Linny Marsh's Arc

Chapter 19 of 22

They marched Linny north through the dark trees. The vine at her wrists did not chafe. It tightened when she slowed and loosened when she kept pace. The tall one wore her hat. Another carried her bundle. A third walked at her shoulder, close enough that she felt the cold coming off it like a wall. They stopped in a place she knew was made, not found. A ring of slender trees leaned inward, their branches braided overhead. Mushrooms crowded the roots in colors that did not belong to any season. Small lights hung in the branches without cords. She had seen a smaller ring like this once before, in Lena's story. This one was bigger. This one was theirs. The tall one turned her to face it. It bent close. Its breath smelled of wet stone. "You carry a place," it said. Its voice was soft and even. "Not on you. In you. We want it." She understood then. Not her paints. Not the pages. The grove she had found. The warm stone. The light that was not light. She had walked in it and it had walked out with her, caught in her skin like smoke in cloth. "I don't know what you mean," she said. The one with her bundle turned it over and spilled her things onto the moss. Brushes. A tin of paint. The knife. Four folded pages slid out last. It picked them up in two long fingers. Her chest went tight. She kept her face still. The tall one took the pages. It unfolded them one at a time. It looked at the sketch of the stone, the coordinates, the girl's words. It looked at Linny. "Show us the way in," it said. "I don't know the way in," Linny said. This was true. She had been turned away at the door. "You will remember," it said. "Or we will take it out." She thought of the barefoot girl. GO HOME. YOU'RE NOT READY. She thought of what these creatures would do to that grove if she pointed at it on a page. She thought of Lena, and her father, and the shape of her own house at the edge of the village. She looked at the tall one. "No," she said. It tilted its head. It folded the pages once, twice, and held them over a mushroom cap that glowed pale green. The paper began to smoke without flame. She did not flinch. She did not look away. It watched her not looking away. The pages curled to ash. The coordinates went with them. "Then we keep you," it said, "until you change." They led her through the ring. The braided branches closed behind her. The lights above dimmed to match the dark. Somewhere past the trees, home kept being a day away, and stayed there.