Kate Bush's Arc

Chapter 14 of 21

The pale woman was gone past the fourth oak, but Will's voice lay in pieces on the grass. Kate knelt and put her palm flat where the sound had scattered. She could not see it, only feel a cold hum in the wet blades. Will was watching her from the stone. His mouth was open a little now, working, trying. A dry click came out. Then a thin whistle. Then a word she could not catch. "Say it again," Kate said. She leaned close. Will's lips shaped her name. The sound that came was a scrape, no bigger than a fingernail on paper. His throat pulled tight and he flinched. Mr. Echo crouched by the stone with his brass device. The needle twitched, then fell. "His voice came back thin," he said. "The salt cut it when you sealed her mouth. He has pieces. Not enough to speak." He set the device down. "If he tries harder he'll tear what's left." Kate looked at the grass. "The pieces are here. She spat them out." She scraped her hand across the ground and felt the cold hum move under her fingers, small and shy. "We put them back." "Paper won't hold it," Mr. Echo said. "Skin won't hold it." He was quiet a moment. "A jar would. Yours is empty now." Kate pulled the jar from her coat. She had emptied it over Will's body to give him back his name. The glass was still cold. She unscrewed the lid and laid the mouth flat on the grass where her palm had been. The hum crawled in. She watched the inside of the jar mist over, then clear. She capped it. Ollie crouched by Will and set his ear to Will's chest the way Lily had. He listened a long time. "He wants it back inside him," Ollie said. "Not in the jar. In him. Or he can't tell you." Lily was already reaching for the jar. "Tip it into his mouth," she said. "Slow. Like water." Kate lifted Will's head. She opened his lips with her thumb. She turned the jar and let the cold hum pour out. Will swallowed. His throat moved. He coughed once, hard, and the cough had a voice inside it. "Kate," he said. It was rough and cracked, but it was his. He said it again. "Kate. She was on the hill. I climbed up looking for the Whitmore girl. The woman took my mouth. I couldn't call down. I'm sorry I didn't come home for the soup." His hand closed on her wrist with his own fingers, the ones she knew. Kate's face broke. Three years of not knowing walked out of her in one breath. Outside the ring, past the fourth oak, something in the dark heard him speak and started moving back toward the salt line.