Linny Marsh's Arc

Chapter 1 of 8

Linny Marsh spread the stolen journal across the picnic blanket and weighed its pages down with a heel of bread. Her painted coat rode up her wrists as she worked. Pale purple hair fell across her cheek. Behind her, the cobblestone wall of her sister's shop threw back the afternoon light, and the moss along its stones smelled damp and green. She had taken the journal from the library three nights ago. It belonged to one of the three painters who had all rendered the same real place with a flat, dead light. Somewhere in these pages was the road there. Forge sat beside her with a plate of cheese he hadn't touched. His sleeves were rolled. A burn scar ran down one forearm. He brushed her hair back and kissed her shoulder. He watched her turn a page and said, "You stole it." "Borrowed." "Fern will know." "Fern already knows." Linny tapped a sketch in the margin. A hill. A stand of trees drawn twice, from two angles. "Look. He went back. He couldn't get the light right, so he went back." Forge set the plate down and scooted back an inch. "Why this place, Linny. Why so hard." "Because something is missing from every painting anyone has ever made of it. All three of them painted the light wrong. Flat. Still. Like they were afraid of it." She looked up. "I want to see what they couldn't." "Don't go." It was almost a plea. "What?" She breathed with disbelief. "It's past the ridge. People don't come back from past the ridge." His voice stayed level, which was worse. "It's a silly dream. It'll get you killed." She closed the journal on her thumb. Betrayal stung her chest. She’d never expected it from him. "A silly dream." "Yes." "You spent two weeks drawing swords instead of finishing Mrs. Hale's bracelet." His jaw set. "You want a forge full of blades no one in this village will ever buy. Don't tell me about silly dreams, Sterling." "That's different." "Because it's yours." He stood. The blanket lifted at one corner and the bread rolled off the journal. "Stay," he said. "Paint here. Paint anything else." It was the same sentence, in a new mouth. She had heard it once already, and she had left that house too. "No." He waited. She did not look up. After a moment his boots crossed the grass and were gone. Linny opened the journal again. Her hands shook once and then stopped. She read every margin. She read the ink smudges. On the fourth page from the back she found what she wanted: a line of small numbers under a sketch of a leaning pine, and beside it, three words in a hurried hand. Past the ridge. North of the frost line. She held her thumb on the words until they printed into her skin. She rolled the journal into her coat pocket, stood. Tomorrow morning, she set out to find the magic. To finish what the other artists couldn’t.