Chapter 13 SEVEN - JOHN FAA-1

Now that Lyra had a task in mind, she felt much better. Helping Mrs. Coulter had been all very well, but Pantalaimon was right: she wasn't really doing any work there, she was just a pretty pet. On the gyptian boat, there was real work to do, and Ma Costa made sure she did it. She cleaned and swept, she peeled potatoes and made tea, she greased the propeller shaft bearings, she kept the weed trap clear over the propeller, she washed dishes, she opened lock gates, she tied the boat up at mooring posts, and within a couple of days she was as much at home with this new life as if shed been born gyptian.

What she didn't notice was that the Costas were alert every second for unusual signs of interest in Lyra from the waterside people. If she hadn't realized it, she was important, and Mrs. Coulter and the Oblation Board were bound to be searching everywhere for her Indeed, Tony heard from gos-sip in pubs along the way that the police were making raids on houses and farms and building yards and factories without any explanation, though there was a rumor that they were searching for a missing girl. And that in itself was odd, considering all the kids that had gone missing without being looked for. Gyptians and land folk alike were getting jumpy and nervous.

And there was another reason for the Costas interest in Lyra; but she wasn't to learn that for a few days yet. So they took to keeping her below decks when they passed a lockkeepers cottage or a canal basin, or anywhere there were likely to be idlers hanging about. Once they passed through a town where the police were searching all the boats that came along the waterway, and holding up the traffic in both directions. The Costas were equal to that, though. There was a secret compartment beneath Mas bunk, where Lyra lay cramped for two hours while the police banged up and down the length of the boat unsuccessfully.

"Why didnt their daemons find me, though?" she asked afterwards, and Ma showed her the lining of the secret space: cedarwood, which had a soporific effect on daemons; and it was true that Pantalaimon had spent the whole time happily asleep by Lyras head. Slowly, with many halts and detours, the Costas boat drew nearer the fens, that wide and never fully mapped wilderness of huge skies and endless marshland in Eastern Anglia. The furthest fringe of it mingled indistinguishably with the creeks and tidal inlets of the shallow sea , and the other side of the sea mingled indistinguishably with Holland; and parts of the fens had been drained and dyked by Hollanders, some of whom had settled there; so the language of the fens was thick with Dutch. But parts had never been drained or planted or settled at all, and in the wildest central regions, where eels slithered and waterbirds flocked, where eerie marsh fires flick-ered and waylurkers tempted careless travelers to their doom in the swamps and bogs, the gyptian people had always found it safe to muster.

And now by a thousand winding channels and creeks and watercourses, gyptian boats were moving in toward the byanplats, the only patch of slightly higher ground in the hundreds of square miles of marsh and bog. There was an ancient wooden meeting hall there with a huddle of permanent dwellings around it, and wharves and jetties and an eelmarket. When the gyptians called a byanroping—a summons or muster of families—so many boats filled the waterways that you could walk for a mile in any direction over their decks; or so it was said. The gyptians ruled in the fens. No one else dared enter, and while the gyptians kept the peace and traded fairly, the landlopers turned a blind eye to the incessant smuggling and the occasional feuds. If a gyptian body floated ashore down the coast, or got snagged in a fishnet, well—it was only a gyptian.

Lyra listened enthralled to tales of the fen dwellers, of the great ghost dog Black Shuck, of the marsh fires arising from bubbles of witch oil, and began to think of herself as gyptian even before they reached the fens. She had soon slipped back into her Oxford voice, and now she was acquiring a gyptian one, complete with Fen-Dutch words. Ma Costa had to remind her of a few things. “You ent gyptian, Lyra. You might pass for gyptian with practice, but theres more to us than gyptian language. Theres deeps in us and strong currents. Were water people all through, and you ent, youre a fire person. What you most like is marsh fire, thats the place you have in the gyptian scheme; you got witch oil in your soul. Deceptive, thats what you are, child.” Lyra was hurt.

"I ent never deceived anyone! You ask..." There was no one to ask, of course, and Ma Costa laughed, but kindly. “Cant you see Im a paying you a compliment, you gosling?” she said, and Lyra was pacified, though she didnt understand. When they reached the byanplats it was evening, and the sun was about to set in a splash of bloody sky. The low island and the Zaal were humped blackly against the light, like the clustered buildings around; threads of smoke rose into the still air , and from the press of boats all around came the smells of frying fish, of smokeleaf, of jenniver spirit.

They tied up close to the Zaal itself, at a mooring Tony said had been used by their family for generations. Presently Ma Costa had the frying pan going, with a couple of fat eels hissing and sputtering and the kettle on for potato powder. Tony and Kerim oiled their hair, put on their finest leather jackets and blue spotted neckerchiefs, loaded their fingers with silver rings, and went to greet some old friends in the neighboring boats and drink a glass or two in the nearest bar. with important news. “We got here just in time. The Ropings this very night. And theyre a saying in the town—what dyou think of this?— theyre saying that the missing children on a gyptian boat, and shes a going to appear tonight at the Roping !"

He laughed loudly and ruffled Lyras hair. Ever since theyd entered the fens he had been more and more good tempered, as if the savage gloom his face showed outside were only a disguise. And Lyra felt an excitement growing in her breast as she ate quickly and washed the dishes before combing her hair, tucking the alethiometer into the wolfskin coat pocket, and jumping shore with all the other families making their way up the slope to the Zaal. She had thought Tony was joking. She soon found that he wasn't, or else that she looked less like a gyptian than shed thought, for many people stared, and children pointed, and by the time they reached the great doors of the Zaal they were walking alone between a crowd on either side, who had fallen back to stare and give them room.

And then Lyra began to feel truly nervous. She kept close to Ma Costa, and Pantalaimon became as big as he could and took his panther shape to reassure her. Ma Costa trudged up the steps as if nothing in the world could possibly either stop her or make her go more quickly, and Tony and Kerim walked proudly on either side like princes. The hall was lit by naphtha lamps, which shone brightly enough on the faces and bodies of the audience, but left the lofty afters hidden in darkness. The people coming in had to struggle to find room on the floor, where the benches were already crowded ; but families squeezed up to make space, children occupying laps and daemons curling up underfoot or perching out of the way on the rough wooden walls.

At the front of the Zaal there was a platform with eight carved wooden chairs set out. As Lyra and the Costas found space to stand along the edge of the hall, eight men appeared from the shadows at the rear of the platform and stood in front of the chairs. A ripple of excitement swept over the audience as they hushed one another and shoved themselves into spaces on the nearest bench. Finally there was silence and seven of the men on the platform sat down. The one who remained was in his seventies, but tall and bull necked and powerful. He wore a plain canvas jacket and a checked shirt, like many gyptian men; there was nothing to mark him out but the air of strength and authority he had. Lyra recognized it: Uncle Asriel had it, and so did the Master of Jordan. This mans daemon was a crow, very like the Masters raven. "That's John Faa, the lord of the western gyptians," Tony whispered. John Faa began to speak, in a deep slow voice. “Gyptians! Welcome to the Roping. Weve come to listen and come to decide. You all know why. There are many families here who lost a child. Some have lost two. To be sure, landlopers are losing children too. We have no quarrel with landlopers over this. “Now theres been talk about a child and a reward. Heres the truth to stop all gossip. The children name is Lyra Belacqua, and shes being sought by the landloper police. There is a reward of one thousand sovereigns for giving her up to them . Shes a landloper child, and shes in our care, and there shes going to stay. Anyone tempted by those thousand sovereigns had better find a place neither on land nor on water. We ent giving her up.” Lyra felt a blush from the roots of her hair to the soles of her feet; Pantalaimon became a brown moth to hide. Eyes all around were turning to them, and she could only look up at Ma Costa for reassurance. But John Faa was speaking again: “Talk all we may, we wont change owt. We must act if we want to change things. Heres another fact for you: the Gobblers, these child thieves, are a taking their prisoners to a town in the far North, way up in the land of dark. I dont know what they do with em there. Some folk say they kill em , other folk say different. We dont know. “What we do know is that they do it with the help of the landloper police and the clergy. Every power on land is helping em. Remember that. They know whats going on and theyll help it whenever they can. “So what Im proposing ent easy. And I need your agreement. Im proposing that we send a band of fighters up north to rescue them kids and bring em back alive. Im proposing that we put our gold into this, and all the craft and Courage we can muster. Yes, Raymond van Gerrit?" A man in the audience had raised his hand, and John Faa sat down to let him speak. “Beg pardon, Lord Faa. Theres landloper kids as well as gyptians been taken captive. Are you saying we should rescue them as well?” John Faa stood up to answer. "Raymond, are you saying we should fight our way through every kind of danger to a little group of frightened children, and then say to some of them that they can come home, and to the rest that they have to stay? No, youre a better man than that. Well, do I have your approval, my friends?" The question caught them by surprise, for there was a moments hesitation; but then a full-throated roar filled the hall, and hands were clapped in the air, fists shaken, voices raised in excited clamor. from their perches up in the dark a score of sleeping birds woke up in fear and flapped their wings, and little showers of dust drifted down. John Faa let the noise continue for a minute, and then raised his hand for silence again. “Thisll take a while to organize. I want the heads of the families to raise a tax and muster a levy. Well meet again here in three days time. In between now and then Im a going to talk with the child I mentioned before, and with Farder Coram, and form a plan to put before you when we meet. Goodnight to ye all.” His massive, plain, blunt presence was enough to calm them. As the audience began to move out of the great doors into the chilly evening, to go to their boats or to the crowded bars of the little settlement, Lyra said to Ma Costa: "Who are the other men on the platform?" “The heads of the six families, and the other man is Farder Coram.” It was easy to see who she meant by the other man, because he was the oldest one there. He walked with a stick, and all the time hed been sitting behind John Faa hed been trembling as if with an ague. “Come on,” said Tony. “Id best take you up to pay your respects to John Faa. You call him Lord Faa. I dont know what youll be asked, but mind you tell the truth.” Pantalaimon was a sparrow now, and sat curiously on Lyras shoulder, his claws deep in the wolfskin coat, as she followed Tony through the crowd up to the platform. He lifted her up. Knowing that everyone still in the hall was staring at her, and conscious of those thousand sovereigns she was suddenly worth, she blushed and hesitated. Pantalaimon darted to her breast and became a wildcat, sitting up in her arms and hissing softly as he looked around. Lyra felt a push, and stepped forward to John Faa. He was stern and massive and expressionless, more like a pillar of rock than a man, but he stooped and held out his hand to shake. When she put hers in, it nearly vanished . "Welcome, Lyra," he said. Close to, she felt his voice rumbling like the earth itself. She would have been nervous but for Pantalaimon, and the fact that John Faas stony expression had warmed a little. "Thank you, Lord Faa," she said. “Now you come in the parley room and well have a talk,” said John Faa. “Have they been feeding you proper, the Costas?” "Oh, yes. We had eels for supper." “Proper fen eels, I expect.” The parley room was a comfortable place with a big fire, sideboards laden with silver and porcelain, and a heavy table darkly polished by the years, at which twelve chairs were drawn up. The other men from the platform had gone elsewhere, but the old shaking man was still with them. John Faa helped him to a seat at the table. “Now, you sit here on my right,” John Faa said to Lyra, and took the chair at the head of the table himself. Lyra found herself opposite Farder Coram. She was a little frightened by his skull-like face and his continual trembling. His daemon was a beautiful autumn-colored cat, massive in size, who stalked along the table with upraised tail and elegantly inspected Pantalaimon, touching noses briefly before settling on Farder Corams lap, half-closing her eyes and purring softly. A woman whom Lyra hadnt noticed came out of the shadows with a tray of glasses, set it down by John Faa, curtsied, and left. John Faa poured little glasses of jenniver from a stone crock for himself and Farder Coram, and wine for Lyra . "So," John Faa said. "You run away, Lyra." "Yes." “And who was the lady you run away from?” “She was called Mrs. Coulter. And I thought she was nice, but I found out she was one of the Gobblers. I heard someone say what the Gobblers were, they were called the General Oblation Board, and she was in charge of it , it was all her idea. And they was all working on some plan, I dunno what it was, only they was going to make me help her get kids for em. But they never knew...” "They never knew what?" “Well, first they never knew that I knew some kids what had been taken. My friend Roger the kitchen boy from Jordan College, and Billy Costa, and a girl out the covered market in Oxford. And another thing...My uncle, right, Lord Asriel. 1 heard them talking about his journeys to the North, and I dont reckon hes got anything to do with the Gobblers. Because I spied on the Master and the Scholars of Jordan, right, I hid in the Retiring Room where no ones supposed to go except them, and I heard him tell them all about his expedition up north, and the Dust he saw, and he brought back the head of Stanislaus Grumman, what the Tartars had made a hole in. And now the Gobblersve got him locked up somewhere. The armored bears are guarding him. And I want to rescue him.” She looked fierce and stubborn as she sat there, small against the high carved back of the chair. The two old men couldn't help smiling, but whereas Farder Corams smile was a hesitant, rich, complicated expression that trembled across his face like sunlight shadow chasing On a windy March day, John Faas smile was slow, warm, plain, and kindly. "You better tell us what you did hear your uncle say that evening," said John Faa. "Don't leave anything out, mind. Tell us everything." Lyra did, more slowly than shed told the Costas but more honestly, too. She was afraid of John Faa, and what she was most afraid of was his kindness. When shed finished, Farder Coram spoke for the first time. and musical, with as many tones in it as there were colors in his daemons fur. “This Dust,” he said. “Did they ever call it anything else, Lyra?” "No. Just Dust. Mrs. Coulter told me what it was, elementary particles, but thats all she called it." “And they think that by doing something to children, they can find out more about it?” "Yes. But I dont know what. Except my uncle...Theres something I forgot to tell you. When he was showing them lantern slides, there was another one he had. It was the Roarer—” “The what?” said John Faa.