Elestar Ravencrest's Arc

Chapter 2 of 6

Elestar waited three days. The twelfth cup grew a skin of dust. Then, near dusk, a clean silver note rang against the tower window, and he pushed himself up from his chair. He opened the shutter. The winged harp glided in and settled on the desk, folding its wings over a stack of scrolls. Behind it, small boots scraped the stone stairs. A boy stopped in the doorway. He had leaves in his hair and a leather satchel across his chest. Bark dust smudged one cheek. He stared at the room, then at Elestar, then at the room again. "You must be the boy the harp found," Elestar said. "Rowan," the boy said. "The pines told me which way to walk. They said the old man on the crag was expecting company." Elestar looked at the room the way the boy was looking at it. Books leaned in crooked towers. Dried herbs hung from the rafters in gray clumps. Cold ash spilled from the hearth. A cot in the corner held only more books. There was nowhere for a child to sit, sleep, or eat. He saw Rowan's shoulders creep up toward his ears. "Don't run," Elestar said. "Give me one hour." He moved faster than he had in a year. He cleared the desk with one sweep of his arm, catching the scrolls in a basket. He dragged the cot from the corner and shook the books off it. He kicked open the small side chamber he had used for storage and hauled out crates until the floor showed through. Rowan set down his satchel and helped. He carried the herb bundles to a hook by the window. He stacked the loose pages the way Elestar pointed. He did not speak much, but he moved like someone who had worked all his life. Halfway through, Elestar reached for the wool blanket at the foot of the cot and found it gone. He looked under the cot. He looked behind the crates. He heard a soft giggle from beneath the desk. The flower creature skipped out with the blanket bundled in its arms. A striped sock hung from one petal. Another dangled from its wrist. It grinned at Rowan and offered him the sock like a gift. Rowan laughed. It was the first sound of laughter the tower had held in eleven winters. "That is not a pet," Elestar said. "That is a thief." "I like it," Rowan said. By nightfall the side chamber held a swept floor, a cot with clean linen, a lamp, and a small table. Elestar stood in the doorway and looked in. The room was plain. It was enough. "This is yours," he said. "We begin at first light." Rowan nodded. Somewhere behind the desk, a drawer slid open, and another sock went missing.