The Ferryman - Book 1

Chapter 81:

More Caught by the Apron Strings

The night was deep and heavy with clouds that swallowed up the moon – it settled over Poor Loom as if it were deep underwater.

Even as dawn neared, the usual glow that announced the coming sunrise was denied behind the cloud cover, and so midnight and dawn looked much the same – the only way to tell was the timely, unerring birdsong. They always knew despite the darkness that it was morning.

Moth walked out into the shadowed dawn, holding a lantern in a hand that still smelled like Ama’s blood.

She went through the grove, mindful of the path and the roots that writhed across it, took the bend she had taken before, and passed between the twin aspens, until she reached the maghouse.

Even in the lightlessness, the structure was gloriously red and her lantern lit it up like fire.

“Nokk?” Moth called, her voice hoarse and broken.

In the grove the murmuring of the magpies could be heard somewhere overhead, and, soon, Nokk emerged from the low and sacred darkness and landed on the perch of the maghouse.

“Nokk, I…” Moth began, but her body began to shudder, and she clutched a hand over her mouth. “Oh Nokk, please!” she gasped, and the world shifted under her and she fell at the foot of the maghouse and couldn’t breathe.

It was all on her at once.

“The farmers…they’re going to kill me.” She could barely speak through the choking fear in her throat, her voice came out in shuddering gasps. “They’re going to kill me – the sunstones, I…Oh, Nokk, help me!”

Nokk flew down and wedged his large feathered body between her arms, and pressed his head to her neck. He made a growling purr, and Moth’s heart – which was chewing itself to pieces, settled down into a small painful throbbing.

Moth clutched onto him and sobbed.

The ofere had been her choice – she had put her life into her own hands.

Appearing before the farmers, after promising hope, and not having the sunstones needed – it was going to turn into an execution.

“I don’t want to die,” she whispered to Nokk. “But I can’t run. I have to face them.”

Nokk tilted his head and nuzzled her, but his eyes were wide with the limited understanding of a holy bird.

“Please,” said Moth, “will you take a message to Lord Correb for me?”

When Nokk nodded, she hugged herself as she composed her thoughts. As she tried to speak, the panic set in again – she kept swallowing her sobs to stay coherent for the patient bird.

“My siblings went to get the sunstones, but on their way back they were attacked. Ama fled through Picky Woods, but Quin – Quin used the forest against her and she lost the sunstones. The sunstones…are gone. Please help me, I don’t know what to do.”

As she spoke, more magpies gathered on the maghouse, leaning forward while glancing at each other. When she was done, Nokk nodded solemnly, but unlike usual, he didn’t repeat back the words.

Moth said urgently, “I sent a message before to Lord Correb, but that magpie never returned.”

Nokk nodded again. He jumped up to the maghouse, calling to the five or so other magpies, and they all began chirruping the message in a cacophony of words.

“Picky Woods.”

“Lost the Sunstones.”

“Gone.”

They called and called, until all the magpies in the grove gathered, about two dozen, and began repeating her message over and over like learning a song, and then, in a rush of feathers, they all rose up as one with Nokk leading, and were gone – leaving Moth alone at Poor Loom.

The grove was quiet. Moth had only her thoughts now.

Even if the message reached the ferryman, Moth feared he couldn’t do anything in time.

The day was stronger now, she blew out her lamp and could see the light behind the clouds, and she knew – it was Saturday. Tomorrow sat behind another sunrise, and she would have to explain to Hiren why their hope was gone.

If she wasn’t worrying about the farmers and sunstones, she was worrying about her brothers. How long will the sentries keep Ira and Nehem? What will they do to them?

Finally, Moth stood. She kept a hand over her nauseated stomach and wandered back towards the house.

There was nothing to do about the sunstones or the farmers until tomorrow, but today she could begin to help her captured brothers.

*

Ama slept deeply, buried under blankets on the stove bed.

One of her hands had slipped out from the blankets and dangled over the edge.

Moth watched Ama’s breathing and the rhythm of her eyes fluttering under her eyelids. She always has her hand poking out, ever since she was a baby, Moth thought.

The small joy she could focus on was that Ama was not blind under the swollen eye – the wounds, though nasty, were not deep. Ama would be alright, in time.

Moth began to make soup on the stove – even this noise could not rouse Ama from her sleep, which Moth was grateful for. While she heated up the pot and chopped the carrots and potatoes, Moth turned her mind to what she could do for Nehem and Ira – who could she send.

The back door of the house groaned open and Lt. Grotte shuffled in tiredly, straw stuck to her clothes and hair.

While Moth had been tending to Ama, Lt. Grotte had tended to Aggo – there was a lot more wounds to tend to on that giant horse, and it’d kept Lt. Grotte busy. Even when she had finished cleaning Aggo’s wounds and feeding and watering him, Lt. Grotte had opted to sleep in the stall with him to make sure.

Judging by how she took care of her own horse, Moth suspected Lt. Grotte had a tender heart for horses.

“How’s your sister?” Lt. Grotte asked, settling at last in her favored chair.

“She’s mending. Her eye will be fine.” Moth scraped the vegetables into the pot. “How’s Aggo?”

“He took more of a hit than Ama. His face got it something awful – amazingly he’s not blind, I don’t see how he managed that. But he’s a tough one, he’s going to be fine with proper care and rest.”

Moth nodded. “Thank you for taking care of him. I couldn’t even think about him until I tended to Ama.”

“Glad I was here.” Lt. Grotte, tired though she was, seemed restless. She kept jiggling her feet, shifting her weight in the chair, then at last stood up to stand by the fire and light a cigarette, sucking on the smoke. At last she said to Moth, scratching and scratching her neck as she talked but unable to lift her eyes, “Will you tell me how this happened to the kid? Don’t bullshit me – was it sentries?”

Moth was not sure she should trust anyone with the knowledge of the sunstones. How could she explain Aggo and Ama’s sudden appearance, their sudden wounds?

As she thought of how to answer, her hesitation seemed to answer some fear Lt. Grotte had.

Lt. Grotte had to bite her knuckle to stifle a barrage of curses. She stormed out into the backyard and kicked over an old hen cage and a pile of logs, shouting incoherently.

Shocked, Moth ran out to her. “Sabine! What is it?”

“Oh, hell, we are done. I should just go – maybe the mountain?” Lt. Grotte pushed back her wild hair and struggled for air.

“Please, calm down,” Moth urged, taking her arm.

Lt. Grotte did not calm down. She pointed towards the house, at Ama. “A Hevwed just got jumped by some sentries and you want me to calm down? I mean, hell, we’re going to go up in flames – this is it, it’s the tin cry, the sentries are going to get piked – I’m going to get piked – Hiren will be–”

“It was in Lad!”

Lt. Grotte stopped. She looked down at Moth, befuddled enough to snap her out of her collapse. “What…was your own doing in Lad?”

Moth took a breath and said, slowly, “I asked Nehem, Ira, and Ama to go to Lad. I had left a load of valuables hidden there. We were worried it would get taken

by the sentries if they went down the main road, and so they took the long way around but got detained. Ama escaped through a thorn forest.”

Lt. Grotte unsteadily grabbed onto the wall of the house for support. “…And your valuables?”

“Lost.”

“Gems?” she asked.

Moth stiffened, meeting Lt. Grotte’s wary eyes, and nodded.

“There was a bag jammed under the saddle. I put it in your room, on your bed. It’s a goodly amount – there was more?”

Heart pounding, Moth felt joy that even one satchel survived. It would not be enough, but to have even a little to show the farmers was a relief. Breathing in, Moth said, “Six bags got lost. Torn to shreds and scattered.”

“Six!” Lt. Grotte echoed, sitting on the railing of the back porch. “Well, that is a shame. And you were right to try and avoid the outpost – seeing all that glitter, I can only imagine the temptation that’d overcome a sentry.”

Moth – too tired, too weary – hastily wiped tears from her eyes. “I’ll have to send a letter to dad, tell him where Nehem and Ira are. I can’t leave Ama.”

“Well, I can watch Ama, why can’t you just go get your brothers?” asked Lt. Grotte, puzzled. “Nothing a sentry fears more than an angry rich person – you go there all decked out, in full regalia, and throw a huge tantrum, you’ll get your brothers out in no time.”

Moth was shocked. “They’ll release them? They purposely evaded capture, they even attacked the sentries!”

“True though that is, I’m sure the sentries weren’t supposed to be there. Two, alone, waiting for three people on horses? Have a feeling that wasn’t ordained by their lieutenant – they probably wanted Aggo and suspecting they were carrying something valuable. They’ll be as much in trouble as your brothers if they told the

truth. My guess is they’re keeping your brothers for as long as possible to get information from them.” Lt. Grotte thought it over, and then nodded in agreement with herself. “Yeah, go there and throw a tantrum, act like a royal, they’ll be out the same day.”

“I have to stay here – the farmers are expecting me on Sunday, and…I wish I could explain it all to you but–”

“I’m sure its some ferrier business I don’t get, offering magpies to a puddle or something,” muttered Lt. Grotte. She thought hard. “Well, who can go for you? Do you know someone who knows rich people well enough to act like a royal pain, maybe get some of your jewelry to play the part?”

Moth faintly thought long ago to Amanda from the washhouse, but she shook her head.

Then she realized.

She looked at Lt. Grotte. “Could you deliver a letter to the Pehku Inn for me?”

*

Charlotte Casswork stood in the kitchen of Poor Loom, looking first at Ama’s mangled body, and then at Moth – who was sleep-deprived and stressed – standing in the aftermath of a thousand poultices, the whole place still reeking of honey and mapmoss.

“Hm,” Charlotte said, plucking a stray scrap of bandage off her skirt. “This place looks different from when I was a child. Patri, Quin, and I…well, Lt. Grotte, this place is much improved for your removal of some of its décor.”

“Don’t much care for teeth.”

“I’ve no palate for it myself,” she said in a friendly way, smiling at her own joke but waning when Lt. Grotte looked at her blankly. “Alright, please, Mere – why did you ask for me?”

Moth struggled to know where to begin, but Lt Grotte chimed in, saying enthusiastically, “Can you throw a tantrum?”

Charlotte’s smile froze in place. She looked at both sleep-deprived women and said crisply, pointing sternly at Lt. Grotte, “You make coffee. And you,” she said to Moth, as she swept her skirts aside to sit down elegantly on a chair, “Explain. Use words – full sentences. And from the beginning, for goodness’ sake.”

Moth wobbled and sat down as Lt. Grotte hurried to make coffee.

She was feeling a touch lost, when Charlotte took her hand and added kindly, “At your own pace.”

Nodding, Moth breathed and began slowly. “I asked Nehem, Ira, and Ama to go to Lad and get something from Lord Correb for me – valuables,” said Moth.

She emphasized the ferryman’s role in this, which had the desired effect – Charlotte pressed her mouth together and looked nervous.

“But the sentries detained Ira and Nehem – Ama only just managed to escape through a thorn forest. I would go there to get them, but I need to meet the farmers tomorrow. Would you be willing to go in my place, and demand they be released? You’d need to look regal, and act regal, to have the effect Lt. Grotte suspects will work on them.”

“Throw a tantrum,” emphasized Lt. Grotte again. “You know how rich people are.”

Charlotte paused, and then nodded, her eyes distant and tense with memories from working in a high-level inn. “Oh yes,” she said. “I know how they are.”

“Could you…act like that?” asked Moth. “I’d lend you my clothes.”

“The beaded shawls with the gold coil tassels – oh and the blister pearl shoes,” Charlotte said at once. “They’ll be a little big but I’ll double up the socks. And the two gold torcs.”

“You’ll…you’ll do it?” Moth asked, amazed.

Charlotte raised her eyebrows. “Of course I’ll do it. For two reasons: I hate sentries, and I trust our ferryman. He’s done right by my family; I’ll do right by his. I’ll take my own horse – he’s no Aggo, but he looks enough the part, and I’ll take a maid and a servant too. I’ll make those dirt guards regret they ever saw your brothers.”

Overwhelmed, Moth grabbed her hands and thanked her profusely.

Charlotte charmingly waved away the thanks.

“Oh, but please,” added Moth. “Don’t tell anyone that this happened to my brothers or Ama. It might be delaying the inevitable, but I don’t want to cause a tin cry. No one should know they were ever on this trip.”

Charlotte glanced at Lt. Grotte, who was looking visibly relieved. Charlotte agreed reluctantly, and said, “I don’t want a tin cry either. People already think my family sides with the dirt guard because we lend rooms to the ranked officers that visit – Hiren would burn down the inn, and my mother’s far too sick to travel, even on a good day. You can trust me with this, Lady Korraban – I’ll save your brothers.”