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Chapter 25
Golden Auroras
"This way, now," Lord Boreal was saying, weaving his way through the plants of the dark, empty greenhouse.
This is very strange, Father MacPhail couldn't help but observe as he quietly followed the other man. He felt like he was in danger somehow, like he was doing something forbidden and illicit—probably because in all reality, he was .
If the Cardinal hadn't sent us here, I'd have guessed this was a trap. Eulaia was bitter as they moved forward, her little claws digging into his shoulders. This is utter insanity.
His daemon was usually the more adventurous one. She hadn't balked when they'd first been introduced to the new worlds. She wanted to see them, actually, and had craned her head forward when Father MacPhail himself shied away. She opened her mouth to taste the air of another world, begging him to stay and to move forward and to give them that chance. Yet now she felt dragged through the mud like a dog forced on a leash, her claws painfully clinging to him as if she were hanging on for dear life. With a smirk, he realized that perhaps the one thing that could overpower her excitement over new worlds was her hatred of Lord Boreal.
You're not wrong, she practically hissed back to him. He grinned, and then frowned again with a heavy sigh.
At the very edge of the greenhouse, something caught their eye. It was a glimmering, translucent stream of air. Father MacPhail knew what it was: light and silvery, there yet not. It was the exact same one they'd seen on the bridge. Except this one didn't seem to lead to anywhere that drastically different.
"After you," Lord Boreal crooned, amusement and taunting in his eyes as he stepped aside and gestured toward the window. Father MacPhail scowled at him then, allowing himself one moment of unpious discontent before he shook himself, cleared his head, said a little prayer and then stepped through the window—eyes closed and heart pounding.
o-o-o-o-o-o-o
"Lyra, wake up now." Mrs. Coulter gently shook her daughter's shoulders, watching as her face twisted and protested, attempting to go back to sleep. She loved watching Lyra sleep. It was something she hadn't been privy to for the past twelve years, after all. Most mothers did this when their children were first born, tucking them into their cribs and watching them fuss and squirm and then eventually lull into sleep. Mrs. Coulter had exactly one of those nights, when Lyra was first born before Asriel came to take her away. And it wasn't enough for her.
"Lyra. Lyra. "
"Huh!"
Finally the girl was awake, dark eyes snapped open and her body jolting forward. Both she and Will had been doing that lately, where their light rests left them waking up in a panic. Mrs. Coulter couldn't blame them, after all they've seen and all they've had to deal with. And after traveling from one place to the next!
"Shh, you're alright, darling." Mrs. Coulter smoothed down Lyra's hair, which was damp from sweat. "We're safe. We're with Dr. Malone in London."
The morning was already tense and wary as Mrs. Coulter and the children woke up and came downstairs, changed into new (and stolen) outfits. Mrs. Coulter sported blue jeans for the first time, uncomfortable with the way the fabric was heavy and thick. She missed the air and breathing room dresses and skirts brought, despite the way they tightly clung to her frame and made it a little difficult to move. These jeans complemented her purple sweater, however, and her small-heeled black boots. Lyra donned a much-more-comfortable-looking pair of red pants and a flower t-shirt while Will wore black jeans and a white shirt. Quite forgettable, really, the three of them. Just regular people out and about.
When they got down to the kitchen, they found Dr. Malone at the stove. She was cracking a series of eggs into a pan while dashing them with salt, pepper, and a spot of cheese. That was a curious choice, Mrs. Coulter thought, but she wasn't going to complain when they were quite literally at this woman's mercy and care, and when, as Lyra kept promising, they very desperately needed her still.
"Good Morning," Mrs. Coulter sang instead, forcing herself to smile and clap her hands. Her daemon loitered by her ankles, feeling at a loss of what to do except sit there and glower at everyone with contempt.
"Oh, hi!" Dr. Malone jumped a bit, stepping away from the stove to look at them. Her glasses were a bit steamy, as she'd been leaning very close to the pan.
"Can I help you with anything, Dr. Malone?"
"Oh, uh, sure. Want to stir the sausages and pop some bread into the toaster?
You didn't mean it, the monkey scoffed to her, laughing with more malice than Mrs. Coulter would have liked. She resisted the urge to kick him as she went over to the stove and picked up a spatula. This is what you get, trying to be polite. Live the life of a commoner. Flounder around in the kitchen.
Mrs. Coulter instructed Lyra and Will to go set the table as she and Dr. Malone cooked in the kitchen. Well, mainly Dr. Malone, as she realized quite soon how Mrs. Coulter barely knew her way around a pan.
"Never cooked much, have you?"
"We have… people for that, where we come from."
"I see." Dr. Malone snorted then, stirring the eggs and flipping them to the other side of the pan. "One of those worlds, eh?"
The women exchanged a glance just then. Dr. Malone's dark eyes were surprisingly soft and kind as they gazed at her. An unspoken connection seemed to transmit between the two of them. Mrs. Coulter didn't know much about the woman, except the little Lyra had let loose, but she understood the woman's religious past, and some of her views and some of the things she had gone through. It seemed similar in some ways to Mrs. Coulter's tangling with the Church, except perhaps less binding in the way the Magisterium demanded. Mrs. Coulter still felt like she could understand the other woman, however, and vice versa. The two seemed to find in each other ambition stained by very real cultural expectations and restrictions.
"We can talk more later," Dr. Malone said to her before transfering the eggs and sausage to a plate and then heading over to the table, Mrs. Coulter left only to blink a few times before gathering the toast and following. She hadn't expected to find anything in common with the woman, but perhaps there was more to her after all.
They ate breakfast with surprisingly pleasant chatter, Dr. Malone and Will taking turns describing things about their world while Lyra and Mrs. Coulter listened, their daemons sitting patiently under the table.
"Computers are probably the best thing we've invented," Dr. Malone was saying, her mouth full of eggs. "Back even twenty years ago when I started university, we had to look up everything in books. Can you just imagine! All that digging, and only whatever you had at your own library. It was painful, really, and took several hours. Now to think we have access to so much information online, wherever you are."
"How did you find information when you were in school, mother?"
It was always a shock, to hear Lyra call her mother. Even the golden monkey jumped at that, feeling the same course of emotion that flowed through her. Mrs. Counter was still getting used to it, to being someone's mother. It was a title not every woman could claim. She'd given birth to a child twelve years ago, to be sure, but to be that child's mother, and to care for her in the ways someone's mother should…
"Well," Mrs. Coulter said, shaking herself from her thoughts and offering Lyra a smile, "it was much like Dr. Malone said. We had our library of books at St. Sophia's, and, of course, other books at the colleges in Oxford we could visit. This one time my classmates and I needed a book at Wordsworth and it was quite the adventure…"
When they'd finished sharing stories, asking questions, and eating as much food as they could possibly stomach, Dr. Malone encouraged Lyra and Will to go watch TV while she and Mrs. Coulter started to clear the table. She also put on a fresh pot of coffee, apologizing for having neglected to do so earlier.
"Do you feel like talking more, now?" Dr. Malone asked once she'd poured Mrs. Coulter a cup and all of the dishes were washed and drying out on the sink. Mrs. Coulter paused to consider the woman, who was sitting across the table from her looking extremely calm and relaxed. She'd taken the three of them in and transported them across the country while barely knowing anything about them. Why did she do that? Was there something more sinister involved?
"I don't know what, exactly, you want," Mrs. Coulter began, "but I can assure you that we're better off as friends than enemies. We can be equally advantageous to one another."
"I have no intentions of being your enemy," Dr. Malone quickly interjected, her eyes round now. "Good God, why are you so suspicious? What is going on?"
She's no threat to us, her daemon concluded, his eyes narrowed as he sat up on a chair on the left side of the table. She's also not lying, or hiding anything. I dare say she might very well just be a good person.
Mrs. Coulter snorted at that, but then cleared her face and turned back to Dr. Malone with a smile. "I apologize, Dr. Malone. I'm afraid it's rather…tense, where I come from, and one must always be on their guard."
"Mary," the other woman said then, returning the smile. "If we're to be friends and help each other, you may as well call me Mary."
"Then please call me Marisa."
"Why are you here, Marisa?" Dr. Malone leaned down on the table now, shoulders hunched and a worried look furrowing her brow. "When Lyra first came to see me, she was so anxious, and she knew so much that I could hardly believe it. She explained the alethiometer, and that's fine, but why are you here with her? What are you running from?"
"In our world, the Church does not exactly look favorably on this particular phenomenon," Mrs. Coulter sighed, gesturing around them.
"Independent living?" Dr. Malone asked.
"Other worlds," Mrs. Coulter clarified, "although they don't like that much, either. After my husband died it took me years to establish myself on my own."
"Oh, I didn't realize—I'm sorry for your loss. Is Lyra—did she take it well? I imagine it's hard, to lose a father."
"My husband wasn't her father." Dr. Malone's eyebrows rose, and Mrs. Coulter couldn't help the smile that spread across her lips. Even the golden monkey felt amused. "I'm indeed caught up in the Church, you see, but I'm not exactly its most holy example."
It was easier talking to Dr. Malone than Mrs. Coulter thought. She told her more about the politics of their world and the difficult situation she was in, where she'd more or less turned her back on the Church in following Lyra over when she very well knew about their stances on Asriel's research and the heresies within.
"They fear it, these other worlds," Mrs. Coulter explained. "They fear it because they can't control them. And now that one most definitely exists, well, I'm afraid of what they'll do, and how they'd treat Lyra and her ability to read the alethiometer."
"Is it not common in your world, for people to read it?"
"No. For one, there are only six known devices in the world—seven, counting Lyra's, which I didn't even find out about myself until very recently. And for another, they've adapted reading to be a religious affair—one tied directly to the Magisterium which in turn controls all six devices."
"Can they...read it as well as her?"
"No." Mrs. Coulter smiled again. "No, they cannot. I know one of the readers. He spends weeks studying the books and the symbols to even ask the question, let alone read an answer to it. These men don't seem to have the natural affinity for the alethiometer that my daughter does. And I'm afraid that they'll kill her for it, Mary, which is why I am here with her. Here with you, hoping you and your research can somehow help us in the way Lyra seems to think you can."
Dr. Malone was quiet for a few moments after that. She'd been absorbing Mrs. Coulter's every word, listening intently to her and reacting as she went along. The golden monkey was watching her. Her face balked with concern when hearing about Lyra's voyages alone through the north, suspicion when hearing about Father MacPhail's plans, and thoughtful now as she sat back and considered everything Mrs. Coulter had said. She's not hiding anything, the monkey observed again. She's very...open.
"I'll admit part of me is still in shock at the realities of other worlds," the other woman began, "but I am theoretically prepared for them, given my research, as you understand." Mrs. Coulter nodded, charmed, a bit, at how Dr. Malone acknowledged and respected her own expertise as a scholar. "I have to say the Church in your world concerns me, and sounds something like how the Church in my world could have become, given certain circumstances. But I also sit here and wonder how it is I'm supposed to help you and what I can even do."
"Well, you're helping right now," Mrs. Coulter said softly. She reached over the table to place her hand gently on Dr. Malone's. "You've provided us shelter and safety during a time of great uncertainty, and I will forever be grateful for that."
Dr. Malone smiled then, her eyes kind as she placed her hand over Mrs. Coulter's to give a gentle squeeze back. "It's the least I can do, given the absolutely years of progress Lyra gave me in just one hour. Now, what about the boy? How does he fit in?"
Mrs. Coulter sighed as the golden monkey bristled. They still didn't know the answer to that. Since he'd stumbled upon their lives and traveled with them all this way, he'd been nothing but a complication. In some ways, Mrs. Coulter thought they'd be better off without having met him. They would have continued to explore Cittàgazze, with the alethiometer leading them to safety and, eventually, perhaps, to Asriel.
But, he was important. And she couldn't well abandon him, after all they'd been through together. He was important in the way Dr. Malone was important, which was also shrouded in obscurity. The knife alone is clear enough reason now, of course. Mrs. Coulter could finish Lyra's sentence now: a boy with a knife. A knife that Lord Boreal and, perhaps by extension the Magisterium, very desperately wanted to find. And that they now never will, as long as she could do anything about it.
"I don't know," Mrs. Coulter answered her. "I really don't. But Lyra says he's important, and he's with us now. So my guess is as good as yours, but all I know is I will help him in whatever ways I can while trying to do what's best for my daughter."
"What will you do now?" Dr. Malone asked then, setting down her now-empty cup.
"Keep a low profile for a few days," Mrs. Coulter mused aloud. "Enough time for things to settle down. I'm not sure the lengths to which my acquaintances will look for us, and I don't want to do them any favors."
"That's wise," Dr. Malone agreed. "I suppose I'll keep a low profile, too, given they know Lyra came to see me."
"Will that make your work difficult for you now?"
"Probably not. They'll be watching me, but not too closely. These things have a way of blowing over after a certain length of inactivity. It's nothing we can't manage."
"I'm glad." Mrs. Coulter pushed her own empty-cup away and folded her hands together then, not exactly sure what to do now. This idle chit-chat was common for her but not with people she actually liked and meant to spend actual time with. She was uncomfortable, and at a loss of how to proceed and what to suggest.
"I probably won't be heading back until the weekend is over, though," Dr. Malone added, grinning shyly over at Mrs. Coulter. "I'm not sure what kind of profile you'd like to keep, but how about we gather the children for a walk in the park?"
"I would love that," Mrs. Coulter sang. She didn't know what the next few days or weeks had in store for them, but she was happy to have a friend amidst it all, as unlikely a friend as it may be. The golden monkey still held a healthy dose of apprehension, of course, but it was going to be alright. Lyra trusted Dr. Malone, and in her own way, Mrs. Coulter did, too.
o-o-o-o-o-o-o
"She's not here." Lord Boreal was angry as he stormed into the living room from his study. Very, very angry. Angrier than Father MacPhail had ever seen him in all of their time working together.
"What do you mean?" Father MacPhail asked him. "I thought you said that you'd just seen her here?"
"I did, and then she left!" He pounded his hand on the table then, sending a small stack of papers flying to the ground. "That damn woman. Always finding a way to ruin everything."
If Marisa Coulter is one thing, it's resourceful, Eulaia almost laughed to him. She very much enjoyed seeing Lord Boreal squirm, even if it meant being grateful to Marisa. He didn't see this coming and now he has nothing.
"Is there a problem, my lord?" Even though he was in an entirely different world and at so many disadvantages, Father MacPhail had a sudden revelation. He held the upper hand here now. They were there at Lord Boreal's command only because of his knowledge of Marisa and her intentions, because he had her and knew where she was and held some sort of leverage over her. But now, if she were gone, and if Lord Boreal couldn't help them find her after all…
"No problem at all," the other man growled, moving to the side of the room to pick up a phonebook. "I just need a bit of time."