The Ferryman - Book 1

Chapter 5:

Touching Water

That day, the fog that had leaked onto Moth’s hand from a sliver of earth, had traveled further underground burst out in the center of the Hevwed’s field.

    A massive patch of crops was turned to nothing but white stone.

    Within a week, the sentries burnt up what nearby crops had escaped the fog, to satisfy the KCAC’s demands.

    The damage was not bad enough to force the family to sell, but extreme cutbacks had to be made in the house. Norwin and Ira continued to farm the soil they had left, while Japh and Nehem went and farmed the nearby Tunhofe property to ensure food for everyone in winter.

    Vade and Ursula took on darning and sewing work.

    Ama moved in with Clem to help him and Moth.

    They all managed to scrape though a winter, but the next two years they held on by a string.

    Moth waited and hoped her hand would heal, but it did not – just like the ground, just like the crops.

“Moth, it’s time to get up,” said Ama, tugging the curtains back.

Moth opened her eyes, seeing the autumn light come in through the pane. She shrugged off her nightgown and twisted her way into a dress.

“I got that,” said Ama, reaching to help her button her collar.

Turning away, Moth said, “It’s alright.” She could manage most things with one hand.

Ama flopped onto the floor to yank on her shoes. “After I get you set up with the washing, I can chat with you while I mend, but only after the baking.”

“That’s sounds nice.” Moth got her boots and shoved her feet into them. She was twenty-one, now – in the last three years she had learned to tie her shoes one handed, and it felt like her only major accomplishment.

Moth looked up at the walls – only a few of her drawings and dried plants remained pinned up into the wood. Moth had not felt carefree enough for a long while to go out and collect pieces of nature to admire, when everywhere you turned there was a black eye of burns on the landscape. Most of her collections and sketches she had quietly taken down from the walls and thrown away, making room for Ama’s bow and arrow – hung up and gathering dust.

Ama finished dressing and hurried down the stairs with Moth a few feet behind. “I fed the yeast yesterday but the flour is almost gone. It won’t be much for breakfast. Where did Grandpa say he put a new sack?”

“On the shelf by the fireplace.”

“Oh, that’s good, and I–” Ama stopped and whirled around. “Oh, I forgot about the letter desk. I swear I meant to bring it down yesterday, we just had so many farmers in.”

“It’s fine, Ama.”

“No, this is the second time, I’m so sorry. The mending can wait – well, no it can’t, but remind me this evening, I know you want to talk to Tully.”

“There’s the flour,” said Moth, gesturing with her left hand. Her fingers were locked in a curl – not a fist but looking as though she was reaching for something. “I can knead a bit.”

“That’d be a help. Thanks, Moth.”

Ama set her up with the dough for her to knead, and Moth worked her knuckles through it. With enough movement, it allowed her a to bend her fingers a little, but too much bending and the pain was hard to endure.

Ama started making breakfast at the fireplace. She brought the eggs in from outside – less each week as it got colder – and gathered up a bread heel from last night’s dinner. “Mrs. Tunhofe was around yesterday to talk with Dad and Grandpa.”

“Nothing wrong with Camb?” asked Moth.

Ama rolled her eyes. “Nothing will ever be wrong with Camb, Priscilla babies him so much I’m shocked he ever learned to walk. No,” Ama quieted, staring into the egg mixture she was soaking the breadcrust in. “No, she said the soldiers have blocked off part of her wheat fields where the recent fog touched. It goes into her neighbor’s wheat fields too and…well, there’s not going to be much wheat this year for us.”

Moth made sure to scrape up every thread of dough. “We have some set by.”

“Grandpa says it’s not near time enough to be touching on our reserves.”

Moth stepped from her board, and Ama shaped the dough into a loaf and put it near the fire to rise, then helped Moth get a basin of water for her hands.

Moth sunk her hand into the water and watched her fingers uncurl like petals. She smiled. This was the only time her hand felt fully normal – underwater. They moved and curled and twisted, as through nothing had ever happened, as though the snow-white skin on her hands was merely a birthmark, and just as she removed them from the water, it hardened up. Solid and curled.

This was why she loved to do the washing, and insisted she do all of the laundry from the main house as well. Anything to be useful. Moth sat over her washboard and scrubbed and scrubbed until the stains and mud and dust was purged from the fibers of the fabric and was spotless.

With a little difficulty, she could pin them up on a clothesline and watch the patterns ripple in the warm October day.

She dreaded the laundry being done and having nothing left to do but sit in the house and watch Ama do the harder chores, so she took her time. Moth spent most days hunched over her washboard, feeling the joints her back and neck ache – but to be idle felt worse.

*

It was evening. Grandpa Clem sat wrapped up by the fire, shakily writing out letters on his knees to farmers who had left Hiren. Every week he had a stack of letters from families he had known since he was a child. Occasionally, they were from neighboring regions asking him for advice about their farms, and how they should bear the fog and the agricultural restrictions.

His hands were thinner now. They were crinkled and shiny, dotted with liver spots. Each knuckle protruded from his trembling fingers, but still he clung onto his pencil and scrawled out his replies to the families.

Ama inked the letters when he was finished, and set them in letters with stamps, totaling the cost of postage in a book she kept in her pocket. “Really, Grandpa, with all these stamps we could buy a new milk cow.”

Clem sighed. “I should have tried harder to warn people about seeking out Magden for help, so I’m a bit to blame.”

“Hush, you are not,” said Ama, elbowing his knee. “I’ll upend this ink on you.”

Moth watched from the corner, and after about ten minutes stood to leave.

“Moth, are you going to bed already?” asked Clem, looking around the edge of his chair.

“I’m tired,” she said, forcing a smile.

Clem searched her face, but said, “Good night, then. I love you.”

“I love you too.”

“Oh Moth, wait a minute.” Ama leapt up. “Let’s get your letter desk.”

The letter desk was in the attic, which was only accessible through a door on the outside of the house by means of a ladder – Moth had not felt herself capable of climbing the tall ladder and traying to open the latch.

Ama scurried up like a squirrel, flung open the door, and wriggled into the crawlspace. A lot had been moved up into the attic since Ama moved in.

Moth had sent one letter to Tully in the last three years, with a simple letter explaining what had happened. Though Tully had written to her four times, Moth had not responded to anything, and Tully had eventually stopped her efforts – in her last letter from nine months ago, she had written to inform Moth that Aunt Rena had fallen ill and died. Moth had felt too empty to answer.

But an idea had entered Moth’s heart in the last few months, and she pined over it, until it gave her something like hope and she felt she had to write to Tully and tell her the idea.

“Here it is! It was behind the grain bags and all the canned meat.” Ama scooted out and climbed halfway down, handing the heavy, portable letter desk to Moth.

It had been a gift from Norwin a decade ago – he had made it himself. It had a lock on the drawer, and in it Moth kept all her letters from Tully, as well as blank sheets of stationary, envelopes, and postage stamps.

“Thank you Ama,” said Moth, hugging it to her chest.

“I’ll fetch you some ink.”

Moth went to her room and began setting up her desk, blowing a harvestman off the lid. Ama appeared by her with the ink, looking at her eagerly. “I’m glad that–” She paused, trying to think of the words, “you are writing a letter.”

“Thank you, Ama.”

Moth took a deep breath, opened the ink, and began to write. She felt Ama hovering at her side. She had often told Ama what she was writing in her letters, but now it felt private – but she didn’t want to keep it from her either.

“I…I’m writing to tell her I’m sorry that Aunt Rena died.” Moth thought about how to write words that felt like they were too late to comfort. “You know, she died in Imbridon, while visiting her friend. They didn’t even get to bury her.”

“Oh,” said Ama. She kicked her heels against the side of her bed where she sat. “I don’t remember her very well.”

Moth wrote the words she hoped would ease Tully’s heart. It took a while to think of just what to say, and she read and reread what she wrote until it didn’t feel like it meant or said anything anymore. She sighed and moved on.

“Is that all you’re writing?” asked Ama.

Moth knelt at her letter desk, hesitating. “I…” she lifted her head and looked at Ama, her eyes bright, “I have an idea, there’s something I want to do and – oh I want to do it so badly but I don’t know if I’ll be able, but just thinking about it makes me excited.”

Ama sat up, grinning. It had been a long while since she had seen Moth like that. “What is it?”

“Don’t tell anyone, in case Tully says no, but I want to go to Magden,” said Moth, her heart quickening. “My hand works underwater, I’ve gotten good at laundry. Tully’s wash house has gotten bigger in the last few years, and I want her to hire me. I could send the money home to mom and dad – they pay well in the city, I could never make money like that from taking in laundry here.”

As she spoke, the grin faded from Ama’s face.

Moth trailed off.

“You’re leaving?” Ama asked.

Clearing her throat, Moth looked down. “I want to – I hope I can.”

“I can take care of you, Moth, Tully doesn’t need to do that.”

“Ama, you do an amazing job, for me and for Grandpa,” said Moth, but Ama turned her head away. Her fists were clenched. “This is about finances – you know how hard these years have been for Mom and Dad to keep the farm together.”

Ama didn’t answer. Her shoulders trembled.

“You know we need money.”

Ama whipped forward to face Moth, her eyes wide and white. “That’s bullshit!” she shouted. “This is because you feel guilty. You’ve felt guilty for three years! I’m happy to do your chores, I’m happy to take care of you.”

“I don’t want to be taken care of, baby.”

Ama paced back and forth, until she stopped and leaned on the wall. Her voice cracked. “Please don’t leave, Moth.”

Moth reached out to take her hand. “I have to help. I can’t help where I am now.”

Ama jerked her hand away, kicked over her letter desk and ran out of the room. She didn’t return that night to her bed.