The Doorway and the Deep (13 page)

They walked for hours. Since her first visit to Limn, Lottie had grown far quicker on her feet. That skill came in handy
now. Dorian set a good pace, too—not nearly so fast as she was used to walking with Fife floating ahead. Today, Fife floated behind, the very last of the company. Lottie walked in step with Adelaide. Oliver and Eliot trailed Dorian, singing a song that Eliot had taught Oliver:

“What though on hamely fare we dine,
Wear hoddin grey, and all that;
Give fools their silks, and knaves their wine;
A Man's a Man for all that:
For all that, and all that,
Their tinsel show, and all that;
The honest man, though e'er so poor,
Is king o' men for all that!”

The singing carried on until someone yelled, “Saints and goblins! Would you two finish already?”

The boys stopped their singing and turned, wide-eyed, toward Fife.

“I've never heard anything so blasted obnoxious in my thirteen years, five months,” Fife went on. “And anyway, we're supposed to be on the run from Southerlies. Shouldn't we be trying to stay inconspicuous? You'll back me up on this, won't you, Ingle?”

“It would probably be wise,” said Dorian, “if you boys didn't sing.”

“Well, what else are we supposed to do?” asked Eliot. “We've been walking for ages. We've got to do
something
to keep entertained.”

“Then talk about the weather,” said Fife. “Or sing something that makes sense.”

“It's Scottish,” Eliot said. “My father taught it to me. He lived in Glasgow for a while.”

“Well, I don't like it,” said Fife, “whatever the blazes
Scottish
is.”

“It's Robert Burns,” said Oliver in a coaxing voice. “I've read you plenty of his stuff, Fife. You really liked it.”

“Maybe I was only pretending to like it because you wouldn't shut up about it.”

Oliver's eyes turned an injured gray.

“What's the matter with you, Fife?” said Adelaide.

“He's not in a good mood,” said Eliot. “Clearly.”

“That's no reason for him to take it out on us,” said Adelaide. “If you don't have anything nice to say, Fife, then—”

“Oh,
shut up
,” said Fife, floating above their heads. “Come on, let's just keep walking. And no singing this time, if you please.”

Dorian, who seemed relieved that the bickering had resolved itself without his intervention, resumed the lead.

“Children,” he muttered to himself.

Lottie scowled at Dorian's back, though she was angrier still at Fife for giving them such a bad reputation. She wasn't sure why, but she wanted Dorian Ingle to think well of them. Just because they were young didn't mean they weren't smart. Lottie quickened her steps so that she was in stride with Dorian. “What's a gorge?” she asked.

Dorian raised a brow at Lottie but said nothing.

“That wisp guard said Starkling's trying to build a gorge. I know Silvia said it's none of our business, but if we're traveling all this way just to bring Starkling down, I think we've got a right to know what he's up to. So tell me: what's a gorge?”

Dorian arched his brow higher. After a moment's pause, he spoke.

“Gorges are illegal,” he said. “They're dangerous and rare and highly volatile. That's why Silvia didn't want to discuss it.”

“All right, but you still haven't told me what a gorge
is
.”

Dorian scratched his jaw. He said, “In order to make a gorge, you have to hack off a silver bough from an apple tree—like I said, very illegal. But as you might imagine, the silver of a silver bough is precious. Magical. If you siphon the silver out, you can use it to create a portal—a gorge in the ground that leads anywhere you'd like, anywhere at all. Unlike a full apple tree, which is used to travel between worlds, a gorge only has the capacity to travel
within
a world.
So, for example, you could create a gorge between your front door and the entrance to the Southerly Court—a convenient little portal, as it were. It's a fine idea, perhaps, but as it requires killing apple trees, which are rare enough as it is . . . well, you can understand the concerns.”

“Why would Starkling need a gorge, though?” said Lottie. “He's king. Why can't he just use Piskie Dust to get where he wants to go?”

“That's the question, isn't it?” said Dorian.

Lottie frowned at him. “Yes, it is.”

Dorian said nothing.

“It is the question,” Lottie said, “and you know the answer. Only you won't tell me.”

“I know
an
answer,” Dorian replied. “Just a conjecture. A possibility. And I'm not going to share it with you, because I don't want you getting crazy ideas in your head when they might be completely groundless.”

“But I want to—”

“No.”

“But—”

“
No
.”

Dorian lengthened his strides until Lottie could no longer comfortably keep up with him. She had a terrible feeling that her attempt to make Dorian take her seriously had only worsened his opinion of her.

As they walked on, Lottie became aware that Oliver and Eliot were having a conversation about impressionist painters from the human world.

“Have you seen his sunflowers, though?” Eliot was saying. “I think you'd love them.”

“He's handsome, don't you think?” Adelaide whispered to Lottie.

“Who?” asked Lottie. “
Fife?
”

“What? No, you ninny. I mean Dorian. He cuts quite the rustic figure, doesn't he?”

Lottie stared at the back of Dorian's dark-haired head. She noted his tall stature, his exceptional posture, and the broadsword that hung in a bronze scabbard at his side. Dorian was, Lottie supposed, very athletic-looking. His face wasn't bad, either, though Lottie didn't very much like the nose piercings. Still, she wouldn't call him
handsome
.

Then again, Adelaide had once told Lottie she thought Eliot was handsome, which was even more ridiculous. Eliot was just
Eliot
.

“I guess he looks all right,” Lottie said. “But Dorian's a Northerly. I wouldn't think you'd like him.”

“He's not a
proper
Northerly,” said Adelaide. “He's on their side, but he's from good Southerly stock. You won't find a more thoroughly Southerly name than Ingle.”

“If you say so,” said Lottie.

She was no longer thinking of Dorian, but of his father, Mr. Ingle. She'd heard just recently from Mr. Wilfer that Mr. Ingle had moved from New Albion to a town called Gray Gully, after King Starkling had put a warrant out for his arrest. Not only had Mr. Ingle harbored fugitives, he was one of Mr. Wilfer's good friends, and his son had turned out to be a traitor to the Southerly Court. Gray Gully, Mr. Wilfer told Lottie, was in Northerly territory, and Mr. Ingle would be safe there. Lottie still worried. She hated to think that the kindly innkeeper was in trouble for something she'd had a hand in.

Lottie glanced back and found that Fife was trailing far behind them, arms crossed, indulging himself in a sulk.

“What's the matter with him?” Lottie asked Adelaide. “He told me he was glad to be leaving Wisp Territory.”

“How should I know?” Adelaide said, and then tacked on a long-suffering sigh. “But since you bring it up, I think he's a tad jealous.”

This wasn't the answer Lottie had expected. “Jealous? Of what?”

Adelaide raised her brows at Lottie, as though to say,
Don't you already know
? Then she pointed at Eliot.

“
What?
” The idea was so silly that Lottie laughed. “That's impossible.”

“What's impossible about it? Just because you're friends with two people doesn't mean they'll be friends with each
other. And haven't you noticed,” Adelaide added, lowering her voice, “Oliver's been spending much more time with Eliot than Fife these days?”

“That's just because Fife's been busy apprenticing for your father.”

“Or it's because Ollie's got much more in common with Eliot than with Fife. Think about it. All they ever talk about is poets and paintings. That's never been Fife's interest. He only talked about subjects like that because it made Oliver happy.”

The more Lottie thought this over, the more she realized Adelaide was right. Maybe, she allowed, not all her friends would be the best of friends. But they couldn't be
enemies
. Fife couldn't possibly be jealous of Eliot.

She cast a worried glance at Fife, who caught it and slackened his sulking face. He tipped the smallest of smiles at Lottie.

Fife couldn't be
that
jealous.

Surely not.

“Here!” called Dorian. “We'll stop here to eat.”

They settled around a fallen oak tree. Oliver and Eliot unpacked the canvas bags they'd been carrying for the group, each filled with nuts, fruits, and wafercomb. They used the oak trunk as their table. Fife spoke to no one, only munched away on handful after handful of hazelnuts.

“If we keep up our pace,” said Dorian, “the river will have wound back to our path by nightfall. We'll board a boat
at Dewhurst Dock. I've already sent my genga ahead to make arrangements.”

“But we're still in Southerly territory,” Lottie said. “Do you think Starkling could have spies posted at the dock?”

“Starkling has spies everywhere,” said Dorian. “But docks are different from towns and courts. There are laws and loyalties there that no royal can control. Sailors are governed by the rules of the water, and their only loyalty lies with their crew.”

Oliver's eyes turned deep blue as he quoted, “Save I take my part of danger on the roaring sea, a devil rises in my heart, far worse than any death to me.”

“Well, okay,” said Eliot. “But if that's the case, how can you trust any of those sailors?”

“You're asking the wrong question,” said Dorian, breaking a piece of wafercomb. “You
can't
trust anyone, not on the road north. You can only ask whose betrayal will cost you the least.”

“I don't like the sound of that,” said Adelaide. “Traveling is foul business.”

“So is skinning a hare,” said Dorian, “but the end result is mighty fine.”

“No, it isn't,” said Adelaide. “It's disgusting. I don't know how your kind can stand it.”

“Forgive me, Mistress Wilfer. I forgot that my carnivorous nature is so offensive to your delicate Southerly sensibilities.”

“It's not that hard to remember,” said Adelaide, “unless you're dense.”

Lottie smiled into her flask of water. She found it funny that, however handsome Adelaide might have found Dorian Ingle, she didn't hold back her usual criticisms.

“Are Northerlies really all that different from Southerlies?” asked Eliot. “They aren't from what I can tell, aside from the meat-eating thing. And, you know, the tattoos.”

“We're completely different,” said Adelaide, with vehemence.

“He's just curious,” said Lottie, defensive. She remembered a not-too-distant time when she hadn't even known what “Northerly” and “Southerly” meant.

“They have different values, the Southerlies and Northerlies,” said Oliver. “It's not so much a thing you can put into words.”

“Sure it is,” said Fife, speaking for the first time since he'd fallen into his sulk. “Southerlies are rich and like the opera. Northerlies are poor and like rolling around in the dirt.”

Dorian squinted.

“I'd agree with that assessment, actually,” said Adelaide.

“D'you hear that, Eliot?” asked Oliver, eyes a merry blue. “You've witnessed a great phenomenon just now: Fife and Adelaide have agreed on something.”

Eliot laughed, and as he did so, Fife's face clouded over. The start of what seemed like a good mood had caved back
into a pout. Lottie's stomach sank. Maybe Adelaide had been right about the jealousy thing.