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The intention craft was being piloted by Mrs Coulter She and her daemon were alone in the cockpit

The barometric altie her altitude roughly by watching the fires on the ground that blazed where angels fell; despite the hurtling rain, they were still flaring high As for the course, that wasn’t difficult, either: the lightning that flickered around the Mountain served as a brilliant beacon But she had to avoid the various flying beings ere still fighting in the air, and keep clear of the rising land below

She didn’t use the lights, because she wanted to get close and find somewhere to land before they saw her and shot her down As she flew closer, the updrafts becayropter would have had no chance: the savage air would have slaround like a fly In the intention craft she couldher balance like a wave rider in the Peaceable Ocean

Cautiously she began to cli by sight and by instinct Her daelass cabin to the other, looking ahead, above, to the left and right, and calling to her constantly The lightning, great sheets and lances of brilliance, flared and cracked above and around the aining height little by little, and alwayspalace

And as Mrs Coulter approached, she found her attention dazzled and bewildered by the nature of the Mountain itself

It reminded her of a certain abo in the dungeons of the Consistorial Court He had suggested that there were more spatial dimensions than the three familiar ones - that on a very sht other dimensions, but that they were impossible to examine directly He had even constructed a ht work, and Mrs Coulter had seen the object before it was exorcised and burned Folds within folds, corners and edges both containing and being contained: its inside was everywhere and its outside was everywhere else The Clouded Mountain affected her in a similar way: it was less like a rock than like a force field,space itself to enfold and stretch and layer it into galleries and terraces, chaht and vapor

She felt a strange exultation welling slowly in her breast, and she saw at the sa the aircraft safely up to the clouded terrace on the southern flank The little craft lurched and strained in the turbid air, but she held the course firuided her down to land on the terrace

The light she’d seen by till now had coashes in the cloud where the sun struck through, the fires frohts; but the light here was different It calowed and faded in a slow breathlike rhythm, with a ot down froo

She had the feeling that other beings were h the substance of the Mountain itself with es, orders, information She couldn’t see the, infolded perspectives of colonnade, staircase, terrace, and facade

Before she could o, she heard voices and withdrew behind a colu closer, and then she saw a procession of angels carrying a litter

As they neared the place where she was hiding, they saw the intention craft and stopped The singing faltered, and some of the bearers looked around in doubt and fear

Mrs Coulter was close enough to see the being in the litter: an angel, she thought, and indescribably aged He wasn’t easy to see, because the litter was enclosed all around with crystal that glittered and threw back the enveloping light of the Mountain, but she had the i decrepitude, of a face sunken in wrinkles, of tre estured shakily at the intention craft, and cackled andincessantly at his beard, and then threw back his head and uttered a howl of such anguish that Mrs Coulter had to cover her ears

But evidently the bearers had a task to do, for they gathered the the cries and mumbles from inside the litter When they reached an open space, they spread their wings wide, and at a word fro the litter between theht in the swirling vapors

But there wasn’t tioldenbridges, always her they went, the more they felt that sense of invisible activity all around them, until finally they turned a corner into a wide space like a el with a spear

"Who are you? What is your business?" he said

Mrs Coulter looked at his who had fallen in love with huo

"No, no," she said gently, "please don’t waste ti for ht, keep theel did not knohat he should do, so he did as she told hi perspectives of light, until they came to an antechamber How they had entered, she didn’t know, but there they were, and after a brief pause, so in front of her opened like a door

Her dae into the flesh of her upper ar theht He was ht, but she was too dazzled to see The golden monkey hid his face in her shoulder, and she threw up an arm to hide her eyes

Metatron said, "Where is she? Where is your daughter?"

"I’ve coent," she said

"If she was in your power, you would have brought her"

"She is not, but her daemon is"

"How can that be?"

"I swear, Metatron, her daeent, hide yourself a little - my eyes are dazzled"

He drew a veil of cloud in front of hilass, and her eyes could see hih she still pretended to be dazzled by his face He was exactly like aWas he clothed? Did he have wings? She couldn’t tell because of the force of his eyes She could look at nothing else

"Please, Metatron, hear me I have just come from Lord Asriel He has the child’s daemon, and he knows that the child will soon come to search for him"

"What does he ith the child?"

"To keep her froe He doesn’t knohere I’ve gone, and Iyou the truth Look at ent, as I can’t easily look at you Look at me clearly, and tell els looked at her It was the one Every scrap of shelter and deceit was stripped away, and she stood naked, body and ghost and daeaze

And she knew that her nature would have to answer for her, and she was terrified that what he saw in her would be insufficient Lyra had lied to Iofur Raknison with her words; herwith her whole life

"Yes, I see," said Metatron

"What do you see?"