The Ferryman - Book 1

Chapter 35:

Five – Juho’s Haunting

That day in the greenhouse refused to end - Moth wondered if days in the marches were longer than in Hiren. When she finally laid on her pillow, she fell instantly into a deep, dreamless sleep.

By the time she woke up the next morning, the hazy sun was well over the horizon.

Moth yawned and shambled from her room. She went onto the creaking wood landing and down the steps to reach the pump just outside the gatehouse.

When she re-entered the gatehouse with a pail of water, she saw two journals sitting on the table with a crisp white note from Agate.

Moth grabbed up the note, which read: ‘Thank you for your patience. When you are done with the journals, please return them to the library.’

Moth tucked the journals under her arm and ran up to the bedroom. After she had used some of the icy cold water to wash up, and some of it to boil on her stove, she sat on her bed by the light of her window and began thumbing through Juho’s journals.

She couldn’t remember the last time she had been so excited to read, and she took the oldest journal from Juho and flipped it open. She was too enthusiastic, and several loose pieces of paper fluttered out that he had slipped between the pages. Moth wasn’t sure which area they slotted back into, so she stacked them neatly to the side and started reading through the journal.

Hellish state the greenhouse was in. Not for neglect, but the previous gardener, some fool named Jaakko, seemed to be determined to let the whole place fall apart. First order; start from scratch and uproot all his hybrids.

Moth turned to the other journals. There were no gardener journals from a man named Jaakko.

She resumed with Juho’s journal. It was full of helpful information on how he managed to keep the ivy out of the greenhouse, if some of its berries managed to get in and seed, and how to contain the hideous overgrowth of it.

I was informed the ivy was not indigenous, which explains it overtaking this whole place. I’ve asked to burn all of it up but have received a resounding ‘no’ from Hagate, who blathered on about loose fire and Correb.

The more Moth read, the more she discovered how much Juho disliked Agate, referring to her as Hagate, or simply, Hag. The journals felt more private than they had before, and Moth wondered if Agate knew what Juho had wrote of her before she entered them into the library records.

She kept reading, and there was a point when she turned the page and the following sentences made no sense – she realized a section must had fallen out, and tried to match it with the dozen loose pages to see which fit into the writing.

The handwriting on the loose page was stiff, yet sloppy, and it must have been written in a hurry. Moth wondered if Juho had written it on a separate page elsewhere and taped it into his journal.

Cannot do my work with this cursed ivy – ‘swan ivy’. How in hell am I supposed to keep it out of the greenhouse? Nothing will deter it and I am forbidden the use of loose fire by Hag – shall I be tormented by her in two lifetimes? I cannot

Moth thought the section might continue, but it ended abruptly. When she turned the page, it was just botanical sketches and information about the swan ivy.

Have met Correb at last.

God help me, he was nothing I imagined. I understand why he secludes himself – he is not well.

He had left it at that. A whole, empty page with only that scrawled at the top.

It wasn’t until near the end of the journal that Moth read this hopeful entry:

Passerine birch! I have done it, at last, I know what to do. The swan ivy despises the oil in the bark; a simple water solution and the ivy is no more. I don’t need to use fire, and I need not salt the earth and prevent anything from growing.

At first, I could not understand why Correb would not let me destroy every tendril of this wicked ivy, but Dueluck informs me the ivy is a form of protection against the creatures of the woods – a gift from Adavidan. Only someone or something with a human soul can walk over it.

Moth excitedly noted down the recipe he wrote for birch water in her own journal. If it was true, the ivy would no longer be a problem; she could soak the whole base around the greenhouse.

The rest of the journal was notes on the various flowers cultivated in the greenhouse, most of which Moth found useful.

She picked up the second journal, and found there to be almost no personal notes; whole sections where it felt there should be something written down, there was only one sentence lines written on scrap paper stuffed between pages

Vining rose needs lowlight

Fixed broken pane

Need to make more fertilizer

As she thumbed through, she came across what seemed the only large entry in the book.

Why did Correb show me? What was his purpose in bringing me to Welclose to show me that man? Seeing his damned form below the water to drown in penance, for years – I hate him, he deserves it, but I am cut to the bone to see it, I am broken to know. How long has he left? I can hear the sound of him when I close my eyes – the never-ending last gasp.

I am sick

I am haunted.

There were no previous entries to give any context to Juho’s outburst.

The mountain, Welclose was the second to last of the ferryman’s seven mountaintops. Moth had been told it was a place of sorrows.

She turned the pages and found empty sheets of unused journal. She flipped through to the very end; there was a sleeve to place loose paper, but there was nothing inside but a dried, pressed cyclamen flower.

Moth’s fingers were curled tight over the journal cover, and she felt the hair on her arms stand up. There was nothing else; the journal was ended.

She sat, dazed, looking out the window to search the horizon for Tiding Range, and remembered she was standing on it. She shook her head to steady herself and got dressed for the day, her mind so full she kept buttoning her vest up wrong.

Below, she heard Lander enter the greenhouse leap up the steps.

Moth opened the door and waved to her, saying, “Lander?”

Lander stopped, smiling.

“Did you know the previous gardener, Juho?”

“Juho?” she said, tilting her head back. “Only for about a month. Don’t remember much of my first weeks here, getting used to this place is fuzzy, but I do remember him.”

“What was he like? What happened to him?”

“He had a temper, he didn’t like people going into the greenhouse. Let’s see…oh, he hated Agate, they could hardly be in the same room, sometimes he’d break things if someone really set him off.”

“But where is he?”

“Agate said he spent up his time and the ferryman took him through to the other side.”

Moth scrunched her brow. “Did Agate dislike him as well?”

“Oh yes. Someone told me – I don’t know if it’s true – that Juho and Agate knew each other before they died and came to the House of Springs.”

Thanking her, Moth returned to her room. She made herself a cup of tea and sat onto her bed to go through the journals again for any other information.

She reread a sentence she had seen before, but now had new meaning.

I have asked Correb the same request every day for the last year, and each time he tells me no. I believe he thinks I’m weak and wouldn’t relish the sight of him locked away.

“Baby?”

Moth jumped, spinning around on the bed, and saw a magpie on the outside of her window. It pecked on the glass, and said again, in Vade’s cadence, “Baby?”

“Hello,” said Moth, relaxing. She opened her window. “You’re the one who gave the ribbon to my mother, aren’t you?”

When she let him in, she realized the bird had a bundle of something clutched in one foot. The magpie dragged it across the sill and dropped it on Moth, saying, “It’s getting dark, come in.”

It was a shawl. It was her mother’s shawl. A deep dark green, with woven white spots – like a magpie’s wing – and interwoven throughout with pale green, and blue sparks of color. Moth carefully picked it up and pressed to her face, and it smelled like her – like juniper soap.

“Oh,” said Moth, and she wrapped herself in it to feel her mother. She clenched her jaw and looked at the magpie. “Thank you,” she whispered.

The magpie bobbed its head at her and flew off.