Where the Woods End

by Charlotte Salter

  Kestrel licked her lips, tasting salt. Her eyes stung.

  None of these animals had ended up here by accident. They were all facing one another as though they’d been carefully arranged for viewing. She cautiously moved among the animals, one hand on her spoon, making sure not to touch anything. Even Pippit was quiet.

  She turned a corner in the corridor of animals, then another, and realized too late that it was almost impossible to tell one direction from another. Everything was the same color, and she was surrounded by a wall of repeating eyes and teeth and claws. She tried to go back the way she had come, but she wasn’t sure how she’d gotten in. The animals leered at her.

  “I’m lost,” she said to Pippit urgently, her voice low. “Can you smell your way out?”

  “Salt,” he said, shaking his head.

  Kestrel forced herself to slow down. Getting frantic wouldn’t help, and neither would the twinge of panic that was dancing in her stomach. She closed her eyes and breathed deeply.

  “This way,” she said.

  She walked softly around the statues, looking curiously into all their faces. Kestrel was starting to enjoy herself in the Salt Bog now. Being in the maze was like wandering around someone’s private museum. She gently reached out to touch the face of a frozen stag, then stopped dead, standing over a pool of water, balanced precariously on a layer of clear salt.

  She wasn’t alone. There was something in the water, and it was watching her.

  She reached for her slingshot before remembering that it was missing. She felt a pang of dread, then squashed it down.

  As quietly as possible, Kestrel stepped back onto the grass. If the thing didn’t know she’d seen it, it might not bother her. She started to retrace her steps, now determined to find her way out as soon as possible, but the thing glided under the water and broke the surface in front of her.

  Shards of salt flew in all directions as the bloated, damp creature rose from the depths. Kestrel backed away, but her heel broke through the surface of the bog and she almost toppled in. The creature continued to rise a few feet above the surface of the water, as though it were swimming in the air, then waded forward and down until it was standing in front of Kestrel, blocking her path.

  The it was a he, a man with a bloated stomach, wet, glistening skin, and lips that were blue with cold. Small bubbles issued from his lips and nostrils as though he were still underwater. His clothes were wet, limp rags, and his beard was thick with weeds, but he had a clever face that told Kestrel he was more dangerous than any person she’d known.

  Kestrel raised her spoon in front of her.

  “Try it,” he whispered, in a wet, blubbery voice that sounded like it was coming from the bottom of a well. He stepped toward her, moving his arms like he was pushing water out of his way, even though he was on dry land. Small blue fish darted around and through his head, vanishing into one ear and flying out the other. “You couldn’t hurt me if you sliced me into a thousand fillets.”

  Kestrel imagined him laid out on a platter like a cold, wet fish, and shuddered. “What do you want?” she asked loudly. She made sure to look him right in the eyes, although they were so filmy and white she wasn’t sure he could see her at all. She waved a hand experimentally, but his eyes didn’t twitch. He was blind.

  “What do I want?” he said in his slow, bubbly voice. “You’re the one who came to visit the Briny Witch’s museum. You’re the one who trespassed on my collection.”

  “Some collection,” Kestrel said. “It’s just a pile of dead animals.”

  He curled his lip, showing his slippery teeth.

  “If you get out of my way, I’ll leave without hurting you,” Kestrel said, changing tack.

  The Briny Witch laughed. His hair was floating away from his face in slow, thick clumps.

  “Nothing can hurt me,” he gurgled. “I was dead long before my body floated into this salty pit.”

  Despite the fact that she was standing in front of a foul-smelling, apparently dead man, Kestrel was interested.

  “Where did you float in from?” she asked. She was wary of the Briny Witch, but she didn’t think he could move fast enough to surprise her. “Did you come from the outside?”

  “You might call it that,” said the Briny Witch in his slippery voice.

  “So it’s real,” Kestrel breathed. Then she remembered to jab her spoon threateningly. “Tell me how to get there,” she demanded.

  “I can’t,” he said, and despite his frightful face and greenish teeth, Kestrel thought she detected a hint of sadness. “Long ago, and far away, I was on the run. I had murdered my older brother. My sister hunted me down and blinded me before throwing me into a river to drown. I floated for days and ended up here. The way I know is cold and wet, and dark and lonely. Only dead people take that route.” He leaned forward and slowly glided toward Kestrel, forcing her to take another step back. “There’s something in this water,” he whispered. “It preserves those who drown. Take care not to go through the surface or you’ll end up like me, cold and alone.”

  “Come any closer and my weasel will burrow into your skull and give you the worst headache you’ve ever had,” Kestrel snarled. She plucked Pippit from her shoulder and held him out, but he was as stiff as a loaf of stale bread. “That means he’s getting ready to attack,” she added.

  To her surprise, the Briny Witch didn’t come any closer.

  “You’re brave,” said the Briny Witch. He reached out to touch the face of a nearby frozen bear, his expression turning dreamy for a second as he ran his fingers over its muzzle. Then he dropped his fingers and his face tightened again. “Maybe you’re brave enough to do a deal with me.”

  “I don’t make bargains with the dead,” said Kestrel.

  The Briny Witch stepped forward, his rags floating around him. Kestrel automatically stepped back again. Her heel cracked through the salt; she was standing right above the bog. She didn’t know if the Briny Witch was telling the truth about the water, but she didn’t want to risk becoming a half-dead thing like him.

  “It would be a fair deal,” said the Briny Witch. “I can give you anything you want. I can make you stronger. I can make you prettier.”

  “I don’t want anything like that,” said Kestrel derisively. “And I like the way I look, thank you very much.”

  “I could even,” said the Briny Witch slowly, “make you invisible.”

  “Why would I want that?” Kestrel asked, but a tiny part of her was already imagining all the things she could do.

  “Oh, there’s so much potential,” said the Briny Witch, casually running a finger over the back of a fox. “Imagine what you could do to those who bully you. The village children destroyed your collection of forest trinkets a few days ago, didn’t they? You could hide under their beds at night and terrify them with whispers. You could slip away from that nasty black dog that’s always following you.”

  Kestrel chewed her lip, hypnotized by the thought.

  “An invisible girl could do anything,” the Briny Witch said, his voice suddenly low and silky smooth. “You could even get rid of Hannah before she steals your friend.”

  “Wait,” said Kestrel, suddenly coming to her senses. “How do you know about that?”

  “I know everything,” he said. “I can go anywhere there is water. I lurk in the village well and creep through the puddles. I stream in the river with my long, grabbing fingers, and I play in the gutters where the small animals drown. I can be in any glass of water or any cup of tea, listening to you all the time. I have ears and fingers everywhere.”

  Kestrel imagined one of the blue fish sliding down her throat as she drank a glass of water, and shivered.

  “I already know a lot about you, Kestrel,” he said, his voice lowering to a hiss. “I know you have the best eyes in the forest. I want your eyes for myself so I can see my precious statue
s. I want to see the light shine on their faces. It wouldn’t hurt a bit. . . .”

  The Briny Witch slowly raised a hand. Kestrel took a step back and gasped as cold water sloshed into her shoes.

  “Get out of my way,” she said, Pippit in one hand, her spoon in the other. She tried to sound as terrifying as possible.

  “Not until you give me your eyes,” said the Briny Witch, his mouth opening in a horrible greenish grin.

  Then the Briny Witch twitched, as though he’d heard something. He paused with one hand stretched toward her. Nothing in the Salt Bog had changed, but Kestrel suddenly felt icy cold.

  “You didn’t tell me you had one of those,” the Briny Witch said, looking panicked.

  “One of what?” she asked. The Briny Witch turned around and sniffed the air frantically. Kestrel tried to see past him, but his floating rags formed a dark cloud around his body. “What is it?”

  “What do you mean, what is it?” the Briny Witch repeated, and turned back to her, seeking her out with his blind eyes.

  “That’s what I asked!” she yelled, caught up in his obvious panic.

  “Go!” he commanded, then hesitated before adding: “If you change your mind about your eyes, I’ll be in the water.”

  Without warning the Briny Witch collapsed into a heap of rags and frogspawn-y slime and rattling bones, all of which slid backward into the hole he’d risen from. There was a final slurp, and the water closed over him. Kestrel looked around wildly, but she couldn’t see anything at all, only the salt-encrusted animals.

  “Thanks for nothing,” Kestrel said to Pippit, who had shamefacedly gone limp in her hand. “You don’t mind fighting grabbers, but as soon as you see a witch you’re useless!”

  She wasn’t really mad, but the sound of her voice helped her feel less alone, less like something was watching and waiting in the bushes. As soon as she stopped, the icy feeling came back stronger than ever.

  A nasty voice in the back of her head was telling her that she knew exactly what would scare something like the Briny Witch.

  I’m paranoid, she thought, and took a deep breath. Her heart was fluttering nervously, even though she thought the Briny Witch’s damp brain was probably playing tricks on him.

  “There’s obviously no path to the outside here,” she told Pippit loudly. She was too embarrassed to admit that she didn’t like the way the Salt Bog made her skin crawl.

  Pippit nudged her hand with his wet nose, looking worried.

  “Nasty,” he said. “Eyes. Follow. Agh!”

  Kestrel ignored him. “We’ve got time for one more place,” she said. “To the Pit of Doom!”

  And she fled through the corridor of frozen animals to the next deep, dark place in the forest.

  THE PUNISHMENT

  The cold was as sharp as a paper edge. Kestrel scrunched her frozen toes and kept working, scooping handfuls of rancid fat out of the burrow where she slept. She could see the forest from here, at least. Maybe she could even spot her dad.

  “Lessgo,” Pippit said, shivering in her pocket. His breath made tiny puffs of condensation in the air, and his teeth were chattering.

  “I haven’t finished,” Kestrel said determinedly.

  The Pit of Doom had been nothing more than a ditch with a pile of bones in the bottom of it. According to Granmos’s notebook, it had once been home to an arthritic troll with a face on both the front and back of its head. She was disappointed that she’d never gotten to see it firsthand. Its skull, with its two jaws and four eye sockets, had grinned at her from the bottom of the ditch. She’d felt like it was laughing at her attempts to find a way out. Path? she imagined it saying. There’s nothing like that here.

  Kestrel sighed, scooped another handful of fat out of the burrow, and threw it away. It landed with a gross splattering sound. Some of the village kids liked to sneak in and dump things there. Playing tricks on Kestrel helped establish a pecking order of the brave, and messing with the gutter was the ultimate challenge. They’d egg one another on until someone gave in. Then they got to wear this stupid badge one of them had made of wax.

  “Snuh-h-h,” chattered Pippit as a tiny white snowflake landed between his eyes.

  “I know,” said Kestrel unhappily, and looked at the edge of the forest for the tenth time. Her dad was going to freeze if he stayed away much longer.

  Pippit curled himself into a tighter ball. For an animal that had come from the forest, he wasn’t particularly well-equipped to deal with the cold. Kestrel wondered if she’d spoiled him.

  She wrinkled her nose and scooped the last of the fat out of the burrow. Then she took her trinkets—the shoe, candle holder, cup, fork, and ring—and made sure they were hidden right at the back, under a pile of leaves.

  Kestrel had half expected Finn to come looking for her by now, but he’d disappeared entirely, and Hannah wasn’t in her house, either. She wondered if they were out somewhere together.

  Maybe they’re having a horrible time in the cold, she thought, cheering up a little bit.

  That’s when she heard it, far away but clear as ice. The familiar, thrilling sound of metal clanking against metal deep in the trees. The forest shivered, and Kestrel felt its worry deep in her bones. Then she saw it, almost hidden by the trees—brief glimpses of shining iron.

  “Trapper!” shouted Pippit. “E’s back!”

  * * *

  Kestrel’s dad was tall and broad, and he wore a waxed brown overcoat that made him look like a tent. Around his neck he wore strings of wolves’ teeth, and the brim of his brown leather hat was studded with black claws. There were metal traps hanging from his belt, swinging into one another, their sharp teeth clashing. If you saw him in the forest you would probably run from him, because he was bristling with sharp points and trophies, and covered in great, twisting scars from the neck down.

  When Kestrel reached him, he was standing by a gnarled tree, his back turned to the village, watching for something in the shadows. Kestrel crept through the dirty tendrils that were blowing from the wolf fire, her hand over her mouth to stop her coughing.

  She felt suddenly shy. She almost didn’t want him to turn around. He hadn’t been back in such a long time, a small part of her wondered if he wanted to see her at all.

  Kestrel was so close now that she was almost touching his shadow. She was still working up the courage to open her mouth when he turned around, quick as a fish in a bog, and caught her with his great paw.

  “You’re getting better,” he said. “But it’ll take more than that to catch a wolf hunter.”

  Kestrel wriggled out of his grasp and flung her arms around him, all her doubt melting. The top of her head barely reached his chest. He crushed her into him, and she breathed in the smell of the deep forest, the bonfires he lit way out there, the fur and the blood, and something a bit like bacon. He was the greatest wolf hunter that had ever lived, and he smelled like home.

  She pulled away and raised her chin for the usual inspection. She was glad the smoke was there, so he couldn’t see how much she was smiling.

  “You’re stringier,” he said. “You don’t eat enough.”

  “I’ve got to be stringy so I can hide,” she fired back. He didn’t need to know how much she longed for the cake and stew her mother ate. “You’re so fat you have to pretend to be a rock or a boulder.”

  “But I get to eat wolf meat every day,” he said, patting his stomach and laughing. The sound was deep and rich, as though it came from a place made of butter.

  It had been three months. Kestrel wanted him to say it. The words were hanging explosively in the air, but he just smiled in that mild way of his.

  “I didn’t know if you were coming back,” Kestrel burst out.

  “I always come back,” he said, catching her in his huge paw again and scooping her close.

  His presence was so big, and Kestrel so
small, that it was like being an ant squashed against a cliff. She couldn’t stay mad at him for more than ten seconds, even when she tried. All she wanted to do was stay like this forever, in the only place she felt safe, with her face pressed against her dad’s coat.

  She felt silly for doubting he’d come back. He always did.

  * * *

  They walked around the perimeter of the village, her dad’s traps clanking all the way. Pippit was clinging to her boot, his nose wiffling excitedly. Kestrel was unused to openly strolling around. She wanted to jump back into the shadows.

  “Did you find anything for my collection?” she asked, trying to hide her nervousness.

  “Not this time,” he said, shaking his head. “But I promise I always look.”

  Kestrel opened her mouth to tell him most of it had been stolen by the village kids, but she thought better of it. She didn’t want to ruin his visit. Besides, now she had Hannah’s plait to add to her collection. It was even better than the silver ring.

  Her dad held his traps still as they passed behind Ike Fletcher, who was peering into the well with an expression of deep distrust.

  “Ike’s scared of water,” her dad said softly, nudging her when they were safely away from him. “He looks in there every day to check there aren’t any monsters.”

  “I don’t believe you,” said Kestrel, feeling thrilled with this new piece of information. She wondered how Ike would feel if he knew the Briny Witch lurked around the village.

  “Just watch him. And you see that thing inside Walt Leith’s coat?”