by Joni Sensel
Ariel bandaged his gashes as best she could and knelt stroking Willow's head until Zeke tugged at her. She hated to leave the injured horse alone, but there was nothing else they could do, and she was anxious to check back on Scarl.
Zeke had retrieved the Finder's knife from the floor. Dain toed Elbert's blade, which still lay near the hole.
"Should I leave this?" she asked.
Ariel took it sourly. After the surprise with the lion, it seemed wiser to keep dangers in sight.
They returned to the house. Scarl's condition hadn't changed. Cassalie sat clutching one of his hands, and Ariel resisted the urge to take the other. She knew he'd hate so much fuss, and she clung to the idea that he'd open his eyes soon to complain.
Awaiting that moment, she fingered Elbert's knife and considered tossing it into the hearth. The sick flame that had bloomed from the bloodied sponge on their first day in the village convinced her to wait for a bonfire outside. Inhaling evil smoke might hurt Scarl more than she could help by reducing the knife to ashes. Instead, she knotted a spare bootlace around the hilt and tied it below her knee, flat against her calf, so she could tuck the tip of the blade into her boot. That way, she could keep a close watch on it, and it couldn't hurt anyone else.
When night fell, Cassalie made a faint offer of supper, but they all felt too worried to eat. After bathing Scarl's lump with bruise potion again, Ariel sat staring into the fire, listening to the wind's hiss and blow.
Something clattered against a window: Tap-rattle. Tap-tap. She leapt from her stool, imagining that the twisted lion had somehow come back.
"It's all right," Zeke murmured, guessing her thoughts. "Listen to it. That can't be anything big."
With the lamps lit and the night black beyond, no one could see what was out there. Whatever it was, the wind did not puff it away. Tap-tap-tap.
"I'd better check that's not driftwood." Cassalie rose. "If it broke the window, I'd have to shutter it. We've got no more glass."
"I'll go." Zeke moved fast. Ariel chased him to the door, but he slipped out before she could stop him. As she struggled with the wind on the threshold, he nudged her back through. A bedraggled crow hopped at his heels.
"Grim-golly!" Dain's eyes widened. Cassalie gasped and leaned protectively over Scarl.
"That thing!" Ariel exclaimed, recognizing the crow that had brought her so many bones. "Throw it back to the storm!"
"I tried. But then I noticed it's carrying something." Zeke turned to Dain. "What did you call it?"
Cassalie answered, her voice strained. "A grim-golly. They're said to visit death-beds to coax reluctant souls out of the world."
They all turned horrified expressions toward Scarl.
"You told me the grim-golly was just superstition, Cass!" Dain cried.
"It is. It is! I won't let it be anything else."
"We call it a crow," Ariel said quickly. "It's a pest. Nothing more. Open the door, Zeke." She bent to chase the bird out.
The crow fluttered out of her grasp, and she saw something pale gripped in one of its claws. It wasn't the right shape for a bone.
Not touching the door, Zeke said, "A Kincaller you know might have sent him."
"Oh!" That hadn't occurred to her. The bird didn't take her invitation to perch, but it flapped past her to drop its burden within reach.
It was paper that'd been folded, tied with thread, and dipped in candle wax to protect it. Ariel broke the wax seal and unfolded the page, her hands trembling with the uncertainty of what it might say. Symbols spread before her. Zeke looked over her shoulder.
Butterfly, it began.
"Butterfly?" Zeke raised his eyebrows at her.
Ariel blushed but ignored him and returned to the rest: Ash says you stopped. He thinks all is well, but my fingers twitch. Shall I follow? Give the crow an answer if you need help. Love, your Nace.
"His fingers twitch?" Zeke repeated. "Huh. Usually they're making a fist."
Ariel let the snipe pass. She knew what Nace meant. Savoring the love mark at the end, she examined the note. "He must've made more paper. This is smoother than ours--better for marking."
It had merely been an observation, but Zeke turned away, looking wounded. Ariel sighed and tucked the note in her pocket, though she wanted to press it to her heart. All was not well, not anymore, but Nace couldn't help Scarl. She would wait to return an answer until she knew what to say--until she could tell him that Scarl was all right. Still, Nace's concern glowed like a beacon of comfort from beyond this terrible day. Grateful, she fed the crow a scrap of dried meat from her pack. It gobbled the tidbit and looked for more.
"You know quite the Kincaller," Cassalie said. "To persuade the bird to do his bidding like that, through a storm. I don't want to be cruel, but I don't think I can bear seeing your messenger here--not with Scarl ill. You needn't turn it out, not in weather like this, but would it stay in the entry?"
"Let me try." With more meat, Ariel lured the crow near the door. It seemed content to perch on the latch like a sentry.
"I'll clean up its droppings," she told Cass on returning.
"That's the least of my worries," Cass replied. "We'll need chamber pots ourselves. In this whale-drowning storm, we're not likely to make it out to the privy tonight."
She was right. Ariel and Zeke tried to check on the horse before bedtime. The wind had risen so they couldn't get out the doorway and needed help from Dain merely to shut it again. Her piping had worked too well.
"I guess Willow will either be alive in the morning or not," Zeke said. They returned to the hearth.
They stayed near Scarl all night, sometimes dozing despite the raging of the wind, rain, and sea. The heat of the fire became a haze of exhaustion. Ariel started awake twice to what she thought was Scarl's voice, only to choke on disappointment when she saw him unchanged. She imagined Elbert's laugh in the wind. Memories kept bubbling up to remind her what her Healtouch mother had done for knocks on the head, but Ariel had seen none of those healing plants here, and she couldn't get out to collect them anyhow. Cassalie pleaded with Scarl, teased and chided him, and once barked an angry command to wake up. Nothing had any effect.
As dawn turned the windows to grey, the storm was still strong. Only Scarl had weakened. The spoonfuls of tonic Cassalie dribbled between his lips leaked back out.
"We've got to do something!" Ariel whispered to keep tears of frustration from cracking her voice.
"Should I try to bring Tilda?" Dain asked. "She's the oldest one left, isn't she, Cass? Maybe she's seen a head-banging like his before?"
"I doubt she can help, and she's too frail to make it here through the blow, even with three of you propping her up. We just have to watch and hope now." Cassalie bit her lip. "I'm sure those brown eyes will soon open."
By mid-day, though, Cassalie looked nearly as haggard as Scarl, despite the warm soup Dain had made them all swallow. Ariel sat clasping the Finder's limp hand, but she hated how boneless and empty it felt.
"It's been a whole night and day," murmured Zeke at her shoulder. "How can he still be asleep?"
"I don't think it's sleep." Cassalie stroked Scarl's wan cheek. "I think he's standing at the bridge and trying to decide whether to cross it."
Ariel moaned. "Don't say that." She couldn't bear the thought of a future without him.
"All my begging has not swayed him. Perhaps--" Cass's voice broke. "Perhaps he sees his first love on the far side."
Ariel squeezed her eyes shut against what Cass suggested. When she opened them again, they found Dain.
Sympathy shone in Dain's face, but she returned Ariel's gaze. It stretched between them, unspoken. A bridge.
"I think," Dain said slowly, "I'll go take a nap. Not much sleep for me last night." As straight as a fence post, she walked into the room where she slept.
Mumbling agreement, Ariel followed.
As soon as the doorway drape fell to hide them, Ariel whispered, "All right, Dain. You've got a trade." If Sca
rl stood poised at either end of the bridge, Ariel was ready to cross it.
Whether Elbert awaited her on the far side or not.
Chapter 22
"I'm probably the one the crow really came for," Ariel told Dain. "Not just to deliver Nace's message, I mean." The lion had failed, but it had been stalking her. And the bird's eyes had fixed on her each time she'd checked it. "It might have arrived to coax me out of the world. To guide you. And save Scarl." The crow had dogged her for weeks, but perhaps it was prescient. This wouldn't be the first time Ariel's path had called to her before she'd been willing to set her boots on it--or indeed, before she'd even understand how.
She refused to acknowledge the nagging suspicion that despite Nace's taming, it might have been Elbert who'd first sent the crow.
Dain nodded. "I got twice as much reason to go now. We can find Scarl and point him back here."
"But how can we sneak out, with the storm?"
Dain nudged aside their bedding. A large flagstone beneath looked suspiciously loose.
Ariel snorted, no longer surprised by a tunnel. "We'll need a hefty head start or Zeke might catch up. The stones will give us away to him."
Dain smiled grimly. "That shows you don't know the wind. The way isn't all underground. I can't stop the storm once it's started, but I can ask the wind to keep Zeke behind." She pried at the loose stone in the floor.
"Wait. I don't have my pack." Ariel had left it in the entry, where she'd been feeding the crow from her supply of dried meat.
"Don't need it. I told you, it's not very far."
"We've got to take water, though. Maybe some food."
"Here. You got pockets? Smugglers always stay ready." Dain dug through the chest where her spare clothes were stored and thrust cakes of dried fish and seaweed at her. Against her better judgment, Ariel took them, along with a sea mammal bladder that sloshed. The water bag had a strap, so she hung it over her head and one shoulder so it couldn't slip off.
Dain tugged a length of sailcloth from their bedding and slung it around her own neck. "We might need this. We can share it like a blanket, too, if we rest. It's lighter than furs but it'll still keep us warm."
"Let me leave Zeke a note to find later." She didn't want him to worry. If she shared her plans with him now, he'd never let them leave alone, and she hated to place him in danger. Besides, Cass might need help tending Scarl.
She could have reused Nace's paper, still in her pocket, but she found herself unable to part with it. Instead, she tore a strip from one tail of her shirt. Feeling rushed, she scanned Dain's corner for something that might serve as ink. A little spit moistened the patches of rust on Elbert's knife. She transferred the brown juice to its tip to draw with.
The symbols proved more of a struggle. She kept the message short: Zeke--I'm giving Dain her trade. Back in one or two days. With luck, Scarl will wake up first. Please don't follow. The storm will stop you.
She hesitated. How should she end it? Since he'd seen Nace's note, her name mark alone felt too curt, and the love mark she would've left for Scarl might pinch Zeke.
Soon, Ariel.
She left the note on their bedding. Dain had lifted the loose flagstone, revealing the tunnel beneath.
"Is there a room here without an escape?" Ariel whispered.
"Not many. This isn't the shortest route, but it'll do."
Dain squirmed, feet first, into the narrow hole. When she vanished, Ariel sat down to follow. She lowered herself and hung by her elbows, feeling no floor or stairs beneath her, only a dark, depthless unknown. Then a light bloomed below, and Dain patted her hip, urging her down.
She dropped. Dain steadied her as she landed and handed her a glowing lamp.
They stood in a narrow tunnel stretching away in both directions. Using hollows hacked out of both walls for a ladder, Dain climbed up to tug the flagstone into place.
"Won't Cassalie guess how we've gone?" Ariel whispered.
"Aye, she'll know." Dain took back the lamp. "That don't mean Zeke can follow. Not far, anyhow. Come." She started down the tunnel. "You can take over once--"
"Wait." Ariel pointed to the kelp-bulb lamps at the base of the wall. "Should we take another for later? Maybe a few? And some firesticks, too. It might be dark all the time on the other side of the bridge. Plus we'll need one for when we come back, right?"
Dain returned to stuff two lamps and a few firesticks into her pockets. "I suppose that'd be a smart idea, Farwalker girl."
Watching her, Ariel realized Dain still had room in her pockets because she'd taken no food at all. She grabbed Dain's arm. "You are coming back, aren't you? I guess you're hoping to see your family, but--"
"No!" Dain jerked free. "My brother, that's all. I hated my pa, and Ma let him thrash us. But Dain--I loved Dain. I aim to tell him I'm sorry." She hurried into the darkness, the flame on her lamp throwing threatening shadows.
Ariel had little choice but to follow. "What makes you think we can find him? Or talk to him there?"
"I've gotta try. Scarl first--he should be easy. And since he's a Finder, maybe he can point us the right way. After that, if we haven't found Dain in two days--"
"We don't even know if they've got days! It might be night there forever."
In the lamplight, Dain's face cramped. "Well, we'll try for a while. You get tired of searching, you come back. With me or without."
Her concession did nothing to soothe Ariel. "You can't trade places with him, Neela, if that's what you're thinking."
"How do you know? And don't call me that."
"Scarl's told me a story about it. The bridge has been blocked so the dead can't get back to this side." The confidence Ariel showed was false, since she'd known a ghost, but she persisted with storycraft of her own. "And you'd better get used to your real name, because you can't take a lie over the bridge. Just like riches or loved ones, those stay on this side. The lamps and our clothes might not even go with us."
Neela increased her pace. "I'd rather be naked than Neela."
Deciding to take it one step at a time, Ariel focused on finding Scarl alive on this side. With luck, he'd make Neela turn around and they'd never have to pass the near end of the bridge.
The tunnel began twisting and branching off on both sides. Neela led her across narrow ledges, through cracks so tight they had to turn sideways, and up steps into storm light, where the wind bullied them before they ducked back underground. They descended a long wooden ladder whose rungs crackled with age. Several snapped under their weight. Scarl would have cuffed Ariel for taking such risks, but her feet were always game to continue. That reassured her the bridge could be reached. She hoped her Farwalker instincts knew the difference between dead and alive.
"You'd better be right about the wind stopping Zeke," she told Neela at the base of the ladder. "He weighs more than we do. If he gets this far, he might fall." It was easy to imagine him chasing, despite the danger, and if the wind didn't stop him, the chilled stone of these sun-forsaken tunnels might bait him on instead of warning him off.
"He won't get this far. Trust me." Neela moved on. "You're gonna have to trust me now, anyhow."
"What's that mean?"
"Come and I'll show you." Neela led her toward a spot of daylight.
A breeze hit Ariel's face. They moved out of the tunnel to emerge midway up a sheer bluff, one face of a deep crack in the land. A long finger of rock thrust from under their feet and pointed crookedly over the chasm toward the opposite wall. The storm had calmed, at least here. Mist rose from the abyss below.
"This is how we get to the bridge." Neela blew out her lamp. "The smugglers called it The Plank."
The stone pier, although wide enough for their feet, jutted out into nothing. Wind or long-ago water had worn at the rock, rounding its edges and nibbling away at its base until what remained seemed too thin to support so much weight. Since time and gravity never gave up, someday The Plank would let go of its hold and crash down to the earth or sea far be
low. Gingerly Ariel tested the rock and felt no qualms in her feet about going farther. The stone seemed firm today.
"It doesn't go all the way over," she said.
"It doesn't lead to the other side. It leads out of the world."
As Neela spoke, the crow swooped from above to alight on the end of The Plank.
"Ha! Grim-golly knows it," Neela added. "Cass must have shooed it. Which means they know we're gone."
Ariel scowled at the bird. "Are you following us, or am I following you?"
Wishing she'd given it a reply for Nace, just in case, she took a careful step toward the crow. An updraft bore a whiff of sulfur to her nose. She stared over the edge. That wasn't mist below. It was smoke.
"That smell! Flames?"
"Aye. They say brimstone burns down there. The fires of Hell. You sound like you didn't believe me."
"I figured you'd been to a bridge. Not the bridge! The one the crosses out of the world!"
Neela shot her a quizzical look. "Who said there's only one? There's as many ways out of the world as there are people. Or lots, anyhow."
Ariel had to admit that made sense. "I get confused between what's real and what's only a way to think about things. Which is why I hate riddles. Never mind. You don't mean to jump, do you? I'm not doing that."
"If we were smugglers on the run, mayhap, but we're not." Neela gripped Ariel's hand and lifted her windpipe. "The first time I went, it weren't my idea to reach the bridge alive. I reckoned I'd be dead and could go be with Dain. But that's not what happened. Hold tight." She played dissonant notes and pulled Ariel into a trot down The Plank.
"Wait! What are we doing?" Ariel stumbled behind. Her instincts blared: Drop your weight! Dig in your heels!
She didn't have time. A shriek caught in her throat as her feet kicked against nothing but air.
Chapter 23
Ariel's mind whirled. Her limbs bucked and flailed. Neela fought mightily to keep hold of her hand.
"Stop!" Neela cried. "I don't know what'll happen if you break my grip!"
No rushing air. No sense of speed. Only pain in her fingers. Clinging to each fact like a buoy, Ariel realized she wasn't falling. Neela was the only solid thing she could feel, but they seemed to be safe. She went still and stiff.