No More Crossing Mountains for Her

In the Blackridge Mountains there's an old tradition: a man may leave the mountains only seven times in his life. If he still can't get out of the mountains with the woman he loves after the seventh journey, he's expected to marry inside the mountain villages and stay there for good. Because of that tradition, I borrowed hair oil from Grandpa seven times, put on my best coat, and crossed ridge after ridge down to the town below, waiting each time for the woman who said she'd take me out of the mountains and marry me. All seven times, she never came. At the village, the chief sat smoking his pipe and said, "That's the seventh time you've gone down for marriage registration. And that young director of yours ran off to the next village again, to film the handsome boy who smiles for her camera. "Her heart hasn't been on you in a long time, Noah. What are you still waiting for?" In the four years since she came to these mountains, I crossed them for her seven times. But something always happened to the man named Ash, and every time, I was the one left behind. I looked at the village chief and shook my head. "I'm not waiting anymore. I'm getting married in three days." Chapter 1 "What's so bad about the Blackridge Mountains? Even if you really want to leave, you shouldn't pin your hopes on a woman like that." The village chief coughed around the dry pipe between his teeth. "She carries a camera around all day, films one man in this village, then moves on to the next. If she were serious about you, would she have let you make seven trips down to town for nothing?" The smoke stung my nose. Four years. Her camera had traveled through nearly every corner of these mountains, and she'd filmed every young man in the villages. Everyone except me. I swallowed the ache in my throat and nodded. "I'm done waiting, Silas. I'm getting married in three days." On the way back to my village I saw Claire Reed coming up the path with Ash, holding him carefully because his leg was hurt. When she noticed me standing at the fork in the trail, she frowned. "Noah? Didn't I tell you to wait down in town? We were supposed to register our marriage tomorrow. Coming all the way back up means you'll just have to make the trip again." I lowered my head. The skin on my heels had been rubbed raw from crossing the ridges, and she was right, it wasn't easy. For one promise from her, I'd climbed up and down those mountains seven times in four years. "We agreed to do it today." Claire paused. "I already explained. Ash got his leg caught in a trap. That's why I missed it." I looked at the man leaning comfortably against her. "There are plenty of people in these mountains. Why did you have to be the one who stayed with him?" "That's different. He got hurt helping me film. I'm responsible for him." Different. Of course. When he got hurt, everything stopped; when I crossed mountains to marry her, our plans could be dropped whenever she liked. Maybe she finally noticed how red my eyes were, because her voice softened. "This one was my fault. Things got chaotic and I forgot to tell you, and I shouldn't have made you go down alone. Give me three more days. I'm finishing Ash's part of the documentary, and once we're done I'll take you down and we'll do it properly." My fingers curled into my palm. "That was the seventh time." Her hand tightened around Ash's arm, and irritation flashed across her face. "I know what you're going to say, that it's some Blackridge rule. But I asked Ash, and there's no rule saying a man can only leave the mountains seven times. "Noah, you don't have to make things up just to keep me. I've already told you I'll marry you." I pressed my thumb hard into the web of my hand. "So because nobody enforces the old rule anymore, that means you can keep breaking your promises?" "Don't twist it. I understand you want me to take you out of the mountains, but this isn't the time for you to make a scene." "Make a scene." I repeated the words quietly. She was right about one thing. The old seven-journey rule had been abandoned years ago. But where I grew up, people still remembered what it meant: seven journeys was once the limit a mountain man would make before marrying. For four years I'd crossed range after range for Claire. Seven times. I looked down at my swollen feet. "You should go. Ash's leg matters more." Claire guided him past me. After two steps she looked back. "My tone was harsh. Don't be angry." "I'm not angry." She smiled faintly as she walked away. "I knew you'd understand." I forced my mouth into something close to a smile. I wasn't calm because I understood. I was calm because there was nothing left to argue about. In three days I'd marry a woman from the next village over. Grandpa always said a mountain man marries only once, and that if you're going to marry you ought to smile. That's how a marriage starts off right. Chapter 2 The next morning, fog covered the mountains. Claire didn't come back until noon. She found me and held out her phone, the screen full of tailored suits. "I remember you liked these when you were scrolling through my phone. Pick one. When we go down for the license, you can wear it at the wedding." I ran a rough finger across the screen. Men up here spend their lives carrying wood, working fields, and climbing steep ground. We wear clothes that can survive stone and mud and rain. Four years ago Claire showed me a video of her friend's wedding, and that was the first time I'd ever seen a suit like that. Back then I dreamed of wearing one and walking out of the mountains beside her. Now the dream felt like it belonged to someone else. "No." I shook my head. Her fingers tightened around the phone. "You're still angry?" "No." I met her eyes calmly. "Grandpa already has my wedding clothes ready." The night before, he'd measured me for the coat, using cloth Silas brought over. I was about to become somebody's husband. Claire smiled and kept scrolling. "Fine. As long as you're happy with it." Then she started talking about flowers and food and where we could hold the ceremony once we were out of the mountains. I barely heard her; my ears rang like they were full of water. Then she stood up suddenly and her smile disappeared. "We start filming again today. Three days of final shooting, then I'll take you down." She turned away before she could see my eyes redden, and I watched her disappear into the mountains. Ignoring the pain in my feet, I crouched beside the wooden cabinet in the corner of our house. Inside were photographs from the last four years, and every one had writing on the back. On the photograph taken near our village, Claire had written, "I'll love Noah forever." On one of us watching the sunrise, "Noah's smile is prettier than dawn." I hesitated, then dropped them all in the trash. After I'd sorted through everything, only one thing was left: a silver bracelet, the promise Claire made four years ago that she'd take me beyond the mountains. My chest tightened as I closed my hand around it. "I should give it back." I limped over to the next village. Ash was standing among the wildflowers and stone terraces in a bright new shirt, his hair combed back, not a speck of dirt on him, and he looked vivid in front of Claire's camera. I stood in the shade, dusty and worn out, like something that had wandered into the wrong picture. "Noah?" Claire looked surprised. A second earlier she'd been crouched beside Ash, carefully treating his leg. "Did I interrupt you?" My throat felt blocked. Her brows drew together. "Don't say it like that. I'm just putting medicine on his leg." Then, without once looking at the wound on my own foot, she lifted his leg again and kept going. Ash turned toward me and switched into the old mountain speech. Claire couldn't follow a word of it, and his voice went vicious while his face stayed perfectly innocent. "What are you doing here?" "I came to get out of your way." He laughed, mocking. "Quit pretending. You'd really give Claire up? You think she's actually going to take you out of these mountains? It's been four years. You're entertainment to her, something to pass the time while she films. "She likes people who are bright and interesting, people like me. Not some quiet village boy who only knows how to wait for her. And now you've used up all seven trips, so you'll die up here like the rest of them." I curled my fingers. "I know. That's why I'm getting married." For the first time, Ash's confidence slipped. Then he raised his voice and switched back to plain speech. "Nothing has ever happened between Claire and me. How can you make it sound so sordid?" Claire hadn't understood a word he'd said before that, but she still decided, immediately, that I was the problem. "Noah, there's a limit to how jealous you get to be. Ash was hurt because of my documentary. There's never been anything between us." I looked down at the bracelet, then snapped it in two, and the metal fell onto the dirt. I forced the words past my throat. "I won't be jealous anymore. Claire, we're over." Chapter 3 Claire's hand clenched around the tube of ointment, and green salve squeezed out across her palm. "Noah, what did you say?" "We're over." I said it again. Disgust flashed across her face. "I already said I'd marry you. Now you're threatening to leave just to hurry me along?" I nodded. "That's right. And when the threat doesn't work, I'll go marry somebody else." She laughed, cold. "If you could really walk away from me, you wouldn't have come all the way out here to put on a show. You went after Ash just now to back me into a corner. I promised I'd marry you. Why do you have to be jealous over nothing?" She turned back toward Ash and ignored the tears gathering in my eyes. I watched her from behind. My legs were getting heavier and they shook every time I shifted my weight, but I made myself walk away anyway. I only wanted distance from the sight of the two of them. "Noah." Claire called after me. I stopped, and some small, stupid part of me still hoped. Then she said, "We're rushing the shooting schedule, so I'm staying at Ash's place for the next three days. When we're finished I'll come back and take you down." I kept walking. A stretch of trail that usually took half an hour took me nearly twice as long, and by the time I reached our house my leg gave out and I collapsed onto the threshold. Grandpa heard the sound and came running. "Noah! What happened?" I opened my mouth and no sound came. My whole leg felt swollen and hot. When he rolled up my trouser leg, he sucked in a breath. My ankle was badly swollen and the skin had gone dark and broken from days of walking on it. Men up here live by their legs. Planting, carrying firewood, crossing slopes, working fields — all of it depends on being able to walk. Grandpa's eyes turned red. He crouched and held my leg with shaking hands. "You foolish boy, how could you do this to yourself? That woman broke her word again and again, and you've nearly ruined your own leg waiting on her. What are you supposed to do with the rest of your life?" I lowered my head and tears fell silently onto my hands. I could hurt, I could get tired, I could be afraid. But for years I'd held onto one thought: one more trip, one more wait, and maybe this time she'd come. Grandpa wiped my face. "At least your marriage is settled now. Three days, then you marry. The girl from the next village is kind. She'll know how to look after you." I closed my eyes and the pain spread through my chest. The next day Claire came back, with Ash behind her. "Why are you sitting out here?" I didn't answer. Then she saw my swollen ankle, and surprise crossed her face, lasting less than a second before her expression hardened. "What are you trying to pull now? Ash's leg got infected, so you decided to hurt yourself too, just for the attention? I already said I'd take you out of these mountains. Stop trading on the fact that I care about you." Trading on it. I tried to lift my leg and couldn't. So this was me taking advantage of her. I closed my eyes and the tears finally came. "I'm getting married." She gave me an impatient look. "You're saying that again just to get a rise out of me. I need to take Ash down for treatment. Think about how you've been acting." Then she walked off without looking back. Chapter 4 Three days went by fast. Claire spent every one of them finishing the documentary and never came to see me again. When she spotted me from a distance, the only thing left in her eyes was irritation. I stopped explaining. On the morning of my wedding, Grandpa woke me before sunrise. He combed my hair and helped me into my wedding clothes, and the heavy coat sat so stiff across my shoulders that for a moment it was hard to breathe. He took my hand and patted it. "A man up here takes a wife and that's him settled. Build yourself a quiet home and let the hard years end here." I nodded. The moment I stepped outside, the music broke across the mountain and the whole village heard it. "The groom's up! Wedding party, move out!" I'd barely settled onto the horse when my phone buzzed. Claire. I stared at her name for a long time, and only once the horse had started moving under me did I answer. "Where are you?" "On the wedding road." She either didn't hear or didn't understand, and before she could say anything, somebody near her spoke loud enough for me to catch it. "Claire, there's a real mountain wedding coming through the village up ahead and the atmosphere is perfect. We need one last shot. It'd make a beautiful ending for the film." Claire laughed lightly. "Good. Film the wedding." Then she came back to our call. "Noah, this is the last shot. After this the documentary's done, so stop sulking. I'll take you out of these mountains and marry you." I sat there on the horse and said nothing. Then she hung up. The wedding party moved on along the mountain road, and not long after, it stopped. I heard footsteps up ahead and camera equipment being adjusted. Then Claire's clear voice. "We're filming a documentary about the Blackridge villages and we only need a few shots. This is our last sequence." A slim figure came up the line carrying a camera and rounded the head of the horse. I lifted my eyes, and Claire froze, the smile staying on her mouth a second too long. Her camera focused, and filled its frame with me in my wedding coat. The groom.