by Sarah Zettel
“Very well.” Bridget tensed her shoulders and met her reflection’s eyes. Despite her resolve, she could not help but see Sakra’s reflection behind her own, and once it was seen, she could not miss the gentleness in his eyes.
“Come back to me, Bridget. I would … I would …” But Sakra fell silent, and turned his face away, beginning to walk in a circle around Bridget and the mirror.
I will do my best, she said silently, as his reflection paced back into view. She could only hope he sensed that somehow, for Sakra began to speak. This time, however, Bridget understood each word.
“I stand between the worlds. I stand between the shores. I call upon the waters. I call upon the fires. I call upon the metals, I call upon the winds, and all forms of the earth. I call my home. I call the blood that spilled at my birth. I walk the narrowest road, I see the coldest light, I slip between the darkness to my home.” His footsteps made no sound as he walked; there was only the dragging of the staff against the stone floor, a single, monotonous noise. Bridget stared into the mirror. Alice through the looking glass, she thought. Surely, it was growing soft under her hand, going misty. Surely, she would step through at any moment.
But there was only the cool silver, the dragging staff, and Sakra’s voice, again, and again, the words sinking into her mind, until Bridget knew each and every one. She stared at herself, forgetting to blink, forgetting to breathe, oblivious of the fact that it was her voice taking up the spell, weaving together with Sakra’s. She could not feel, she could only stare into her own eyes.
“I walk the narrowest road. I see the coldest light. I slip between the darkness …”
The coldest light, it shone in her own eyes, if she could only reach it, if she could only go a little closer, closer yet, still closer, walk the narrowest road, see the coldest light, slip between the darkness to my home …
To my home. To my home. Slip between the darkness to my home.
Bridget walked into the mirror and met no resistance.
Chapter Twenty
The Land of Death and Spirit was different this time. Bridget was aware of no landscape, only a shifting darkness divided into two by a thin, steady beam of light as from an electric torch. She followed it, less because she wished to than because there was nothing else she could do.
She was not alone. The shadows rippled as she passed, some of the darkness trailing behind her, near, but not near enough to touch. It was cold here. So cold. Cold as the heart of Lake Superior.
The silence that surrounded her was as thick as the darkness, and so persistent that her ears began to imagine that the shadows rustled as they stirred. Surely, it whispered to her, and surely if she just leaned a little to one side or the other she could understand what happened in the darkness and she would not need to fear it anymore.
But the light pulled stronger than the shadows and Bridget kept walking forward.
Gradually, as gradually as the coming of winter’s dawn, the darkness around the thin beam of light began to pale. The world before her went from black, to ashen grey, to ice white, and Bridget stood in the snow before the door to the keeper’s quarters.
After the deep cold of the Land of Death and Spirit, the winter wind from Superior was warm, and the star-scattered darkness as bright as day. She inhaled the fresh air gladly, and knuckled her eyes to clear them.
When she lowered her hands, she saw that someone had broken the latch on her front door.
That small thing shot a bolt of anger through Bridget. She barged through, not caring what she might meet. This was her home! No one else had any right …
She took the three steps to the front room in one stride, turned the sharp corner, and froze.
Sakra, she saw, would not find Kalami.
They were like a wax tableau — the dowager stretched on the sofa, Kalami clasping her hand in a strange parody of a lover, bound wrist to wrist, their eyes wild and staring, and yet they both seemed frozen out of time, victims of the cold.
Anger took Bridget first. How dare they bring this feud to her house? Winter or not, the light was not the place for such pettiness.
Not petty.
Yes, petty. Whatever war they fought, it meant nothing here.
Help me.
Suddenly, Bridget realized that other voice was not of her own imagining. Under the window waited the Firebird’s cage, dim and tarnished in the starlight, but not more so than the bird itself, huddled on the bottom of the cage, all its fire turned to ashes.
Help me. The Firebird tried to lift its head, but it only shuddered.
Instinct and wordless sympathy moved Bridget. She knelt in front of the cage, and the bird turned its fallen head up to her and she looked into one milky eye.
And she saw again the burning fields, and the triumphant flight, and the driven enemies, and the frozen homes. Saw all those things in her mind’s eye, and saw them again in the eye of the dying Phoenix.
Help me. Please.
And saw again with her own eyes that that cage had no door.
“I don’t know what to do …” she began, reaching out to touch the twisted gold bars.
“No, Bridget.”
Bridget spun around on her knees. Kalami had risen from his place beside the dowager. He held the rope in his hands and the expression on his face was one of feral delight.
“No, Bridget,” he said again. “The cage is not for you to touch. Not until I give you leave.”
Slowly, Bridget rose. Behind Kalami she saw the dowager pale on the sofa, her eyes closed, and one hand trailing along the floor. She swallowed.
“You killed her, then.”
“No, she chooses to die. She sees it is the only way to lay down her burden.” Kalami’s voice was soft, almost kind. “Which is what she’s wanted for so very long. When you are secured, I shall help her on, if need be.”
“How well you serve your mistress.”
“And she has repaid me. At last.”
“What payment might that be?”
“You do not know?” He arched his eyebrows. “She gave me the cage. She finally understood that she had to give me the cage, and all its secrets.” His smile was thin, and all kindness gone. “She at last realized you had played her false and turned to me.” His eyes sparked with cruel fire. “The empress of Isavalta turned to her Tuukosov dog and begged.”
Bridget said nothing. What could possibly be said? “You’re revolting”? “You’re mad”? He would simply laugh at her, and his laughter was not a thing she wanted to hear.
“Now, Bridget, I need you to come with me.”
“I think not.”
“I think so. I have need of you. The Firebird cannot remain caged for much longer without your help.”
Bridget’s mind skittered across the plan of the house. She could make it to the summer kitchen and the back door, to the tower and the stairs, but outside waited the snow, thick and heavy, impossible to run through, and even if she could, beyond the snow was only the lake.
Kalami held up the rope in his hands. “I made this for you, you know. I did not think to be using it on my erstwhile mistress, but I am glad the opportunity came.” He smiled again. “It will still serve you and me.”
The house was empty. They were alone. There was nothing here, no help, no hope. Just a dead woman and a pathetic creature dying in its cage and there was nothing she could do.
Or was there?
“Come now, Bridget. This is enough stalling.”
Bridget ran, feinting right, then left. Kalami lunged for her, but Bridget dodged past him to the stove, snatching up a piece of kindling. She jabbed the stick at his face, making him duck again, and swat the stick aside. Bridget ran past him through the foyer. His fingers grasped her skirt as she dove through the fire door to the tower stairs, and she slammed the door against his arm. He cried out in pain and let go, and she slammed the door again so hard the iron stairs rang. She stuffed the splinter of firewood under the hinges, wedging the door shut.
The li
ght. She had to get to the light. Grasping her skirts, Bridget pounded up the stairs, the thunder of her footsteps merging with the thunder of Kalami hammering against the fire door. Her splinter would soon be jarred loose and he’d be behind her again. Her mind’s eye saw his face, the rope in his hand, the dowager cold and dead behind him. She hauled herself around another turn, her fingers burning with the cold of the stair rail and all her will focused on not looking down.
Bang! Bang! Bang! Her name cried aloud in frustration and the pounding starting over again, faster than her feet could fly up the stairs to the trapdoor and the tiny room that housed the light.
The door below crashed open and a fresh pair of feet pounded up the stairs, just as Bridget pushed herself through the trapdoor to the lamp room, slammed it down and shot the bolt home.
For a moment she stood, gasping for air. There stood the light, a machine of brass and glass that she knew from childhood, every gear, every screw, every spring. It smelled of ice and oil and was the place in all the worlds she knew best. The light was hers and if she had any magic in her, it would come to her in this place.
The mineral oil still sloshed in the bottom of the can she’d left up here. Not much, but maybe enough. The reservoir opened smoothly and she poured the oil inside. The four wicks were dry, and the matches, and the key for the works turned smoothly, although her hands shook as she struck the matches and applied the flame to the first wick, praying to she knew not whom that it would take.
The match flame grew plump and blue and doubled, and Bridget lifted the match away from the wick, which blossomed with its own small fire. Its fellows, blessedly, followed its example. She shook the match out and shut the lamp housing, and cranked up the pumps. The beam shone bright and the works clacked and clicked into life, drawing up the oil and feeding the four flames.
Down below, unobserved, in the cold of the keeper’s quarters, the Firebird lifted its head.
On the stairs, the pounding stopped.
Slowly, fear swelled Bridget’s heart until it filled her throat. Where was he? What was he doing? Was he waiting on the stairs for her to open the trap? Had he gone in search of a tool, an ax or a chisel to break his way in? Was he simply going to wait down in the quarters until hunger or cold drove her out?
“It doesn’t matter,” she whispered to herself, her breath making small clouds of steam in the air. “It just gives me time.”
She rubbed her hands together and stared around her. It seemed so absurd now. She had come up here to work a charm, to believe that somehow she could weave the sound of the pumps and the light of the lamp into the kind of miracle she had seen Sakra and Kalami work. Ridiculous. That was for another world, not for this place of brass, iron, glass and memories.
But downstairs, the dowager and the Firebird both lay dying. She had to try, unless she wished to join them, or to wish she could.
But what could she do? Drive him into the lake? Or just even drive him from the house? Could she summon help somehow? Yes. That was it. The light was a beacon, normally a warning, but perhaps she could use it to summon help. Her thoughts turned to Sakra. Could she call Sakra? Could he follow the light? His knowledge could aid her fight.
She could try.
Bridget pulled back the curtains. The light beamed across the expanse of white snow and dark water, and showed her a figure standing at the foot of the tower.
Kalami did indeed wait for her, but not on the stairs. The beam lit him brightly, sending a long, black shadow stretching out behind him. Kalami held the rope high for her to see. His hands tied a knot in the rope, and were instantly busy tying a new knot. Bridget gripped the rail, but before she could make any other move, Kalami tossed the rope away, over the cliff and down onto Superior’s slush and restless ice. It lay there for a moment like a somnolescent serpent, and then the dark water drew it down.
“Now, Bridget.” Kalami must have been shouting, but his voice sounded soft, as if he stood next to her and whispered in her ear. “Now you will come to me, because like her, your sins leave you nowhere else to go.”
They rose dripping from the lake then, and it seemed to Bridget they were legion. Their skin was all shades of grey, but their eyes were only black holes. Yet they saw her. They knew her. They stretched out their rotting hands toward her, begging for help, for answers.
Why weren’t you there? they asked. We needed you!
Bridget couldn’t breathe, she couldn’t think. She staggered backward under the onslaught of their need.
Save us! Save me!
Poppa had told her the dead slept beneath the lake, but he’d been wrong, he’d been wrong. They struggled down there in the cold and the dark, crying out forever.
Help me! Save me!
And because she hadn’t heard them, no one ever would.
These were the dead men, the sailors on the ships that had gone down despite the light, despite her visions, despite everything. These men with their grey skin, their empty eyes and their pleading, they were all the ones she had failed.
No, not all, and they knew it too, because they shuffled aside, making a narrow lane in their crowd, so someone else could step through.
Poppa.
Poppa said nothing, he just stood there among the dead men, as grey and stooped over as any of them. He shuddered, as if one of his coughing spasms racked him, and he looked up at her with empty eyes.
Poppa.
You didn’t save me, his eyes said. You left me here.
“No, Poppa.”
You began to call some stranger your father. You started to believe.
“No, Poppa, never.”
Help me.
“I tried.” Bridget’s hands clawed against the glass. “I tried!”
Help me.
“They’re calling to you, Bridget,” laughed Kalami, sweeping his arms out wide to welcome her ghosts. “It’s your duty to save them!”
“Stop it!” she screamed to Kalami. She threw open the tiny door and ducked through onto the walk. “You’re doing this! This is your work!” Wind and cold snatched at her words, and below her the dead in their hundreds swayed, but not in time to the gusts of wind. They swayed to the pull of the waves that rocked the lake where they waited, cold and afraid, for salvation that did not come.
Help us!
Help me.
“Poppa!” she screamed, her throat raw, her heart bursting, tears streaming from her eyes to freeze against her cheeks in the stinging wind.
Come down to me. Poppa lifted his empty eyes, standing slack and frightened in the snow. I’m cold. I need you, Bridget. I need you down here.
“Poppa, no,” Bridget whispered, clutching the rail until it bit into her palms. “Don’t make me. I tried, Poppa. I tried.”
But Poppa would accept no excuse. When had he ever? There was no excuse for a broken promise, for a failure in duty. None at all. You promised me. You promised them. I trusted you to do the job. It was all I had to leave you and you ran away. You ran away from me and your daughter, Bridget. All the family you had, all the responsibility.
“Please, don’t.” Bridget’s knees began to give way. “I didn’t.”
“You did,” snickered Kalami.
Anger lent Bridget a momentary strength. “Because of you!” she shouted down to Kalami where he stood amid the ghosts.
But all her words did was make him throw back his head and laugh, a long, loud mocking sound that she had never wanted to hear. “Tell them, Bridget! Tell them it’s not your fault because I flattered you.” The laughter died and he reached one hand up toward her. “Come now, Bridget. Let me take this from you. Give over, and I will make them all go away.”
“I will not listen to this!” Bridget slammed her hands over her ears, turning toward the tower, pressing herself against the stone.
But it was not enough. Kalami’s mocking voice still reached her. “You don’t have a choice. You are bound to them, as you always were. I’ve just made it so you see them.”
Help
us.
“I can take them away again, or I can leave them to devour you, as is their right,” called Kalami. “It is your decision, Bridget.”
So tired, so cold, so afraid for so long, lying down on the grey sand where nothing lived, not even the worms, where there was only the slow, cold water creeping along their flesh to wear them away, no help, no hope, waiting for the light, for her promise to be fulfilled. Dead, dead, all her dead and all they wanted was for her to fulfill the promise that she would keep them alive.
To go down and take their hands and pull them from the water, to give them warmth against the cold. All of them. They’d smother her up and freeze her, and she’d deserve it. Bridget crumpled to her knees. She’d deserve it.
Bridget.
“I’m going.” She crawled, hands and knees, through the door and collapsed against the light. “Poppa. I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have left.”
Bridget they aren’t all.
“All of them. So many of them.”
Bridget, the living. The bonds between the living are stronger than the bonds between the dead.
The living? Bridget wrapped her ice-cold hand around the pump’s crank. It did not seem possible that anyone still lived. There was only the winter and the lake, and the lake’s dead, and Kalami down there in the snow waiting for her, all of them waiting for her.
All the dead, but not the living. The living didn’t need to wait.
Bound to the dead by all her promises, her duty and her name, but wasn’t she bound to the living too? Bridget’s head snapped up. Bound to the living, by her promise, and all the times she’d kept that promise. Momma had told her as much, a world away from here. Sakra said, Kalami even said, that the souls of mortals were divided, half walking in the world, half walking in the Land of Death and Spirit.
And she knew. She knew what to do.
She did not see the light flicker behind her. She did not feel the warmth drawn away from the wicks.
Bridget threw open the door to the outside and stooped through it. On the walkway, she stood straight against the wind, the cold wind that she had known all her life, as she knew the stone tower that supported her and the light that played over her and the water that cradled the island that had known her since her birth. And the dead stretched out at her feet, calling, waiting, yearning for life.
