Janni Simner - Bones of Faerie

I turned around. The way behind was dark, too. The only light seemed to be the twilight around us, which was already fading to gray. Matthew fumbled with the plastic torch. It flared to life, producing a wide beam of light. That should have dispelled the shadows nearest us, but they drew closer to the light, as if for warmth.

“Ow!” A length of shadow lashed at Allie's arm. She jerked back. Blood soaked through a jagged gash in her sleeve. She pressed her hand against it, muttering words I hadn't thought she knew.

Another shadow snaked around the torch. The torch sizzled like wet firewood, flickered, and went out. Around us, trees began to groan. Something cold slashed my cheek, breaking skin. “Go away!” I shouted.

The shadows drew back. The trees fell silent. The twilight brightened around us.

Matthew drew a breath. “Keep saying it, Liza. Just— keep saying it.”

I did so, chanting like a child afraid of the dark. “Go away.” Matthew lit the torch once more. “Go away, go away, go away.” The shadows kept their distance, staying a few dozen yards back on all sides.

Magic flows in both directions, Karin said. If I could call things to me, I could also push them back.

“Go away.” We walked on. I kept ordering the darkness back, and it kept retreating. That darkness happily would have swallowed us whole, if not for my words.

If not for my magic.

“Go away.” Rebecca shifted in her sling and reached for my hair. Allie walked as close behind me as she could, her footsteps landing where mine had been. Her braid was in her mouth again, and she chewed it as she walked. On her shoulders, Tallow hissed and swiped at something in the dark. Behind them, Matthew's movements were slower, more fluid, even as he hunched beneath the pack.

“Go away.” I prayed Matthew was right that magic could be controlled. Because my magic was all that stood between us and the dark.

We walked through the night. My voice grew hoarse as time passed. For a while the white torchlight held, much steadier than oil or burning wood.

Bluffs rose to either side of us, holding shadows of their own: a shadow arm with a dangling charm bracelet, a shadow boot kicking the air as if to get free, a shadow face staring at us from within a hillside, its mouth open as in surprise, a poplar root growing through one of its shadow eyes.

When the torchlight dimmed from white to yellow and then went out, we quickly changed the batteries in the dark while I shouted as loudly as I could to keep the trees away. My throat ached after that, and my chest, too, but I didn't stop.

“Go away.” I thought of Mom, alone in this darkness with no magic to protect her. Yet if my visions were true, somehow she'd found a way through to the Arch.

An owl hooted, but it, too, kept its distance. The moon rose, casting thin beams of light through the dark web around us. Rain began to fall, soaking my hair and turning the road to mud. That rain fell right through Rebecca and puddled beneath her in the sling. I drew the raincloak over her.

The trees started moaning again, stretching toward the water but drawing back at my words. The air grew chill, from rain or shadows, I couldn't tell. Clouds covered the moon.

“Go away.” Each word took strength. As if it weren't only my words but something deeper inside me that pushed the shadows back. I grew weary with the effort of that pushing.

Ahead, through gaps among the shadows, I saw patches of pale light.

Dawn. My legs went weak at the sight. I stumbled but kept speaking. Allie bumped into me and let out a startled cry. Rebecca started awake and made small fussy sounds.

I rocked her as I kept walking. My legs felt heavy as stone, but I didn't dare stop. The road turned north. Water carved rivulets through the mud and around patches of black rock. Each step, each word, took more work than the last. I struggled to keep my eyes open and my lips moving. “Go away.”

The rain let up. The clouds pulled apart like carded wool. Sunlight set the clouds ablaze just as our torch dimmed to yellow again. Matthew clicked it off. To the east, beyond the bluffs, light glinted off distant water.

Something else shone in the distance ahead. A silver rainbow, beginning amid the trees but arching high above them. Silver drew my gaze up and up, even as I caught my breath. Metal reflected the morning sun, far brighter than Kate's mirror. I forced my gaze away, though I yearned to keep looking upward.

“So that's the Arch,” Allie whispered.

Just like in my visions. Just like on Caleb's disk. “Mom,” I said, and tried to walk faster.

My legs wouldn't listen. It was all I could do to keep lifting first one, then the other. Rebecca's sling dug into my shoulder. The road climbed toward the top of the bluffs. Up ahead, another road met it.

This crossroads formed a larger clearing than the last. Slabs of black stone shone in the sun. I staggered as I neared its center, but no shadows of the dead reached for me from under this hill. No visions filled my sight. Ash and cypress stretched shadow branches toward us, but the clearing was too wide. The shadows couldn't reach.

I fell to my knees and let my voice go silent. Maybe I could afford to rest here, just for a moment.

Matthew knelt beside me. I leaned, trembling, into his arms, barely remembering to shield him from Rebecca with my own arms as I did. I was so very tired.

“Liza.” Matthew's arms tightened around me. He smelled of rain and wet wool. “You got us through.”

I shook my head. “Not yet.” There was still more forest and more shadow between us and the Arch. We had to keep walking. I stumbled to my feet, took a few steps, and fell again. Allie cried out. This time she and Matthew both helped me lie down.

I tried to sit up and felt Matthew's firm hand on my shoulder. “If anyone could go on it'd be you, Liza. But even you need to rest after a night like that.”

I shook my head, but when I closed my eyes, I couldn't find the energy to open them again.

“Don't worry,” Matthew said. “I'll keep watch.”

I didn't have the strength to protest any further. Yet even in sleep I felt the trail beneath my feet and saw shadows reaching for me out of the dark.

I woke what seemed moments later and found the sun past noon. I shifted Rebecca's weight gently as I sat up. Her cold hand brushed my cheek.

Matthew handed me a water bottle. I drank deeply. My throat hurt when I swallowed. “Thank you.” My voice came out scratchy and dry.

“Thank you,” Matthew said. “For keeping us alive last night.”

Allie slept on a blanket beside us, her face resting on one hand. Tallow was pressed up against the girl's back with a paw tangled in her hair, which had mostly fallen out of its braid.

The tree shadows were gone now that the sun was up, and any human shadows remained beneath the earth, beyond calling or wanting to be called. This crossroads was nowhere near as bad as the other one, whether because fewer people had died here or because they'd died more completely, I didn't know.

I stood, stretching my legs—and caught my breath. From the hilltop I clearly saw both River and Arch.

The River lay downslope to the east, so close I almost could have shot an arrow to it. The Mississippi—it made the Meramec look like little more than a creek. By the near shore willows trailed branches into the water. The far shore was a half mile away, maybe more. Between the banks green-brown water flowed relentlessly south, ribbons of light rippling on its surface. I stared, but no visions caught me. No magic of mine could stop this River's flow to make it reflect like metal or glass. I heard the River's murmur even from where I stood. My breathing slowed to match the sound.