Chapter 29 29. Battle on the Plain

Everyone is under the control of his ghost until his humanity When the moment of awakening comes... —William Blake It was too hard for Lyra and Will to leave the wonderful world they slept in last night, but they knew they had to go back into the darkness if they were to find their elf.Now after many hours of weary crawling in the dark cave, Lyra leaned over the alethiometer for the twentieth time, involuntarily making soft, desperate sounds—whimpers and choking of breath, louder than ever. Words turn into sobs at one point. Will also felt the pain where the elf had been, a scalded, sensitive flesh that tore at each breath like a cold hook.

She turned the wheel wearily, and her thoughts weighed heavily.Each of the needles of the alethiometer's thirty-six symbols, which she once moved lightly and confidently, now felt loose and wobbly.Keeping the connection in mind...it used to be as natural as running, singing, or storytelling.Now she has to work hard, her hands won't hold, but she can't fail, or everything will fail... "It's not far," she said at last, "and there are all kinds of dangers—there's a battle , yes . . . but we're nearly there now, and just at the end of this hole, there's a smooth, washed stone where you cut through."

The fighting ghosts pressed forward eagerly, and she felt Lee Scoresby close beside her. He said, "Lyra, buddy, it won't be long now, when you see that old bear, tell him that Lee is out to fight, and after the fight is over, I'll keep drifting down the world to find the old bear who used to be Hercules." Atom of ster, find my mother in the holy place, and my sweetheart - all my sweethearts... Lyra, boy, you rest when this is over, do you hear me? Life is good, death is over ..." His voice was fading, and she wanted to put her arms around him, but of course it was impossible; so she just looked at his pale figure, and the ghost saw in her eyes that affection and wisdom, from which Gaining strength.

On Lyra's and Will's shoulders sat the two Gallifers flats, their short lives coming to an end, both feeling stiff in their limbs and cold around their hearts.They'll both return to the world of the dead soon enough, this time as ghosts, but they see each other's eyes and swear they'll stay with Will and Lila as long as possible without saying a word about their dying days. The children climbed up step by step. They didn't speak. They listened to each other's heavy breathing, their own footsteps, and the sound of small stones kicked up by their footsteps.Ahead of them, the Harpy climbed heavily along the way, her wings dragging and her claws scratching, silent and stern.

Then came a new sound: a regular ticking sound, echoing in the hole.Then came a quicker tick, then a trickle, then a rush of water. "Here!" Lyra said, bending over to touch the rock that blocked their path, which was wet and cold. "It's here." She turned to the Harpy. "I've been thinking," she said, "how you saved my life, and how you promised to lead all the other ghosts through the world of the dead to the world where we rested last night, and I thought if you didn't have a name, Is not fair, and inappropriate for future generations. So I thought I would give you a name, just like Iorek Bernison gave me the eloquent name, I will call You are the Wings of Love, so now you are called this name, and this is your forever name: Wings of Love."

"One day," said the harpies, "I'll see you again, Lyra? Eloquent." "If I knew you were here, I wouldn't be afraid," Lyra said. "Goodbye, Wings of Mercy, until I die." She embraced the Harpy, holding her tight and kissing her on both cheeks. Then, the knight Thales said: "Is this Lord Asriel's Republic?" "Yes," she said, "that's what the alethiometer says, and it's near his stronghold." "Then let me speak to the ghosts." She held him up high, and he cried: "Listen, Lady Salmachia and I are the only ones among us who have seen the world, and there is a fort on the top of the hill: that is where Lord Asriel is I don’t know who the enemy is at the place of defense. Lila and Will have only one mission now, and that is to find their elves, and our mission is to help them. Let’s muster up our courage and fight a beautiful battle.”

Lyra turned to Will. "Okay," he said, "I'm ready." He took out his knife and looked into the eyes of his father's ghost standing beside him.Before long, they didn't know each other anymore; Will thought how happy he would be to see his mother standing beside them, all three together—"Will," Lyra reminded road. He stops thinking, the knife is stuck in the air, he pulls his hand away and the knife hangs there, firmly lodged in the matter of an unseen world.He took a deep breath. "I almost..." "I can see that," she said. "Look at me, Will."

In the ghostly light he saw her bright hair, her firm lips, her frank eyes: he felt her warm breath, caught the friendly smell of her flesh. The knife is loose. "I'll try again," he said. He turned away, trying to focus, letting his thoughts flow to the point of the knife, touching it, retracting it, searching, and finding it.Inside and out, front and back: the ghosts were so close that Will and Lyla felt a slight chill hit every nerve. He lasts everything. Their first impression is the sound.The light that came in blinded their eyes and they had to cover their eyes, as did the ghosts, so they couldn't see anything for a few minutes, but then the banging, the explosions, the gunfire and the shouting were immediately discernible and terribly terrifying .

John Perry's ghost and Lee Scoresby's ghost came to life first, because they had been soldiers and fought in the war, and they were not dazed by the sound; Will and Lyra were just scared and surprised looking at. Rockets exploded in the air above, sending a storm of rock and metal shards down the hillside not far from them.In the air, angels are fighting angels, and witches are running up and down, screaming tribal slogans and shooting arrows at the enemy.They saw a Galliferspin, riding a dragonfly, swoop down to attack the craft, while the pilot tried to open him with his hands, and the dragonfly darted above it while its rider jumped down and slapped the boot spurs. Inserting deep into the pilot's neck, the dragonfly returned, swooping low to let its rider jump onto the bright green back, while the craft hummed straight down into the rocky clump at the foot of the fortress.

"Open it a little," said Lee Scoresby. "Let's get out!" "Wait, Lee," said John Perry, "something new—look over there." Will cut another small window in the direction he pointed, and they all looked out, and they could all see that the situation of the battle had changed, and the attacking side began to retreat: a group of armed vehicles stopped advancing, struggling under the cover of artillery fire. Turning back, a squadron that had gained the upper hand in the fierce battle with Lord Asriel's rotorcraft turned around in the air and headed west.The Kingdom forces on the ground—platoons of infantry, armed with flamethrowers, gas sprays, and armed forces they had never seen before—began to cease fire and retreat.

"What's going on?" Lee said. "They're leaving the field—but why?" There seemed to be no reason for this: Lord Asriel's allies were outnumbered, with weaker weapons, and far more dead and wounded than the enemy. Then Will felt a sudden movement in the ghosts, they were pointing at something floating in the air. "The monster!" said John Perry. "The reason is the monster." For the first time Will and Lyra thought they could see them, like shimmering veils of mist falling from the air like catkins, but they were so faint that they were harder to see when they hit the ground. "What are they doing?" Lyra said. "They're going to attack the infantry—" Knowing what was coming, Will and Lila yelled in terror, "Run! Go away!" Some of the soldiers looked around in amazement when they heard the shouts of the children just before them, and some saw the monster jumping up, so strange and pale and greedy, and raised their guns and fired, but of course there was no effect, and then it attacked whatever it came across the first person. He was a soldier from Lyra's world, an African, and his elf was a long-legged tawny cat with black spots, her teeth pulled back to jump on it. They all saw the man aiming his rifle, fearless, not giving an inch-then they saw the elf helplessly wailing and howling in an invisible net, the man tried to grab her, he dropped the rifle , shouted her name, but fell down and fainted from the pain and unbearable nausea and vomiting. "Okay, Will," said John Perry, "let us out now, we can take care of those things." So Will opened the window wide, rushed out with the Ghost Army, and ensued the strangest fight he could imagine. Ghosts crawled out of the ground, pale figures even paler in the midday light, they had nothing to fear anymore, they fell on unseen goblins, fighting what Will and Lyra couldn't even see , beat and tear. The foot soldiers and other living allies froze: they couldn't comprehend the battle of ghosts and goblins, and Will swung his knife through it, remembering how the knife had kept ghosts at bay before. Lyra followed Will everywhere, wishing she had something to wrestle with as he did, but she looked around, watching wider.She thought she could see ghosts in the air from time to time.It was Lyra who first felt the thrill of danger. She rode Sarmazia on her shoulders and came to a small plateau, which was just an earth bank surrounded by hawthorn bushes, from which she could see a large area of ​​land that was being abandoned by the invaders. The sun is above her head.Ahead, on the western horizon, clouds piled up, shining brightly, and then blotted out by darkness, their heads elongated in the high wind.Over there, on the plain, the enemy's ground troops waited: submachine guns gleamed, banners flew, and regiments stood ready to go. Behind her, to her left, was the ridge of jagged peaks leading to the keep.They gleamed bright gray in the pale, terrible light that preceded the storm, on the black basalt walls in the distance.She could see small figures moving about, repairing damaged battlements, bringing in more weapons and clothing, or simply watching. It was about this time that Lyra felt the first faint nausea, pain, and fear that must have been the genie's touch. She knew immediately what it was, even though she had never felt it before.It made her realize two things: first, she must be old enough to be harmed by the ghost by now; and second, Pan must be somewhere nearby. "Will—will—" she called. He heard her cry and turned, knife in hand, eyes blazing. But before he could speak there was a gasp, a gasp, and he clutched his chest, and she knew the same thing was happening to him. "Pan! Pan!" she cried, looking around on tiptoe. Will bent down and tried to suppress the nausea, and after a while it passed, as if their spirit had escaped.But still haven't found them.The air around was filled with the sound of guns, shouts, pain or panic, the distant yow of the cliff ghosts hovering overhead, the occasional rustle and snap of bows and arrows, and then a new sound: the wind has risen . Lyra felt it on her cheek first, then she saw the grass bend, and then she heard it in the hawthorn grove, in the sky ahead, dark and stormy: all the white had come out of the thunderclouds. The anvil faded, the cloud anvil billowed and swirled with sulfur yellow, sea green, soot and oil black, tremulously churning miles high and spreading as wide as the horizon. Behind her the sun was still shining, so that between her and the storm every grove and every tree was bright and full of life, and these fragile little things defiantly challenged with leaves, branches, fruit, and flowers. in the dark. Two children who are no longer quite children move through it all, and can almost see the genie now.The wind was slapping Will's eyes and pulling Lyra's hair into her face, it should have been able to blow the genie away, but the guys were floating right through it to the ground.Boys and girls, hand in hand, walked cautiously over the dead and wounded, Lyra calling to her daemon, and Will, all alert, searching for his. Now there was lightning in the sky, and then the first thunderclap split like an axe, Lyra put her head in her hands, and Will nearly fell, as if weighed down by the sound.They hugged each other and looked up, seeing a scene that no one had seen before. The witches, the tribe of Ruta Skadi and Raina Mitty, and half a dozen other tribes, each with pitched torches of blazing tar pine, were coming from the east, from the last clear The sky, over the fortress, flew directly to the storm. Those on the ground could hear the roar and crackle of the explosive hydrocarbons burning high above.A few monsters remained in the higher air, and some witches didn't see them. When they bumped into them, they screamed and fell to the ground with raging fire. But at this time, most of those pale things had reached the ground, and the huge team of witches Flow like a river of fire into the heart of the storm. A group of angels with spears and bows and arrows came to meet the witches from the cloud mountain. They were with the wind, and their speed was faster than the bows and arrows, but the speed of the wizards was the same. Sweeping left and right with their burning torches, one after another angels were surrounded by fire, their wings were on fire, and they fell from the sky screaming. Then big drops of rain began to fall, and if the commander in the thunderstorm cloud tried to drown out the witch's torch, he was disappointed. The pitch pine and pitch challenged it openly, and the rain splashed in. The more there are, the louder they spit and hiss.The raindrops hit the ground as if thrown viciously, crashing and splashing into the air.Within a minute, Lyra and Will were both drenched and shivering, with the rain hitting their heads and arms like pebbles. Through it all they staggered and struggled, wiping the rain from their eyes, calling out through the confusion, "Pan! Pan!" The thunder above the head was almost like a burst, tearing, crushing, and exploding, as if atoms were splitting apart.With thunder bursting and bursts of fear, Will and Lyra ran, howling: "Pan! My Pantalaimon! Pan!" Will's call was silent, and he knew what he had lost. what, but don't know her name. The two Galliferspins followed them all the way, warning them to keep their eyes on their side, to watch their way and to watch out for monsters that the children still couldn't quite see.But Laila had to hold Salmakia in her arms, because the lady had no strength left to lean on Laila's shoulders.Thales was scanning the surrounding sky, looking for his kind, and every time he saw something bright like a needle flashing in the sky above, he would call out, but his voice had lost a lot of strength, let alone other additions. What the Riverspins were looking for were the tribal colors of their two dragonflies, iron blue and reddish yellow, which had faded long ago, and the two bodies that had once shone with those colors lay in the world of the dead. Then there was a strange movement in the air.Shielding their eyes from the pouring rain, the children looked up and saw a plane unlike anything they had seen before: ugly, six-legged, black, and completely silent.It came out of the keep, low, very low, and it skimmed overhead, only as high as the roof above them, and then left and flew into the heart of the storm. But they didn't have time to think about it, because another sharp nausea told Lyra that Pan was in danger again, and then Will felt it too, and they were blind among puddles and mud and confused wounded and fighting ghosts. Stumbling, feeling helpless, scared and sick.