Lyra Belacqua:
Our greetings to you, Great King, or rather my greetings and not his.
Ragnar Sturlusson:
Not whose?
Lyra Belacqua:
Iorek Byrnison's, your majesty.
Ragnar Sturlusson:
[growls]
What have you to do with Iorek Byrnison?
Lyra Belacqua:
I'm Iorek Byrnison's daemon.
Ragnar Sturlusson:
How has the exiled, the unworthy Iorek Byrnison obtained a daemon?
Lyra Belacqua:
Iorek Byrnison was the first bear to receive a daemon, but it should have been you. They gave me to him at Bolvangar. Mrs. Coulter did.
Ragnar Sturlusson:
How can you be so far from him?
Lyra Belacqua:
I'm like a witch's daemon, Great King. I can go as far from him as I please.
Ragnar Sturlusson:
[growls]
Well, if you are his daemon, then I will kill you right now and be free of an enemy!
Lyra Belacqua:
If you do that, I can never be your demon.
Ragnar Sturlusson:
My demon?
Lyra Belacqua:
That's why I come here, see. Cause' I want to be your daemon, not his. He's just an exile, nothing. But you? You're powerful, and clever, and rich, and better in every way. He's on his way here now to fight you.
Ragnar Sturlusson:
What? He's mad. We shall destroy him!
Lyra Belacqua:
No. If you defeat him, I will become your daemon. But you must defeat him in single combat. And all his strength will flow into yours. And my mind will flow into your mind. You and me together. Have him killed any other way, I'll just go out like a light and you'll never have a daemon.
Ragnar Sturlusson:
Prove it. Prove to me that you are a daemon.
Lyra Belacqua:
Ask me something only you know.
Ragnar Sturlusson:
How did I become king?
[Then, Lyra takes out the golden compass after she sits down]
Ragnar Sturlusson:
What is that?
Lyra Belacqua:
It's a daemon mirror, Great King. We daemons use it to see the truth in our own eyes.
