Jordan said as I passed by him in the hall.
"Good morning, Sir." I smiled. Everyone looked up to me now. I was much more respected than any master of any college. In fact, it would be hard to find someone on this planet who was better respected than I. But of course I deserved all of this respect, I was the one, after all, who was building the Republic of Heaven.
"Lyra! Over here!" Billy called to me from the other side of the roof of Jordan. I waved a tiny bit then hurried over to where he stood. It was already six o'clock. I looked up at the sky, watching the sun go down.
"What are you looking at?" Billy asked. He followed my gaze. I pointed up to the transparent moon.
"Alright, we have a few minutes until in the north, the Northern Lights begin. When they do start, we have to try to separate ourselves from our bodies and float up. It usually happens in your sleep, like Dr. Mary did it. But I have been trying to do it awake, and so far, it's worked." I said. He nodded to tell me he'd understood what to do.
"Once we get out of our bodies and float up, we have to then use these to see dust. If you can't see any, think of good thoughts and more will appear. So then, collect it in this. It's a dust catcher. Then go to those clouds, don't worry, they won't move away. They are fixed there in place." I said. Handing him an amber spyglass and a large, purple pouch.
"Can this thing hold that much dust?" Billy asked me, staring at the mystical, golden sparkles. I nodded.
"It can hold a lot more than just the sky's contents. We have to make our spirits hover near growing children too, they have the most dust around them." I instructed. Billy turned over the spyglass in his hands.
"I can do that. Easy work you're doing here, Lyra." Billy laughed. I frowned.
"Tell me that when you've disconnected from your body, Billy. Then you'll know what it's like for just me to build an entire heaven in those clouds." I said, once again pointing to the exact clouds I wanted him to build upon.
"Alright, Billy. Try to separate yourself from your spirit, in other words, your demon." I sighed. This would be hard for him on his first try.
But to my surprise, he did it in a few minutes' time. I disconnected from Pantalaimon. I looked around me, I was in the sky. I willed myself to go back down to the roof, catching a bit of dust on the way down.
"This is perfect, Lyra! How come you didn't show me this earlier?" Billy exclaimed. He stuck out his pouch and dust streamed in, as if it were a magnet.
"Good, now keep getting as much as you can, okay? Then go to the cloud, remember, the cloud that doesn't move." I ordered. Billy waved me off.
"Yeah, Yeah, I'll remember." Billy smiled when the dust swirled around him. In some ways, he was still a child, never taking anything seriously. I smiled at the memories.
I floated upwards to the motionless cloud. On it, there was already a solid gold ground and a few houses I was able to make. The world of the dead led here, to an opening in the sky. I had already made this Heaven official. Now I needed some way to make it spiritually official. So that order would remain in tact in this new Heaven.
Something glinted near the ground a few hundred yards away from where I was. My head snapped up.
"Billy? Is that you?" I asked. I walked towards the glint. It slowly turned into a dark silhouette.
"Billy, it's not funny! I gave you a job here, you'd better answer me!" I scolded. Nobody answered. The silhouette moved towards me.
"Lyra?" It asked in a husky voice I had not heard for six years. My heart nearly stopped. Was it possible for him to see me here? Could it be that all universes shared the same Heaven?
Yes, it was true. It was him. It was Will.