I live! Yes, I haven't given up on this fic yet, even though figuring out the pacing is making my head hurt. To the people who have reviewed: Thank you. It really means a lot, and your compliments have inspired me to keep working on this monstrosity when my inner perfectionist tells me to let it die. I really do intend to finish, even if it takes me an embarrassingly long time. -DW
The Dead returned in the night. Mogget woke Sabriel with a paw on the back of her neck. "The Diamond won't hold against all of them," he observed, pointing out the flickering of movement behind the first row of buildings around the square, "What are you going to do?"
It was Sabriel's turn to be smug. "You wouldn't miss so much if you didn't sleep all the time, Mogget," she said, "We'll be fine." She let Mogget wait to see what she meant until the first revenant darted forward to hurl itself at the barrier of the Diamond.
It never got that far. When it was still ten yards away, it stepped on a patch of ground that gave way and glowed brightly under the pressure of its rotting foot. It only had time to look down in confusion before a small explosion left it twisting, legless, on the ground.
Before going to bed that night, Sabriel had set up a dozen such traps – Charter Marks for detection of the Dead linked to powerful explosive runes. Now they lay dormant just under the dust, invisible until triggered. Mogget cocked his head and stared at the downed revenant. Sabriel had a feeling that he could sense every Mark. "Clever," he observed, "But you won't be able to repair the stone and still have strength left to set those every night."
He was right; Sabriel had wanted to set many more traps, but she had exhausted herself after only twelve. It left sizable gaps in her defenses, and the next revenant to advance slipped through without triggering an explosion. Sabriel watched impassively as it disintegrated against the wall of her Diamond. Many more attacks like that and the Diamond would fail, but luckily the Dead gave up before that happened. After the next revenant to advance lost the left half of its body to an explosion, its fellows seemed to reassess their chances. Slowly, they slinked back out of the city and left the town square still and silent except for the upper half of the first revenant still flailing in the dirt.
"Maybe," said Sabriel, belatedly answering Mogget's challenge, "But we're safe for tonight at least." When the revenant finally laid still, the soul attached to it fading into Death, Sabriel was able to sleep again.
She woke with renewed vigor. She had a job to do, and the sun would keep the Dead from bothering her while she worked. Mogget couldn't be roused, so she left a bit of dried fish out for him before going to stand before the Stone.
After sleeping next to it, she felt that she had almost gotten used to the unease and discomfort the Stone brought. Sure, her hands were a little clammy and her head somewhat light, but she was in control. The Stone was waiting. She steeled her nerves as she began tracing Charter Marks, arranging the puzzle pieces of the broken conduit.
At first she felt the same sense of rightness and certainty as the night before, but after a few hours of work frustration began to seep in. She changed her method and angle of attack again and again, but the more she modified her work the more she saw that it was hopeless. She had approached it in the wrong way completely. Ruefully, she undid all her work, letting go of her end of the chain of Marks she had woven and watching the links fall and disappear.
"Bitten off more than you can chew?" came a voice from behind her. Sabriel turned to see Mogget chewing on the fish and watching her. He seemed to time his moments of waking to be most inconvenient for her.
"I didn't expect to get it on the first try," she lied, "It's not as if anyone really knows how to do this properly. I just need to keep trying." She turned back to the Stone and raised her hands back into a casting stance.
Mogget's voice continued nagging her even as she resumed her work, "Then you'd better figure it out quickly. You don't have forever."
Sabriel said nothing, but she knew he was right. Her arms were heavier than before, and her mind weaker. She had grown much as a Charter Mage over the last few months, enough to rival any in the Kingdom. But she couldn't endure this indefinitely. After a few more hours of forcing her body to cast Marks despite its protests, she found herself unraveling her invisible tapestry for a second time.
Every failure added to the strain until she could barely stand.
"That's enough," said Mogget, interrupting the beginning of Sabriel's fifth attempt.
"But I've barely made any progress at all!" she protested. A few of her Marks had held, but the vast majority were wasted, falling apart as soon as Sabriel abandoned them. She thought the door to Death had closed by a fraction, but it might have been her imagination.
"You're finished," Mogget said unequivocally, "Save your strength to defend yourself tonight."
Sabriel looked up for the first time in hours and saw that the light was already fading. How had so much time gone by without her noticing? She drifted back to her bedroll and collapsed there, surprised at how exhausted she felt. She considered re-casting her Diamond of Protection to insulate her from the Stone while she slept, but her pride wouldn't allow it. Irrational as the thought may have been, it seemed to Sabriel that sleeping in its shadow was a fitting punishment for failing to repair it. Besides, she wasn't completely sure that she could cast another Diamond if she tried. She was so tired.
When the sun returned the next morning, Sabriel opened her eyes and wondered when she had closed them. It felt as if she hadn't slept at all. In fact, she felt even worse than she had the night before. She glanced around at the square; small craters and torn limbs told her that the Dead had returned again, and that they had set off more of her traps. How many remained? And how had she slept through it?
It was a few minutes before she noticed that Mogget was watching her. She expected him to make some sort of comment, but he only gave her a pointed look, curled up, and went to sleep. It seemed that, now that Sabriel was beginning to feel the weight of her task, he was content to silently judge her.
Sabriel fought her discomfort and stood. Though she felt nearly spent, she resolutely approached the Stone again and thrust herself into the Charter. At first glance, the disruption seemed so simple, as if it were a split board that she could repair with just a few nails. But she knew that it was deviously complex. For every connection she renewed, there were ten more beneath that remained fragmented. Every movement, every Mark, took all of Sabriel's concentration, and soon she lost track of time and place. All she knew was the Charter.
She had begun that morning as if it were a last-ditch effort, as if she didn't have much left in her. But she was wrong; every time she thought she was finished, she somehow found a new reserve of energy and continued. Sometimes she stopped to eat or sleep, and sometimes she got the feeling that she had fallen asleep on her feet, still chanting Marks. She had thought that she would get used to the Stone's influence, but if anything it was only getting worse. Everything ached. Every movement felt as if she were embedded in sand. Every moment was a fight to keep from vomiting. But she had to keep working. All the force of will that had allowed her to conquer Death and master the bells she now poured into her arms and lips, commanding them to keep moving at any cost.
By trial and error, she found a sort of method to her madness. One by one, connections held. The stone glowed brighter, and the door to Death closed another inch. But suddenly that doorway began to look very inviting. Sabriel could almost feel it calling to her, calling her away from her body. Her repairs were holding, and would continue to hold without her. She could slip away for just a moment, into Death where her body wouldn't hinder her, wouldn't hurt her…
"OW!" Sabriel's own voice snapped her out of her trance. Though most of her work held, the string of Marks she had been working on fell apart as she whirled to find four neat, red lines on her ankle. Mogget crouched by her heel, the low sun making his white fur look orange. Sabriel found that she wasn't sure whether it was sunset or sunrise.
"I've seen many Abhorsens die," Mogget declared, "In an astounding variety of ways. It would be awfully anticlimactic if the last Abhorsen died because she worked herself to death."
Sabriel was about to shoot back a witty retort, but all that came out of her mouth was a breathy groan. Slowly, as if her legs had simply decided to stop working, she sank to her knees. It was several moments before she was able to speak. "How long have I been at it?" she said huskily.
"Three days, off and on," said Mogget, and Sabriel wouldn't have believed him if he hadn't looked so serious, "You need to get away from the Stone. It's killing you."
Sabriel couldn't argue. With one last effort, she pushed herself to her feet and picked up her pack and bedroll. As she staggered away from the stone with only a vague idea of where she would go, she crossed the boundary of her Diamond of Protection, and it disappeared with a slight fizzle. Sabriel froze. Too late, her dulled brain realized that she didn't have the strength to cast another.
Mogget saw the horror on her face, and seemed to wait to let her stew for a moment before he said, "There's an offshoot of the Ratterlin north of here. Not far, if memory serves."
Sabriel could only follow, wishing for nothing but rest. Despite Mogget's promise, the river was over a mile outside of town. By the time they arrived, Sabriel was ready to drop and sleep wherever she happened to be. However, while her tiredness remained, she could already feel the effects of the Stone fading. Her mind was sharper, and her body more responsive.
This part of the river was heavily fished, and there was an extensive series of docks extending over the banks. Sabriel staggered as far out onto the docks as she could before she collapsed in a heap, her body too painfully exhausted to sleep. The hard, soggy wood felt as comfortable as her own bed, and she didn't even mind her bandolier digging into her side.
It was a long time before she was able to fall asleep, and to her mind it was far too short a time before she awoke again. But as she stretched experimentally and sat up, she realized that she had regained much of her strength. The next thing she realized was that she was famished. Mogget was lying near her pack where she had dropped it. As she rifled through the pack, looking for food, he flicked one eye open and regarded her disdainfully. "A fine mess you've made of this," he commented, "You've lost three days trying to repair that Stone by brute force, and now you've wasted another day and a half sleeping. If you keep this up, we'll be lucky to be finished by summer. If you don't die first."
Sabriel was so intent on her food that she barely listened. But once her stomach was full and her mind focused once more, she demanded, "What did you mean by 'brute force.' Do you know of another way to repair a Charter Stone?" She realized belatedly that she should have asked him that before she had started. Better late than never.
"No," said Mogget, much to Sabriel's disappointment. And much to her suspicion, he didn't elaborate. "But throwing Charter Marks at it willy-nilly until you collapse is hardly a sane way to go about it, even if you have the excuse of not knowing what you're doing."
"I don't see what else I'm supposed to do," said Sabriel, "It's not as if there's a manual for this. I've already searched my library and the castle's for some reference. The Clayr might know, but they can't talk about it in any kind of useful way, and their library isn't what you would call easy-to-navigate."
Mogget yawned. "Why don't you sit here and complain about it some more? I'm sure that will help matters."
Sabriel didn't feel like getting into a battle of sarcasm with the master, so she fell silent for a while. When she spoke again, she had something else on her mind. "Who was the first Abhorsen?"
Mogget's ears pricked up, and for a moment he seemed to be at a loss for words. But he recovered quickly and said, "Why would you want to know that?"
"I'm trying to do my duty," Sabriel explained, "But I know almost nothing about my family. I can learn from them. And no one knows them better than you."
Mogget shrugged uncomfortably. "She was a Charter mage. A powerful one. Saraneth took a liking to her. What more is there to tell?"
Sabriel had the feeling that there was a lot more to tell, but she didn't pry in that particular direction. "And the others?" she prompted, "The ones who came after. What kind of people were they? How can I be more like them?"
"You're already quite like them," said Mogget, "Stupid, impulsive, young…"
Sabriel interrupted, "I won't be young for long."
"Not many of your kind live to grow old," Mogget snapped, "Where was I? Ah, yes. Young, naïve, self-sacrificing to a fault, completely incapable of seeing the big picture, idiotically trusting… except the ones who were idiotically paranoid. Incidentally, the latter tended to live longer, though they were insufferable."
"I'm sure you could list our faults all day," Sabriel sighed, "But could you tell me something more useful?"
Mogget considered for a moment before continuing in a less scathing tone, "The twelfth Abhorsen was tolerable sort of boy. He was called quite young – couldn't have been more than ten. He worked hard, didn't complain. Clever. A lot of potential. Pity he died so young."
"How young?" Sabriel wondered.
"Thirteen, I believe it was. Ambushed by a stilken. Not much left for his mother to bury," said Mogget flippantly. Sabriel suppressed a shudder. "His sister took over. She was useless, but somehow she managed to survive long enough to reproduce before that necromancer tracked her down and slaughtered her along with her lover and her children. Their cousin was called next. He was somewhat renowned for discovering a plot on the princess's life and apprehending the conspirators. Heh. Clearly he was better detective than a warrior, because a no-account revenant managed to catch him off-guard and tear out his throat. Pathetic."
"Stop telling me about how they died," Sabriel protested, "I'm more interested in how they lived."
"You shouldn't be," said Mogget, "How they died is much more entertaining, not to mention more relevant to you. You see, most of what the Abhorsen does is avoid death for as long as she or he can. Anything that happens along the way, however remarkable, is usually incidental."
Sabriel's mouth twisted impatiently. "You don't really believe that," she said, "It means something to be Abhorsen. Even you spoke of it as a calling."
"It's a set of abilities and a long, depressing legacy," Mogget replied, "As for what you do with it, there's no more a manual for that than there is for fixing Charter Stones."
Sabriel turned away from him, ending the conversation. So Mogget was in a mood to bait and needle her. She would ask again later. Because despite what he had said, she believed that her ancestors' lives could be a manual of sorts. In any case, it would be better than flying blind.
Wordlessly, she gathered her things and began the hike back into the deserted town.