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Chapter Nineteen
Captivity
The bears took Lyra up a gully in the cliffs, where the fog lay even hasts and the crash of the waves grew fainter as they cli of seabirds They clah Lyra peered wide-eyed into the enfolding grayness, and strained her ears for the sound of her friends, she ht have been dead
The bear sergeant said nothing to her until they were on level ground There they stopped Froed them to have reached the top of the cliffs, and she dared not run away in case she fell over the edge
"Look up," said the bear, as a waft of breeze
There was little daylight in any case, but Lyra did look, and found herself standing in front of a vast building of stone It was as tall at least as the highest part of Jordan College, but much more massive, and carved all over with representations of warfare, showing bears victorious and Skraelings surrendering, showing Tartars chained and slaving in the firefroifts and tributes to the king of the bears, lofur Raknison
At least, that hat the bear sergeant told her the carvings showed She had to take his word for it, because every projection and ledge on the deeply sculpted facade was occu-pied by gannets and skuas, which cawed and shrieked and wheeled constantly around overhead, and whose droppings had coated every part of the building with thick smears of dirty white
The bears seemed not to see the e arch, over the icy ground that was filthy with the spatter of the birds There was a courtyard, and high steps, and gateways, and at every point bears in ariven a password Their ar, and they all wore plu every bear she saith lorek Byrnison, and always to his advantage; he was raceful, and his armor was real arant, enameled, and decorative like most of what she saw around her now
As they went further in, the te else The smell in lofur’s palace was repulsive: rancid seal fat, dung, blood, refuse of every sort Lyra pushed back her hood to be cooler, but she couldn’t help wrinkling her nose She hoped bears couldn’t read human expressions There were iron brackets every few yards, holding blubber la shadows it wasn’t always easy to see where she was treading, either
Finally they stopped outside a heavy door of iron A guard bear pulled back ahis paw at Lyra, knocking her head over heels through the doorway Before she could scra bolted behind her
It was profoundly dark, but Pantalailow around them They were in a narrow cell where the walls dripped with damp, and there was one stone bench for furniture In the farthest corner there was a heap of rags she took for bedding, and that was all she could see
Lyra sat doith Pantalaimon on her shoulder, and felt in her clothes for the alethio about, Pan," she whispered "I hope it still works"
Pantalai while Lyra composed her mind With a part of her, she found it reer and yet sink into the calm she needed to read the alethiometer; and yet it was so much a part of her now that the most complicated questions sorted themselves out into their constituent symbols as naturally as her muscles moved her limbs: she hardly had to think about theht the question: "Where is lorek?"
The answer came at once: "A day’s journey away, carried there by the balloon after your crash; but hurrying this way"
"And Roger?"
"With lorek"
"What will lorek do?"
"He intends to break into the palace and rescue you, in the face of all the difficulties"
She put the alethiometer away, even more anxious than before
"They won’t let him, will they?" she said to Pantalaimon "There’s too o off and find hies and all, and we could ht of her life
A man’s voice spoke in the darkness a few feet away, and said, "Who are you?"
She leaped up with a cry of alar, and flew around her head as she backed against the wall
"Eh? Eh?" said the ain "Who is that? Speak up! Speak up!"
"Be a firefly again, Pan," she said shakily "But don’t go too close"
The little wavering point of light danced through the air and fluttered around the head of the speaker And it hadn’t been a heap of rags after all; it was a gray-bearded littered in Pantalai over his shoulders His dae out her tongue occasionally as Pantalaimon flew near
"What’s your name?" she said
"Jothaius Professor of Cosy at the University of Gloucester Who are you?"
"Lyra Belacqua What have they locked you up for?"
"Malice and jealousyWhere do you coe," she said
"What? Oxford?"
"Yes"
"Is that scoundrel Trelawney still there? Eh?"
"The Palmerian Professor? Yes," she said
"Is he, by God! Eh? They should have forced his resignation long ago Duplicitous plagiarist! Coxcomb!"
Lyra made a neutral sound
"Has he published his paper on ga his face up toward Lyra’s
She moved back
"I don’t know," she said, and then,it up out of pure habit, "no," she went on "I reures AndHe said he was going to write about Dust as well That’s it"
"Scoundrel! Thief! Blackguard! Rogue!" shouted the old man, and he shook so violently that Lyra was afraid he’d have a fit His daeically off his lap as the Professor beat his fists against his shanks Drops of saliva flew out of his ht he was a thief And a rogue and all that"
If it was unlikely for a scruffy little girl to turn up in his cell knowing the very ius Professor didn’t notice He was ht have some scraps of information that Lyra could use
She sat carefully near hih for Pantalaiht to show hi Professor Trelawney used to boast about," she said, "was hoell he knew the king of the bears - "
"Boast! Eh? Eh? I should say he boasts! He’s nothing but a popinjay! And a pirate! Not a scrap of original research to his na filched froht," said Lyra earnestly "And when he does do so"
"Yes! Yes! Absolutely! No talent, no iination, a fraud from top to bottom!"
"I mean, for example," said Lyra, "I bet you know more about the bears than he does, for a start"
"Bears," said the old man, "ha! I could write a treatise on them! That’s why they shut me away, you know"
"Why’s that?"
"I know too much about them, and they daren’t kill me They daren’t do it, much as they’d like to I know, you see I have friends Yes! Powerful friends"
"Yeah," said Lyra "And I bet you’d be a wonderful teacher," she went on "Being as you got so e and experience"
Even in the depths of his madness a little common sense still flickered, and he looked at her sharply, almost as if he suspected her of sarcas with suspicious and cranky Scholars all her life, and she gazed back with such bland admiration that he was soothed
"Teacher," he said, "teacherYes, I could teach Give ht a fire in his ht not to just vanish," Lyra said encouragingly "It ought to be passed on so people re seriously "That’s very perceptive of you, child What is your naain "Could you teach me about the bears?"
"The bears" he said doubtfully
"I’d really like to know about cosh for that You need really clever students for that But I could learn about the bears You could teach ht And we could sort of practice on that and work up to Dust, ain
"Yes," he said, "yes, I believe you’re right There is a correspondence between the microcosm and the macrocos out there is alive, and there are grand purposes abroad! The universe is full of intentions, you know Everything happens for a purpose Your purpose is to reotten Good! Excellent, ? lofur Raknison?"
"Yes Oh, yes I came here at his invitation, you know He intended to set up a university He was going to make me Vice-Chancellor That would be one in the eye for the Royal Arctic Institute, eh! Eh? And that scoundrel Trelawney! Ha!"
"What happened?"
"I was betrayed by lesserthem, of course He was here, you know On Svalbard Spread lies and calumny about my qualifications Calumny! Slander! Who was it discovered the final proof of the Barnard-Stokes hypothesis, eh? Eh? Yes, Santelia, that’s who Trelawney couldn’t take it Lied through his teeth lofur Raknison had me thrown in here I’ll be out one day, you’ll see I’ll be Vice-Chancellor, oh yes Let Trelawney co for mercy! Let the Publications Committee of the Royal Arctic Institute spurn my contributions then! Ha! I’ll expose them all! "
"I expect lorek Byrnison will believe you, when he coood waiting for that He’ll never come back"
"He’s on his way now"
"Then they’ll kill him He’s not a bear, you see He’s an outcast Like es of a bear"
"Supposing lorek Byrnison did coed lofur Raknison to a fight"
"Oh, they wouldn’t allow it," said the Professor decisively, "lofur would never lower hiht hiht as well be a seal now, or a walrus, not a bear Or worse: Tartar or Skraeling They wouldn’t fight him honorably like a bear; they’d kill hiot near Not a hope No mercy"
"Oh," said Lyra, with a heavy despair in her breast "And what about the bears’ other prisoners? Do you knohere they keep them?"
"Other prisoners?"
"Like-Lord Asriel"
Suddenly the Professor’s ainst the wall, and shook his head warningly
"Shh! Quiet! They’ll hear you!" he whispered
"Why mustn’t we erous! lofur Raknison will not allow hi closer and whispering herself so as not to alar Lord Asriel prisoner is a special charge laid on lofur by the Oblation Board," the old man whispered back "Mrs Coulter herself came here to see lofur and offered him all kinds of rewards to keep Lord Asriel out of the way I know about it, you see, because at the time I was in lofur’s favorconversation with her lofur was besotted with her Couldn’t stop talking about her Would do anything for her If she wants Lord Asriel kept a hundredfor Mrs Coulter, anything He’s going to name his capital city after her, did you know that?"
"So he wouldn’t let anyone go and see Lord Asriel?"
"No! Never! But he’s afraid of Lord Asriel too, you know, lofur’s playing a difficult game But he’s clever He’s done what they both want He’s kept Lord Asriel isolated, to please Mrs Coulter; and he’s let Lord Asriel have all the equipment he wants, to please hi both sides Eh? The wave function of this situation is going to collapse quite soon I have it on good authority"
"Really?" said Lyra, herabout what he’d just said
"Yes My daeue can taste probability, you know"
"Yeah Mine too When do they feed us, Professor?"
"Feed us?"