Wystwood

47. Canal and matchstick houses

Ada was falling again. The water tugged her down, deeper and deeper, gathering within her cloak until its velvet stuck to her body and bound her limbs. The stream pressed against her eyelids and screamed within her ears. It wanted nothing more than for her lips to part so that it could rush into her mouth, down her throat, and fill her lungs. Down, down, down.

Two hard vices closed around her waist, and then she was huddled forwards, her eyes opening in time to see the water run black. The darkness touched her cheek, and it was rough and frenzied, flickering against her skin in time with the current. She tilted her chin up, and though her eyes began to sting from the salty water, she could make out Raeph's wild hair rippling against her vision.

Raeph kept Ada's chest pressed against his own, their bodies entwined as the stream dragged them down into a basin. Ada's toes flapped helplessly against the current, but before they could find the ground, her feet were swept up past Raeph's shins and the pair was suddenly jerked sideways. She tried to keep her eyes open, but the water was cast murky as they were carried beneath the city's wall.

The last vision of the valley was lost to ebbs of algae that stuck in Ada's hair and crept down her neck. She shuddered and Raeph clasped her tighter, her chest suddenly crushed against his ribs. With fingers feeble against the water, she tried to push him away, and her startled moan sounded low and little. But Raeph kept her trapped, even as she shook her head desperately against his shoulder.

The stream turned them and Ada's sense of direction disappeared. There was no up and down, or left and right, only Raeph. He bowed his head, their hair swirling together, and through its dark webbing, Ada saw that the world had been cleaved into three. The stream heaved them nearer, faster, and Ada realised the water had rather been struck through with a trio of steel bars.

Her mouth opened without Ada willing it to, and she wanted to cry a warning, but her lips were limned with salt before she could utter a sound. The water ran heavy here, hurling their bodies this way and that, desperate to prise them apart. But Raeph's hands were hard on her back, keeping Ada so close that she moved in time with him when he heaved his legs to one side. They tumbled together once, and a panic quicker than the current swept through Ada. But then Raeph was righted, his spine lined up with the bars.

Ada felt Raeph's hand press her head to his collar at the moment steel collided with his back. A jolt ran through them both, slowing their bodies even as they were swept through a space between the bars. A flurry of bubbles erupted from Raeph's mouth, drifting through the water in a soundless shout. Whatever iron still remained in the bars had scalded hot through the cold tides of the stream.

Raeph's grip weakened as the water carried them further, head lolling, but Ada grasped his shoulders despite her dwindling oxygen. Black was seeping past the corners of her vision, shadows dancing through the stream, seething closer and closer. Tears burned away the darkness, but they were torn aside by the tide before they could settle. The shadows were closing in.

Then, a light. So faint it came in strokes of watercolour, not yet fully formed. It shimmered closer, tempting, and the stream tugged Ada towards it. Her hands lost their grip, Raeph's long fingers flitting from between her own, but in a sudden surge, he reached out, linking them together again as the current expelled them both into a quivering body of water. Ada's eyes drifted shut, her lungs giving a final shudder, and the world faltered out.

Raeph and Ada broke the surface of the canal, spluttering and gasping as the water lapped around their necks. Ada's chest felt tight, even though Raeph's arms were no longer banded around her, and her throat was ragged. She couldn't get enough air. Raeph's head kept bobbing below the water, but he kicked himself up, Ada's cloak twining around his hips as they held each other afloat.