The Silver Door by Emily Rodda Page A

wonder! Wait till Four-Eyes sees him! Ho, we’ll feast tonight, me hearties!’
    The sled rattling behind him, he loped back the way he had come, quickly disappearing into the gathering shadows.
    â€˜May a sky serpent take the old loon!’ the haggard woman muttered.
    â€˜Take care what you wish for, Needle,’ Cap replied mildly. ‘Who else would dare enter the Saltings and bring out the bones that keep us all alive? You?’
    Needle scowled and turned away.
    â€˜Finish here while I deal with our guests,’ Cap called to the gaping, whispering crowd. ‘Floss, will you—?’
    â€˜Oh yes, I’ll bring your pickings along, Cap, forwhat they’re worth,’ grinned an old woman whose skin was so webbed with fine lines that it looked like well-used leather. ‘It’s painful enough watching you climb down the hole once a day, without watching you do it twice.’
    â€˜So kind,’ the man replied with a smile and a mocking bow.
    The exchange broke the tension. A few people laughed. Needle and her two henchmen scrambled up a large mound and crawled into the hole at the top one by one. Then Floss and the others disappeared into their own mounds, and soon only Rye, Sonia, Dirk and Cap remained above ground.
    In the silence that followed, the companions became aware of an ominous growling, panting sound in the distance. Rye’s skin prickled. He felt Sonia grip his arm more tightly.
    â€˜What is that?’ Dirk asked sharply.
    â€˜Nothing that concerns you,’ snapped Cap, whose smile had vanished the moment they were alone. ‘Come with me.’

12 - Four-Eyes
    C ap turned away from the mounds and began limping along the trail left by the runners of the sled. ‘Take care to tread where I tread,’ he called back over his shoulder. ‘The ground’s not safe.’
    Rye, Sonia and Dirk followed cautiously, hands linked. By now it was almost completely dark. The panting sound was growing louder by the moment, but Cap did not speak again. Only when they had reached the track and scrambled down onto its pebbled surface did he turn to face them.
    The marks of Bones’ sled continued across the track and disappeared into the darkness on the other side, but clearly Cap did not plan to take his guests any further. He had no intention of offering them shelter for the night.
    Rye found himself feeling quite shocked. Even before the skimmer attacks began, no citizen of Weldwould have dreamed of turning a traveller away at nightfall.
    You are not in Weld now, Rye
.
    Indeed, Rye thought grimly.
    â€˜This will lead you out of the Scour,’ Cap was saying rapidly to Dirk, pointing along the track. ‘Don’t stray from it or you’ll come to grief—the land on either side is studded with old jell pits. Only those who know what they’re doing can navigate it. Trust no one. There are spies everywhere.’
    He glanced at Rye and Sonia then looked quickly back at Dirk, frowning with distaste. ‘And for pity’s sake, make those two cover their hair,’ he added. ‘Nothing is more likely to betray you.’
    Rye found his fisherman’s cap and pulled it on. Sonia looked mutinous, then seemed to decide that the advice was good even if she resented the way it had been given. Silently she twisted her hair into a knot and snuffed out its brilliance with the ugly cloth helmet of the Keep orphan.
    â€˜The track runs past the Diggings,’ Cap was telling Dirk. ‘If you manage to pass them in safety, which I doubt, it will take you on to where you want to go.’
    â€˜And how do you know where we wish to go?’ Dirk asked coolly.
    Cap snorted. ‘Do you take me for a fool? Even if I hadn’t heard your copperhead friend shout her feelings to the skies, there’s only one reason for peoplelike you to have risked your lives trekking over the Saltings. You’ve come from across the sea to spy on the