by Joni Sensel
"I suppose since they're facing this side of the bridge, they're not speaking to us, anyhow," she said. "The gate at the other end is supposed to keep out the living. This might be some kind of gate for the dead. The marks must be a message or warning for them." She wondered what the stones could have told Zeke, if he'd been there.
She touched one of the marks. It squirmed and flowed onto her finger, losing its shape to twine over her knuckles. The symbol had somehow come loose from the stone. The remaining marks writhed.
"Oh!" Ariel shook her hand, hard.
Neela glanced up from inspecting the cobbles at their feet. "What?"
The creeping thing on Ariel's skin had not been dislodged. Like a rivulet of water or blood, it streamed to the back of her hand. Retaking its original shape there, it gleamed.
"This mark!" Ariel scrubbed it against the leg of her trousers. The symbol doubled. One remained on her hand. Another appeared on the fabric. The same mouse brown as the wool, the second mark had just enough shine to see it. It slid to stop over her pocket and twisted into another symbol shown on the stones.
"Ariel...?" Neela pointed to Ariel's sleeve. Three more marks wiggled up it like caterpillars. They also must have spawned from the one on her hand. Ariel flicked at them, but they would not be knocked off. They settled atop her shoulder and stilled. She'd been infected by the whole set of five.
A moan escaped her.
"Easy, Farwalker girl," Neela said. "Do they hurt?"
"They tickle when they move." Ariel took a shaky breath. "But I can't feel them when they don't."
Before Ariel could stop her, Neela jabbed the one on Ariel's leg. It twitched but remained. She turned and touched a mark on one of the stones. Nothing squirmed onto her.
She shrugged. "They don't want me."
A puzzled curiosity replaced Ariel's fear. "Maybe they know I'm a Farwalker! I carry messages all the time. Not on me, exactly, but... maybe this message wants to be delivered somewhere."
"Where? Or to who?"
Ariel shook her head. "I don't know. But maybe they'll crawl off if I get there." She certainly hoped so. She didn't want to wear the sinister marks for too long.
"They're on the ground here, too." Neela swished one leg to chase off the mist at their ankles. The same symbols lay snarled across the width of the bridge, one lengthy stride ahead of where they stood now. The large marks looked like chunks of the ebony timbers, inlaid in the cobbles to mark the bridge's end. The cobblestones petered out just beyond.
"I stepped on one, that's how I noticed," Neela added. "Something slid under my foot. When I jumped back, I saw it moving. It didn't crawl on me, though."
Ariel bent for a closer view. As she stared, they seemed to writhe into her thoughts.
She looked away quickly. "Let's jump over and get off the bridge. If we can." She leapt.
"Don't go without me!" Neela bounded over, too. "That wasn't so hard."
"If we haven't just jumped through a curse." Ariel moved forward, alert to warnings from her feet. Once the cobbles ended, the ground shifted under her tread like sand.
"The dead's end of the bridge," she murmured.
Neela brightened. "Now to find Dain."
In the fog, finding anything seemed unlikely. The shadow-spirits they'd seen had no faces, made no sound, and had taken no interest in them. Ariel thought of Scarl, but just as before, she felt no inclination to walk anywhere. She hoped that meant he was with the living, not anywhere here among the dead. Her farwalking skills might not be reliable here, though. Certainly Neela's piping hadn't worked as they'd expected.
"I could call to my brother and see if he answers," Neela said. "Except it feels wrong to make noise."
"Let me try something first." Ariel shifted her focus to Dain. The faster they found him, if he could be found, the faster they could return to confirm Scarl was all right.
Ariel summoned every scrap Neela had told her about Dain, closed her eyes, and moved her awareness to her feet. Oddly, they twitched with opposing impulses. The first was a desire to move back onto the bridge. The second, less familiar sensation was like standing in the sea while waves sucked the sand out from under her bare feet.
Alarmed, Ariel looked down to see if the current that'd dragged them across the hole had returned. If anything, the mist seemed to creep toward the bridge, but the slurping under her boots pulled the opposite way. She shook her head, dizzied by the conflicting impressions. Perhaps she'd confused her feet by asking for both Scarl and Dain.
"Do you feel anything in your feet?" she asked Neela. "Like the ground's sliding away a few grains at a time?"
"No." Neela stamped. "Feels solid to me."
"Let's try this way, then." Ariel followed the suction.
The shadowy spirits still accompanied them, some overtaking, some being passed. Faces of mist formed and melted away when Ariel looked directly at them.
Twice the crow fluttered up for a visit. When Ariel offered, the bird perched on her arm before tipping its head and flying off again. Ariel wondered where it went and why it kept coming back. It wasn't with them enough to be coaxing them on.
Uneasy, but trying to attend to her feet, she gave no thought to other senses until Neela said, "You hear that?"
Heavy footsteps approached.
Chapter 25
Ariel and Neela halted. At their silence, the footsteps paused, too.
"Dain?" Neela called.
Ariel elbowed her. "Shh!"
Clump, clump, clump-clump. The noise moved faster and closer, but the fog masked its direction. Ariel shifted her weight, wanting to run but unsure which way to go.
Clump-clump-clump--whack! Something hard hit her back.
"Ow!" Ariel pitched forward to her hands and knees.
A cobblestone flew up to strike Neela's belly. She doubled over. The sail she carried slipped from her neck. Instead of dropping, it fluttered into the air.
"Yesss!" hissed a thin voice in the mist.
"Is that the wind?" Ariel jumped up.
"No!" Neela grabbed for the sail. It whipped out of reach.
Ariel scooped up the cobble that'd knocked her down, ready to heave it at their attacker. But there was no attacker, except for the rocks. The sail had whisked out of sight.
The marks on her shoulder raced down toward her hand--the one holding the stone. The rock wiggled out of her grip and away. Changing direction in mid-air, it swooped back at her. She flung up her arms, protecting her head. The stone landed and hopped closer for another try.
Not thinking, just reacting, Ariel stomped it. The cobble squirmed under her boot.
"Giiive iit!" wailed a new voice. Ariel searched for its source. A serpent of mist stretched between the two rocks, one at each end like hands on rubbery arms. A misshapen face hovered midway between. Its mouth was a dark, flapping hole. "Giive!"
Neela grabbed the second rock and held it at arm's length while the mist monster tugged it this way and that in her hands. More mist had gathered as if drawn by the fight. Tendrils tugged at Neela's windpipe, its lanyard stretched to full length and sawing into her neck. A lamp popped out of her pocket and bounded away.
The waterskin bounced at Ariel's side, too, lifting and yanking against its strap. She clamped the bag under her elbow to keep it. A clammy wisp slid up the strap to her cheek. When it branched into fingers, she slapped it. Another misty hand reached over her shoulder. The symbols at her wrist squirmed back up her arm toward it.
"Forrrm, youu haff fforrrrm." The hiss pierced Ariel's thoughts, not just her ears. Goosebumps rose on her skin. "Niice forrm... I waant it!"
The hand at Ariel's shoulder shot to her lips. Two cold fingers thrust in and yanked her mouth wide, plunging in to the back of her throat. Ariel gagged. More clammy tendrils probed around her tongue and cheeks as though an icy octopus writhed inside in her mouth. Something black flashed past Neela, but Ariel had no thought for the crow. It was not cramming itself into her throat. Her hands scraped her face, fin
ding nothing to grab. Yet the thing trying to slide down her throat blocked her breath.
Ariel jerked Elbert's knife from its thong and slashed it through the mist, putting all her defiance into the strokes. Her ferocious motion scattered the mist near her face and sucked cold streams from between her lips. She fought to keep her gorge down, but at last she could breathe.
"Giive!" The rock still under her boot struggled harder. Squirming loose, it jumped to hit Ariel's hand. The knife flew. Its arc halted as a misty hand snatched it. Ariel cringed. Would it fly back to cut them?
"Mmmore!"
"I'll give you more!" Neela flung her cobblestone at the knife, knocking it well away. The second stone tumbled after the first as if chasing. Streams of mist trailed behind. But more mist had wound its way inside Neela's pipe. The shell glowed from within as it yanked at her lanyard, working to jerk the cord over her head. Neela fought to keep it as the crow swooped around her. With mist tendrils lashing, the shell finally burst. Sharp fragments flew.
"Run!" Ariel grabbed Neela and they tore away. Ariel braced for a knife flying into her back. Neither of the voices she'd heard had been Elbert's, and the blade hadn't been the only thing stolen, but oh, how she wished she'd been strong enough to hold it! Now it might strike against them, far more deadly than stones.
"Is it a trick, or is it brighter up there?" Neela asked as they ran. "Like the sun breaking through?"
Something did shine ahead, though a moon seemed more likely. They'd left the world in the daytime, but hours had passed--and surely the dead needed no sun.
They jogged on with caution. The tug on Ariel's feet had grown reassuringly stronger. Within a few moments, the glow ahead split the fog and a tall shadow took shape beneath.
"Oh, a fire beacon?" Neela said, panting.
"Or a lighthouse." Ariel wondered if it might be the source of the sparks. "I've heard Fishers tell stories about them." She squinted at the round tower under the light. It appeared to be built of brown stones so lumpy that they were more suited for cobbles than walls, but the glow atop soothed her, even if the beacon couldn't be meant for them.
Growing confident that they'd outrun any pursuit, Ariel slowed them to a walk as they approached the lighthouse. "You all right?" she asked Neela, who was holding her ribs.
"Except for my busted pipe. Curse those cold squirmies! None got in you, did they? I saw that one try."
"It nearly choked me!" Ariel said. "But I got it back out."
"Or your message marks stopped it. They ran to your neck."
"They did?" Ariel glanced at her hand when it tickled. The symbols had settled together in her palm, almost as though painted there for her to carry.
"Aye. It looked to me like they kept the mist from getting in farther. Maybe their message is 'No monsters allowed.' Anyway, they helped more than your grim-golly did. It was darting all around us, but I guess it's gone now."
"Maybe it was flapping at the mist with its wings." Ariel doubted it, though. After all, crows were scavengers. It had just been awaiting its chance at her--
Bones. She sucked in a breath. She could see more clearly now. The odd stones of the tower were not stones at all.
"It's bones, Neela! Bones!" Pelvic bones by the hundred formed the tower's foundation. Brown with age, they'd been nested and stacked ten feet high. Above those rested the knobby ends of thighbones and shins, stuck out from the center like spokes of a wheel. The next round made Ariel shudder the most--human skulls staring outward, row upon row. Up and up rose the tower, without stairs or a door, until details were lost in the glare at the top.
Ariel pulled her gaze back to the base. Gaps in the rows showed some bones out of place, leaving dark hollows or uneven tangles. No wonder the ghoul at the gate had looked cobbled together. Clearly it'd drawn some of its pieces from here.
"That's the bones of a whole lot of people," breathed Neela.
Ariel shivered. "But whose? Dead things leave their bones in the world."
"Not everyone, maybe," Neela replied. "Smugglers used to say if you're not buried right, your bones get up and walk. They might all come here."
Ariel swallowed. Elbert hadn't been buried at all. But she'd stomped his bones to dust. Maybe these had been here since the days when the bridge had been easier for the living to cross. They looked old enough. If so, though, few who'd come here alive seemed to have found their way back to the world. Her bones and Neela's could end up here, too.
A light hit them from above, so bright it was painful. Shading her face with her hand, Ariel squinted up. The beam fell from the tower like a column of flame. Someone or something had noticed them there.
She took a few steps. The light followed her. But nobody hailed them and nothing else moved.
Then the ray of light folded into a glowing staircase, which rose toward the blaze at the top.
"That looks like an invitation," Ariel whispered. "But to what?"
"Maybe Dain's up there!"
Whatever it was, it already knew they were there. Ariel lifted one boot toward the stairs. Her feet didn't protest. "I guess we'd better find out."
Chapter 26
Ariel stood on one foot, prepared for the other to pass through the staircase and slip back to the ground, but the glowing stair held her. She mounted with care. The staircase of light was no wider than she was, steep and without railings. Ariel's arms helped her balance, but she didn't dare glance away from her boots.
"Ariel?" Neela called.
Ariel rested her hands on a step so she could look back without toppling off. Neela remained at the foot of the stair.
"What are you doing?" Ariel called. "Come up!"
"It won't let me." Neela raised one foot. The first step went dark and vanished, and her boot plunged straight back to the ground. Once she stood squarely, the light reached her again. "And I don't want to be in the dark by myself."
Ariel's perch felt more precarious than ever. Reluctant to leave Neela, she tentatively lowered one foot. The stair below blinked away, leaving nothing but space. She yanked her dangling leg back up.
"I get it." Swallowing the quiver in her voice, she told Neela, "I have to keep going. I don't have any choice."
"I saw it," replied Neela. "Just come back quick! If you can."
Ariel resumed climbing. The ascent strained more than her legs and her nerve. It made her heart ache, because memories tumbled through her with each step. She recalled moments with Scarl during the first frightening journey she'd taken with him--especially the short time they'd rested in his village. The woman he'd loved had left the world soon thereafter, so Ariel felt she'd stolen days he could've spent with Mirayna. The tower's shining staircase carried her back to that sorrow as if she were climbing a stair of bright, hard mistakes. Each one brought the pain of regret.
With a final step, she moved into a light too bright to bear. She hid her eyes with her hands, but her palms only seemed to push the brilliance into her head. A flickering shape like a heat wave stirred against the bright background of the Essence.
"Ariel Farwalker. I might've known I'd meet you again." The voice was not human. It sounded more like chimes rippling through water. But Ariel understood, and her heart knew who spoke. The memories on the staircase had warned her.
"Mirayna?"
"Once."
Ariel cracked her eyelids, trying to look through her lashes and fingers to see the Allcraft Scarl had loved. The chime rose in a fiery laughter.
"Don't wound your eyes. Tell me instead why you've dared to come here. You ought not have. But I know how rarely you heed good advice."
Ariel swallowed hard. "Is Scarl here, too?"
"Scarl Finder turned away from the gate. Which you would know if you'd stayed in the world. Is that why you've come?"
A cry of relief fell from Ariel's lips. "Oh, thank you! Yes. Thank you."
"I suppose I can't chide you, since my presence here isn't so different from yours. Some serve at this beacon to help guide those who follow.
We're rewarded with glimpses of those we have loved."
Ariel's breath caught. She tried to focus beyond Mirayna. "My mother--?"
"No. That one moved on when she saw that you wouldn't be left alone. And I have tarried too long. But I wanted to see Scarl love anew, if he could. Now I, too, will proceed."
Ariel said, "I almost wish he were with me to..." See wasn't the right word. "...meet you again."
The light rippled. "No. That would only be cruel. Please don't tell him we've spoken. I know you can fib when it's called for."
Ariel didn't understand but did not dare to argue. "All right."
"You don't know how important you are to him. And to me. If he hadn't turned around and come back to you after your trials near the Mouth of the Mountain, when I was newly arrived here, his soul might've been lost a long time."
Not sure she deserved any credit for that, Ariel ducked her head. Scarl still bore the five-fingered mark on his chest that he'd gained on the day Mirayna meant. A ghost had given it to in a dream. Nonetheless, it showed on his skin. Though she rarely saw it, Ariel hadn't forgotten; it'd played a part in his promise to her. She'd never considered what he'd be otherwise, but she could imagine him callous and bitter.
"It is my gratitude, Ariel, that has built you a stairway and allowed us to meet. My gratitude to you, and your regrets about me."
"The stairs are made of feelings?" Ariel murmured. "No wonder."
"Yes. You are accustomed to form having power, but tangible bodies and physical strength don't matter on this side of the bridge. Emotions have more power here. Love and compassion keep this beacon alight, but those lost in the mist are filled with hatred and greed, and they use them as weapons. The most envious could rip your limbs from you simply by wanting them badly enough. Which is why I insist you and Neela go back as you've come. Right away. You know you don't belong here, and you're in terrible danger."
In her awe, Ariel had nearly forgotten about Neela. She said, "There's another reason we're here. Neela needs to see her brother, Dain."
"Guilt binds the living, not the dead. The dead are bound mainly by anger and fear. If Dain bore any grudge, he'd be lost in the mist. I promise you he is not. Go back."
