Page 1 of Nix and Tell

1

Chlo

It doesn’t really matter what season it is, whether its rain or shine, how cold it is outside. None of that matters when the sun sets in Wyrten Bridge. In the depths of December, I’ll time my appointments so that I can pop outside, or even just open the window of my shop to lean out and watch the sun setting over the River Arun.

Sunsets are always beautiful, but this isn’t just about the sunset.

It’s six o’clock on a Friday afternoon, and I’m done with clients for today, so I walk outside Suited and lean against the doorframe to watch.

The sky—clearer tonight than it’s been for a while—has turned into a canvas, coloured with warm pinks and reds and oranges. As I watch, it sinks behind the church on the bridge. Whoever built the old church managed to line up the windows perfectly, and at each sunset, a riot of colour shines through the stained-glass and paints the road and river before it.

And thenshewalks behind the window and the light cuts out and the velvet night spreads across the sky.

No human could be that tall.

She isn’t human. Trisantona, Goddess of the River Arun, returned to this mortal world for the last five years. My fingers itch and I look at where starwort carpets the riverbank. The plants are moving on the river, dancing even, and I long to go and pluck them, to see what my needle could make of their strong stems and textured leaves. But they belong to the river.

And I don’t fuck with the river.

Turning abruptly, I head back into my shop and pick up a needle. Fire scalds my fingertips and I drop it, swearing beneath my breath.

I haven’t been that careless in a while.

Most needles are made of steel, plated in nickel, and I can’t touch those without burning myself, for obvious reasons. Most of mine are plated with gold, which just about holds the pain at bay. Where in the Gods did this one come from?

I crouch, leaning as close as I dare, before my eyes start to water. It’s a new needle, and when I look at the box, I realise that my supplier has sent the wrong ones. And they know about my metal allergy.

There’s something to be said for science; a metal allergy is just another type of ACD—allergic contact dermatitis—and though it’s not common, it’s common enough around here that most people are aware of it.

Half the residents of Wyrten Bridge have a metal allergy.

Well, technically it’s an iron allergy, but steel triggers an allergic reaction in much the same way, being an iron alloy. Round here, people think it’s genetic, and it kind of is. If you’re fae.

There are two kinds of fae: the Tuatha Dé Dannan, who are so close to Godhood that when the Veil descended, they weredragged behind it; and the rest of us, whose mortality is such that we didn’t have enough magic to be eradicated from the world with the rest of the Gods.

No, we were left behind with inexplicable metal allergies whilst magic lay dormant in the world. That doesn’t mean that I was around when the Veil fell—that was a good few centuries ago, and I’ve only just turned thirty-one—but my ancestors were. Nixes who can’t fulfil their purpose get a little rage-y, occasionally murderous, and never move away from their river.

I make a note to call my supplier and get my gold-plated needles sent. I might see if someone else in the Riverbed Shops wants the ones that are sat on my counter, staring at me. Anger rises suddenly, swelling in my breast and it’s all I can do to stop myself from picking the box up and flinging it at the window. It wouldn’t solve anything, and it would be an absolute fucker to clean up, but that doesn’t calm the ignited passion inside me.

Quick to anger, that’s the temperament of a nix, even if you have nothing to do with the river.

And I want nothing to do with the river, nothing to do with our legacy of drowned sacrifices. I don’t care how it helps power swell; I want none of it.

There’s only one thing that calm me as quickly as my anger rises, and I head there immediately, opening the door and entering my stockroom.

I’m all wrong for a river nix. I should be drawn to water, instead of repelled by it. And though I can’t bring myself to leave the river Arun behind me completely, I refuse to swim in it, the way my family does. The way that other nixes do. Even the Goddess tries to persuade me to come back to her river, that she can make me whole again.

But I’m not broken.

It’s just that I’ve never felt magic in the river, the way that I do in plants.

I reach out and run my fingers across the shelved material in my stockroom. All-natural fibres. No polyester or nylon here. Cotton, hemp, silk, wool… They’ve each got their own feel, their own call, and they ground me the way that water never can. I’ve got a theory about that. Water’s always rushing by, constantly moving, making for impatient magic users; whereas plants are grounded–literally rooted in soil that’s dank and dark and earthy.

I like dank and dark and earthy.

Give me roots over upheaval any day.

The front door opens, bell jangling, and I sigh, rolling my eyes and exit the storeroom. A good business owner would be welcoming, cheerful even. I’m brusque, forthright, and have absolutely no qualms about kicking people out of my shop if they annoy me. I’m not sure that Violet even knows the meaning of the world brusque.

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