Aster Alloway's Arc

Chapter 21 of 26

The rain came before the walls did. Aster pushed the cart with three hands and hummed with the last of her voice. The yellow dress caught her breath and fed it to the pollen. But her throat had gone raw. Each note scraped now. If she stopped humming, the dress fell silent, and the spores under the glass would fade before the city. She tried a lower note. It cracked. She swallowed and tried again. Nothing came but air. The chime in the fridge dulled. The pollen dimmed a shade. Aster froze on the wet trail, six years of work fading under her hands. A sharp coat cut through the gray. Benny Stitch stepped off the path, ink-stained fingers already reaching for the cart. She had sewn the singing dress Aster wore. She wasted no time now. "You've gone hoarse," Benny said. She looked at Aster's throat, then the dress. "I planned for this." She pulled a small object from her coat. It was a music box, shaped like a glowing crystal blade, a tiny key jutting from its base. Aster stared. "That's a toy." "It holds a tune," Benny said. "Wind it. It sings without you." Aster's hope snagged. "The dress needs a real voice. The singers' song. Not any noise." "I recorded them," Benny said. "Before you left the meadow." She wound the key. A thin melody spilled out, the poppy singers' exact tune, small but true. She held the box against the yellow dress. The peacock feathers on the skirt trembled. The stitched seams caught the sound. The dress hummed on its own. The fridge chimed back to full. The pollen brightened under the glass, steady again. Aster let her sore voice rest and heard the machine sing in her place. But the box wound down within a minute. The tune slowed. The glow began to slip. "It won't last the road," Aster said. "No," Benny said. "But I don't work alone." A voice called through the rain. Zinnia Chatterwick jogged up the trail, hood back, hair pink and blue and soaked. She minded Aster's shop and flowers back home. She should not be here. She grinned anyway. "Shop's fine. Flowers are alive. Mostly." She caught her breath. "Benny sent word you'd blow your voice. So I came to talk. I can talk for days." Zinnia took the box, wound it, and started singing along the moment it played, matching the tune. Her voice was rough but loud. The feathers caught it. The dress held. When the box slowed, she wound it again without stopping. "Go," Zinnia said between notes. "I'll keep it fed. You just push." Aster gripped the handle with all four hands. Her voice was spent, but the pollen glowed. The dress sang. Zinnia sang. The city wall showed dark ahead through the rain. Aster pushed, and for the first time the sound did not depend on her alone.