Ch. 93. The Far Side of The Bridge

Chapter 93: The Far Side of the Bridge

Alistair made me hold a feather in the air while he tried to hit me.

I had questions about this method.

He answered the first with a wooden sword against my shoulder.

“You were looking at the feather.”

“You told me to keep it floating.”

“I also told you to defend yourself.”

Melody sat on the low wall beside the practice yard, eating an apple.

The feather drifted toward her.

She caught it.

“Dead again.”

“Only bruised,” Alistair said.

“I was speaking to the feather.”

I rolled my shoulder.

Above us, the sky had the low, heavy appearance it acquired before snow.

I had been able to feel the approaching weather since waking. A pressure beyond the walls. Moisture waiting in the air.

Keeping a feather still should have been easy.

It was easy.

Until someone swung a sword at my head.

We tried again.

This time, I held the feather just outside my attention and watched Alistair’s shoulders.

His first strike came low.

I turned it aside.

The second would have caught my ribs if I had not stepped back.

The feather rose sharply.

“Less,” he said.

I eased the power.

He advanced.

I gave ground, caught his blade, and felt a brief, satisfying moment in which everything held.

Then a gust crossed the yard.

The feather vanished over the wall.

Melody watched it go.

“I think that one survived.”

Alistair lowered his sword.

“So did you.”

I bent with my hands on my knees.

“Was that the lesson?”

“One of them.”

He waited until I looked up.

“You can put more strength into almost anything now. That won’t always help you do two things at once.”

Snow began to fall.

A single flake caught on his sleeve.

Then another.

By midday, the courtyard had turned white.

The children watched it from Evelyn’s arms and mine, though I suspected they were mostly interested in the window.

Carol followed a flake until it disappeared against the stone.

Her eyes remained on the place where it had been.

Garrick yawned.

“A considered response,” Evelyn said.

“He has never had to clear a path.”

“Neither has Carol.”

“She appears willing to supervise.”

We stood there for a little while.

Then Mary knocked.

She brought a message from Stoneford.

A wagon carrying Hester Fen’s timber and linen had failed to arrive at the healing house.

The driver’s boy had reached the nearest farm on foot.

The bridge beneath the house had partly collapsed.

I passed Garrick to Helena, who had just come through the adjoining door.

“How many?”

“Three on the wagon. The driver, his boy, and a carpenter. The boy got clear before the approach gave way.”

“The others?”

“Alive when he left.”

Mary held out the page.

“The wagon is hanging over the stream.”

Eliza met me at the gate with ropes, harnesses, and four guards.

Eleanor arrived carrying her coat rather than wearing it.

“Wait.”

She put one arm through a sleeve while walking.

“I’m coming.”

“Do we need more people?”

“We need enough room to work.”

Alistair handed me my gloves.

Melody had already gone through to help ready the horses.

Before I stepped onto the gate platform, Evelyn caught my hand.

Her fingers were warm.

“Send word when they’re safe.”

“I will.”

She looked at my face for a moment, then let go.

There was no time for a longer goodbye.

I was grateful we did not spend what little we had pretending there was.

The road north of Stoneford was worse than it had been on our first visit.

Snow hid the ruts. Water ran beneath a thin crust of ice near the ditches.

We rode as quickly as the footing allowed.

At a farm halfway up the rise, a boy waited beneath a cart shelter with a blanket around his shoulders.

He stood when he saw us.

“My father—”

“Show us,” Eliza said.

He climbed behind one of the guards.

His name was Tobin.

He spoke in bursts as we rode.

A wheel had dropped.

His father had shouted for him to jump.

The carpenter had been in the back beside the timber.

Then the wall at the side of the bridge had fallen outward.

“Is the horse still there?” I asked.

“I don’t know.”

He sounded ashamed.

“You did well getting help,” Eliza told him.

He held the guard’s coat tighter.

We rounded the bend.

I heard the water before I saw the bridge.

The stream I remembered had become a fast, brown torrent.

Broken branches rolled in it.

The wagon lay crooked across the remains of the bridge, its rear wheels below the level of the road. One shaft had snapped. The horse stood on the far bank, trembling in the ruined harness.

A man crouched near its head.

Hester was there too.

She shouted when she saw us, but the water swallowed the words.

The driver clung to the wagon seat.

Farther back, beneath the sloping stack of timber, someone moved an arm.

Then the wagon shifted.

I reached for it.

Air struck beneath the rear axle.

The whole load lurched upward.

The driver cried out.

“Hold there!” Eleanor snapped.

I froze.

A timber slid half a hand’s breadth toward the man trapped beneath it.

I could lift the wagon.

That was the first thing my power told me.

Eleanor was already telling me why I should not.

“Two loads,” she said, crouching at the broken edge. “Wagon and timber. Lift them together and those boards may go through him.”

I spread the force beneath the bed instead.

The weight settled against me.

Heavy.

Uneven.

I could feel the water hitting the hanging wheel through the strain of holding it still.

“Better,” Eleanor said.

Eliza sent two guards upstream to look for a place to cross.

Melody lay flat and edged onto the surviving stonework with a rope around her waist.

Alistair took the rope.

I kept my eyes on the wagon.

“Can you hear me?” I called.

The driver turned his head.

Blood ran from his brow into one eye.

“Yes.”

“Stay where you are.”

“My leg’s caught.”

“We’re coming.”

The man beneath the timber made a sound.

I could not make out the words.

Then I saw his bare fingers against the sideboard.

Moving.

I fixed my attention on them.

The driver came free first.

Melody reached him along the higher side of the bridge. Eliza followed far enough to pass a second rope.

There was a buckle caught around his boot.

It took longer than I liked.

Everything took longer than I liked.

Water struck the wagon again.

I tightened my hold without meaning to.

The broken wheel rose.

“Uriah,” Eleanor said.

I eased it down.

The driver crawled toward Melody, dragging one leg.

When they reached firm ground, Tobin ran to him.

Eliza caught the boy by the shoulder before he reached the broken stones.

“Here. Let him come here.”

The driver gripped his son’s coat with both hands.

I looked away before the relief distracted me.

“Carpenter next.”

Eleanor nodded.

“His name’s Bram.”

She had managed to hear him.

I was glad someone had.

Bram lay twisted beneath three lengths of timber.

One pinned his thigh.

Another rested against his chest.

The third had caught beneath the wagon rail and was holding the others from sliding farther.

Eleanor studied it.

Then she looked at me.

“I need the top piece moved toward the road.”

“How far?”

“A hand’s breadth first.”

I found the weight of it.

Wet wood.

A long, stubborn shape wedged against two others.

The wagon dipped.

Alistair’s hand closed around my upper arm.

“Keep the first hold.”

“I am.”

“You’re changing it.”

I stopped.

Snow melted against my face.

The feather.

I could not look at both things.

But I could keep one where I had left it.

I settled the wagon into the broad cradle of air beneath it and held that pressure steady.

Then I reached for the timber again.

It shifted.

Eleanor raised a hand.

“Enough.”

Melody slipped a rope around the exposed end.

We moved it together.

A little lift.

A pull.

The timber scraped across the sideboard and fell onto the road.

Bram cried out.

Maelin had not come with us.

Neither had Ilyen.

For one stupid moment, I wanted everyone who knew more than I did to be standing beside me.

Then Eleanor said, “Next one,” and I obeyed.

The stone beneath the wagon gave a sharp crack.

Everyone heard it.

Eliza shouted for the guards to move back.

Melody was still on the wagon.

So was Eleanor.

The remaining bridge wall tilted outward.

I caught the wagon harder.

For an instant, it held.

Then the sideboard tore away from the bed.

Eleanor dropped to one knee.

Melody caught her coat.

I felt my control split into too many pieces.

The wagon.

The timber.

The two women.

Bram beneath them.

Alistair spoke beside my ear.

“Hold the wagon. They have ropes.”

I held it.

The wall fell.

Brown water leaped against the shattered stone.

Eleanor’s rope went taut. Melody braced herself against the wagon frame, teeth bared, and hauled the builder back within reach.

Eliza and the guards pulled from the road.

No one fell into the stream.

My breath came out in a sound I would have preferred not to make.

Eleanor looked at the last timber.

“Now,” she said.

I lifted.

Only the timber.

Only far enough.

Melody dragged Bram clear while Eleanor guided his injured leg.

The guards took the weight of the ropes.

Bram crossed the gap wrapped in a hauling sling, his face white beneath the dirt.

The moment he reached the road, Eliza pulled him farther back.

Eleanor followed.

Melody came last.

She dropped beside Alistair and rolled onto her back.

“Everyone?” I asked.

Eliza counted.

Then counted again.

“Yes.”

I released the wagon.

It fell with a crash that disappeared beneath the roar of the stream.

For several seconds, pieces of it turned in the water below us.

Then they were gone.

I sat down where I stood.

Alistair crouched beside me.

“Hands.”

I looked at them.

They were shaking.

He took one glove off, checked my fingers, then put it back.

“Can you stand?”

“Yes.”

I did not attempt it immediately.

Across the stream, Hester raised both arms to show she had seen the rescue.

One of the guards who had gone upstream appeared beside her.

There was a narrow footbridge farther along, still intact.

The horse could not cross it.

People could.

Eliza began arranging the movement of the injured.

Eleanor stood looking at the broken bridge.

I expected her to swear.

Instead, she wiped her face and said, “That culvert above the bend needs clearing.”

“What?”

“Something sent all this water down at once.”

I looked upstream.

Beyond the snow, there was a jam of branches where the channel narrowed.

No enemy.

No god.

A winter stream, an old bridge, and enough things going wrong together.

I leaned forward and rested my elbows on my knees.

At the healing house, Hester had already made room.

Her niece, Ada, brought warm water while the guards carried Bram inside.

Maelin arrived from Stoneford before the afternoon light had begun to fail. The runner Eliza sent had found her preparing to leave her hospice.

She examined both men while Hester shut the door against the weather.

I stood near the hearth.

Nobody asked me to hold anything.

For a while, that was a considerable kindness.

Tobin sat beside his father’s bed.

The driver kept touching the boy’s sleeve, as though checking he remained there.

Eleanor drank half a cup of broth without noticing what it was.

Melody noticed.

“Careful. You may recover.”

Eleanor looked at her.

Then at the cup.

Then she drank the rest.

Bram’s leg needed splinting.

Maelin asked Alistair to help.

I went outside while they worked.

The horse stood beneath the lean-to, brought around by a longer track after the guard found the route.

Its shoulder was scraped.

Otherwise, it appeared mostly offended.

I rested a hand against its neck.

“You too,” I said.

It breathed into my coat.

Behind me, the door opened.

Eleanor stepped out.

“I should have had the bridge inspected when we came.”

“We crossed it.”

“With riding horses. Different load.”

“You can’t see through stone.”

“No.”

She stood beside me for a moment.

“I’ll still want to know what was there to see.”

I nodded.

That seemed fair.

After a while, I said, “I nearly lifted the whole wagon.”

“I noticed.”

“I thought I could get them clear in a moment.”

“You might have.”

She looked at me.

“And you might have crushed his chest.”

The horse shifted beneath my hand.

Eleanor’s voice softened slightly.

“You listened.”

I looked toward the warm windows.

Inside, someone was asking for another blanket.

“Yes.”

I sent word to Evelyn as soon as the injured were settled.

Both men alive.

Everyone from Greykeep safe.

We would return late.

Then I helped Ada carry water.

The first bucket slopped against my boots.

She looked at my hands.

“I can take it.”

“I know.”

She let me carry it anyway.

By the time we left, Bram was resting, the driver had begun asking whether the timber could be recovered, and Hester had told him that he could discuss the timber when she stopped being angry with him for almost dying.

He accepted this with the weariness of a man who had no argument worth making.

Tobin walked us to the door.

“Thank you,” he said.

I rested a hand briefly on his shoulder.

“Stay with your father tonight.”

He nodded and went back inside.

Evelyn was awake when I returned.

She met me at the door.

For a moment, she simply held me.

Then she drew back and looked at my face.

“You’re freezing.”

“I spent some time beside a stream.”

“So your message suggested.”

Helena had left food warming near the fire.

I sat while Evelyn took my wet gloves.

She did not ask me to begin at the beginning.

I told her anyway.

The wagon.

The timber.

Alistair’s voice when I had nearly tried to hold everything.

She listened with my hands between hers.

When I finished, she looked toward the nursery.

“Both men will live?”

“Maelin thinks so. Bram has a difficult few weeks ahead.”

“But he has somewhere to stay.”

“Yes.”

She rubbed warmth back into my fingers.

I watched her hands.

There was no golden light around them.

I had not asked for any.

The following morning, I went back to the practice yard.

Alistair was waiting.

He looked at the feather I had brought.

“Already?”

“I think I understand what it’s for.”

He took up the wooden sword.

“Where would you like it?”

I floated the feather beside the wall.

Far enough away that I would have to stop watching it.

Alistair settled into his stance.

I raised my practice blade.

Above the wall, the morning sky was clear.

The feather trembled.

Then his sword moved, and I kept my eyes on him.

I parried the sword while keeping the feather steady.

Progress.