Goldenhand by Garth Nix Read Free Book Online Page B

Hrule. Though perhaps it was only a matter of digestion, and time. Like when a cave python got into the rabbit hutches back in the Clayr’s Glacier and ate so well it lay down in a torpor.
    The only serious wound she could find on Nick was the deep cut on his wrist, though his feet were also bloody and scabbed. She was about to rip off the sleeves of his tunic to make bandages when she thought to look in the pockets, and found a tin marked with a red cross that held several very tightly wound dressings of some very thin cloth, and two glass vials she didn’t know were surettes of morphine.
    With Nick’s wrist and feet swiftly bandaged, Lirael felt for his pulse. Nick had lost a lot of blood already, and his heartbeat felt weak and irregular when she pushed her fingers against the big artery under his chin, against the neck. She used her right, magical hand without thinking, and was surprised that she could somehow feel his cool skin and the beat of his heart through her metal fingers, even though they were Charter-spelled. Sam had made her hand even better than she had thought, though she did check again with her left hand, repeating the process. Just in case.
    The pulse confirmed what Lirael already sensed. Nick’s hold on life was anything but secure. It would be very easy for his spirit to slip away into Death. He had been brought back once by the Disreputable Dog, but that could not be done again, not to keep him as a living person. Indeed, Lirael didn’t know how the Dog had managed to do it the first time without making Nick some sort of Dead creature, rather than to be simply alive again.
    Bandaging his wounds was not enough. She needed to use ahealing spell, and quickly. Even as she thought this, she reached into the Charter, finding comfort as she let her mind move through the great flood of magical marks, focusing on the ones she needed, bringing them together by force of will, her fingers sketching the air to help her visualize each mark and how it would fit in the spell she was building.
    But the first spell she tried didn’t work. It was a fairly simple one, often used. All it took was six marks, none of them very difficult. She had drawn them from the Charter with the ease of long practice, linked them together to form the spell, and tipped the glowing network of marks into Nick’s chest.
    But the marks ran off into the earth on either side, like spilled water, and immediately dispersed.
    Lirael frowned, and thought for a moment. Then she cautiously touched the baptismal Charter mark on Nick’s forehead, half-expecting to find it had become corrupted in some way. But she felt a true connection to the Charter. He was still very much a part of the constant, ever-changing flow, deeply joined to the Charter that defined and described everything upon, under, and above the earth.
    It must be the Free Magic in him, Lirael guessed, resisting interference. The legacy of Orannis. The baptismal mark had built a shell of Charter Magic around the Free Magic that lurked within every part of Nick’s physical being, but it was this deeper magic that resisted, indeed repelled, any further intrusion by the Charter.
    So she would need to use a stronger spell.
    Which would take more time and effort, and thus give the Hrule longer to digest the powerful blood it had drunk. Lirael vacillated for a moment. She had just remembered how to deal with the Hrule, but it would require some minutes searching along the Wall, though she thought she had seen what was required near the gateway. But in those few minutes, Nicholas might die.
    â€œBest heal Nick first,” muttered Lirael. She kept one eye on theFree Magic creature as she once again reached for the Charter, this time delving deeper into the eternal flow. Seeking out rarer, more powerful marks, which required both certain knowledge of them and a great effort of will to draw them out. When she had them all arranged and held in her mind, she spoke