Billhook

The girl found the billhook left on the bench by the hedge, a short curved blade set into a stout wooden handle, the inner edge bright from use and the back of it dull and thick. She lifted it by the handle and asked what work was done with a blade bent round like a hook instead of straight. Nyra took it from her and turned the edge to the light. “It is for laying a hedge,” Nyra said. “You cut the stems partway through and bend them down, and the hook is what draws the cut toward you as you pull.”

The girl ran a careful finger along the blunt back of it and then along the curve of the bright edge. “A straight knife would be simpler to grind,” the girl said. “Why curve it at all?”

“The curve is the reason it works,” Nyra answered. “A straight edge slides off a round stem and you lose the stroke. The hook catches the wood and holds it, and the bend gathers the whole cut into the deepest part of the blade where the arm is strongest. You pull, and the stem gives, and your hand is never in front of the edge.”

The girl wanted the billhook written into the book, the hooked blade and the thick back and the way the curve pulled the cut home. Nyra let her set it down, and watched the slow letters form. A book gathers what can be set down in a line and counted, and leaves the rest to the one who was there.

“You can draw the curve of it and the handle worn to your grip,” Nyra said, “but not the long row of a hedge laid down a whole morning, nor the ache that settles in the shoulder by the end of it.” The girl looked at the page, and then at the quiet blade on the bench, and she understood. The book keeps the billhook, and you keep the hedging of it.