Chapter 36 Thirty-six Broken Arrow

Destiny strikes like an iron wedge, And always squeeze yourself in the middle. —Andrew Marvell The two elves walked through the silent village, haunted the shadows, walked softly in the shape of cats across the moonlit meeting place, and stopped outside Mary's open door. Carefully looking inside, they saw only the sleeping woman, so they withdrew, and by the moonlight again, they walked towards the sheltered tree. Its long branches bring fragrant, spiral-shaped leaves down almost to the ground.Extremely slowly, taking great care not to rattle a leaf or break a fallen branch, they slipped through the curtains and saw what they were looking for: the boy and the girl, sleeping in each other's arms.

They walked across the grass to get closer, gently touching the two sleeping teenagers with their noses, paws, and beards, basking in the life-giving warmth they radiated, but taking absolute care not to wake them. As they surveyed their fellow (gently cleaning Will's quick-healing wound, brushing a strand of hair from Lyra's face), a soft voice came from behind. Immediately, the two elves jumped back without a sound, and turned into wolves: their eyes gleamed fiercely, their white teeth were exposed, and they were full of menace from head to toe. A woman stood there, silhouetted against the moon, not Mary, and they heard her clearly when she spoke, though no sound came from her throat.

"Come with me," she said. Pantalaimon's elf heart danced in him, but he said nothing until he was far enough away from the two sleeping boys under the tree to greet her. "Serafina Pekkala!" he said cheerfully. "Where have you been? Do you know what happened?" "Shh. Let's fly to a place where we can talk," she said, wary of the sleeping villagers. She picked up the cloud pine branch that was leaning against Mary's door, and the two elves became birds—a nightingale, an owl—and flew with her over the thatched roof, over the meadow, over the ridge, to the nearest Wheelwood, with its castle-like crowns that look like silver curds in the moonlight.

Serafina Pekkala alighted on one of the tallest comfortable branches, among the open dust-sucking flowers, and two birds settled nearby. "You won't be birds for long," she said. "Soon your shape will settle down. Look around and store the sights in your memory." "What shall we be?" said Pantalaimon. "You'll know the answer much sooner than you expect, listen," Serafina Pekkala said. "I'm going to tell you some wizarding songs that only witches know. The reason I'm able to do this is that you Here with me, while your humans sleep down there. Who's the only one who can do that?"

"Wizards," said Pantalaimon, "and shamans, so..." "In leaving the two of you ashore in the world of the dead, Lyra and Will unknowingly did something that wizards have been doing since the first time they were wizards. In our Northland there was a region, a desolate and nasty place where, at the very beginning of the world, a great catastrophe occurred, and since then nothing grew there and no elf could enter. To become a wizard, the girl had to go through it alone and leave her elf behind. Afterwards. You know the ordeals they had to go through, but afterwards they found that they were not separated from the Elves, as in Birvangar they were still one, but now they roamed free, to far-off lands, Meet strange things and bring back knowledge.

"You are not separated, are you?" "Yes," said Pantalaimon, "we are still one, but what a pain it is, we are so afraid..." "Well," said Serafina, "they can't fly like wizards, and don't live as long as we do, but you and them are wizards because of what they've done." The two elves pondered the strange news. "Does that mean we shall be birds, like wizard's elves?" said Pantalaimon. "Be patient." "How could Will be a wizard? I thought all wizards were women." "Both of them have changed many things, and all are learning new ways, even wizards. But one thing has not changed: You must help your humans, not hinder them, you must help them, guide them, encourage them to gain wisdom , that's what sprites are for."

They fell silent.Serafina turned to Nightingale and said, "What's your name?" "I don't have a name, and I didn't know I was born until it was torn from his heart." "Then I'll name you Kiriava." "Kiriava," said Pantalaimon, trying to make the sound, "what does that mean?" "Soon you will understand what it means, but for now," continued Serafina Pekkala, "you must listen carefully, for I will tell you what to do." "No." Kiriava said emphatically. Serafina Pekkala said softly, "I can tell from your tone that you know what I'm going to say."

"We don't want to hear about it!" said Pantalaimon. "It happened too soon," said Nightingale, "it was too soon." Serafina was silent, sorry that she agreed with them, but she was still the wisest person there, and she had to guide them to the right thing; but she let their agitation die down before continuing . "Where did you all go during your wanderings?" she said. "Through many worlds," said Pantalaimon, "every time we found a window, we went through it. There are many more windows than we thought." "You saw—"

"Yes," Kiriava said, "we looked closely and saw what was happening." "We saw many other things," said Pantalaimon quickly, "we saw angels and talked to them. We saw the world where the little men Galliferspin came from, and there were adults there too, and they tried to kill Galliferspian." They told the wizard more of what they had seen, and they tried to distract her, and she knew it, but she let them talk because they felt love in each other's voices. But at last they had nothing more to tell her, and they fell silent, the only sound being the endless soft murmur of the leaves, until Serafina Pekkala said, "You have been hiding from Will and Lyra as punishment." They, I know why you do it, that's what my Caesar did when I walked through the desolate no-man's land, but he came back to me in the end, because we still love each other, they are very happy You will soon be needed to help them with what they must do next, because you must tell them all you know."

Pantalaimon let out a cry, a pure cold owl's cry, a cry never heard before in this world.In the far-flung lairs and burrows all around, in every place where any little nocturnal animal hunted or grazed or ate meat, a new and unforgettable fear arose. Serafina watched from up close, feeling nothing but sympathy, until she saw Will's elf, Kiriava the Nightingale. She remembered a conversation she had with Ruta Skadi. Ruta had only seen Will once, but she asked Serafina if she had looked into his eyes, and Serafina replied that she dared not. .The little brown bird radiated a restless, fierce light, as clear as fire, and Serafina was afraid of it.

Pantalaimon's feral screams finally died down, and Kiriava said, "We have to tell them." "Yes, you must tell them," said the wizard gently. Gradually, the fierce light left the brown bird's eyes, and Serafina was able to look directly at her again, and what she saw was a bleak sadness in its place. "There's a ship coming," said Serafina, "and I've left it to fly here to meet you, and I've come all the way from our world with the gypsies, who will be gone in a day or two." will be here." The two birds sat close together, and after a while they changed shape and became two pigeons. Serafina went on to say: "This may be the last time you fly, I can see a little bit of things in the future, I can see that with a tree this big, you two will be able to climb this high, but I think you are set It won't be a bird. Try to see as much as you can and remember. I know you and Lyla and Will will have a hard time thinking about it, and I know you'll make the best choice, but it's yours The choice is not someone else's." They didn't speak, she picked up her cloud pine branch, flew away from the towering treetops, hovered high above, felt the coolness of the breeze on the skin, and the tingling of starlight, and she had never seen The dust fell gently. Serafina flew to the village again and quietly entered Mary's house.She doesn't know anything about Mary, except that she's from the same world as Will and that she plays a key role in these events.Whether she was fierce or friendly, Serafina had no way of knowing; but she had to wake her up without startling her, and there was a spell for that purpose. She sat on the floor next to Mary's head, watching through half-closed eyes, breathing with her.Soon, part of her vision began to show her the pale shadow that Mary was seeing in her dream, and she adjusted her brain to resonate with Mary's dream as if adjusting a thread.Then, after a further effort, Serafina stepped into Mary's dream.Once she's inside, she'll be able to speak to Mary.The reason for this is that people often have an immediate liking for the person they meet in their dreams. After a while they began talking in a low, rapid voice, which Mary did not remember afterwards.They walked through a field of weeds with transformers standing, and it was Serafina's time to speak. "In a little while," she said, "you'll wake up, don't be alarmed, you'll find me by your side, and I'll wake you up like this, and you'll know everything's quite safe. Nothing's going to hurt you, and then we'll We can have a good talk." She withdrew, and the Mary of the dream was brought out with her, until she found herself back in the house again, sitting cross-legged on the floor, with Mary looking at her with piercing eyes. "You must be the wizard," murmured Mary. "That's right, my name is Serafina Pekkala, what's your name?" "Mary Malone. I've never been woken up so quietly. Am I awake?" "It's waking up. We have to talk. Talking in dreams is not only difficult to control, but also difficult to remember. It's better to be awake. Do you like to stay in the room and talk or would you like to go for a walk in the moonlight with me?" "I'm leaving now." Mary sat up and stretched. "Where's Will and Lyra?" "Sleep under a tree." They went out of the house, past the tree covered with leaves, and came to the river. Mary looked at Serafina Pekkala warily and enviously: she had never seen such a slender and graceful figure, and she seemed younger than Mary, although Lyra said she was hundreds of years old, only the elderly The signs were in her expression, which was full of complicated sadness. They sat down on the embankment by the silver-black water, and Serafina told her that she had spoken to the children's spirit. "They went to them today," said Mary, "but another thing happened, and Will never got a good look at his elves, except once when they fled from the field, and that was only for a moment. Fleeting, he wasn't sure he had a spirit." "Well, he has it, and so do you." Mary stared at her with wide eyes. "If you could see him," continued Serafina, "you would see a black bird with red legs and a slightly curved beak of bright yellow, a merle." "An Alpine chough...how can you see him?" "I can see him when my eyes are half-closed. If we have time, I can teach you to see him too, and see other people's elves in your world. We think it's weird that you can't see elves." Then she told Mary what she had said to the Elves, and what they meant. "They fell in love." "I know." "They just found out..." Mary tried to understand all the implications of Serafina's words, but it was too difficult. After a minute or two, Mary said, "Can you see the dust?" "No, I never saw it, and we never heard of it before the war started." Mary took the telescope out of her pocket and handed it to the witch; Serafina held it up to her eyes and took a breath. "That's the dust... so beautiful!" "Turn around and look at the tree where they are perched." Serafina obeyed, then exclaimed. "Is this what they did?" "Today--yesterday if it's past midnight--something happened." Trying to find the words to explain it, Mary said, she recalled seeing a torrent of dust rushing like the Mississippi River. "One small but crucial thing...if you want to divert a great river into a different course, you can do it even if all you have is a pebble: as long as you put that pebble in the right place, it will Just send the first drop of water that way instead of this way. It just happened yesterday, I don't know what it is, they see each other differently, or something... in They didn't feel that way before, but suddenly they did, and then the dust was attracted to them, very powerfully, and it stopped flowing in the other direction." "So, this is what was destined to happen!" Serafina exclaimed, "It's safe now, or it will be safe when the angels fill the huge abyss of the underground world." She told Mary about the abyss and how she had discovered it. "I was flying high," she explained, "looking for a landing point, when I met an angel: a female angel. She was very strange, young and old." She went on, forgetting that she What does it look like in the eyes. "Her name is Halfaniah. She told me many things... She said that the history of human life has been a struggle between wisdom and ignorance, and she and the rebel angels, followers of wisdom, have been working to open minds , The Authority and his church always try to keep them closed, and she gave me many examples of Minecraft." "I can also think of many examples from my world." "While most of that time Wisdom had to work in secret, whispering, traveling like a spy through the poor parts of the world, while the courts and palaces were occupied by her enemies." "Yes," said Mary, "I realize that too." "The battle is not over yet. Although the strength of the kingdom has encountered setbacks, they will regroup under the leadership of the new commander and launch a fierce counterattack. We must be prepared to resist." "But what about Lord Asriel?" said Mary. "He wrestled with the Regent of Heaven, the Angel Metatron, and he twisted him into the Abyss, and Metatron was gone forever, as was Lord Asriel." Mary held her breath. "Where's Mrs. Coulter?" she said. In answer, the wizard drew an arrow from the quiver and carefully selected one of them: the best, straightest, and most well-balanced. She broke the arrow in two. "Once in my world," she said, "I saw that woman torture a witch, and I swore to myself that I would send this arrow down her throat. Now I will never do that, she sacrificed herself Fighting that angel with Lord Asriel, and getting a safe world for Laila, they couldn't do it alone, but together they did it." Mary said despondently, "What do we tell Lila?" "Wait until she asks," Serafina said. "She probably won't. She has the alethiometer anyway, and it will tell her all she wants to know." They sat side by side in silence for a while while the stars slowly turned in the sky. "Can you see the future and guess what they'll choose to do?" Mary said. "No, but if Lyra returns to her own world, then I will be her sister for life. what will you do " "I..." Mary began, only to realize that she had never thought about it. "I think I'm in my own world and even though I'd be sad to leave it, I've been very happy here and it's been the happiest I've ever been in my life, I think." "Well, if you do go home, you'll have a sister in another world," said Serafina, "and so will I. We'll meet again in a day or two when the ship comes, We'll talk on the way home then, and we'll be parted forever. Hug me now, sister." Mary did as she was told, and Serafina Pekkala flew away on her cloud pine branch, over the reeds, over the swamps, over the mudflats, over the beaches, over the sea, until Mary came again. Can't see her either. At about the same time, a large blue lizard saw Father Gomez's body.Will and Lila had taken another road back to the village that afternoon, so they didn't know the truth.The body of the priest lay intact where Balthamos had laid him.Lizards are carnivores, but they are benign and harmless, and by an ancient agreement with Murfa they have a right to any abandoned animal carcass after dark. The lizard dragged the priest's body back to its nest, and its children feasted.As for the rifle, it was still quietly turning to rust in the grass where Father Gomez had placed it.