His Dark Materials Omnibus

by Philip Pullman

  He blew out the lantern and looked back at the dim shapes of his father, of the witch, of his father again before turning to go down the mountain.

  The stormy air was electric with whispers, and in the tearing of the wind Will could hear other sounds, too: confused echoes of cries and chanting, the clash of metal on metal, pounding wingbeats that one moment sounded so close they might actually be inside his head, and the next so far away they might have been on another planet. The rocks underfoot were slippery and loose, and it was much harder going down than it had been climbing up; but he didn’t falter.

  And as he turned down the last little gully before the place where he’d left Lyra sleeping, he stopped suddenly. He could see two figures simply standing there, in the dark, waiting. Will put his hand on the knife.

  Then one of the figures spoke.

  “You’re the boy with the knife?” he said, and his voice had the strange quality of those wingbeats. Whoever he was, he wasn’t a human being.

  “Who are you?” Will said. “Are you men, or—”

  “Not men, no. We are Watchers. Bene elim. In your language, angels.”

  Will was silent. The speaker went on: “Other angels have other functions, and other powers. Our task is simple: We need you. We have been following the shaman every inch of his way, hoping he would lead us to you, and so he has. And now we have come to guide you in turn to Lord Asriel.”

  “You were with my father all the time?”

  “Every moment.”

  “Did he know?”

  “He had no idea.”

  “Why didn’t you stop the witch, then? Why did you let her kill him?”

  “We would have done, earlier. But his task was over once he’d led us to you.”

  Will said nothing. His head was ringing; this was no less difficult to understand than anything else.

  “All right,” he said finally. “I’ll come with you. But first I must wake Lyra.”

  They stood aside to let him pass, and he felt a tingle in the air as he went close to them, but he ignored it and concentrated on getting down the slope toward the little shelter where Lyra was sleeping.

  But something made him stop.

  In the dimness, he could see the witches who had been guarding Lyra all sitting or standing still. They looked like statues, except that they were breathing, but they were scarcely alive. There were several black-silk-clad bodies on the ground, too, and as he gazed in horror from one to another of them, Will saw what must have happened: they had been attacked in midair by the Specters, and had fallen to their deaths, indifferently.

  But—

  “Where’s Lyra?” he cried aloud.

  The hollow under the rock was empty. Lyra was gone.

  There was something under the overhang where she’d been lying. It was Lyra’s little canvas rucksack, and from the weight of it he knew without looking that the alethiometer was still inside it.

  Will was shaking his head. It couldn’t be true, but it was: Lyra was gone, Lyra was captured, Lyra was lost.

  The two dark figures of the bene elim had not moved. But they spoke: “You must come with us now. Lord Asriel needs you at once. The enemy’s power is growing every minute. The shaman has told you what your task is. Follow us and help us win. Come with us. Come this way. Come now.”

  And Will looked from them to Lyra’s rucksack and back again, and he didn’t hear a word they said.

  LANTERN SLIDES

  The Subtle Knife

  John Parry and the turquoise ring: how did he get hold of it? You could tell a story about the ring, and everything that had happened to it since it left Lee Scoresby’s mother’s finger; and you could tell a story about Lee himself, and recount his entire history from boyhood to the moment he sat beside the little hut on the flooded banks of the Yenisei, and saw the shaman’s fist open to disclose the well-loved thing that he’d turned and turned round and round his mother’s finger so long ago. The story lines diverge, and move a very long way apart, and come together, and something happens when they touch. That something would lead Lee to his death, but what happened to the ring? It must still be around, somewhere.

  A dæmon is not an animal, of course; a dæmon is a person. A real cat, face to face with a dæmon in cat form, would not be puzzled for a moment. She would see a human being.

  All the time in Cittàgazze, the sense of how different a place this could have been if it hadn’t been corrupted; how easy it would have been not to make the knife, if they’d seen the consequences. A world of teeming plenty, of beautiful seas and temperate weather, of prosperity and peace—and still they wanted more.

  Will and his mother, visiting an elderly-seeming couple in a large house and getting a cold welcome. He was puzzled: he was too young to understand the conversation, the murmuring voices, his mother’s tears. Later, all he remembered was the contempt on the older woman’s face, the feeling that these two regarded his beloved mother as dirt, and his savage resolution never to let her be exposed to that brutality again. He was six. He would have killed them if he could. Very much later, he realized they were his father’s parents.

  Lyra lying awake on the cold rocks, pretending to be asleep, while Will whispered to her dæmon. How often did she think of that in the days that followed!

  The window in Alaska. Natural that the people of the area, if they knew about it at all, would regard it as a doorway to the spirit world; and natural that the other windows into our world should be hard to find, and often neglected. People don’t like the uncanny, and rather than look fully at something disturbing, they’ll avoid it altogether. That house that no one seems to live in for long, that corner of a field that the farmer never quite manages to plow, that broken wall that’s always going to be repaired, but never is … There is such a place on Cader Idris in north Wales, and another in a hotel bedroom in Glasgow.

  Sir Charles Latrom every morning applying two drops of a floral oil to the center of a large silk handkerchief, which he then bundled and tucked into his top pocket in a meticulous imitation of carefree elegance. He couldn’t have named the oil: he’d stolen it from a bazaar in Damascus, but the Damascus of another world, where the flowers were bred for the fleshlike exuberance of their scent. As it developed through the day, the fragrance of the oil rotted like a medlar; Sir Charles would lean his head to the left and sniff appreciatively, perhaps too frankly for the comfort of most companions.

  Cittàgazze under the moonlight, deserted and silent and open: the colonnades drenched in soft shadow, the Casino gardens so perfectly clipped and swept, the gravel paths … Every house lit, every door open to the warm night. It was the first place where Will had ever felt entirely safe and entirely welcome and entirely at home. Lonely, yes, at first, but he lived in that condition like a fish in water. He would never know how inconceivably strange he appeared, at first, to Lyra.

  THE AMBER SPYGLASS

  The morning comes, the night decays, the watchmen leave their stations;

  The grave is burst, the spices shed, the linen wrapped up;

  The bones of death, the cov’ring clay, the sinews shrunk & dry’d

  Reviving shake, inspiring move, breathing, awakening,

  Spring like redeemed captives when their bonds & bars are burst.

  Let the slave grinding at the mill run out into the field,

  Let him look up into the heavens & laugh in the bright air;

  Let the inchained soul, shut up in darkness and in sighing,

  Whose face has never seen a smile in thirty weary years,

  Rise and look out; his chains are loose, his dungeon doors are open;

  And let his wife and children return from the oppressor’s scourge.

  They look behind at every step & believe it is a dream,

  Singing: “The Sun has left his blackness & has found a fresher morning,

  And the fair Moon rejoices in the clear & cloudless night;

  For Empire is no more, and now the Lion & Wolf shall cease.”

>   —from “America: A Prophecy” by William Blake

  O stars,

  isn’t it from you that the lover’s desire for the face

  of his beloved arises? Doesn’t his secret insight

  into her pure features come from the pure constellations?

  —from “The Third Elegy” by Rainer Maria Rilke,

  translated by Stephen Mitchell

  Fine vapors escape from whatever is doing the living.

  The night is cold and delicate and full of angels

  Pounding down the living. The factories are all lit up,

  The chime goes unheard.

  We are together at last, though far apart.

  —from “The Ecclesiast” by John Ashbery

  CONTENTS

  ONE The Enchanted Sleeper

  TWO Balthamos and Baruch

  THREE Scavengers

  FOUR Ama and the Bats

  FIVE The Adamant Tower

  SIX Preemptive Absolution

  SEVEN Mary, Alone

  EIGHT Vodka

  NINE Upriver

  TEN Wheels

  ELEVEN The Dragonflies

  TWELVE The Break

  THIRTEEN Tialys and Salmakia

  FOURTEEN Know What It Is

  FIFTEEN The Forge

  SIXTEEN The Intention Craft

  SEVENTEEN Oil and Lacquer

  EIGHTEEN The Suburbs of the Dead

  NINETEEN Lyra and Her Death

  TWENTY Climbing

  TWENTY-ONE The Harpies

  TWENTY-TWO The Whisperers

  TWENTY-THREE No Way Out

  TWENTY-FOUR Mrs. Coulter in Geneva

  TWENTY-FIVE Saint-Jean-les-Eaux

  TWENTY-SIX The Abyss

  TWENTY-SEVEN The Platform

  TWENTY-EIGHT Midnight

  TWENTY-NINE The Battle on the Plain

  THIRTY The Clouded Mountain

  THIRTY-ONE Authority’s End

  THIRTY-TWO Morning

  THIRTY-THREE Marzipan

  THIRTY-FOUR There Is Now

  THIRTY-FIVE Over the Hills and Far Away

  THIRTY-SIX The Broken Arrow

  THIRTY-SEVEN The Dunes

  THIRTY-EIGHT The Botanic Garden

  Lantern Slides

  1

  … while the beasts of prey, / Come from caverns deep,

  Vewed the maid asleep …

  • WILLIAM BLAKE •

  THE ENCHANTED SLEEPER

  In a valley shaded with rhododendrons, close to the snow line, where a stream milky with meltwater splashed and where doves and linnets flew among the immense pines, lay a cave, half-hidden by the crag above and the stiff heavy leaves that clustered below.

  The woods were full of sound: the stream between the rocks, the wind among the needles of the pine branches, the chitter of insects and the cries of small arboreal mammals, as well as the birdsong; and from time to time a stronger gust of wind would make one of the branches of a cedar or a fir move against another and groan like a cello.

  It was a place of brilliant sunlight, never undappled. Shafts of lemon-gold brilliance lanced down to the forest floor between bars and pools of brown-green shade; and the light was never still, never constant, because drifting mist would often float among the treetops, filtering all the sunlight to a pearly sheen and brushing every pine cone with moisture that glistened when the mist lifted. Sometimes the wetness in the clouds condensed into tiny drops half mist and half rain, which floated downward rather than fell, making a soft rustling patter among the millions of needles.

  There was a narrow path beside the stream, which led from a village—little more than a cluster of herdsmen’s dwellings—at the foot of the valley to a half-ruined shrine near the glacier at its head, a place where faded silken flags streamed out in the perpetual winds from the high mountains, and offerings of barley cakes and dried tea were placed by pious villagers. An odd effect of the light, the ice, and the vapor enveloped the head of the valley in perpetual rainbows.

  The cave lay some way above the path. Many years before, a holy man had lived there, meditating and fasting and praying, and the place was venerated for the sake of his memory. It was thirty feet or so deep, with a dry floor: an ideal den for a bear or a wolf, but the only creatures living in it for years had been birds and bats.

  But the form that was crouching inside the entrance, his black eyes watching this way and that, his sharp ears pricked, was neither bird nor bat. The sunlight lay heavy and rich on his lustrous golden fur, and his monkey hands turned a pine cone this way and that, snapping off the scales with sharp fingers and scratching out the sweet nuts.

  Behind him, just beyond the point where the sunlight reached, Mrs. Coulter was heating some water in a small pan over a naphtha stove. Her dæmon uttered a warning murmur and Mrs. Coulter looked up.

  Coming along the forest path was a young village girl. Mrs. Coulter knew who she was: Ama had been bringing her food for some days now. Mrs. Coulter had let it be known when she first arrived that she was a holy woman engaged in meditation and prayer, and under a vow never to speak to a man. Ama was the only person whose visits she accepted.

  This time, though, the girl wasn’t alone. Her father was with her, and while Ama climbed up to the cave, he waited a little way off.

  Ama came to the cave entrance and bowed.

  “My father sends me with prayers for your goodwill,” she said.

  “Greetings, child,” said Mrs. Coulter.

  The girl was carrying a bundle wrapped in faded cotton, which she laid at Mrs. Coulter’s feet. Then she held out a little bunch of flowers, a dozen or so anemones bound with a cotton thread, and began to speak in a rapid, nervous voice. Mrs. Coulter understood some of the language of these mountain people, but it would never do to let them know how much. So she smiled and motioned to the girl to close her lips and to watch their two dæmons. The golden monkey was holding out his little black hand, and Ama’s butterfly dæmon was fluttering closer and closer until he settled on a horny forefinger.

  The monkey brought him slowly to his ear, and Mrs. Coulter felt a tiny stream of understanding flow into her mind, clarifying the girl’s words. The villagers were happy for a holy woman, such as herself, to take refuge in the cave, but it was rumored that she had a companion with her who was in some way dangerous and powerful.

  It was that which made the villagers afraid. Was this other being Mrs. Coulter’s master, or her servant? Did she mean harm? Why was she there in the first place? Were they going to stay long? Ama conveyed these questions with a thousand misgivings.

  A novel answer occurred to Mrs. Coulter as the dæmon’s understanding filtered into hers. She could tell the truth. Not all of it, naturally, but some. She felt a little quiver of laughter at the idea, but kept it out of her voice as she explained:

  “Yes, there is someone else with me. But there is nothing to be afraid of. She is my daughter, and she is under a spell that made her fall asleep. We have come here to hide from the enchanter who put the spell on her, while I try to cure her and keep her from harm. Come and see her, if you like.”

  Ama was half-soothed by Mrs. Coulter’s soft voice, and half-afraid still; and the talk of enchanters and spells added to the awe she felt. But the golden monkey was holding her dæmon so gently, and she was curious, besides, so she followed Mrs. Coulter into the cave.

  Her father, on the path below, took a step forward, and his crow dæmon raised her wings once or twice, but he stayed where he was.

  Mrs. Coulter lit a candle, because the light was fading rapidly, and led Ama to the back of the cave. Ama’s eyes glittered widely in the gloom, and her hands were moving together in a repetitive gesture of finger on thumb, finger on thumb, to ward off danger by confusing the evil spirits.

  “You see?” said Mrs. Coulter. “She can do no harm. There’s nothing to be afraid of.”

  Ama looked at the figure in the sleeping bag. It was a girl older than she was, by three or four years, perhaps; and she had h
air of a color Ama had never seen before—a tawny fairness like a lion’s. Her lips were pressed tightly together, and she was deeply asleep, there was no doubt about that, for her dæmon lay coiled and unconscious at her throat. He had the form of some creature like a mongoose, but red-gold in color and smaller. The golden monkey was tenderly smoothing the fur between the sleeping dæmon’s ears, and as Ama looked, the mongoose creature stirred uneasily and uttered a hoarse little mew. Ama’s dæmon, mouse-formed, pressed himself close to Ama’s neck and peered fearfully through her hair.

  “So you can tell your father what you’ve seen,” Mrs. Coulter went on. “No evil spirit. Just my daughter, asleep under a spell, and in my care. But, please, Ama, tell your father that this must be a secret. No one but you two must know Lyra is here. If the enchanter knew where she was, he would seek her out and destroy her, and me, and everything nearby. So hush! Tell your father, and no one else.”

  She knelt beside Lyra and smoothed the damp hair back from the sleeping face before bending low to kiss her daughter’s cheek. Then she looked up with sad and loving eyes, and smiled at Ama with such brave, wise compassion that the little girl felt tears fill her gaze.

  Mrs. Coulter took Ama’s hand as they went back to the cave entrance, and saw the girl’s father watching anxiously from below. The woman put her hands together and bowed to him, and he responded with relief as his daughter, having bowed both to Mrs. Coulter and to the enchanted sleeper, turned and scampered down the slope in the twilight. Father and daughter bowed once more to the cave and then set off, to vanish among the gloom of the heavy rhododendrons.