For her part, Candy found the rhythm of the travel quite relaxing after a while and was so lulled that she let her eyes close. Sleep quickly overtook her strangely fatigued body. When she opened her eyes, an hour and twenty minutes later, according to her watch, the sky was darkening overhead.

She was by habit a great sky watcher, and she knew the names of many of the stars and constellations. But though a sprinkling of stars had appeared as the darkness deepened, she found she could recognize none of the configurations ranged above her. At first she assumed she was simply looking at the sky from a different angle, and so was failing to recognize what was in fact a perfectly obvious constellation. But as she continued to study the heavens as they darkened to night (an unnatural night, by Minnesotan standards: it was barely two in the afternoon), she realized that she was not mistaken. There were no recognizable arrangements of stars up there.

This was not the same heaven that hung over Minnesota.

For some reason she found this much more disquieting than the fact of the Sea of Izabella appearing from nowhere, or the prospect of some hitherto unvisited archipelago of islands awaiting her somewhere ahead.

She had assumed (naively, perhaps) that at least the stars would be constant. After all, hadn't the same stars she knew by name hung over all the other fantastic worlds that had existed on earth? Over Atlantis, over El Dorado, over Avalon? How could something so eternal, so immutable, be so altered ?

It distressed her, and yes, it made her a little afraid of what lay ahead. Apparently the Abarat wasn't just another part of the planet she knew, simply hidden from the sight of ordinary eyes. It was a different world entirely. Perhaps it had different religions, different ideas about good and evil, about what was real and what wasn't.

But it was too late to turn her back on all of this. After all, something here had called her, hadn't it? Wasn't that why she'd been drawing on her workbook the same design she'd found on the ball in the lighthouse: because for some urgent reason the ball had been sending out a portion of its power (a power to summon seas), and her mind had been ready to receive it? She'd done so without any conscious thought: drawn, and redrawn the design in a dreamy state. She'd even walked away from the principal's office without giving what she was doing any deep thought, simply going where her feet and her instincts had led her.

Though this all had looked accidental at the time, perhaps none of it was. Perhaps, as Tropella had said, Candy had business in the Abarat . Was it possible?

She was just a schoolgirl from Chickentown. What business could she have in a world she hadn't even seen?

But then was the idea any less likely than the fact that the sky over her head was now filled with stars from the heavens of another universe? Even the darkness between those stars—the darkness of space itself—was not like space as she saw it from her bedroom window. There were subtle colors pulsing through it: shades of deepest purple and rich royal blue, moving like tides across the sky, ready to be swum or sailed.

In the time that she'd been turning all these wild ideas over, the Sea of Izabella had quieted down considerably. The waters were virtually flat now, and the step of the Sea-Skippers more hushed because it was easier going. It was even possible for Candy and the Johns to chat normally, as their bearers skipped side by side.

"We're moving through the Ring of Darkness right now," John Drowze explained. "That light you see ahead of us"—Candy had not seen any light before, but now that it was pointed out, she saw a distinct paling of the sky close to the horizon—"the light at Efreet—"

"—one of the Unfettered Islands," Sallow broke in to add.

"What does that mean?"

"It means they govern themselves," said John Slop. "They don't pay taxes to the Abaratian government, nor are they part of the Commexo Company."

"Oh, don't get political on us, Slop," John Drowze complained.

"I just wanted her to understand the complexities of—"

"Nobody understands the complexities of the islands anymore," John Mischief said despairingly. "It used to be so simple. You had the Islands of Night and the Islands of Day—"

"And almost constant war," John Serpent interjected.

"At least everybody knew where they stood. You had your allegiances and you lived and died by them. But now?" He made a noise of profound disgust. "Now who knows?"

"Oh, do stop," said John Drowze wearily.

If there was more to be said on the subject (and undoubtedly there was) nobody got to say it, because at that moment Pux whispered—

"Quiet, everyone."

"What's the problem?" said Serpent.

"Lookup."

Everybody turned their gazes skyward. There were dark forms, like those of huge birds with the bodies of men, circling around, blotting out the stars.

"Vlitters," said Deaux-Deaux.

"They won't touch us," Sallow opined.

"Maybe not," said Pux. "But if they see us, they can report us to Inflixia Grueskin. We're in her waters."

Candy didn't ask for the details on Inflixia Grueskin; the name was descriptive enough.

"Are you going under the Gilholly Bridge?" Mischief whispered.

"It's the quickest way," said Tropella. "And we're all getting tired. Trust us. We know what we're doing."

Mischief duly fell silent. By degrees the travelers approached the bridge in question, which spanned perhaps half a mile's width of glacial water between two islands. On one side the light was still embryonic, barely delineating the shapes of the cliffs and the immense buildings that were perched on top of them. On the other side, the light was noticeably brighter. Candy could see a temple of some kind, or perhaps the ruins of a temple, and beside it a row of pillars.

One of the creatures Pux had referred to as Vlitters swooped down and skimmed the shining water, its lower jaw cutting through the reflection of the starlit heavens. Candy caught only a glimpse as it dived, skimmed and rose again. It was an odd-looking beast: a cross between a bat and a human being. Though it had failed to see the Sea-Skippers and their passengers, the Vlitter did see something edible. It scooped up a fish the size of a baby, which let out a furious doglike yelping as it was taken, and continued to yelp until the Vlitter consumed it, mercifully somewhere too high up to be seen.

They moved on, with the yelping of the doomed dog-fish still echoing off the walls of the temple and the cliffs, away from the calm waters beneath the bridge. The sea became steadily rougher as they cleared the protection of the islands, and Candy was glad for all their sakes that the journey's end was close at hand. What would she have done, she wondered, if she hadn't the good fortune to meet the card players at their game? She would surely have drowned, despite all that Mischief had told her about relying on the kind arms of Mama Izabella.

They moved off to the left now, and what Candy saw ahead was yet another puzzlement. The sky, which had seemed to be growing lighter, was darkening once again. There was an immense bank of blue-gray mist filling the panorama ahead of them, and there were more stars showing through the mist. No doubt of it, the glimpse of day she'd seen had been only that: a glimpse. Now night was approaching again.

The sight of this murky vista was clearly a welcome one for the Sea-Skippers.

Pux was so happy he broke out into song as he skipped. The ditty was sung to the familiar tune of "O Christmas Tree," but the words were unexpected.

"You like my song?" Pux said, when he was done.

"It wasn't quite what I was expecting," Candy said. "But yes. It was certainly… um… unusual."

"I'll teach it to you!" Pux said. "Then you'll have something to sing as you go around the Yebba Dim Day and people will think, Oh she's one of us ."

"Is this a very well-known song?"

"Believe it or not," said John Serpent, his expression one of profound distaste, as usual, "yes."

"Then I should learn it," Candy said, secretly glad to be causing the condescending John Serpent a little discomfort. "So," said Mischief. "From the top. Altogether now."

Everybody joined in with the song this time (except Serpent and Moot), and Candy quickly picked it up. By the time they came to the fourth rendition, Pux said:

"This time a solo, from Miss Quackenbush."

"Oh no…"

"Oh yes," said Deaux-Deaux. "We've carried you all this way. The least you can do is sing us a song."

It was a reasonable request. So Candy sang out her first Abaratian song as the mist ahead began to thin, and they skipped their way into the Straits of Dusk.

"Nice. Very nice," said Pux when she was done. "Now I'll teach you another."

"No, I think one's enough, for now. Maybe another time."

"I don't imagine there will be another time," said Tropella. "We very rarely come into the shipping routes. It's not safe. If we go to sleep on the waves, we risk getting mown down by a ferry. That's why we head back out to the Ring of Darkness. It's safer there."

"Don't be so sure you won't meet this lady again," Mischief said to the company. "I believe she's in your lives forever now. And we're in hers. There are some people, you know, who are too important to ever be forgotten. I think she's one of them."

Candy smiled; it was a sweet speech, even if she didn't quite believe it.

Nobody seemed to know what to say when Mischief had finished, so there was just a thoughtful silence for a minute or two as the mists ahead of them continued to part.

"Ah…" said John Sallow. "I do believe I see the Yebba Dim Day."

The last scraps of mist parted now, and their destination came into view. It was not an island in any sense that Candy understood the word. It seemed to be a huge stone-and-metal head, with towers built on top of its cranium, all filled with pinprick windows, from which beams of light emerged to pierce the mist.