The Ferryman - Book 1

Chapter 44:

A Night like Flat Glass

Every time Moth left the ferryman’s presence, she felt she must have dreamed the whole experience.

She wandered away from the greenhouse, disoriented, giddy, and exhausted.

Only three people in all Coewylle Kingdom called her Moth – Ama, Tully, and Clement. The magpies must have told him – they were his messengers after all, and they flocked around the houses and farms of those loyal to him.

Though she knew – from stories – that a ferrier knew details about almost everyone in their county, she had never really considered before that that would include her.

How much does he know about me? What else have the birds told him? She wondered.

She was so lost in thought, she bumped into the doors leading to the guile’s mansion. Even unconsciously het hungry stomach drove her towards the dining hall. She opened the doors and entered.

The long passageway stretched out lazily. All along on wall were tall windows overlooking a well-kept potager, a small haven of tidiness before it gave way to the chaos of the ivy sea.

Chatter and music floated down the passageway – such a lovely sound Moth had almost forgotten over the lonely last week. A sound of companionship.

Moth crept up to the dining hall doors that were open a crack, and peered in.

The dining hall was stuffed full of guiles relaxing before dinner. Some gathered at the fire playing cards, others lounged on the deep window seat like cats and talked about the day.

Everyone was like Agate and Lander – covered in hinged, wrinkled skin.

Before she could lose her courage, Moth pushed the door open and entered the hall.

A few glanced at her – then did a double take and stumbled upright.

A middle-aged man asked worriedly, “Should you be here?” and catching himself, he added, “Lady Korraban.”

Moth felt a chill at that title, and as her eyes went over the room, the other guiles, uncertain and clumsy, stood up and bowed.

“I…” Moth clenched her hand and said, “I heard Lander has her effigy.”

One of the guiles by the fire waved at her from across the room – the one with auburn braids called Vincent. Moth hurried through the hall of staring guiles, and he said with a grin as she got near, “She’s awake and lively, Lady Korraban, thanks for asking. She’ll be down shortly – ah, no, I mean I’ll go fetch her for you.”

“No, no,” Moth urged. “Don’t trouble yourself. I’ll wait for her.”

The guiles hovered for a moment, but soon settled back down – their eyes were often on Moth, combing her over curiously as they exchanged quiet words and looks.

Vincent looked apologetic and offered her a seat by the fire. When she had settled, he returned to his kantele and began tuning it.

“You play?” Moth asked, delighted.

“A bit.” He plucked on a string, but tsked and continued to tune it. “I can do better, just wait.”

Moth tucked her feet up on the spacious armchair, watching as he worked on the shining instrument. He kept glancing at her, and said after a moment, “You

played a good trick on us all, being Lady Korraban this last week without anyone being wise to it.”

Several heads tilted to listen. Vincent raised his eyebrows, and she understood – he was giving her a chance to ease the tension in the room.

“That was for Correb to declare,” Moth said, a touch louder than was necessary. She realized in that moment how wise Agate had been – to say she was the bride would have been absurd. “Can you imagine? I show up here while he’s gone, declaring I’m his wife, and expect all of you to believe me?”

Vincent chortled. Satisfied with his tuning, and her answer, he began to play a sweet song. Moth leaned back to listen - she could almost imagine she was sitting by the fire at the Tunhofe house as Priscilla played.

More guiles came down to the dinner, and there were forty or more swarming around the massive dinner table, and Dueluck and his assistants barged in and out with platters of food and wine.

“Mere!”

Moth turned in her chair. Lander flew down the stairs and launched herself onto Moth.

Tangled in her long limbs, Moth squeezed her tightly and laughed. “You’re alright! I was so terrified when I saw you in the tub.”

“My whole soul,” said Lander, sliding off Moth to sit on the floor next to the chair. “Must have been strange. Thank you, by the way – Dueluck told me you came howling into the mansion to get help.”

Moth winced at the memory of Lander’s board-like body. “When you touched the tin I thought – I thought you had died.”

“What – again?” demanded Lander, then she remembered and slapped Moth’s arm. “And you killed a welkworm with the same sword. I didn’t think you had any spark.”

They could only manage to exchanged a few more words before Dueluck came into the dining hall with a crew of kitchen workers.

“Dinner’s ready!” bellowed out Dueluck, checking the consistency of the pudding as it passed by and nodding in approval. His hollow, fiery eyes widened when he saw Moth. “Lady Mere, I’m so glad to see you up and awake. I have a meal here for you, would you like me to bring it to your room?”

Moth hesitated, reluctant to leave such a warm, lively room. “Could I possibly eat here, at the table? If there’s any space.”

“If there’s any…” muttered Dueluck to himself, squinting at her. “You can do whatever you want. This is your mansion, now, as the Lady of the house.”

Cutlery clinked and there was a chilly wave of quiet; the guiles stared at Moth with startled expressions.

“Please, no,” Moth said desperately, feeling like a charlatan. “No, this is all Lord Correb’s.”

Dueluck pursed his mouth at the uncomfortable feeling in the air. He offered her a seat – not at the head of the table – next to Vincent and Lander, and said, “As you say. But my ferrier declared you his bride – I’ll not argue the point.”

Tensions eased up once food was served. The quietness melted away when platters of smoked duck and cranberry relish were set down, firkins of blackberry beer tapped, and mountainous plates of sweet buns passed around.

Dueluck placed several beautiful, spiced meat buns and glazed carrots in front of Moth, along with a glass of mead. “It’s brewed from our honey,” he said. “The ferryman told me it’d be safe for you to drink. I’m sorry it’s not much.”

“It’s astounding,” said Moth, smiling at him in intense gratitude. “My sad little pan bread is nothing to this.”

Still, Dueluck was not satisfied with his work and gave an annoyed shake of his shoulder before taking his place at the head of the table. In another few minutes, late only by a few ticks of the clock, Agate swept in with her curt little steps, sitting by Dueluck and other senior guiles.

She said something with a laugh and eased tiredly onto her seat, as a guile assembled a plate for her.

Agate sipped at a dark dry wine and began to relax as her eyes skimmed the table, when they landed on Moth, who gave her a friendly wave. Agate choked.

Pattering over, she asked nervously, “Milady, what are you doing here?”

“Don’t worry, Mr. Dueluck made me a meal from Hiren’s offerings.”

Agate’s trembling hand fluttered from her mouth, to cheek, to temple, like a scandalized butterfly. “But – but you should be dining…”

“Alone?” asked Moth, sadly. “Please let me stay, Agate.”

This seemed to activate another part of her mind, and she said, outraged, “You are the Lady of the house; you need not get my permission for anything!”

“So it’s alright if she eats with us?” butted in Lander.

“No! Lord Correb never dines with us, why should you lower yourself this way?”

“‘Lower’?” asked Vincent.

Shushing him, Moth spoke gently to Agate, “Was it ever, in older times before the sickness, normal for the ferrier to dine with the guiles?”

With a reluctant nod, Agate conceded the point. She sighed. “As you say, Milady.” Agate retreated back to her seat, but was unable to relax for the rest of the evening.

Vincent laughed sympathetically and said, “Poor Agate, there really is no protocol for this she knows how to follow. But I’m glad you can sat, Milady, I’ve been hoping you would tell me about your fight with the welkworm.”

Choking downs mouthfuls of sweet buns, and grapes, Lander said “Lord, yes, I’ve been desperate to know how it all happened.”

“Do you remember the attic, just before you touched the tin sword? How I opened the window to let the light in?” Moth asked.

“Yes, the stained-glass…oh. That’s how it got in?”

Moth nodded, embarrassed. “It was my fault.”

“But how did you know it was inside?” demanded Vincent.

“Around midnight. I woke up to it crawling into the attic.” Moth was content to end the story there, but as the two of them urged her on more and more, she slowly unfurled the tale and explained in detail that awful night.

When she had finished, describing how the ferryman had dealt the finishing blow to the monster – while not explaining that he was in a distorted bird form – Vincent leaned back in his chair. He had put away a good deal of duck, buns, and ale during her story, and was now shaking his head at the thought of the welkworm entering the mansion while he slept.

“Good god,” he said. “It’s so massive it would’ve eaten all of us.”

“It seemed even more massive as it squeezed through the gatehouse windows.”

“We measured it. What was it again, Abe?” asked Vincent, calling the middle-aged guile from before, who sat nearby.

“The welkworm?” he asked, leaning around a fruit display to hear better, and Vincent nodded. “Fifty-three feet, three inches. A real beauty, Lady Correb, it must’ve been a struggle.”

Moth wrinkled her brow, looking at Vincent.

“It’s body is still on the lawn. We haven’t moved it yet – Lord Correb said to leave it until next week. Unsettles me, though.”

“It doesn’t smell bad, I just don’t like the scent,” said Lander, making a face. “Like stagnant water.”

The body. Moth felt a chill – it hadn’t been a dream. She was almost certain it had truly happened, but now there was proof for her own uneasy mind that she had killed a welkworm.

Moth pushed herself away from the table. “I’m going to go see it.”

Wiping beer from her mouth, Lander jumped up and grabbed her hand, saying, “I’ll come too.”

As they traveled through the mansion, Moth said to Lander, “Thanks for not telling anyone I was Lord Correb’s bride. Agate was right to keep it hidden until he returned.”

Lander shrugged. “Not saying anything is easy, but you’re welcome.” She glanced at Moth pensively and then glanced around for anyone else, before whispering, “So, you’ve seen the ferryman now?”

Moth hesitated, wondering what Lander was implying. She nodded.

“I did too. After he put my soul in the effigy, he introduced himself to me – properly. Not through a door.” Lander rubbed her neck. “He’s quite…sick. I get why he waits a while before startling some poor guile.”

Moth opened her mouth to ask something but stopped herself. Lander raised her eyebrows. “What is it?”

“Why didn’t you see him when…when you died?” asked Moth, quietly.

Unoffended by the question, Lander scrunched her face thoughtfully and said, “It’s hard to remember much. When I died, my soul left my body. I remember it – the unbearable heat of the fire, the screams, and then it got dark, and quiet, and I felt like I was submerged in water. If you ever took a bath alone at night, when everyone

else is asleep somewhere else, that’s what it was like. I kept going lower into the water, and then the current pulled me along until I got stuck in…in something like a pond. And I was there for a while, until a bird pulled me up, like how a hawk grabs up a fish. Once I was out of the water, I don’t remember much, until I woke up here – in the house of the dead, in a new body.” Lander shrugged and grinned at Moth. “Had I been ferried directly across through the gate into the afterlife, I would’ve seen him. But I got waylaid because my mom insisted on a water burial.”

Moth squeezed her hand. “Do you know how long you have here, until you do pass on?”

“Lord Correb said guiles stay for as long as they have a lingering regret, though at any point they can ask him to ferry them across. I don’t think I have any regrets – I’ve thought about it for ages, but I can’t come up with one.”

“You don’t even regret dying so young?”

“Doesn’t bother me. I mean, if you asked me the day before I died ‘do you want to die’, I would’ve said no – but now that it’s happened, it’s not an unknowable horror. The afterlife sounds grand, Lord Correb told me about its forests, and how you can walk from planet to planet because the night is like flat glass – I’m not sure what that means but I’m ready to explore…and I do miss my grandma, I loved her, and I’m excited to see what she’ll be like all full of energy and ageless.”

Reeling from such a cheerful attitude about death, Moth had a hundred more questions to ask her cousin, but together they emerged from the mansion, and she saw the welkworm.

Its massive body, strewn in coils across the lawn, was beginning to bloat.

Where the old woman’s face used to be, there was only a black hole. Moth approached the cavity – tentative but fascinated – and looked inside. It was like the mouth of a cave, dark and echoing, and deep inside was the faint sound of running water.

Moth could only bear being close to the mouth for a few seconds before she backed away. “Why is it being left here?”

Lander nodded towards the greenhouse. “Lord Correb told me, after he got my effigy and we had a chat, that he wanted it left on the lawn so the guiles could see what you’d done.”