The Sweet Far Thing
Page 126

Ann pulls her away from the boat’s edge. “You don’t want to know.”
“But they’re so beau’iful!” Mae stretches a hand toward the water.
“Do you know how they stay so pretty? They take your skin and bathe in it,” Ann announces.
“Blimey!” With a horrified expression, Mae snaps her hand back and gets to her rowing.
The river rounds a bend. Fog rolls in again, as thick and white as clouds. The boat comes to rest beside a patch of frozen shore.
“Can you see anything?” Pippa asks, cupping a hand over her eyes and peering through the brume.
“Nuffin’,” Bessie answers. She holds fast to her stick.
“Anything could be out there, waiting,” Ann says quietly.
The boat will go no farther. It seems to have decided the destination for us. A plank lowers and we scramble off. The ship drifts back into the blanket of fog and is gone.
“Wot we gonna do now?” Mae asks. “’Ow we gonna get back?”
Bessie gives her a quick slap on the arm. “Shut it! We’re goin’ on.”
The fog is heaviest here; the landscape intrudes like a phantom. We walk through a barren forest with trees like stunted ghosts. Gnarled branches pierce the mist here and there. It’s quiet. Not a sound penetrates except for the ragged cadence of our breathing.
Something brushes against my shoulder, making me gasp. I turn round, seeing nothing. It comes again. Above me. I look up to see a bare foot swaying.
“Oh, God,” I gasp.
A woman’s body hangs from a branch. Sharp twigs wrap themselves around her neck, securing her to the tree. Her skin has turned the graying brown of the bark, and her fingernails are curved and yellowed. Her eyes are closed, and I’m grateful for it.
But she’s not the only one. Now I see them in the mist, all around us. Bodies hang from the trees like ghastly fruit. An unholy harvest.
“G-Gemma,” Ann whispers. Her eyes are wide and I can sense the scream that she’s holding back, that we all hold back.
Pippa looks at the bodies with a combination of revulsion and sorrow. “I’m not like that. I’m not,” she says, starting to cry.
Felicity draws Pip away. “Of course you’re not.”
“I want to go back. Back to Spence. To life. I can’t be here anymore. I can’t!” Pippa’s on the verge of hysteria. Fee strokes her hair, tries to comfort her with private murmurings.
“This is where them ghouls would’ve taken us if not for Miss Pippa,” Bessie says. With a sharp pull, she rips a bit of filthy fabric free of a corpse’s hem, wraps it around her stick, and hands the stick to Ann. “You light it so we can see. I don’ like fire.”
Ann pulls matches from inside her dress. She strikes four to no avail. “They must’ve gotten wet on the boat.”
Bessie is adamant. “I’m not goin’ through there wif no torch.” I lay my hand on the stick and put the magic to its purpose. The torch flares to life.
I am repulsed, and yet I have to know, so I reach toward the swinging arms of one of the bodies. I touch the cold, hard hand, and in my fright, a bit of magic escapes. The body jerks, and I jump back.
“Gemma…,” Ann gasps.
A fierce wind shakes the bodies in the trees, rattling them like leaves. Their eyes snap open, black as pitch and ringed in blood. A dreadful chorus of high-pitched shrieks and moans and low, angry growls of suddenly wakened beasts rises in the forest, clamors in our ears. Underneath it all, I hear a terrible refrain scratching itself into my soul: “Sacrifice, sacrifice, sacrifice…”
“Gemma, what did you do?” Ann wails.
“Turn back!” I shout.
We’ve gone no more than a few steps when the path disappears under our feet.
“Which way?” Mercy shrieks, running in circles.
Wendy stumbles forward, feeling the empty space with frantic arms. “Don’t leave me, Mercy!”
“I don’t know!” I shout. Circe said to stay to the river, but she said nothing about this. Either she lied or she doesn’t know. Either way, we’re alone, without aid.
Suddenly, a voice drifts through the din, calm and clear. “This way. Quickly…”
A path of light appears in the frozen grass and ice.
“Come on! This way!” I call. Brandishing the torch, I hurry through the trees, following the thin ribbon of light. Bodies kick and grab at us, and it is all I can do not to scream. A man reaches for Pippa, and Felicity’s sword is swift. His severed hand flies, and he howls in outrage.