I nod. “Yeah. Yeah, that sounds good.”
“Sorry,” he says. “Old habits and all that. I’m not used to people questioning me. It’s kind of refreshing, actually.” He smiles, dips his head toward the bridge. “We’ll hit the temple next if these bridges turn out to be a dead end. You can do this, Eden, just don’t look down.”
Heights have never been my favorite, and that’s an understatement, but I never realized I had such paralyzing issues with them until I experienced this island. Then again, I’ve been mostly on land or sea my entire life—never this close to the clouds. The human capacity for fear is fascinating, how it grows and stretches to hold innumerable what-ifs, as often as you think of them.
“Ready?” He takes my hand, gives it the tiniest pulse before letting go.
I am electricity itself. It’s a wonder the entire jungle doesn’t burst into light.
The first step of faith is the hardest, and the next aren’t any easier, but soon I’m far enough out that my fear is overshadowed by sheer determination. I focus on the tree platform, concentrate on keeping my feet moving so they no more than skim the surface of the bridge.
We make it to the platform, and though the wooden boards are a little too warped and uneven for my taste, I’ve never been so happy to hug a tree.
It’s only just the beginning. From the vantage point of the platform, the network of bridges comes more fully into view. There are a lot of them. Several trees along the way are nexus hubs for two or more offshoot bridges—it’s like a Mensa-level maze with no ending in sight. Phoenix leads the others toward the next platform once it’s obvious we’re making quick progress behind them.
“Was the map explicit about which bridges to take?” I ask, when we steal another lonely moment.
“Nope,” he says. “Not explicit at all. Phoenix is on the lookout for significant markings, things they might have left as reminders for themselves. The bridge system isn’t exactly the most obvious means of exploring the place, so we’re banking on the hope that they’ve underestimated our ability to find it.”
“Sounds logical enough.”
Even if a lost jungle wanderer dared to look up into the tree canopy, it’d be extremely difficult to trace the bridge network back to its starting place, given all its offshoots. Factor in that we had to conquer an obstacle course to find the cave in the first place, and it’s plausible enough that they didn’t have outsiders in mind when constructing it.
He gestures to the bridge at our feet as if to say after you, and we run.
The next tree we encounter has multiple cocoon-bridge offshoots and a larger, more substantial platform than the others. Phoenix and Cass crouch, examining the wood for any telling carvings. It’s hard to see from where I stand, at the back of the group—but then I have an idea, and it is so obvious: we just came from a place that seems significant, so it makes sense that if there are trail-marking symbols at all, there might be one attached to the bridge we just crossed.
I kneel, and Lonan shifts to give me room. There are no telling marks carved into the wood, nothing painted anywhere that I can see. But then—and I know I’m right as soon as I see it—there’s a knot pattern where the cottony-white fibers are tied to the wood.
It’s like an upside-down V, an arrow of knots pointing in the direction we just came from. There’s an entire section in Dad’s field guide about symbols used to mark trails—stones, pebbles, knots tied into tall grass—and this looks exactly like the pebble marking for straight ahead.
I bolt upright, nearly knocking into Lonan’s jaw—I hadn’t noticed he’d crouched so close behind me. “Phoenix, check the bridge netting for knot patterns—anything there?”
Hope, Alexa, and Finnley back against the tree so I can get a closer look at our options. Sure enough, one is marked with the upside-down V, one is marked with an arrow pointing left, and a third simply has a straight row of knots. Do not go this way, in scout translation. I open the field guide to the trail-marking chart, pass it around for everyone to see.
“Looks like we’re going this way, then,” Cass says, pointing to the bridge marked straight ahead.
“Seems pretty obvious, don’t you think?” Alexa says. “Eden, do you not remember the moss? The beetles?” She leaves out the part where she had hallucinations of Cass, understandably. “You really think anything on this island is that straightforward?”
It does seems a bit too obvious, but then, you would have to know to look for the knot pattern to figure it out. And, like Lonan said, it doesn’t seem like this was ever meant for outsiders to find, so why would it be a trap?
Still, though.
Phoenix is eyeing the do not go this way bridge, and I know this look: a degree of determination I’ve seen only once. I saw this same look—all it took to sear into my memory—on a girl who’d been a varsity cheerleader at our rival high school, as she watched ice cream melt over its cone and down a Wolf’s too-smooth hand. Her sparkling eyes were eager, determined. Alive. She reached out and stole the cone right out of the Wolf’s hands, took a face-smearingly huge bite out of it. Crumbled the cone, feasted on all the broken pieces.
This Wolf was not as kind as the one who’d thrown his cone in the trash for me earlier that day. Her bright red, razor-sharp nails blended perfectly with the cheerleader’s blood. I heard rumors that the cheerleader survived, but I never saw her again.
Nothing good comes from a look like that. Maybe Before, but not now. Eager, alive determination is about as do not go this way as it gets these days.
But Hope pushes her way through and takes the first step past that straight row of knots—the caution-warning-stay-far-from-here knots—and Phoenix follows. Then Cass, then Finnley. Alexa.
Lonan, who continues to pick up the rear in these processionals, raises his eyebrows at me.
“This doesn’t feel right,” I say. “Shouldn’t it feel right?”
Oh, though: I should know by now that you can’t always trust feelings—which is especially problematic when you can’t even trust the things that masquerade as facts.
Hindsight; that’s the only thing worth trusting these days.
Two roads diverge in a wood, and I—I take the one less traveled by.
FORTY-NINE
WE FLY OVER the bridges, one after another. The humidity is so thick it soaks through our layers and down to our skin. We are swift, we are silent. Even Alexa.