Inkheart 3 - Inkdeath by Cornelia Funke

Author:Cornelia Funke
Language: eng
Format: mobi
ISBN: 9781908435002
Publisher: Chicken House
Published: 2011-09-22T04:00:00+00:00

38

A Greeting to the Piper

There was a smell of Time in the air tonight. […] What did Time smell like? Like dust and clocks and people. And if you wondered what Time sounded like, it sounded like water running in a dark cave and voices crying and dirt dropping down upon hollow box-lids, and rain.

Ray Bradbury,

The Martian Chronicles

Farid wasn’t with the party when the Bluejay rode to Ombra Castle. ‘You’re staying in the camp.’ Dustfinger didn’t have to say any more to make Farid worry about causing his death again, and the fear was like a hand clutching his throat. The Strong Man waited among the empty tents with him, because the Black Prince refused to believe that he could pass for a woman. They sat there for many hours, but when Meggie and the others at last came back Dustfinger wasn’t with them, any more than the Bluejay was.

‘Where is he?’ The Black Prince was the only person Farid dared to ask, although his face was so grave that even the bear didn’t venture near him.

‘Where the Bluejay is,’ replied the Prince, and when he saw Farid’s look of dismay he added, ‘No, not in the dungeon. I mean near him, that’s all. Death has bound those two together, and nothing but death is going to part them again.’

Near him.

Farid looked at the tent where Meggie slept. He thought he could hear her crying, but he dared not go to her. She hadn’t yet forgiven him for persuading her father to do that deal with Orpheus, and Doria was sitting outside her tent. He was to be found near Meggie a good deal too often for Farid’s liking, but luckily he appeared to understand as little about girls as his strong brother.

The men back from Ombra were sitting around the fire, heads bent. Some of them didn’t even take off the women’s clothes they had been wearing, but the Black Prince gave them no time to drown their fears for the future in wine. He sent them out hunting. They would need good stocks of provisions if they were to hide the children of Ombra from the Piper: dried meat, warm furs.

But that didn’t interest Farid. He no more belonged to the robbers than he had to Orpheus. He didn’t even belong to Meggie. He belonged with only one person, and he had to keep away from him, for fear of bringing him to his death.

Darkness was just falling, and the robbers were still smoking meat and stretching skins between the trees, when Gwin came scurrying out of the forest. Farid thought the marten was Jink until he saw the greying muzzle. Yes, it was Gwin all right. Since Dustfinger’s death he had looked at Farid like an enemy, but tonight he nibbled his calves the way he used to when he wanted to play, and chattered until Farid followed him.

The marten was quick, too quick even for Farid, who could outrun most people, but Gwin kept stopping to

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