The Edge Chronicles 11: The Nameless One: First Book of Cade
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Celestia’s face grew serious. ‘He told my father that he had come from the Garden of Life,’ she told him, ‘far up at the top of the rock spike that sticks up out of the darkness, high above Riverrise. The city of the waifs.’ She hesitated. ‘According to my father, he’d been there for more than five hundred years.’
‘Five hundred . . . But that’s not possible,’ said Cade.
‘With the life-giving waters of the Riverrise lake, it is,’ said Celestia. ‘Apparently Goom was the sole survivor of a skyship crew that’d ended up there way back in the First Age of Flight.’ She frowned. ‘When we first saw him emerging from the trees behind your cabin, he had a glass vial of Riverrise water round his neck. It was half full, and Goom said it was what had been keeping him alive since he’d left the Garden of Life.’ She paused. ‘And that’s what he gave to you. All of it.’ A smile spread across her features. ‘It was like a miracle, Cade. The spasms in your body stopped. You got colour in your cheeks. Your temperature dropped. And that wound on your shoulder, it just closed up and healed itself, right in front of my eyes. In seconds!’ She reached out and clasped both Cade’s hands in hers. ‘We’d got you back,’ she said. ‘I’d got you back.’
Cade stared into Celestia’s eyes. He felt oddly uneasy.
‘But why me?’ he asked. ‘Why did he give me the last of his precious water?’
‘Because of the nameless one,’ Celestia said.
‘Tug?’ said Cade.
Celestia nodded. ‘Since the opening up of Riverrise, Goom said he’d devoted his life to fighting the enslavement of the nameless ones. Goom had tried to save Tug’s mother from red dwarf slavers in the Nightwoods beyond the city, but she died of her wounds. Tug ran away in the fight and was lost in the woods, and Goom said he’d been tracking him ever since. When he finally found him, you, Cade, had taken him in and given him a home.’ She smiled. ‘This was Goom’s way of thanking you.’
‘But what happened to him?’ Cade asked. ‘Where is Goom now?’
Just then, as if in answer, the distant sound of yodelling cut through the afternoon stillness, and Cade turned to see a lone figure – broad of shoulder, though slightly stooped – standing at the top of the Five Falls. Swallowing hard, he watched as the distant figure of the banderbear stood there on the jutting rock, silhouetted against the sky. Then, slowly, stiffly, the ancient banderbear turned and shambled off, up the High Farrow to the forested ridges beyond, and disappeared from sight.
Cade turned to Celestia. There was a heavy ache in the centre of his chest.
‘He didn’t even know me,’ he said, ‘yet he sacrificed his life for me—’
‘And willingly,’ Celestia broke in. ‘He told my father that he had lived a long, long life, Cade. And that he was ready to join his ancestors in Open Sky. The Final Convocation, he called it . . .’ She frowned. ‘And there was something else.’ She paused. ‘After he had given you the Riverrise water, he just stood there beside your hammock, staring down at you. It was so strange. Then he reached out and ran his great paw gently down the side of your face, and he said something – something that wasn’t just wuh.’ She looked at Cade. ‘It sounded like Twig.’
‘Twig?’
She nodded. ‘Goom told my father that you reminded him of the captain of the sky-pirate ship Goom had been a crew member on. The captain he’d waited for at Riverrise all that time . . .’ She shook her head in wonder, then reached out and took Cade by the hand. ‘But what’s important now, Cade – for you and me, and Thorne and Gart – and my father; and Rumblix and Tug,’ she laughed, and fixed Cade with her green-eyed gaze, ‘is the future.’
Cade nodded. Celestia was right, though he would never forget the banderbear’s gift. The gift of life. And every time he heard that yearning yodelling sound of a banderbear calling, he knew he would remember Goom’s self-sacrifice. He, Cade, would do his best to be worthy of it.
‘Come on,’ Celestia said, pulling him to his feet. ‘They’re waiting for us at Thorne’s for supper. Thorne’s got something he wants to talk to us about.’
‘What?’ said Cade.
‘I don’t know,’ Celestia told him. ‘But it’s something to do with those barkscrolls of your father’s that he made all those notes about.’ She took his hand and led him back down the jetty. ‘Something that Thorne thinks could change the Farrow Ridges for ever . . .’
About the Authors
PAUL STEWART is a highly regarded author of books for young readers – everything from picture books to football stories, fantasy and horror. Together with Chris Riddell, he is co-creator of the Far-Flung Adventures series, which includes Fergus Crane, Gold Smarties Prize Winner, Corby Flood and Hugo Pepper, Silver Nestlé Prize Winners, and the Barnaby Grimes series. They are of course also co-creators of the bestselling Edge Chronicles series, which has sold over two million books and is now available in over thirty languages.
CHRIS RIDDELL is an accomplished graphic artist who has illustrated many acclaimed books for children, including Pirate Diary by Richard Platt, and Gulliver, which both won the Kate Greenaway Medal. His book Ottoline and the Yellow Cat was shortlisted for the Kate Greenaway Medal and won a Gold Nestlé Prize. Together with Paul Stewart, he is co-creator of the Far-Flung Adventures series, which includes Fergus Crane, Gold Smarties Prize Winner, Corby Flood and Hugo Pepper, Silver Nestlé Prize Winners, and the Barnaby Grimes series. They are of course also co-creators of the bestselling Edge Chronicles series, which has sold over two million books and is now available in over thirty languages.
BY PAUL STEWART & CHRIS RIDDELL
THE EDGE CHRONICLES:
The Quint Saga
The Curse of the Gloamglozer
The Winter Knights
Clash of the Sky Galleons
The Twig Saga
Beyond the Deepwoods
Stormchaser
Midnight Over Sanctaphrax
The Rook Saga
The Last of the Sky Pirates
Vox
Freeglader
The Nate Saga
The Immortals
BARNABY GRIMES:
Curse of the Night Wolf
Return of the Emerald Skull
Legion of the Dead
Phantom of Blood Alley
WYRMEWEALD:
Returner’s Wealth
Bloodhoney
The Bone Trail
For younger readers:
FAR-FLUNG ADVENTURES:
Fergus Crane
Corby Flood
Hugo Pepper
www.stewartandriddell.co.uk
THE EDGE CHRONICLES
Have you read them all?
THE QUINT SAGA
The Curse of the Gloamglozer
Deep inside Sanctaphrax, an ancient curse has been invoked . . .
The Winter Knights
Quint struggles to survive the icy cold of a never-ending winter.
Clash Of The Sky Galleons
Quint is caught up in a fight for revenge against the man who killed his family.
THE TWIG SAGA
Beyond the Deepwoods
Abandoned at birth in the Deepwoods, Twig does what he has always been warned not to do, and strays from the path . . .
Stormchaser
Twig must risk all to collect valuable stormphrax from the heart of a Great Storm.
Midnight Over Sanctaphrax
Far out in Open Sky, a ferocious storm is heading towards the city of Sanctaphrax . . .
THE ROOK SAGA
Last of the Sky Pirates
Rook sets out on a dangerous journey in order to become a Librarian Knight.
Vox
Can Rook stop the Edgeworld falling into chaos from the evil schemes of Vox Verlix?
Freeglader
When Undertown is destroyed, Rook must travel to a new home in the Free Glades.
THE NATE SAGA
The Immortals
Nate is a lowly lamplighter, until treachery forces him to flee to the cit
y of Great Glade.
THE NAMELESS ONE
AN RHCP DIGITAL EBOOK 978 1 448 15774 7
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This ebook edition published 2014
Copyright © Paul Stewart and Chris Riddell, 2014
First Published in Great Britain
Doubleday 9780857532343 2014
The right of Paul Stewart and Chris Riddell to be identified as the authors of this work has been asserted in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
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A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.