Read Online Ghoulish Song (9781442427310) by William Alexander - Free Book Online Page B

whole night here. A passing barge might see the bonfire and come pick us up. Sailors are supposed to help the stranded.”
    Maybe, said Shade. But this is a boneyard, remember? This is where pieces of the drowned wash up. Fidlam seemed pretty sure that no one else ever comes here. No one but him.
    â€œWe’ll shout for help when they go by,” Kaile insisted. “Voices are supposed to carry across the River, as long as the River feels inclined to carry voices.”
    I’m sure that strange lights and shouting from a haunted place will bring us dozens and dozens of rescuers, said Shade. I’m sure that will happen before the floods come and wash us away. I’m just sure of it. Sarcasm smeared over her words like a glaze over sweet rolls.
    â€œShut it,” Kaile said. “I bet it won’t really flood. The floods are always coming, but they never really get here.”
    She watched the River go by. Then she examined the flute in her hand. Her fingers rested comfortably on the stops, as though each stop had been carved with her fingers in mind.
    â€œGrandfather used to sing about the girl who jumped from the Fiddleway,” said Kaile. “The one who maybe turned into a swan.”
    I know , said Shade from the other side of the fire. I was there, too. I heard. I always listened.
    Kaile was uncomfortable with the fact that her shadow, which had always been with her, had always been listening—especially considering how sulky and disgruntled her shadow had turned out to be, now that they could speak to each other.
    â€œWere you the girl who jumped?” Kaile asked the flute. “Was Grandfather playing your song? Did you get a bit cracked, and throw yourself down? Did you get your heart broken, and then go a bit cracked? Or did someone else push you, like Fidlam said? Did you wash up here afterward? Would you recognize that song if I sang it to you?”
    The flute said nothing—unless a breath of breeze passing through it counted as something.
    Kaile hummed the tune until the words of the first verse came to her. It was the only verse she remembered. Her memory caught notes and tunes more easily than it ever took hold of words and lyrics.
    â€œA lovelorn girl from the long bridge fell
    To rest in the River’s bed.
    A heart half-given broke her own,
    And words half-given broke instead.
    Her mind half-muddled, she believed
    She was a lovely, flying thing
    And so flung herself down,
    And so flung herself down,
    And so mad Iren fell down from the bridge.”
    She stopped. The tune still broke her own heart a little, but she liked the girl in the song less and less the more she thought about the lyrics. She couldn’t remember much of the second verse, in which Iren’s fingers grew feathers while she fell.
    â€œDo you remember a customer named Tacklesot?” Kaile asked Shade. Shade said nothing. Kaile went on. “A sailor. He used to come to Broken Wall whenever his barge came through Zombay. He told stories about sailors who despaired about one thing or another and then jumped overboard. Usually they drowned. The River isn’t kind to swimmers. But sometimes they got fished out again, either by their own crew or by some other passing barge. Tacklesot said there’s not a single living jumper who didn’t regret the jump afterward—usually before they even hit the water. Each and every one of them said, ‘Whoops, wish I hadn’t done that.’ I think he might have been one of the jumpers who got fished out again. He never said so, but I think that’s how he knew.”
    Shade still said nothing. The fire snapped and crackled between them.
    â€œDid you fling yourself down?” Kaile asked the flute again. “Did you say ‘Whoops’ afterward, before you hit the water, just like Tacklesot?”
    Nothing and no one answered her. Kaile heard waves against the pebble shore. She heard a distant hum and buzz that might have