Chapter 703: Old Pell’s Ferry

The black shore curved slowly away ahead, glowing words washing quietly in like foam before sliding out again. The faceless child vanished the moment Juna blinked, leaving a thin trail of light drifting across the water.

"It spoke with my voice," she said, ears pinned flat, "it told me not to let him name me."

"Then we won’t let him," Hajin said, rolling his shoulders, "whoever he turns out to be."

’A ghost that borrows voices is a trap or a warning, I can’t tell which.’

A lantern bobbed out of the dark on the black river, hanging from the prow of a crooked little boat. An old woman stood at the stern with a pole twice her height, her wide grin missing half its teeth.

"Fare, dumplings, fare," she cackled, rapping the pole against the hull, "nobody crosses my river for free."

"We have coin, or a dowry in forest if you prefer," Eirwen said, already unrolling her purse.

"Coin buys nothing here, little leaf, the River takes a name nobody is using anymore."

"I must dispute the principle, a party this large merits a reduction," Eirwen said.

"Dispute all you like, little leaf, the River has never lost an argument."

Cessy stepped forward with a tight smile, her voice dropping to a murmur, "She means a name left unspoken for years, it is the old fare."

"I don’t have one of those lying around," he said, scratching his neck.

"I do," Aria said brightly, appearing in a cyan panel, "I offer the designation Hajin, which I have used on exactly two occasions."

"Hey, that’s my actual name you’re giving away!"

"It is my name for you, I retain full ownership."

The ferrywoman cackled so hard she nearly dropped her pole into the river, slapping her knee in delight. She wiped a tear away with a gnarled knuckle, beaming at the little blue light floating beside him.

"Hajin, oh, dumpling, I’ll take it gladly," she wheezed, "come aboard, all of you, mind the dead."

"What dead?" Loccy asked, peering over the side.

"The ones who swim, dear, they never bite."

They crowded onto the boat in a heap of elbows, Ash curled in Hajin’s lap, Rumi perched on the prow. The old woman, who called herself Pell, poled them across the water, glowing words drifting beneath the hull like fish.

Hajin leaned over the gunwale to look, and every word he saw was a name.

Some were soft, some were sharp, thousands swimming in slow shoals, each trailing a thread of faint light behind it. They slipped under the boat in endless silent ribbons, brushing the wood with a sound like a single held breath.

’Names nobody got to use, babies who never opened their eyes.’

One name drifted slowly toward the side of the hull, spelled in gold, recognized before he even finished reading it. It was Hajin, the way a mother might have carefully written it, a thin gold thread trailing out behind it.

"That one’s yours, dumpling," Pell said, not looking down, "the one you were nearly given."

"I’m right here... I already have a name."

"You have a name, aye, but everybody has an unborn one besides, the one they might have been."

He reached over the side, the name brushing his fingers as warm as breath before it slid gently away. His chest tightened, so he drew his hand back into the boat, quietly, as if the name stung him.

"Dada, fish," Ash whispered, dipping one small hand toward the drifting names.

Hajin caught the small wrist, "Those are names, buddy, you can’t eat a name."

"Let him try," Pell said, "a name only tickles, these ones are shy."

A silver name nuzzled his palm, then slipped away, making Ash giggle.

"Mind the eddy, dumplings, it bites," Pell called, steering around a swirl of silver letters.

Cessy sat rigid near the prow, her tail wrapped around her ankle, staring at the far shore without a word.

"Quiet tonight, Cessy," he said.

"I am wondering whether home will still be there when we climb back out, darling."

Miri balanced a notebook on her knee, copying the stranger names with a steady hand.

"Cataloguing is how I stay calm," she said, pen scratching, "please nobody remark on it."

At the stern, Nyra sat quietly with her knees drawn up to her chest, Halfmoon laid across her lap. Her gold-edged horns glowed brighter with every pole stroke, lit from within by the pale light off the water.

"It is whispering," she said, so quietly that only he heard.

He leaned closer, "What is it saying?"

She pressed both palms over her ears, shaking her head hard, her eyes screwed shut against the whispers. Hajin did not ask again, sliding onto the bench beside her, shoulder to shoulder, waiting without a word.

Pell’s pole dipped and rose in the dark, steady as a heartbeat, the lantern swaying overhead.

For a long minute there was only the slow creak of the pole and the soft clicking of names. Then Nyra leaned her weight against his arm, warm and heavy, her horns tilted away to spare his ribs.

"Don’t tell Juna," she muttered, her eyes still shut.

"Tell Juna what?" he asked, a smile tugging at the corner of his mouth.

"That I’m leaning."

"It is quieter when you are here," she added eyes still shut.

"Then I’m not moving an inch, not until the far shore," he said.

Her breathing slowed against his sleeve, the whispers fading to a murmur only she could hear. He kept his arm still for the crossing, even after it went numb to the elbow.

"My lips are sealed," he said, grinning down at the top of her head, "you have my word as a father."

In his vision, Aria watched the two of them with her interface flickering in a slow, dim, deadpan blue. Her panel tilted, went rigid with offence, then brightened a full inch higher than physics strictly required of it.

"Noted," Aria said flatly, "I am not jealous of a fifteen-year-old, I am merely observing that the arm was occupied."

"Aria, you can have the other arm."

"I do not want the other arm, I want... a more equitable distribution of arms."

Hajin barked out a laugh and swallowed the rest of it before Nyra’s elbow could find his ribs. Behind them, something climbed over the stern with a wet slap, a small shape no taller than Ash.

"Oh, there you are," Pell said, not turning around, "come aboard, little lost one, you’ll catch your death."

It was the faceless child from the shore, dripping glowing words, with no features at all and no mouth. It turned toward the household one by one, speaking in each voice, a patchwork of tone and borrowed pitch.

"Do not let him name you," it said in Juna’s voice, switching to Loccy’s, Didi’s and finally his own.

"Hey, that’s creepy," Rumi said, edging backward along the prow.

"Do not be afraid," it said, in a gentle woman’s voice that Hajin did not know.

He froze with his hand halfway to the Chain, his whole body stilled, breath caught behind his teeth. That voice belonged to a woman he never met, yet he knew it like the taste of water.

"That isn’t her," Vella said softly, laying a hand on his arm, "it is only borrowing."

"I know," he said, though his voice shook.

"That’s Tsumu, dumpling, a name-wisp, there’s thousands down here," Pell said, "nobody ever gave this one a name, so it takes everybody else’s."

"Can it stay?" Loccy asked, crouching to offer it half a bun.

"It’s ridden my boat three hundred years, it can ride a little longer."

Tsumu took the bun in both hands, studied it with no face, then ate it in one gulp.

"I am cold," it whispered in her voice, curling up at Didi’s feet.

"It copies me, how insulting," she said, but she draped her cloak over it.

They drifted for a while in the lantern light, the glowing names slipping past, the far shore a dark smudge. Pell leaned on her pole, squinting at Hajin with one eye, her smile slowly fading into something older and sadder.

"You’ve got her jaw," she said, "your mother, the night she crossed."

"You knew my mother?" he asked, turning so slowly that the bench creaked beneath him.

"Hanae came through on my boat, pale as milk, big with child, hands shaking on the rail," Pell said, "twenty years back, give or take a nightmare."

"She crossed this river while she was pregnant with me?"

"She did, dumpling, she paid the fare in a name she never got to use, then went up to the Cradle Palace alone."

"Why did she go to him alone, what did she want?" he asked hoarsely.

"A bargain, I think, I never heard the terms," Pell said, spitting into the river, "but she left a promise with the King, he’s been waiting for it to come due."

The household fell quiet, every face turned toward the old woman, even Ash blinking up from Hajin’s lap. Somewhere across the water, a city of lit windows hung upside down, waiting for them with open arms.

"What promise, did she owe him something, was it me—"

"Hers to give him something, mine to keep my mouth shut," Pell said, her grin returning, slow and cracked, "now you’re here, ripe as a plum, just like she told me."

"Ripe?" Vella asked sharply.

"She said my boy will come back ripe," Pell answered, pointing her pole at the far shore, where gold lights began to glimmer, "eat before you meet him, dumpling, the King feeds loyal guests."