Mackenzie Kincaid - [BCS281 S02] - Across the Bough Bridge (html) Read online

  Across the Bough Bridge

  By Mackenzie Kincaid

  When she woke that morning, she named herself Hawthorn.

  She said it into the mirror, three times, just as she’d been instructed: “I am Hawthorn. I am Hawthorn. I am Hawthorn.”

  Then she dressed herself for the trial ahead: warm woolen trousers, crisp white shirt, stout leather boots. The cloth sling she looped over her head, draping it from shoulder to opposite hip; there was very little weight in it yet, only a few items she’d need, but she planned to return home with it heavily laden. She twisted her hair up into a careful top-knot held by an intricately tied red cord.

  She tried not to look at the reflection of the bed behind her, the sleeping form beneath the sheets curled in tight on itself.

  Out on the landing, Sorcha was already waiting, pacing the two short steps between Hawthorn’s door and her own. She looked up the moment Hawthorn stepped into the hall but didn’t speak until the door-latch clicked shut.

  “You’re ready for this,” she said. It wasn’t a question, and it wasn’t a statement either; it wavered somewhere between the two, uncertain.

  “I’m as ready as I can be,” Hawthorn said. She couldn’t quite bring herself to let go of the doorknob, not just yet. “You’ll look in on her, when you get home? Make sure she’s out of bed?”

  Sorcha clucked her tongue, chiding. “You know very well that I will. I’ll bring something warm from the baker’s.”

  “Alright,” Hawthorn said. When Sorcha led the way down the stairs, there was nothing she could do but follow.

  The street outside was already bustling with traffic, despite the early hour: carts clattered their way toward the market, children darted about on little errands, people filled the footpaths as if it was just another day.

  “You’ve named yourself?” Sorcha asked, as they stood on the street, a stillness at the edge of all that movement.

  “Yes,” Hawthorn said. “I’ll be fine, Sorcha.”

  “Tell me the rules,” Sorcha said, clutching Hawthorn’s hand.

  “Never accept hospitality,” Hawthorn recited, dutifully. “Never say ‘thank you.’ Don’t follow the music. Take no food, drink, or gifts. Be polite.”

  Sorcha chewed on her lip, but let go of Hawthorn’s hand. “I’ll expect you back by sunset.”

  “I’ll be fine,” Hawthorn repeated, which wasn’t a promise, but it was the best she could do.

  She stepped into the stream of people and let it sweep her away.

  Hawthorn had never been across the Bough Bridge. Most of the people in the city hadn’t; it led to only one place.

  She stepped onto the weathered planks anyway.

  The bridge itself was a poor-looking thing, nothing but weathered wood, held together with pegs and joins where the city’s other bridges used trusses and rivets of iron. There was no railing along the edges to keep unwary travelers from tumbling into the dark waters below.

  When she looked back, she could see the people of the city still streaming past, but now a few of them stuttered to a stop, obviously catching sight of her. A couple of children slipped out of the crowd and shimmied up the tall wooden posts that marked the near end of the span, watching her progress with keen attention.

  She put one foot in front of the other, let the tread of her boots ring out against the wood, and kept walking.

  She was halfway across when something began to make an answering noise against the underside of the bridge, right beneath her feet. It wasn’t the echo of a footfall so much as a scraping, but it matched her step for step, a clawed scrabbling that mirrored her movements precisely.

  She could tell that it was toying with her, so she kept her head up and kept going, as if she had heard nothing. When it finally grew tired of its game, forty paces later, there was a sound that could be followed to the edge of the bridge. A head appeared, and a knobbly jointed body, and the whole of the creature skittered sideways out from under the bridge and into her path.

  Its skin had the mottled appearance of stone, its limbs were altogether too long and slender to be anything but unnervingly inhuman, and its bright yellow eyes glowed like lanterns. When Hawthorn was a child, the adults had all told stories of this very creature, to keep children from venturing onto the Bough Bridge. She could feel that same terror thrumming in her heart now as the thing crouched before her, staring, as if sizing up her fitness as food.

  She very intently did not flinch at the sight of it, and said, “Hello. Beautiful day, isn’t it?”

  The troll grunted and rotated its head most of the way toward upside-down, in the strangely boneless gesture of a bird. It opened its mouth, and the teeth inside looked like sharpened chips of flint.

  “Toll,” it said, with a voice like a dying gasp. “Toll.”

  Hawthorn reached into the sling at her hip and withdrew a small, bitter yellow apple, the sort humans only used for the brewing of cider. There was still a length of silvery branch attached to it and a pair of delicate pink flowers blooming just above the apple’s stem.

  “I am happy to pay the toll you are due as guardian of this bridge,” she said, formally, as she held out the branch. “With the expectation of safety during my return passage.”

  The troll blinked its lantern eyes, light-dark-light like a signal fire, then reached out one bony-fingered hand and delicately gripped the apple. It brought the branch to its lips and plucked the flowers off with its teeth, daintily, swallowing them down.

  “So bargained,” it said, and skittered sideways again, right over the edge of the bridge and out of view. For a moment she could still hear it beneath her, moving about, until the noise gave way to sudden silence as if it had settled back into a spider-web somewhere.

  Hawthorn began to walk again, and she did not pause until she reached the other side, stepping off the worn planks and back onto solid ground.

  From the side of the city where Hawthorn lived, most of the Underhill district was invisible, shrouded in a river fog that never quite lifted. Only the eroding pinnacles of the watchtowers, from which the king’s wardens had once kept their vigilant eyes upon the populace, still rose above the mist.

  Those who ventured into Underhill—the ones who came back at least—called it a wasted, corrupted, half-cursed place, with the fair folk left utterly broken after the king had finished grinding them beneath his boot. They called it a blight, seething with cut-throats and kidnappers, teeming with dark and twisted magic.

  From this side of the bridge, with the perpetual fog parting like a curtain drawn back, Underhill gleamed.

  The city crawled up the sloping side of the hill, seeming to burrow into it as well. Laneways disappeared around corners without rising, windows appeared at odd intervals as if cut into the hillside itself, and lights radiated from within, giving the impression of a city stacked upon a city. The buildings were made of beautifully cut brick and stone, in warm and inviting tones. The windows were intricately latticed in precious metals, and every window-box spilled over with flowers that should not have been blooming yet, with a bitter-cold bite still in the air.

  There were crowds here, just as there had been on the other side of the bridge, but these were altogether a different sort. The people formed a flowing river of bright silks, luxurious wools, elaborate embroideries, and feathered cloaks. Some adorned their metallic-sheened hair with glinting jewels, while others wore eye-catching hats and headdresses. Their movements were marked by an uncanny grace, and the sound of the crowd was almost musical, like the ringing of many bells. The folk were as b
eautiful and otherworldly as every old story—the before-the-war stories—had made them out to be.

  Next to all that splendor, Hawthorn’s best clothes seemed no better than rags. There were a few others like her scurrying along the edges of the crowd, human tradesmen going about their business with their heads ducked. She felt that same weight on her own shoulders; that same instinct to bow her head and shrink as a few passing ladies sent her disdainful looks.

  She was already familiar with the exact sensation; the mingling of embarrassment and shame. She had worked for some very rich people on her own side of the city: she’d carved the full figure in life size of the Fifth High Adjudicator and sculpted busts of seven of the Prelate’s daughters. She knew what it was to stand in a grand house in the grandest part of her city and be unceasingly aware that she did not belong there.

  In Underhill, the feeling was worse, because it wasn’t only her station that marked her as obviously out of place. Here, it was her species that felt inadequate and unwelcome, her humanness hanging on her like a stench.

  Against the weight of her task, it didn’t matter. She had much to accomplish and only a single day in which to do it; there was no time for hesitation or doubt. She squared her shoulders and stepped into the crowd as if she knew precisely where she was going.

  She didn’t, of course, but even in Underhill the tradesmen set their sigils above their doors, so it didn’t take long for her to find the green-goodsman. The shop had crates of exotic fruit standing outside the door, and the windows were full of odd vegetables alongside familiar ones.

  The moment she stepped inside, a sharp voice said, “Deliveries at the side door, you fool.”

  There was a narrow-faced woman standing behind the counter, scowling at Hawthorn as if she’d just trailed manure inside. Even this greener was finely dressed, though her hair was pulled back into a somewhat utilitarian braid, and she wore an apron as a concession to her trade.

  “I’m not here with a delivery,” Hawthorn said, tipping up her chin, trying to fake a confidence she didn’t feel. “I’d like to buy a chamber-fruit.”

  The greener blinked at her, mystified, as if the statement had somehow knocked her world out of alignment. “I believe I may have a few on hand,” she said, finally. She rounded the counter and plucked up a little fruit from one of the nearest crates, holding out for Hawthorn’s inspection. Its surface was yellow-gold, and it nearly shone. “Can I tempt you with anything else? Have you ever tasted a bauble? They’re sweet as any candy. Try one.”

  Hawthorn smiled tightly but didn’t take the offered food. “No,” she said, and resisted the urge to add a thank you. “Only the chamber-fruit.”

  The greener scowled and put the bauble back where it belonged, then rounded the next display and picked up something else.

  It was an unattractive, indistinct lump of a thing, pale like uncooked chicken meat, with shades of brighter pink streaked through it.

  “Yes, this is it,” Hawthorn said. “But I’ll be needing a much smaller one.”

  “Ah,” the greener said, her expression softening with what might have been understanding. She took the fruit back and leaned over to inspect her display once again, this time much more carefully. Finally, she held up a much smaller fruit, flawless and unbruised; when she passed it into Hawthorn’s hand, it was with infinite care.

  “It’s perfectly ripe,” she said, and all the manipulative charm had gone out of her voice. “Just the thing. You will need to pay for it, you understand.”

  “Of course,” Hawthorn agreed. She reached into her sling and pulled out the first of her payments, planned well in advance for the trip.

  The tuber was small, not even long enough to span her palm, but when she jostled it, the ends of its wispy fibrous roots began wavering, as if tasting the air. The long taproot squirmed against her palm, seeking an opening.

  “It’s been grown from seed and watered with my own blood. It’s a fair payment.” She still had no idea where Sorcha had gotten the seed for her; she’d been afraid to ask.

  The greener accepted the squirming snakeroot, holding it with practiced ease. “So bargained,” she said, with a brisk and business-like nod, then went to serve her next customer.

  Hawthorn examined the soft, fleshy chamber-fruit resting in her palm. It seemed impossible that such a small thing should be so heavy, or that anything so important could be so fragile. She wrapped it carefully in a delicate scarf she’d brought along just for that purpose, tucked it into her sling and took a deep, fortifying breath before stepping back out into the street.

  The wood-grower was much harder to find; the search took her into the truly under-hill part of the city, where the light took on a perpetual-twilight glow, and the lanterns were already burning though it was still the middle of the day. It hardly seemed a place for growing trees, but when she rounded a corner she found herself at the very end of the lane, confronted with the glassed-in wall of a massive greenhouse.

  Back home, in what seemed now like another world, greenhouses were hot. They soaked in sunlight and trapped it, keeping their contents in a comfortably temperate state year-round. In this greenhouse, it was gently snowing, flakes drifting down from a haze of clouds gathered against the glass roof.

  The place was filled to bursting with trees, but none of them had leaves. Every branch was winter-bare, though the world outside was warming into spring, and the trees grew in odd, twisting ways, with gnarled joints, strange sproutings, and clusters of twigs where none should have grown.

  “Good day,” said a soft voice behind her.

  The man looked young, with a clear, pale face, but the silky hair brushing his shoulders was white, and there was something in his posture that looked like he should have been old and stooped. His clothing, too, looked like the attire of an older man and more worn than the fashions that others had been wearing in the streets. His black apron was purely utilitarian, contrasted by a glimmer of bright polished silver at the pockets, where the filigree handles of tools waited to be put to use.

  Unlike the greener, his smile seemed almost welcoming, if still a little calculated. “How can I help you today?” he asked, and seemed to truly want to know.

  Hawthorn took the chamber-fruit carefully from her sling, unwrapped it, and held it up for the wood-grower’s scrutiny. “I need its complement.”

  He moved closer and grasped her wrist with cold fingers, to turn the chamber-fruit around without touching it himself.

  “I believe I can accommodate you,” he said, picking up a shining silver tray, and led the way deeper into his indoor forest.

  He began with the smallest of the trees, a neat row of miniature saplings in little white-glazed pots. Each branch received careful scrutiny, until finally the wood-grower dipped his hand into his apron and emerged grasping a pair of scissors with a dainty little cutting end and big, flamboyant handles in the shape of a leaf.

  Carefully and deliberately, he began to trim pieces from his trees, placing each cut-off on the silver tray, then moving on to the next plant. Hawthorn could detect no particular rhyme or reason to his selections; why he chose to prune this tree or that rather than reaching for the nearly identical one beside it, but he moved with purpose.

  He worked his way to the older and larger trees, trading in his delicate little scissors for a heavier tool. The wood crunched beneath the pressure of his ornate clippers like cracking bones, but he hummed a quiet little tune to himself and seemed almost cheerful about the methodical dismemberment.

  When he was finished, he laid the silver tray, piled with strange wood, on top of his work table, presenting it to Hawthorn with a flourish.

  “This, I believe, is what you require,” he said, and stood back politely as Hawthorn examined each piece, turning them over and mentally rearranging them, trying to determine whether everything she needed was there.

  “It will do,” she finally said. In truth, she could not know whether every last piece that she needed was accounted for, not
without spending a great amount of time examining and arranging each little length of wood. Time that she did not have.

  The wood-grower nodded graciously and picked up a folded cloth from his work bench, tipping the sheared wood into the center of it. He tied up the corners to form a neat little bundle and passed it to her, watching with sharp eyes as she stowed it carefully in her sling.

  “Now, I believe payment is owed,” the wood-grower said.

  She looked down at her hands, her fingers scarred from rough stone and slipped knives, clay still clinging beneath her fingernails from her work the day before.

  “The smallest one,” she said, holding up a fist with just the little finger of her right hand extended.

  He squinted at her, then drew that same set of silver pruning shears from his apron. “So bargained,” he said, and with a kind of terrible gentleness, just as he’d cut each delicate branch and twig from his own trees, he snipped her finger off at the joint.

  It may have been the pain that made her sway on her feet, or it may have been the rush of jubilation. He must have known exactly what she needed his goods for, but he hadn’t pushed for a better price and hadn’t demanded more of her blood and bone. She would have given it, and gladly. A finger was nearly nothing to pay for that precious little pile of wood.

  He was kind enough to wrap the wound for her too, before he turned away to bury her severed finger in one of his little pots.

  Her next stop was by far the most difficult to find. She let her feet guide her at first, but her path seemed to wind in strange directions and loop back upon itself until she worried not only that she would never find the place she sought but that she might never find her way out of Underhill again. If the laneways she’d wandered before had seemed to be cast into perpetual twilight, here in the hill’s shadow the world descended into permanent night. There were lamps burning, but their blue-tinged flames reminded her of fool’s fire, the twinkling sprites that infested the forest outside the safety of the city walls and led travelers away from the path.