They hurried down the silent stairwell and stopped just inside the main door of the Bear Tower. ‘I know it feels right to creep,’ said Duckling. ‘But you’ve got to walk as if you’ve every right to be here. Otherwise people’ll notice you.’
Pummel and Otte nodded, and straightened from their furtive crouch. Sooli nodded too. At least, Duckling thought she did. The other girl had woven herself and the chicken into invisibility, and Duckling wished she could do the same.
But she could do the next best thing, which was to send her breeze ahead of them.
She blew on the little windmill that never left her side, and hummed up the breeze. When it tickled her chin, she whispered, ‘We have to go to the Keep, and we mustn’t be spotted. Can you stir up a bit of dust as we cross the bailey? Blow it in the eyes of anyone who might look towards us? Make them turn away?’
In reply, the breeze whisked out the door, and seconds later a tiny whirlwind rose, laden with dust and small bits of gravel. It teetered this way and that, then moved off across the bailey, towards the Keep.
‘Right,’ said Duckling, and with every sense alert, she stepped out into the first bailey. To her relief, it was deserted.
‘Where is everyone?’ asked Otte.
‘Still in the Great Chamber, maybe,’ said Duckling. ‘With the Harshman. And Krieg must be searching somewhere else. But it’s our good luck, so let’s use it.’
Because there was no one to see them, she and Pummel picked Otte up between them and ran across the first bailey as fast as they could. The cat galloped beside them, and Duckling hoped that Sooli did too. The air was bitterly cold.
At the side door of the Keep, Duckling called her breeze back, and asked it to warn her if there was anyone ahead of them. Then they set off through those dark stone passages, with the cat leading the way.
She took them up to the second floor, to the same little corridor behind the Great Chamber that Duckling had used when she was hiding from the soldiers. The air in the corridor stank of fear and hatred. On the wall, a candle was almost burned to a stub. And under the candle lay the body of the Grafine, with a great wound in her chest.
‘Dyyying,’ said the cat.
Duckling’s heart was beating so hard and fast that she thought she might be sick. She ran forward and knelt beside the Grafine, whose tunic was sodden with blood. The woman’s bones stood out stark against the skin of her face, and her eyes were closed.
‘Is she dead?’ whispered Pummel.
Otte knelt down next to Duckling, hanging onto her shoulder to keep from tipping over. Sooli appeared out of nowhere. In her arms, the chicken was craning her neck to watch.
‘She is still bleeding, so her heart must be beating,’ whispered Otte. He pressed the rumpled sheet he had brought from the Bear Tower over the wound. Then he looked at Duckling and nodded.
Duckling wasn’t squeamish – no one who lived with Lord Rump could afford to be – but there was so much blood. She swallowed. Then she took hold of the Grafine’s shoulder and shook it gently.
‘Grafine,’ she said. ‘Wake up!’
There was no response, so Duckling shook her again.
‘Don’t hurt her,’ said Pummel, kneeling beside them.
The cat yawned, as if death bored her. Duckling looked up at Sooli. ‘You can see people’s paths, can’t you? Where does hers go?’
Sooli put the chicken down and inspected the floor around the Grafine. ‘Her path leads straight to death. She already has one foot on the threshold. She will not wake up.’
‘She must wake up,’ muttered Duckling, and she shook the Grafine a third time. But the woman didn’t even groan.
Duckling wished Grandpa was here. He could persuade anyone to do anything. He could probably even persuade someone not to die quite so quickly—
She looked up at Sooli again, her heart beating faster than ever. ‘If you can see her path, can you change it? Keep her away from that threshold thing?’
Sooli shook her head. ‘Her path runs out. It stops. There is nothing left.’
‘Well, only a little bit.’
‘Then could you – I don’t know – put a bend in it or something? So we’ve got time to question her?’
Sooli bent over and took hold of something that Duckling couldn’t see. Or rather, she tried to take hold of it. Her fingers dipped and twisted, then sprang apart. She grimaced, and repeated the action. Dip. Twist. Spring apart. Dip, twist, spring apart.
‘Her path is too short,’ whispered Sooli. ‘There is nothing to hold onto. She has given up.’
There was a moment of silence. Then Otte said, in a cold voice that Duckling had never heard him use before, ‘Of course she has given up. My mother the Margravine always said she was weak. Unfit to rule, that is what my mother said. She tolerated the Grafine because they were cousins, but she despised her, too—’
Under Duckling’s fingers, a pulse jolted. The dying woman’s chest rose and fell. A groan spilled from her lips.
Sooli’s fingers seized hold of something and began to weave it to a different shape. ‘I cannot keep her here for long,’ she hissed. ‘Ask your questions. Quickly!’
But before Duckling could open her mouth, Otte whispered, ‘Grafine, I did not mean what I said. My mother had the greatest respect for you.’
‘Killed … her,’ mumbled the Grafine, without opening her eyes. ‘To save … the Strong-hold.’
Duckling didn’t believe that for a moment. According to Grandpa, people could always find good reasons for the bad things they did. But that didn’t take away the badness.
‘Did you raise the Harshman?’ she whispered.
The slightest of nods from the Grafine. Another groan.
Sooli’s hands grabbed desperately at something, as if it was slipping through her fingers. ‘Quickly!’
‘How do we send him back?’ asked Duckling.
The Grafine’s lips moved, but no sound came out.
‘What’s she saying?’ whispered Pummel.
‘Ice,’ croaked the Grafine. ‘Ice to … war.’
Otte leaned closer. ‘Ice to war?’
‘Ice to … wa-ter.’ The dying woman tried to say more, but the effort was too much for her. Her face sagged. She coughed.
‘Sooli!’ hissed Duckling.
‘I am trying,’ whispered Sooli. ‘But she has only seconds left.’
Duckling gripped the Grafine’s shoulder. ‘How do we stop him? Tell us, or he’ll destroy Neuhalt. Tell us!’
‘Boo … book,’ croaked the Grafine.
‘There’s a book?’ asked Pummel. ‘Where? Where is it?’
The Grafine’s hand jerked, as if she was trying to point. The chicken squawked in alarm. The cat hissed.
‘She is going!’ cried Sooli.
And so she was. A breath sighed out of her – and the Grafine died.