Arc 2 - Magden
The Wages of Water
The Ferryman - Book 1
Chapter 8:
#14 Mercy Avenue, River Heel District, Magden
The regions skimmed past the window, all the farms and their fields blurred green together, except for the occasional bruise of a prescribed burn.
Soon, the scenery was all green – pristine and untouched by fire, but it was split by an enormous river. Moth knew it must be the Wylle river; though the river did not flow through Hiren, its distributaries led deep into Hiren and fed its ponds.
The train crossed a bridge that spanned the bend of the river, and the temperature of the train dropped with the cold water rushing below. Moth clutched onto her seat and tried not to think about the bridge, which was just a bundle of rusted iron and bug-eaten wood.
Across the river the landscapes changed from farms to clusters of worker villages sprouting up on the massive properties of business magnates – the workers who lived in them were gone to Magden to work in the factories.
The train pulled into its station on the edge of Magden, passing through a tangle of railways, with other enormous trains waiting on their tracks, chimney’s chuffing with smoke and eager to be moving.
Their train screeched and rumbled as it slowed down – as it had been slowing down steadily for the last mile – and finally it came to a full stop at Magden Station. The station was freshly painted in red and green, with trimmings of brass that winked in the light. It was full of people bustling with their luggage and families, and more smoke from pipes and cigarettes that clogged the air with the trains.
Nearby were trains meant for transport, having no passenger cars, full of lumber, or crates of animals and produce, and Moth marveled at the food being unloaded, the sheer amount being brought onto the platform by swarms of workers.
Mrs. Tunhofe took Moth’s arm to anchor her back to reality, and Moth gathered up their luggage – between the two of them, they just managed to get it all off the train in one trip, landing it on a bench so they could wait out the flurry of passengers receding form the station like low tide.
“Opal!”
They looked up. A graying woman with a massive hat shuffled across the platform, waving to Mrs. Tunhofe. “Opal, sweetness, hello!”
“Ellewig, how are you?” Mrs. Tunhofe quickly put out her pipe as Ellewig glowered at it with flared nostrils.
“Worse with the smell I can tell you. But come on – oh hello baby, you must be Mere,” said Ellewig, shaking Moth’s hand. She wore large, hard rings. “Anyways, come along, I can’t be late home I’m hosting a party and I need to skim by the market as well. Get into the carriage, the man driving it is drunk and I think he might forget he’s waiting for me.”
Mrs. Tunhofe searched the near-vacant platform and squinted at Moth. “When’s Tully supposed to show up and get you?”
“It’s my Aunt Violet who’s coming to get me. She wrote she’d be a half-hour after we arrived.”
Ellewig stared at her wristwatch and turned her eyes on Mrs. Tunhofe. “I don’t have a half hour, Opal.”
Moth gathered her luggage around her and said, “You can go, Mrs. Tunhofe, she’ll be here after work.”
Mrs. Tunhofe pursed her lips, but Ellewig grabbed her by the arm and said, “How considerate! Let’s hurry, Opal, or the market will be picked over.”
“Mere, are you sure?”
“She lives very nearby; she gave me directions in her letter. Even if she’s running late, it’s not a journey to get me.”
Ellewig tugged on her elbow, and Mrs. Tunhofe sighed and said, “Alright. Goodbye, Mere, it may be a year before I see you again.” She gave Moth a kiss on the forehead and was dragged from the platform by Ellewig.
Moth waved goodbye, and they were gone and she was alone on the platform.
Trains rumbled out of Magden Station, and workers chatted in the maze of the railway yard, their voices muffled by a sharp wind. Nearby, the looming face of a clock – set high on the train station – ticked away the minutes, and Moth kept glancing at it, wondering just how late Aunt Violet intended to be.
She ate the rest of the dried fruit from lunch, though the hollow feeling in her stomach filled her up. Even the sounds of Magden were foreign to her; all metal noises, even in the voices of its people, even in the tick of its clocks. She tried to take comfort in a familiar sky, but it was muted by a low smog.
Moth glanced at the clock again. Aunt Violet was over an hour late.
Time kept passing, and the sun made its way down the sky, and Moth became afraid it would be dark and Aunt Violet would still not arrive. Taking a deep breath, Moth crossed the station and waved at an attendant smoking behind a hopper car.
He coughed when he was discovered, waving his smoke away. “Yes? Ma’am?”
“Which way is the River Heel District?”
He tilted his head, sounding out what she said. “Which way to what? You’re accent is – did you say Rare Hill?”
“River Heel District?” repeated loudly Moth, half in despair.
“Oh! Head straight out pass the clock, into the city proper, and then just walk down north – you’ll be knee-deep in no time.”
“Thank you.” Moth got back on the platform, looped her carpet back over her armed and lugged her trunk after her, heading out of the platform and into Magden.
Once she was out of the railway yard, and the brackish smell of smoke and oil dissipated, she was hit with the smell of stale, stagnant gutters, the off-wash of cramped living heated by the sun and congealed into the cracks of the cobblestones – worse than any barn Moth had ever been in, and her eyes watered with the fumes.
The buildings were towering, with ornate trim and thousands of windows glowing in the sun, yet the stones were packed with soot and smoke and rust dripped from the eaves.
Unwatched children chased each other down alleyways, making up games and drawing on the sidewalk with charcoal. Despite not being from a city, it was clear to her she was not in the more affluent part of town, and the further she headed towards the River Heel, the shabbier and dirtier the streets and buildings became, with some buildings having broken windows boarded up, or stretches of laundry on strings hung over the narrow road, dripping down on Moth’s head.
The further she went, the louder the river got. Soon the houses thinned, and Moth stood at the top of gently inclined path leading down towards the river.
A woman sat, half asleep on the stoop of her house, with a bucket of scrap metal she was sorting through at her feet. Moth approached her and asked, “Do you know which way to Mercy Avenue?”
The woman raised her eyebrows. “Why?”
“I…need to get there.”
“What’s on Mercy?”
“My cousin. I’m visiting her.”
The woman glanced down at Moth’s shoes – the toes of it covered in flattened thimbles – and said, “Starting a cult here? We have enough as is, girly. Don’t need to add a ferryman into our problems, eh?”
Moth stared at the woman, then down at her feet, and then down the road towards the river. Not knowing how to respond, Moth nodded her head to the woman and walked away, hoping she was headed in the right direction.
She saw a young boy throwing rocks into the river, and she said, “Do you know the way to Mercy Avenue?”
He wiped his nose and nodded upriver.
Moth thanked him and hurried, her arm sore with dragging her luggage behind her, and her elbow cramped from holding up her carpet bag. She squinted at the signs and read the different street names, until she felt a such of relief when she saw Mercy Avenue pointing her down the road with a tarnished green sign.
The street, liked all the streets, were rowhouses, with one long, shared roof like a road of slate shingles, punctured by brick chimneys. Each house had a number over its door, and Moth followed them until she reached #14.
Its faded blue door waited. Moth smoothed her skirt and knocked on the door.