Guardian of the Dead (43 page)

‘Yes!' I said. ‘Please!'

‘You are certain?'

‘Of course!'

She looked at me for a long moment, her eyes unreadable, then she raised her hand and twisted it. Something spun itself out of the air and wove around her fingers; something that smelled sharply of salt and sweetly of green things after rain, something replete with the sound of dolphins squeaking and the melodic song of the tui bird, something that remembered tall, flightless moa stalking through the dense bush and the huge hawks that had eaten them, and the taniwha in the rivers and the patupaiarehe ghosting through the forests and along the shore. M
ui's fish had lain under the tortured sun for eons in unimaginable agony, and had still given endlessly of himself to the tiny, chattering creatures that clambered over his surface and dug for shellfish at his edges and crawled through his caverns to watch glowworms spreading tiny galaxies over underground lakes.

He came to the goddess gladly, and Hine-nui-te-p
waited until the last of his spirit was gathered in her hand, glowing like a dark moon. Then she twisted her fingers, and he vanished, pain ended.

I was crying, huge drops dripping down my face to splatter on my stomach and thighs.

‘It is done,' she said, and sighed. ‘I must care for my children. There are many waiting. Go, and take your other face with you.'

I picked up the mask, and it trembled in my hands like a dog frightened of a beating. I knew then that it had been overconfident in its power. It was strong and old, but it was nothing to Hine-nui-te-p
. I could never have made her love me and I had been right in more than one way to reject the possibility. ‘How do I get back?' I asked hesitantly.

‘My obligation is paid. Make your own path from here,' she said, and closed her eyes.

I waited in case she had any less-cryptic advice, but she was silent and sleeping. Still, I stayed. The wind of her breath gusted evenly for long minutes, until, aching, I crept out of the cave of the guardian of the dead.

The network of tunnels were gone as if they had never been. I stood instead beneath a dim sky in which no sun or moon shone, at the bottom of the high bank beside a grey river. White herons stalked in the shallows, mincing through the mud on their skinny legs.

I could hear singing over the hill, too ordinary to be patupaiarehe song. Hunger gnawed at me, and I turned to climb up the slope.

Mark was sitting on a rock. ‘Hey, Spencer,' he said.

His face was restored, grave and beautiful. But underneath the high cheekbones and clean, straight hair, I saw the gore-smeared skull patupaiarehe clubs had broken.

‘This isn't fair,' I whispered. How much pain could anyone bear? ‘What are you doing here?'

‘Bird watching.'

Well, it had been a stupid question anyway. ‘This isn't even real,' I said.

His shoulders lifted. ‘Yes and no. I'm really here. It's really me.'

I bit my lip, hands twisting.

He waved at the hill. ‘I was trying to psych myself up for my first meal. But now I'm glad I've got a chance to say sorry.'

‘First meal? Is this some sort of Persephone deal?'

He laughed. ‘There are some interesting parallels. You should read up on this stuff.'

‘I will.'

He cocked his head. ‘In books.'

‘Smartarse,' I said, and let the tears come. He wrapped his arm around my shoulders and held on while I shook into him, kissing my wet cheeks and the corners of my eyes. It felt so good to touch him again, after so long. He
felt
real. I wasn't even embarrassed about my nudity. What did it matter now?

‘I'm so sorry, Ellie,' he said, when I recovered enough to pull away a little and look into his face. ‘Please believe me. I meant to tell you. Right after this all went down, if I survived.' ‘I believe you,' I said absently. ‘I think I knew you weren't lying about that. But I was in danger of loving you, and you knew it. I bet that was tempting.'

Something was nagging at me under the grief; something someone had told me about stories. I chased the memory until I held it firmly, a new but growing hope.

In my mead-happy daze, Professor Gribaldi had said that the stories in your head changed the world. Mark had said that too, or something like it, sitting on the banks of the Avon. And he was really here.

‘Stories I believe,' I muttered. ‘Not Persephone. Orpheus.'

Mark was still holding my bruised shoulders. ‘Can you forgive me?'

I gently disengaged from his grip. ‘Not yet.'

He flinched.

‘We'll talk about it later,' I said, and turned around, clenching my eyes shut.

His voice was startled. ‘Ellie?'

‘Don't talk to me,' I ordered. ‘Don't touch me. Don't make a
sound
. Just follow.'

I thought turning my back on him had been difficult, but the first step was harder still.

I walked for a long time. The sky never got darker or lighter, and I could hear, always, the singing rise above the banks of the river. But I never saw any of the other dead, and strain as I could, I never heard Mark's breathing or the echo of his steps. After a while my stomach stopped cramping, leaving me with a vicious headache and bouts of dizziness. The thirst was worse, and as I followed the river path I caught myself looking at the water far too often. Just one mouthful of that grey water would have made such a difference.

But if my stories would help, the ones I had heard and read and loved until they became part of me, then I had to follow the rules. Don't eat. Don't drink. Don't step off the path.

Never look behind.

The river narrowed to a stream, and then a creek, lined with lichen-covered rocks with ferns in every crevice, and trees that tangled their long roots in knotty clusters. I had to go slower, picking my way awkwardly with my one free hand. The mask noted that it would be easier if I put it on. I ignored it, and squeezed my eyes shut every time I stumbled, in case I fell facing the wrong way.

The creek narrowed to a trickle that disappeared altogether, and I stood on one side of a small clearing in the dense bush.

On the clearing's other side were two gates standing next to each other, not quite touching. There were no walls to hold them in place – only the trees crowding around them. It was as if they had grown there.

I swore viciously, and stalked across the grove to inspect them.

One was constructed from heavy planks of dark wood, with eaves hewn from tree trunks. The gateposts and eaves were covered in intricate carvings, the wood decorated with taniwha and
tupuna
, with eyes of paua shell and teeth of bone. The other gate was made of limestone, with the eaves rising to a sharp point over the two massive blocks of stone that where held upright by white Corinthian pillars crowned with agapanthus wreaths.

There were two gates in one of the stories I knew: gates of horn and ivory, for dreams false and true. If I'd seen those gates, I would have known which path to take. But this was something else, some other choice.

‘I don't even know what I'm choosing,' I said, and felt my voice break in the silence. ‘How can I choose one or the other?' I dug my nails against my thigh, striving not to turn and ask Mark's advice. ‘The story is supposed to be
mine
. I should know this!'

But my stories weren't singular. I had been born in a land to which many had brought stories, and I had chosen others on my own. And then there was Mark. I stood there and trembled, staring at the gates until tears sprang to my eyes and smudged my view.

In that blurry vision, the dark gap between them stood out in sharp relief.

‘Oh,' I said, astounded. ‘Of course. It's about chimeras.

Chimeras and balance.'

Was that an intake of breath behind me? I couldn't tell over the thrumming of blood in my ears, but I held to it as if it had been shouted approval. I forced down one last, fierce urge to look behind, and stepped forward, to walk between the gates.

The gap was tight. I canted my shoulders to get them through, unwilling to turn completely to one side or the other in case it was taken as a choice. Stone scraped at my right hip on one side and splinters stabbed the left. It seemed the gates weren't just gates, but enormous buildings; the walls went on and on as I forced myself deeper into the alley. The light faded. I felt an immovable pressure on the top of my head, and obediently bent, then crouched, then crawled, finally squeezing myself through on my naked belly, mask tucked under my pinned arm.

Why did I have to be so
big
?

The walls squeezed inward in a heart-stopping contraction. I gasped, on the edge of panic, and tried to wriggle a little faster. They squeezed again, so hard I felt as if my bones were cracking. I didn't have the air for a scream, only a pathetic whimper that suddenly infuriated me with its helplessness.

‘Stupid!' I hissed, and reared upwards, ducking my head. My shoulders pounded into the ceiling. Pain flared as my skin tore, but I felt something shift and tried again. The wall definitely recoiled under the blow, and I swung back an elbow strike that skinned half the back of my arm, but made the wall flinch even further away. ‘Stupid metaphors,' I grunted between blows, settling into a rhythm as the walls expanded. ‘I'm not too big. This is too small!'

I cleared enough space to take a stance and caught my breath. There was dim light now; enough to see the blood that oozed from my scraped body; enough to see the ceiling dip threateningly. ‘Oh no,' I said sweetly. ‘I know what to do.' I twisted into a high kick, and snapped my tensed foot at the ceiling.

It shattered, as delicate as blown glass, shards spinning away into a void. The light failed and the ground dropped away. I was falling again; falling bodiless and blind.