Draycca Glimmerwing's Arc

Chapter 3 of 3

Meridwen waded out to check the new markers before noon. The blue-dotted stones traced their path along the deeper channel, twenty paces east of the copper skimmer's nest. But when she reached the final stone, she found it missing. She searched the silt with her feet, then walked the channel twice. Nothing. She followed the channel downstream, watching the tall grass sway where the current bent around a cluster of sticks. A beaver dam. The structure rose from the deep water, too far out for her students to reach safely. She circled it, waist-deep, and spotted blue marks dotting half a dozen stones wedged between the sticks. The current had carried them here overnight, into territory she couldn't ask her students to wade. Meridwen stood in the cold water and studied the dam. She could retrieve the stones and mark a new path again. But the marsh had moved them twice now — first the copper skimmer's nest, then this. Her students needed to learn that stillness meant accepting what the marsh chose, not forcing their own design onto it. She waded back to the shallows and gathered no new stones. When the first students arrived that afternoon, she pointed toward the deeper channel. The path ends where the current took it, she told them. If you want to study the copper skimmer, you'll need to find your own way there. Three of them stood at the channel's edge for a long time before turning back. Two others stepped into the deeper water, slow and careful, choosing their route without markers. Meridwen watched from the shallows and did not follow.