By Maren Blythe, Feature Correspondent, The Times-Observer
The Coastal Tram Line is older than half the villages it serves, a rattling silver spine running along the kingdom’s western edge. It hugs the cliffs, dives through marshy inlets, rattles across wooden trestles, and pauses in towns that smell of brine and rope and bread left to cool in sea-wind. It is the only tram line in Eyehasseen where the bell competes with gulls for dominance, and the only one whose passengers occasionally fish straight out the window.
I rode the entire line in a single long day—from Ravenshore’s storm-battered cliffs to the lantern-lit quays of Thornwold—to collect portraits of the people whose lives unfold along its route. Not interviews, and not quite stories. Portraits. Moments caught out of the air, like the salt on your tongue when the wind turns.
Ravenshore: The Fisherman Who Rides for the View
The tram begins its day in Ravenshore, where the sea beats the cliffs with the stubbornness of a debtor paying in coins of foam. On the first platform stands Old Kinrick, a fisherman so weathered his face looks carved from driftwood.
He boards every Fourthday but rides only one stop.
“Why bother, if you’re going nowhere?” I asked.
“To see the sea from higher up,” he replied. “From the boat, she’s a wife. From the tram, she’s a queen.”
He never misses a ride, not even in winter storms. Some say he hasn’t missed one since his brother was taken by a wave thirty years ago—though Kinrick himself shrugs at that rumor like a man letting sand fall from his hands.
Brindleford Cove: The Woman Who Waits
The next village curves inward like a welcoming arm. As we arrived, the wind whipped at a scarlet scarf tied tightly around the neck of Mistress Lorna Harpe. For ten years she has stood at the platform each dawn, watching the same tram come and go.
“I don’t ride,” she said, kneeling to place fresh flowers by the bronze plaque commemorating her late husband’s last voyage. “I just like knowing the world still moves.”
She never misses a day. Villagers say when the tram bell rings, she hums under her breath—something resembling a sailor’s hymn.
Greywater Steps: The Five Heralds
Greywater is a village built upward rather than outward, a stack of terraces that seem determined to climb away from the relentless sea. As we climbed the steep approach, the air suddenly filled with the shrill, triumphant blasts of tin trumpets.
Five barefoot boys stood atop the highest landing, blasting heroic fanfares with instruments made from hammered funnels.
“We’re the Greywater Heralds!” the tallest announced proudly.
“Payment?” I asked.
“Pastries, mostly! And praise. And sometimes fish heads.”
When the tram braked, they surrounded it as though greeting a victorious army. A woman in a shawl tossed each a coin, and the boys saluted with gusto before scampering off in search of pastries or mischief.
Southmere Bluffs: Lovers in a Shared Glove
Past noon, the tram wound along cliffside rails where the surf crashed far below like the pounding of a colossal drum. At Southmere Bluffs, a young couple boarded: Finn and Maera, both flushed by wind and youth. Between them, they held a single wool glove, their joined hands tucked neatly inside.
“Saving for marriage,” Maera explained cheerfully.
“One glove is cheaper than two,” Finn added, grinning.
They disembarked three stops later, still sharing the glove, still laughing, still holding the world together in the smallest possible way.
Cairnmarsh: The Keeper of Lost Things
Cairnmarsh is a place of reeds, fog, and practical magic. When the tram screeched to its halt, a woman in a patched coat leapt aboard clutching a wicker basket full of waterlogged odds and ends—bottles, driftwood, scraps of ribbon, a child’s shoe.
“You must be Tess,” I said.
Her eyebrows arched. “Must I?”
“You return lost things.”
Tess grinned. “Only the ones that want to be found.”
Down the line she delivered her treasures: a carved wooden bird to an astonished sculptor, a message-bottle to a blushing young woman, the shoe to a toddler who immediately hurled it into a puddle.
Tess sighed. “Some things prefer being lost.”
Thornwold Quay: The Kingdom’s Beating Heart
By twilight, lanterns shone over Thornwold like suspended suns. The tram rolled into the bustling quay where fishermen shouted, children ran, and the steam whistles of distant boats called like mechanical owls.
Here ends the line, but never the journey.
I stepped off to the chorus of gulls, laughter, and the smell of fried batter and salt. The tram bell rang one last time.
Not for departure.
For blessing.
I had not merely ridden the coastline.
I had ridden the lives that inhabit it.