Abarat

all calling to her, trying to get her to wake up. She felt herself tentatively shaken. And—just as tentatively—she opened her eyes.

Eight concerned faces were looking down at her: one large one and seven smaller.

'Anything broken?' John Fillet said.

Candy made a very cautious attempt to sit up. The back of her neck hurt, but it was no worse than the ache she sometimes woke with when she'd been sleeping in an odd position. She moved her legs and her arms. She wriggled her fingers.

'No,' she said, somewhat surprised at her good fortune, given the distance she'd fallen. 'I don't think anything's broken.'

'Good,' said John Sallow. 'Then we can get moving.'

'Wait!' said Mischief. 'She's only just—'

'Sallow's right!' said John Fillet. 'We haven't got time to wait. That damnable creep Shape is going to be down here in a few seconds.'

Shape! The sound of his name was enough to make Candy seize Mischief's arm and haul herself to her feet. The last thing she wanted was Mendelson Shape's claws around her throat a second time.

'Where are we off to?' she wanted to know.

'We're going home, lady,' Mischief said. 'You're going to yours. And we're going to ours.' He put his hand into his inside pocket. 'But before I go,' he said, dropping his voice to a whisper as he spoke, 'I wonder if you could possibly do something for me—for us all—until we meet again?'

'What do you need?' Candy said.

'I just need you to carry something for us. Something very precious.'

From the interior of his jacket he brought an object wrapped up in a little piece of coarsely woven cloth and secured with a brown leather thong that had been wrapped around it several times.

'There's no need for you to know what it is,' he said. 'In fact, if you don't mind, it's better you don't. Just take it and keep it safe for us, will you? We'll be back, I promise you, when Carrion's forgotten about us, and we can chance the return trip.'

'Carrion?'

'Christopher Carrion,' John Serpent said, his voice laden with anxiety. 'The Lord of Midnight.'

'Will you take it for us?' said John Mischief, proffering the little parcel.

'I think if I'm going to carry something,' Candy said, 'I should at least know what it is. Especially if it's important.'

'What did I tell you?' Serpent said. 'I knew she wouldn't be content with that 'It's better if you don't know' line. She's entirely too inquisitive, this one.'

'Well, if I'm going to be a messenger girl,' Candy said, addressing John Serpent, 'I think I have a right —'

'Of course you do,' Mischief said. 'Open it up. Go on. It's all yours.'

Curiously enough the little parcel seemed to have almost no weight, except for that of the wrapping and the cord. Candy pulled at the large knot, which although it looked hard to undo seemed to solve itself the moment she began to pick at it. She felt something move in the parcel. The next moment there was a rush of light out of the bag, which momentarily filled her gaze. She saw several points of brightness appear before her, joined by darting lines of luminescence. They hovered for a moment, then the lights sank away into her unconscious and were gone.

The whole spectacle—which couldn't have taken more than three seconds—left her speechless.

'You have the Key now,' John Mischief told her gravely. 'I beg you to tell nobody you have it. Do you understand? Nobody .'

'Whatever you say,' she replied, looking at the empty bag, mystified. Then, after a moment: 'I don't suppose you're going to tell me what door this key opens?'

'Truly, lady; better not.'

He kissed her hand, bowing as he did so, and began to retreat from her. 'Good-bye, lady,' he said. 'We have to go.'

Candy had been facing the tower throughout this conversation. Only now, as Mischief retreated from her, did she realize what a change had come over the world in the brief time in which she'd been unconscious.

A ramshackle jetty had appeared out of the ground, and at its far end large waves were breaking, their weight sufficient to make the structure creak and shake down its entire length. Beyond the breaking waves the Sea of Izabella stretched off toward a misty blue horizon. Minnesota—at least as Candy had known it—had apparently disappeared, overwhelmed by this great expanse of invading water.

'How…' Candy said, staring at the panorama slack-jawed with astonishment. 'How is this possible?'

'You called the waters, lady. You remember? With the cup and ball?'

'I remember,' she said.

'Now I must go home on those waters,' Mischief said. 'And you must go back home to Chickentown. I'll return, I promise, when it's safe to do so. And I'll claim the Key. In the meanwhile, you cannot imagine what service you do to freedom throughout the islands by being the keeper of that Key.'

He bowed to her again and then—politely but firmly— he nodded toward Chickentown.

'Go home, lady,' he said, like a man attempting to send home a dog that didn't want to leave his side. 'Go back where you're safe, before Shape gets down from the tower. Please . What you carry is of great significance. It can't be allowed to fall into Shape's hands. Or rather, into the hands of his master.'

'Why not? What happens if it does?'

'I beg you, lady,' Mischief said, the urgency in his voice mounting, 'ask no more questions. The less you know, the better for you. If things go wrong in the Abarat and they come looking for you, you can claim ignorance. Now there's no more time for conversation—'

He had reason for his urgency. There was a loud noise from out of the tower behind them, as Shape attempted to clamber back down the broken staircase. Judging by the din from within, it wasn't an easy job. His weight was causing yet more of the structure to collapse. But it would only be a matter of time, Candy knew, before he navigated the remnants of the staircase and was out through the door in pursuit of them all.

'All right,' she said, reluctantly conceding the urgency of her departure. 'I'll go. But before I go, I have to have one proper look.'

'At what?'

'The sea!' Candy said, pointing off down the jetty toward the open expanse of bright blue water.

'She'll be the death of us,' Serpent growled.

'No,' said Mischief. 'She has a perfect right.'

Mischief grabbed hold of Candy's hand and helped her up onto the jetty. It creaked and swayed beneath them. But having dared the tower's stairs and balcony, Candy wasn't in the least intimidated by a little rotten wood. The jetty shook violently with every wave that struck it, but she was determined to get to the end of it and see the Sea of Izabella for herself.

'It's amazing…' she said, as they proceeded down the length of the jetty. She'd never seen the sea before.

All thought of Shape and his claws had vanished from her head. She was entranced by the spectacle before her.

'I still don't see how it can have happened,' she said. 'A sea coming out of nowhere .'

'Oh, this is the least of it, lady,' Mischief said. 'Out there, far off from here, are the twenty-five islands of the Abarat.'

'Twenty-five?'

'One for every hour of the day. Plus the Twenty-Fifth Hour, which is called Odom's Spire, which is a Time Out of Time.'

It all sounded too strange and preposterous. But then here she was standing on a jetty looking out over a sea that hadn't existed ten minutes before. If the sea was real (and real it was, or else why was her face cold and wet?), then why not the islands too, waiting where the Sea of Izabella met the sky?