They fell silent, concentrating on the climb, and Nick found himself marveling once again at the remarkable woman beside him. He’d told her the whole story on the way to the airport from her apartment, fully expecting her to order the cabby to forget LaGuardia and take them straight to Bellevue. But to his surprise, she’d not only taken it calmly, but had actually believed the story.
Or at least, she’d pretended to believe it. Still, that was more than he would have gotten from anyone else he knew.
The rain had moderated a little by the time they reached the bottom of the slope, but the winds had become more turbulent. Carefully, Nick moved to the edge of the river, wiping at the sheet of water streaming down his face as he peered across the roiling whitecaps spilling over the treacherous rocks. “Rhinemaidens!” he shouted. “I’ve brought you your Ring. Come and get it.”
There was no answer but the whistling of the wind. “What if they’re not here?” Lydia asked.
Nick shook his head wordlessly, looking back and forth down the shoreline.
And frowned. There, about fifty yards downriver, he could see a squat figure standing with the stillness of a rock, facing their direction.
It was Alberich.
“I knew you’d come,” the dwarf said as Nick and Lydia slogged through the wet grass to him. “They all do, sooner or later. Hoping to bribe or beg or threaten their way out of the curse.”
“News flash—I’m not here to beg,” Nick told him. “I’m here to give them back their Ring.”
Alberich snorted in disgust. “Fool. You really think you’re the first one to think of that?”
“They won’t take it back?” Lydia asked.
Alberich looked her up and down. “You must be the one he was going to buy the Ring for.” He snorted. “Waste of effort. You’re not nearly ambitious enough.”
“You mean I’m not greedy enough,” Lydia shot back. “Why won’t they take it back?”
“Of course they’ll take it back,” the dwarf said maliciously. “The problem is, the Ring won’t leave him. That means the Rhinemaidens will have to take a bit more than just the gold.”
Lydia inhaled sharply. “You mean … his finger?”
“Or his hand,” Alberich said. “Possibly his whole arm.”
Lydia looked at Nick in horror. “No! They can’t.”
“They will.” Alberich pointed to a jagged rock in the middle of the river, barely visible above the surging water. “That’s their rock, and they’re already on their way. But there is an alternative.”
“What is it?” Lydia asked.
“Forget it,” Nick snarled. “He’s just playing another angle.”
“I’m as strong as they are,” Alberich told her. “For another twenty percent I can keep them away from him.”
“I said forget it,” Nick said again. He could see something in the water now, moving toward him just below the surface. “Even if it costs my whole arm, it’ll be worth it.”
“Nick, that’s insane,” Lydia said urgently. “We’re in the middle of nowhere, with our car fifty feet up a hill. You’ll bleed to death before we can get you to a hospital.”
And then, abruptly, three slender bodies surged out of the water onto the shore, and six hands grabbed at his clothing.
“Back!” Alberich snapped, leaping to Nick’s side and pulling his right arm away from the grasping hands.
“The Ring!” the Rhinemaidens called in unison, their voices thin and ancient and terrifying. One of them shoved her way beneath Alberich’s grip; and suddenly there was a tug-of-war going on for Nick’s right arm.
“Give us the Ring,” one of the Maidens said, her hand wrapping like a vice around Nick’s ankle and tugging him toward the river. “You retain it at your peril.”
“I know,” Nick said. “I want to give it to you—really I do.”
“Only the waters of the Rhine can wash away the curse,” the third Maiden said, her hands on Nick’s jacket, her face up close to his. Over the smell of fish he caught a glimpse of sharp barracuda teeth.
“It won’t let go,” Nick pleaded.
“It likes him,” Alberich said, pushing the first Maiden’s hands off Nick’s arm. “Don’t be a fool, Nick. I can still save you.”
Nick blinked. It likes you. Alberich had said the same thing the first time Nick had set eyes on the Ring.
Only the Ring didn’t like Nick. All it liked was his money.
His money. “Lydia!” he shouted, shaking his left arm free long enough to dig his phone from his pocket. “Here,” he said, tossing it awkwardly toward her.
For a second she fumbled, then caught it in a solid grip. “Who do I call?” she shouted back, flipping it open.
“Phone list one—second entry,” Nick said, stumbling as the third Maiden got a fresh grip on his left arm and pulled him another step closer to the river. The one who’d been tugging on his ankle abandoned that approach and moved instead to Nick’s right arm, and now Alberich had two sets of hands and teeth to fight off. “Input trader passcode 352627.”
Lydia nodded and leaned over the phone. The Maiden on Nick’s left arm shifted one hand to his belt. He kicked at her legs; it was like kicking a pair of oak saplings. “I’m in,” Lydia called.
“There are five funds listed.” On Nick’s right arm, one of the two Maidens opened her mouth and lowered the pointed teeth toward the Ring. Nick cringed, but Alberich slapped the creature’s cheek and shoved her back again. “Transfer everything in the first four into the fifth.”
“What are you doing?” Alberich demanded, frowning at Nick in sudden suspicion.
“The Ring doesn’t like me,” Nick said. “It just likes my money.”
“What?” The dwarf spun toward Lydia. “No!” Abandoning Nick’s arm, he charged toward Lydia.
And suddenly Nick was fighting all three Maidens by himself. “Alberich!” he shouted as they dragged him toward the river. “Help me!”
“For what?” the dwarf spat, lunging for the phone. But Lydia was faster, twisting and turning and keeping it out of his reach even as she continued punching in numbers. “Seventy percent of nothing? She’s throwing it all away, isn’t she?”
“She’s transferring it into my charity distribution account,” Nick said. His feet were in the icy water now, the Maiden on his left arm already in up to her knees. “All the Ring cares about is money. And as of right now—”
“You’re broke!” Lydia shouted in triumph. “You hear me, Ring? He’s broke.”
Spinning away from Lydia, Alberich threw himself back at the Ring. “Get away from the Ring!” he shouted.
“The Ring is ours,” the Maidens chorused in their eerie unison.
“It’s mine!” Alberich snarled, grabbing Nick’s wrist.
Something cold ran up Nick’s back, something having nothing to do with the water swirling around his feet. Lydia was right—with all his money now in the irrevocable trust fund, he had nothing left in the world.
But the Ring still wasn’t letting go.
“Is this how you want to die?” Alberich demanded, pulling at Nick’s arm with one hand as he shoved at the Maidens with the other. “Drowned in the Rhine by ancient creatures who have nothing left but hate and greed? There’s still time for us to make a deal.”
“I don’t want a deal,” Nick said. He was knee deep in the river now, the numbingly cold water threatening to cramp his calf muscles. Out of the corner of his eye, he could see Lydia doing something with the phone. “I don’t want money. All I want—”
And without any warning at all, the Ring came loose.
Nick’s arms were still pinioned, but for the moment no one was gripping his hand. With a desperate flick of his wrist, he sent the Ring arcing into the air toward the center of the river and the Rhinemaidens’ rock. “No!” Alberich screeched, diving toward it.
> But the Maidens were ready. Two of them twisted their arms around the dwarf’s neck and dragged him into the river, swimming backwards toward their rock. The third Maiden dived into and then out of the water like a dolphin, reaching up and catching the Ring in midair as it fell. For a moment she held it triumphantly aloft, then turned and disappeared with her sisters beneath the waves.
And then Lydia was at Nick’s side, pulling at his now aching arms, helping him back to the shore. “What did you do?” Nick asked, shivering violently. The storm, he noticed, was starting to abate. “How did you get it to let go?”
“You had no money,” she told him, wrapping her arm around his waist and leading him toward the cliff where their car waited. “But you still had the potential to earn it all back.”
He nodded in understanding. “So you fired me.”
“I text-messaged your resignation to Sonnerfeld Thompkins,” she confirmed. “I guess it’ll never be Sonnerfeld Thompkins Powell now. I’m sorry.”
Nick blinked a few lingering drops of water from his eyes. “I’m not. Thank you.”
“I’m glad it worked.” She paused. “Nick … your phone list. Number two was your on-line investment number, three and four and five were Sonnerfeld and your office. Number one …”
“Is you,” Nick confirmed with a tired sigh. “You’ve always been number one. I just forgot that for awhile.”
She squeezed his hand. His aching, ringless, free hand. “Come on,” she said softly. “Let’s go home.”
Trollbridge
Traffic seemed lighter than usual tonight, Kersh thought from his toll booth as he watched the lines of cars and trucks streaming through the George Washington Bridge’s toll plaza.
Or maybe it was that the traffic the past two nights had been unusually heavy. Kersh could never tell about those things. All he knew was that the lines of headlights and tail lights stretched all the way to the horizon, the headlights streaming in from New Jersey, the tail lights returning again from Manhattan.
In the old days, he thought wistfully, every one of those incoming vehicles would have had had to stop at booths like his. An endless stream of people giving Kersh money to cross his bridge.
But those days were long gone. First had come the automated bins where the drivers simply tossed in their coins. Far worse was the abomination called the E-Z Pass. Those drivers still paid, of course, but they paid from their homes, without Kersh or anyone else in the plaza ever seeing or handling that money.
Which meant that sitting as he did in the booth marked E-Z Pass/Cash, Kersh had to endure the frustration of sitting idly while most of the cars drove through without even slowing down.
Sometimes the drivers waved cheerily as they passed. That just made it worse.
A movement at the corner of Kersh’s eye snapped him out of his gloomy reverie. A late-model Chevy was slowing down as it approached his booth. An E-Z Pass user being extra cautious? Or someone with actual, real cash?
Kersh focused on the car. The driver had two hundred and eighty dollars on him, he saw, plus another four hundred in traveler’s checks. The woman beside him had seventy dollars cash and two hundred in traveler’s checks. Tourists, then, on their way to a grand adventure in New York City.
And tourists almost never had E-Z Passes.
Sure enough, the car slowed to a stop, the driver’s window sliding down as it did so. “Evening, sir,” Kersh said politely, his heart pounding with anticipation. “Six dollars, please.”
They were a young couple, tired but still showing that spark of anticipation as they thought of the museums and plays and nightlife awaiting them. The driver’s expression slipped at bit as he caught full sight of Kersh’s wide face and shaggy brown hair, but the Midwestern courtesy that came with the Wisconsin tags quickly asserted itself. “Good evening,” he said politely to Kersh as he handed over a ten dollar bill.
“Thank you,” Kersh said, handing over the four singles he’d pulled from his cash drawer as soon as he’d sensed the ten in the other’s hand. “Enjoy your visit.”
“Thanks,” the young man said, and drove off.
Kersh gripped the ten-dollar bill, savoring the feel of it between his thick fingers. Then, carefully, he slid it into the proper slot in the drawer. Watching the Wisconsin car as it climbed the long stretch of the bridge, he silently wished the young couple a pleasant trip to the Big Apple.
And wished them safety, as well. Not all the people in New York were friendly to strangers.
Not all the people in New York were even people.
He turned back to the lines of cars streaming across the toll plaza, feeling a sudden surge of loneliness for central Europe and the old wooden bridges where he’d grown up so many centuries ago. Did his fellow trolls still live beneath any of those bridges, he wondered?
Probably not. The deep places of the world had been vanishing for centuries, and with them the beings who had once lived and thrived there. As far as he knew, he was the last troll in this part of the country. Possibly in the entire United States.
Possibly even in the entire world. Someday, he would be gone, too.
But until then, at least he still had a job that allowed him to cling to the old ways.
Another car was slowing down as it approached his booth. The driver was alone, with sixty-eight dollars in his wallet and a twenty ready in his hand. Feeling his heartbeat again speeding up, Kersh pulled a ten and four ones from his cash drawer and waited.
Seventeen more cars stopped and gave Kersh money before his shift ended five hours later. The day-shifter took over the booth, and Kersh headed toward the lot where the toll plaza employees parked their cars. From the lot it was only a short walk down to the Palisades Interstate Park stretching along the Hudson River where he made his home. The park was closed at this hour, of course, but over the years Kersh had found lots of ways to get in and out.
As he walked through the darkness, savoring the smell of trees and dirt and water, he found himself gazing up at the underside of the bridge. For all his trollish tendencies toward self-pity, he did realize know how lucky he was to have a bridge he could call his own. Even if he could only work it for a third of each day.
And not just any bridge, but a magnificent bridge, spanning a magnificent river. Kersh smiled, his eyes tracing the familiar lines and angles—
His large, flat feet stumbled to a halt. He knew every inch of that bridge, and there was something different up there tonight. Two somethings, in fact: a pair of cylinders about half the size of the orange barrels the Port Authority used when they needed to block off a lane for repairs.
But these barrels weren’t orange, and they were fastened to horizontal girders where no orange barrel had any business being. Had the workers begin some maintenance on his bridge that he hadn’t heard about?
And then the wind shifted slightly, and he caught a faint whiff of something he’d smelled once before. It had been two years ago, when the Department of Homeland Security had run a nighttime test on the bridge. A test that had included anti-terrorist agents, bomb-sniffing dogs … and bombs.
For a long minute he stared upward at the barrels. Then, squaring his massive shoulders, he turned and retraced his steps back toward the toll plaza.
The man seated behind the supervisor’s desk was middle-aged, with the slightly greasy hair and unshaven cheeks of a man who’d been hauled out of bed at five-thirty in the morning. But for all that, his eyes were bright and alert. “Mr. Kersh,” he said politely as Kersh entered the room. “Please sit down.”
“Thank you,” Kersh said, lowering his bulk cautiously onto the office’s single guest chair. It wasn’t nearly strong enough to support his weight, but over the years he’d learned how to keep his legs angled backward so that he wasn’t so much sitting on the chair as he was squatting over it.
“I’m Special Agent McBride,” the man went on
. “I’m investigating the bombs we removed from the bridge an hour ago.”
Kersh felt a lump form in his throat. So they had been real bombs. He’d asked several people over the past couple of hours, trying to find out for sure. But no one had been willing or able to tell him. “Is the bridge all right?” he asked.
“It’s fine,” McBride assured him. “The bombs weren’t very big, and they weren’t positioned with any expertise. They would have made a couple of very big bangs, and scared the hell out of a lot of people, but the damage would have been minor.” He raised his eyebrows. “Of course, that’s only relatively minor,” he amended. “You say you spotted the bombs after your shift?”
“Yes, that’s right,” Kersh said, feeling a flow of relief wash through his tension. His beloved bridge was safe.
“May I ask how?” McBride asked.
“What do you mean?”
“You left your booth at five this morning, supposedly heading home,” McBride said, his eyes steady on Kersh’s face. “Yet ten minutes later, you were back with the news that you’d seen something under the bridge.” He paused. “In pitch darkness. From a spot you shouldn’t have been in if you were actually on your way home.”
Kersh swallowed, his tension suddenly back. “It wasn’t really pitch dark,” he pointed out carefully. “There are a lot of lights from the bridge and the city. And I’ve got good eyes.”
“Good enough to pick out two small anomalies among all those girders and braces?”
“I know the bridge,” Kersh said, forcing his voice to stay calm. He wasn’t very smart, but it was abundantly clear where Agent McBride was going with this. “I spend a lot of time in the park just looking up at it.”
“Really,” McBride said. “You like bridges, do you?”
“I like them a lot,” Kersh said. “They’re kind of in my blood.”
“Mm,” McBride murmured. “Why were you there when you were supposed to be going home?”
Behind his bushy beard, Kersh grimaced. What could he say? That the address he’d given the Port Authority was only a mail drop, and that he actually lived in a hole below the bridge, the way trolls had for centuries? “I like to take a walk along the edge of the park before I head home,” he improvised desperately. “It helps me unwind.”