Ghoulish Song (9781442427310) (8 page)

“It's not mine!” Kaile insisted. “Not unless someone stole it and swapped it out for a stick of wood without my noticing, and I seriously doubt that.”

Shade made a noise that sounded like a laugh.

Fidlam took no notice of shadow laughs. He turned away and continued to putter around the deck, tugging
ropes and winding cranks. “Certainly one of her leg bones,” he said. “And I'm not sure how she stands without it. Not sure how she's standing at all. Dead a long time. That's a long wait before taking up haunting. Must be that the floods are almost here. She drowned. She's one of the River's dead, and the River lets go of its dead in flood times. Loses track of them. If the drowned are up from their watery rest and walking around unquiet, then the floods are coming soon. If the floods are coming, then I'd best stash my wares and get myself downstream to safer harbor.”

“Please make some sense!” Kaile shouted, frustration spilling over and into her voice. “Tell me where you found this bone!”

“Easy enough,” Fidlam answered, still without looking at her. “The Kneecap's where we're going. We'll be there before the clock moves much.”

The River's Knee was a downstream bend where the River turned from flowing westward to flowing south. A pebble beach covered the northern shore of that bend. Sailors called it the Kneecap.

Fidlam drove his barge up onto the Kneecap with a scraping, grinding sound. Then he gathered his wares together: a comb carved to look like a wingfish in flight, several fishhook charms, the knife with a landscape carved
into the side, a few simple pip-dice, two sets of domini tiles, and all sorts of other trinkets that Kaile didn't recognize. He shoved them into a large wooden crate, and then carried them down the ramp and onto the pebbly shore.

Kaile followed at a distance, cautious but curious. Shade followed Kaile.

The beach was a desolate place. Tree roots and branches, stripped bare and polished smooth, lay on the stones and grasped at the air. Living trees stood watch in a rim around the shore. They looked as gnarled and unforgiving as the driftwood. The steep slope of the ravine wall rose up behind the trees.

Fidlam heaved his crate of bones uphill, toward the trees and the cliff face. There, at the very base of the cliff, he kicked aside a few large pieces of driftwood to reveal a metal strongbox, chained and bolted to the ground.

“Here's where my wares will rest,” he said. “No one else comes poking around on the Kneecap. No one but Fidlam. The sailors all say it's a haunted place.” He laughed at that. “And it is haunted now, certainly, by one little ghoul girl—but the River will rise soon to take back its own. The drowned should stay sleeping in their own River bed.”

Kaile didn't like the sound of that. “I didn't drown,” she said with as much iron in her voice as she knew how to put
there. “I'm not dead. It's just that my shadow doesn't like me very much.”

Fidlam paid her no attention. He opened the strongbox and set the crate inside. “There,” he said, talking to the box as he closed the lid and latch. “This beach is where you drifted with the driftwood, where you came to rest, before I made you into other sorts of pretty things. Now you'll all stay anchored here until the flood comes and goes. If any more of you start walking around to make unquiet mischief, you just keep that mischief contained to the Kneecap and off of my barge.” He gave the lid an affectionate pat. “I'm off to race the flood downstream, but I'll be back for you after.”

Kaile stared at the box. “You carve the bones that wash up on this beach.” Most things that fell from the Fiddleway Bridge washed up on the Kneecap. Kaile knew that. Everyone knew that. “You carve the bones of
people
who wash up on this beach.”

“And birds, and fish, and other things besides,” Fidlam said cheerfully. “Though most birds and fish leave fragile bones. Not nearly so useful.”

He looked at Kaile then. He actually looked at her with his pale and deep-set eyes. The look he gave her was curious and unsettling. She took a step backward, away from him.

“It was a good thing to meet you,” he said. “If you can ever see your way to telling me who pushed you off the bridge, then I'll be sure to track them down—if they still live—and I'll give them a shameful shouting in some public place.”

Kaile shook her head, frustrated. “We're not understanding each other here.” She tried to think of a way to make him actually listen to her. “I'm not—”

Fidlam nodded in a formal farewell. Then he bolted back through the trees and across the beach, pebbles flying behind him. One struck Kaile in the eye.

“Ow!” She forced both eyes open and ran after the bone carver. Her sight was blurry, but she saw him climb the ramp and pull it up behind him.

The barge shuddered into movement, pushing itself away from shore.

Kaile shouted. She pleaded. She dropped her satchel, picked up a pebble, and threw it hard. She missed. The stone splashed and was gone.

Fidlam's barge sailed away downstream, leaving the girl and her separate shadow to haunt the River's Knee.

KAILE ROLLED UP ALL
of her fears and frustrations into one wordless lump of noise, and she shouted that lump across the River. Then she picked up her satchel and waved the flute over her head. “This was never my leg! I'm not dead, I didn't jump off the Fiddleway to drown a broken heart, and the flute isn't my leg bone!”

Shade's dark shape stood beside her.
You also haven't turned into a swan. It might be useful if you did, though.

“I'm not a ghoul, either,” said Kaile. “I'm not haunting Fidlam's barge, wailing ghoulish things and jumping up and down on his cabin roof to make sure he never gets any sleep ever again.” She rubbed her eye, and then forced herself to stop because that only made it tear up again.

You're not a molekey,
said Shade.
You're not anything that could scamper up the side of the cliff to get away from here.

“I'm not a greatfish,” said Kaile. “I'm not swimming in
the River. I'm not ramming the bottom of that barge with my tusks.” She sat down on the beach. Pebbles crunched underneath. “I'm not anything useful.”

Are you something that knows how to make a fire?
Shade asked.
The lantern's still empty, and I don't think there's any lamp oil on the Kneecap. I don't know what'll happen to me when it gets dark. I really don't want to find out.

Kaile noticed how cold she was, surrounded by River winds. She wrapped her shawl tight around her shoulders. “I'm a baker's daughter,” she said. “Of course I can start a fire.” She stood up, glad to have something to do, and began to gather driftwood into a pile. There was plenty of driftwood to gather.

Bones also lay scattered on the beach, but Kaile left those undisturbed.

She stacked large, small, and tiny sticks into a proper pile for fire starting, and then used the lantern flint to light it. The driftwood caught quickly. Soon she had a strong blaze burning.

“There,” said Kaile, satisfied. “I've got warmth, and you've got light.” She sat down beside the bonfire and felt the heat of it soak into her fingers, toes, and face.

Shade sat on the opposite side. She grew darker and stronger beside the bright flames. Kaile could make out the lines of her features.

The wood's burning quickly,
the shadow said, sounding worried.
I hope we have enough to last through the night.

“I'm sure we do,” said Kaile. She wasn't actually sure. She had no idea how quickly they might exhaust their store of driftwood. But she was tired of her shadow's complaining. “Besides, we might not have to spend the whole night here. A passing barge might see the bonfire and come pick us up. Sailors are supposed to help the stranded.”

Maybe,
said Shade.
But this is a boneyard, remember? This is where pieces of the drowned wash up. Fidlam seemed pretty sure that no one else ever comes here. No one but him.

“We'll shout for help when they go by,” Kaile insisted. “Voices are supposed to carry across the River, as long as the River feels inclined to carry voices.”

I'm sure that strange lights and shouting from a haunted place will bring us dozens and dozens of rescuers,
said Shade.
I'm sure that will happen before the floods come and wash us away. I'm just sure of it.
Sarcasm smeared over her words like a glaze over sweet rolls.

“Shut it,” Kaile said. “I bet it won't really flood. The floods are always coming, but they never really get here.”

She watched the River go by. Then she examined the flute in her hand. Her fingers rested comfortably on the stops, as though each stop had been carved with her fingers in mind.

“Grandfather used to sing about the girl who jumped from the Fiddleway,” said Kaile. “The one who maybe turned into a swan.”

I know
, said Shade from the other side of the fire.
I was there, too. I heard. I always listened.

Kaile was uncomfortable with the fact that her shadow, which had always been with her, had always been listening—especially considering how sulky and disgruntled her shadow had turned out to be, now that they could speak to each other.

“Were you the girl who jumped?” Kaile asked the flute. “Was Grandfather playing your song? Did you get a bit cracked, and throw yourself down? Did you get your heart broken, and
then
go a bit cracked? Or did someone else push you, like Fidlam said? Did you wash up here afterward? Would you recognize that song if I sang it to you?”

The flute said nothing—unless a breath of breeze passing through it counted as something.

Kaile hummed the tune until the words of the first verse came to her. It was the only verse she remembered. Her memory caught notes and tunes more easily than it ever took hold of words and lyrics.

“A lovelorn girl from the long bridge fell

To rest in the River's bed.

A heart half-given broke her own,

And words half-given broke instead.

Her mind half-muddled, she believed

She was a lovely, flying thing

And so flung herself down,

And so flung herself down,

And so mad Iren fell down from the bridge.”

She stopped. The tune still broke her own heart a little, but she liked the girl in the song less and less the more she thought about the lyrics. She couldn't remember much of the second verse, in which Iren's fingers grew feathers while she fell.

“Do you remember a customer named Tacklesot?” Kaile asked Shade. Shade said nothing. Kaile went on. “A sailor. He used to come to Broken Wall whenever his barge came through Zombay. He told stories about sailors who despaired about one thing or another and then jumped overboard. Usually they drowned. The River isn't kind to swimmers. But sometimes they got fished out again, either by their own crew or by some other passing barge. Tacklesot said there's not a single living jumper who didn't regret the jump afterward—usually before they even hit the water. Each and every one of them said, ‘Whoops, wish I hadn't done that.' I think he might have been one of the jumpers who got fished out again. He never said so, but I think that's how he knew.”

Shade still said nothing. The fire snapped and crackled between them.

“Did you fling yourself down?” Kaile asked the flute again. “Did you say ‘Whoops' afterward, before you hit the water, just like Tacklesot?”

Nothing and no one answered her. Kaile heard waves against the pebble shore. She heard a distant hum and buzz that might have been the Floating Market. She heard nothing else. She shifted her weight, uncomfortable sitting on small, cold stones, uncomfortable with no voices or music or movement around her. She was accustomed to the bustle, warmth, and company of her family's alehouse. The Kneecap was quiet, empty, and in every way different from Broken Wall.

“Can you hear me over there?” she asked her shadow. “Say something.”

I can hear you,
said Shade.
I've always heard you. I've heard every cruel and selfish thing you have ever muttered under your breath. I heard you yesterday when you tried to tell yourself that nothing was your fault. Mother failed the Inspection. Little Cob Snotfish almost had goblin curses called down on his little head. But that wasn't your fault. None of it was your fault. That's what you tried to tell yourself, and me. I can always hear you, but I don't usually believe you.

Kaile sat stunned and perfectly still. Her face felt flushed
and warm, so she turned it away from the fire and away from her shadow. She felt seething mixtures of anger, embarrassment, shame, and annoyance. Her fingers silently worked the stops of the flute. Then she brought it to her lips.