Sabriel locked her door that night. If Touchstone wanted to apologize, then he could just squirm until morning. But the knock she was expecting never came. When she woke up and he still wasn't there, she knew that they had finally managed to screw things up for real.
She lay in bed. Her body couldn't sleep anymore, but her soul was too exhausted to let her rise. She only managed to get herself upright when Karstel banged on her door, yelling, "Breakfast, milady!" Something must have shown on Sabriel's face, because as soon as she opened the door Karstel's eyebrows twitched up and she said, "Is something wrong?"
Sabriel forced a smile. "No," she said, "I just overslept. Have you seen King Torrigan?"
Karstel wasn't convinced, but she answered the question, "Missing in action, as usual. Don't worry; he always turns up."
Sabriel nodded grimly and joined the soldiers for breakfast. She walked through the rest of the day in a fog. When she returned to her room that night, she was surprised to see Mogget stretched out on her bed, looking lazy but awake. He looked at her with half-lidded eyes and said knowingly, "Trouble in paradise?"
Sabriel swept him off her sheets and back into his basket. "What do you know about it?" she muttered.
Mogget fell into the basket with a hiss, but he quickly righted himself and continued. "That fat woman in the armor came by looking for you. Something about the boy. Is he going by Torrigan again?"
"Yes," Sabriel snapped, "You'd know that much if you were awake even half the time." She hated his superior tone and the way he refused to use anyone's name when he could replace it with an insult. It wasn't as if he didn't know what Karstel was called; his memory was perfect going back centuries.
Mogget shook his head. "Touchstone suited him better," he said, "He's still just a fool. Anyway, he's eating supper in the Great Hall as of ten minutes ago, if you want to go talk to him. And that's the last time I'll be acting as your message-taking service if you can't at least be civil." With that, he sank into the basket and out of sight.
Sabriel moved to the door. It would have been childish to avoid Touchstone. But then she hesitated, and looked back at her desk. With sudden conviction, she grabbed an envelope at random out of the pile and opened it as she walked.
By the time she reached the Great Hall, she had read the letter inside and was holding it loosely in her hand. Touchstone sat at the table alone, staring into his plate and looking like he was about to nod off. Sabriel felt a familiar welling up of affection and protectiveness, but she reminded herself of what she had to do. She entered the room and, clearing her throat, sat at the opposite end of the table from Touchstone.
Touchstone's head snapped up as if he were awakening from a deep reverie. A grateful smile lit his face as he greeted her, "Sabriel!" She didn't bother to correct him, but poured herself a glass of wine in silence.
Neither knew where their relationship stood at the moment, and the awkwardness was overwhelming. The silence persisted as Sabriel sipped her wine, breaking only when she said, her face like a stone, "There's a broken Charter Stone near High Bridge. Dead are gathering there. The people want me to help defend the city."
Touchstone's face was also unreadable. "How long will you be gone?" he asked.
"I don't know," said Sabriel.
There was another long, uncomfortable pause before Touchstone asked, "Are you coming back at all?" Sabriel thought she saw a flicker of desperation beneath his businesslike façade, but she couldn't be sure.
"I don't know," she repeated. It was strange to hear her voice sound so calm when her heart was twisting in her chest.
They ate the rest of their meal in silence, and the next morning Sabriel packed her things and left Belisaere without a word to anyone.
It was disorienting to be back on the road after months in the relative comfort of the ruins of the castle. Belisaere had almost started to feel like home. Traveling only reminded her of that terrible time just after her father had sent her the bells, when she was always on the run and haunted at every turn. But at least then she had had Mogget, and later Touchstone. Now she was alone, the sound of her footsteps her only companion, the way she had been during her mad dash from Cloven Crest to Abhorsen's House. Just the thought of that terrible night made her throat feel like it was closing up.
She wiped the beginnings of tears out of her eyes impatiently. Things were different now. She was no longer a girl barely out of school; she was Abhorsen. She feared nothing on these roads. The weight of her bells on her chest, the sway of her sword at her hip, and the buzz of the Charter all around her were all reassuring.
Still, she was lonely.
Suddenly, a sensation of movement at her back made her think someone had grabbed her from behind. In a flash, she wriggled free of her pack and turned to face her assailant. The road behind her was empty, but as her pack hit the dust there came a loud, indignant yowl. Sabriel, her sword half-drawn, watched as a pink nose poked itself out of the top of her pack. The nose was followed shortly by a ruffled-looking white cat.
"That was certainly uncalled-for," said Mogget.
Sabriel took a few minutes to get over her shock before saying, "What do you think you're doing in my pack?"
"Well," said Mogget, settling back inside the bag and kneading Sabriel's spare clothes, "You're the last Abhorsen, and you haven't found yourself a successor yet. I couldn't very well let you run off and get killed."
Sabriel swung the pack back up and kept walking. She said over her shoulder, "I'm not going to get killed. It's one simple job."
"They usually start out simple," said Mogget, his voice getting quieter as he drifted back off to sleep, "This way, if things get out of hand, you'll have me to save your skin. Just slip my collar off… Actually, you could do that now. Then you could rebind me with Saraneth and I wouldn't be so damned sleepy all the time."
Sabriel snorted in derision. "If I never have to take that collar off again, I'll die happy," she said, but Mogget was already asleep. Despite her annoyance at the intrusion, she had to admit that she felt better with a companion. Even if that companion was only waiting for her to make a mistake so he could kill her horribly.
The journey was long, but surprisingly pleasant. The mild autumn weather was much more comfortable than the snow Sabriel had had to contend with the last time she traveled by foot. Even more calming was the knowledge that there was no Kerrigor waiting to spring his next trap, no Mordicant on her heels. Her Death-sense had been honed over the months, so she had ample warning before the appearance of each of the few revenants that she met along the road. They were weak and desperate, and she dispatched them all easily.
When she had first taken up her father's mantle, she had been a scared little girl doing her best in an impossible situation. Shortly after Kerrigor's defeat, she had somehow become something like Touchstone's lackey, helping the soldiers clean up the city while he abandoned her for his own secret projects. Now, walking the land and facing all comers with her bells and sword in hand, she finally began to feel like a true Abhorsen.
Mogget rarely stirred, except to demand some food every now and then. By the time Sabriel reached High Bridge, she had almost forgotten that he was riding in her pack.
High Bridge was so named for the massive, arcing bridge that spanned the Upper Ratterlin. It was as wide as a house, with three separate levels. When the river was at its lowest, all three levels were exposed. During the heaviest of floods – the kind that could only be caused by the Clayr – the water would lap the feet of a person standing at the highest point. That way, no matter the state of the river, the bridge could always be a refuge from the Dead.
And so it had become. The town of High Bridge had once been situated just east of the bridge itself, centered on a Charter Stone. But since the stone had been broken, and the Dead had begun terrorizing the people, everyone had taken advantage of the safest place available to them. Countless people were crammed onto all three levels of the bridge, packed so tight that there was barely room to move. There were the healthy and strong alongside the sick and injured, alongside scattered livestock, alongside the elderly, alongside families with small children. In some parts of the bridge, the crowding was so thick that everyone was standing; there was no space to sit.
As she approached the bridge, taking in the sight, Sabriel was struck by how quiet it was. Some moaning from the hospital area, here and there a child crying, a rare conversation conducted in low whispers – compared to the massive congregation of people before her, the lack of noise was downright unnerving. These were people who had lived so long clinging to the tail end of hope that they had almost lost their grip entirely. They had nothing left to say to each other; they just sat and waited for a miracle.
"Abhorsen!" said a voice, and Sabriel looked to her right to see an elderly woman in a green robe approaching her. By the way people respectfully shifted in their already-tight quarters to make way for her, Sabriel guessed that she was the leader of the town. At her greeting, a rumble of voices broke out and dozens of people turned to see. The old woman reached Sabriel and held out her hands to her, her head bowed. "We hoped against hope that you would come. I'm sorry we have no hospitality to offer you," she said.
Sabriel took the woman's hands and bowed in return. "Never mind," she said kindly, "I'll make my own arrangements, and I'll do my best for your people."
"My people…" said the woman in a voice layered with despair, exhaustion, and the weight of responsibility, "My people are starving. We have fought hard, but the Dead are unending and we have no more ground left to lose. No one can leave the bridge; those who try never return. Our situation is impossible. Please, Abhorsen. We don't ask for much. Drive the Dead out of the town, and let us return home. After that, we will fortify and defend ourselves. We can hold back the Dead if we are given time to prepare." Sabriel had to respect the old woman's certainty. She had no doubt that this woman, given a chance, would organize a defense that would allow her people to hold High Rock.
But Sabriel had other plans. "I will," she said, "I will rid High Rock of Dead, and I'll do you one better. I will repair your Charter Stone."
She left the people on the bridge and made her way east, toward the abandoned town. As she got close enough to feel the corruption of the broken stone, movement against her shoulder blades and the pressure of two paws on her shoulder let her know that Mogget had popped his head out of the pack.
"Hungry?" she guessed.
Mogget sniffed, and Sabriel thought it sounded haughty until she realized that he was smelling the air. "Don't you smell that?" he said, "Even a human should be able to smell that. Watch yourself."
As the tops of humble roofs became visible in the distance, Sabriel realized what Mogget meant. The stench of rotting flesh wafted from the town, faintly at first, and then overpoweringly. High Rock was swarming with Dead.
"Stay in the pack," she said to Mogget as she drew Saraneth. She had never faced this many Dead at once before, but there was no hesitation in her step. She swelled with confidence. After surviving the final battle with Kerrigor, there was nothing in this town that she feared.
The sounds of shuffling feet, creaking bones, and guttural voices were all silenced upon the first peal of Sabriel's bell. She walked into the town, between the buildings, toward the town square with Saraneth's song as her companion the entire way. As she walked, she passed the still forms of revenants she had bound. Their eyes followed her with intense hatred, but their bodies were no longer their own. Sabriel could feel each soul as it fell under her power, and the effort of keeping them all in check made sweat break out on her face. They pushed against the binding, fighting to free themselves, but her will was stronger.
Most heartening of all was the sight that greeted her in the town square. The last of the Dead were scrambling frantically to get away from the deadly sound of the bell, and at the sight of Sabriel a great, terrified howling began. The Dead trampled each other in their haste to flee from the Abhorsen. In their wake they left the broken bodies of their fellows who were not strong enough to keep up with the panicked mob.
Once Sabriel had run from the Dead, but now they ran from her. It was a giddy feeling, most of all because she knew that if the Dead had all turned and faced her, she would have been powerless against their numbers. Her reputation had done the work for her this time. It was good to be reminded that, even though Touchstone and those stuffy ambassadors wouldn't give her her due, the Dead knew who she was and they feared her.
A few more minutes and the small army of Dead had disappeared into the woods, their screams fading and leaving Sabriel standing in silence. It didn't take her long to weave her way back through town, finding all the revenants who had been unfortunate enough to be bound and sending them to their final rest.
When only one revenant was left in town, the sun was just beginning to set. Sabriel, feeling the strain of her efforts now, held it in place while she drew the marks over it body. But she stammered, and the marks failed. She swiped her hand across her forehead, taking a deep breath. The combination of the work she had done and the proximity of the ruined stone was taking its toll, but she was more than equal to the challenge. She forced her hands to be still and her voice to be strong, and the marks came through clearly. The last Dead in High Rock was sent screaming into Death while its stolen body burned.
"The others will be back," said the familiar sardonic voice from Sabriel's pack, "And you've overdone it. You don't even have the energy left to cast a Diamond of Protection."
Sabriel returned to the town square and proved Mogget wrong, casting a huge Diamond with the stone just inside the northern point. Midway through the casting, she almost thought that Mogget would be proven right. The weight of the corruption surrounding the stone was crushing. But this was not the first time Sabriel had felt this discomfort. She calmed her mind, repressed her nausea, and reached deep into the Charter for the marks she needed. When she was finished her Diamond was bright and strong.
She made camp by dropping her pack on the ground and kicking her bedroll open. The nights were mild at this time of year, and she didn't bother with a fire. With a hard day behind them and the sun setting, Mogget curled up at the foot of Sabriel's bedroll and prepared to do even more hard napping. But Sabriel showed no signs of sleepiness as she approached the broken Charter Stone with a contemplative look on her face.
Mogget flicked a single eye open. "Aren't you coming to bed?" he asked, "You're not going to fix that thing in one night."
"I know," said Sabriel, "I'm just looking." With careful concentration, she was able to control the effects of being near the stone and focus on what needed to be done. The stone had once been tall, like a rough obelisk, but was now split down the middle. The two halves sat slightly apart, leaving a gap that was a hand's-width wide at the top and that narrowed as it went down. At the base of the stone, where it was stained with old, rust-colored blood, it was still in one piece. Sabriel could see the Charter marks on the stone, still and lifeless, but in them she could read hope. The Charter that had once flowed through this place was not dead, but merely damaged. In the remnants of the stone, Sabriel could see the places where the order had been disrupted, and she could see what she had to do to realign it.
Heedless of her fatigue, she placed her hands on the stone and began chanting Charter marks. She didn't know exactly what she was doing, but she thought she could feel a sense of rightness, of communion with the Charter. It didn't matter that she didn't know the exact marks; the Charter wanted to be put right, and it would guide her tongue and her hand. She even thought she could feel the stone respond to her efforts, becoming warm under her touch and glowing faintly.
Mogget was right: it would be a long, hard task. But Sabriel knew that she would succeed.
Touchstone wouldn't let her help him, and she couldn't repair what had been broken between them. But as she remembered the bridge and the sparks of hope her presence had ignited in so many eyes, she knew that here were people she could help. Here was something broken that she could repair.