Lyla Brynn's Arc

Chapter 5 of 6

The town looked wrong the moment they reached it. A tidy row of little huts lined the street, each one bright and matching, but no smoke rose from any chimney. Lyla knocked on the first door. Nothing. She knocked on the next, and the next. Henry tried too, hammering with both fists. Doors stayed shut. Half the windows were dark behind dusty glass. "Nobody lives here," Clara said. She hugged her arms across her ragged dress. "Or they won't open for us." Lyla looked down at herself. Mud caked her mother's dress to the knees. Henry's shirt was gray with swamp filth, and Clara's hair hung in dirty tangles. "We look like we crawled out of a grave," Lyla said. "That's why. Come on." She led them to a shallow creek past the huts. They knelt in the cold water and scrubbed. Lyla wiped the dress until the worst stains faded. She washed Henry's face while he squirmed. Clara wrung out her hair and stood straighter. They looked like children again, not ghosts. Farther on, a weathered cottage sat with red tiles on its roof and a stone chimney. Smoke curled from it. Someone was home. Lyla's heart lifted. She climbed the step and knocked. The door opened and a small old woman peered out. White hair piled on her head, round cheeks, a flowered dress under a cream sweater. She did not flinch at the sight of them. Instead she clapped her hands to her chest. "Dear me," she said. "Three little ones, and all skin and bone. Where did you come from?" "The marsh," Lyla said. Her voice shook. "We're trying to get home. We're looking for our mother." The woman's face softened. "Agnes Holloway. Now you come inside before you catch your death." She waved them through the door. Henry hesitated, but Clara nodded, and they went in. Agnes set bread and broth before them and watched them eat. Lyla told her the name of their town. Agnes nodded slowly. "I know the road. But it's a far piece. Three days on foot, through the hills." She frowned at Henry's thin wrists. "You'll never walk it hungry." She stood and shuffled out back. When she returned, she held a lantern. "Come," she said. Behind the cottage stood an old wooden wagon, its boards cracked, its iron fittings worn smooth. A gray donkey waited in the harness, calm and patient. "Take him," Agnes said. "He's slow, but he's steady. Load up and ride." She packed blankets into the wagon bed, then bread, cheese, and a jar of water. "Three days with the donkey. Less walking for those little legs." Lyla's throat tightened. "Why would you help us?" "Because somebody should," Agnes said simply. They climbed onto the wagon. Agnes handed Lyla the reins and pointed up the road toward the hills. The donkey stepped forward. Lyla gripped the reins and looked ahead. Three days now. Three days to their mother.