Freida Waters's Arc

Chapter 1 of 6

Freida Waters started her bookshop with a leaky shack and six borrowed books. She had one strange rule. Read a book, come back, and tell her what you thought. In return, she gave you another book and a warm cookie. Twenty-five years later, her blue shop stood two floors tall on the bog, yellow flowers bright in every window. But she still wanted more. She wanted every child in the swamp to read, and she wanted to dig up the swamp's forgotten history. This morning, her first-ever reader sat across the counter. Captain Silas Marsh had learned his letters from Freida when he first came to the swamp. Now his black beard hung to his chest, and he still fished for eels every dawn. He tapped a book about swamp fishing with one thick finger. "You sure this one's got the deep channels?" he asked. "Page forty," Freida said. "And it says nothing about the animals dancing at dusk." Silas laughed, a deep rumble. "Because nobody believes us. I've seen the frogs line up like a choir." "And the herons bowing," Freida said. She slid a cookie across the counter. "That's a memory, not a book. Somebody should write it down." "Maybe you should," Silas said. Then a cry cut through the window. High and sharp, like something small and hurt. Freida dropped her pencil. Silas was already up, moving fast for a man his age. They pushed out the door together into the wet morning air. The cry came again, from the water's edge. They followed it to a mangrove tree with bright yellow prop roots. Freida knelt in the mud and looked between the roots. A small lizard huddled there, its side torn and bleeding. Above them, a hawk dropped from the branches, wings wide, claws out. "Get back!" Silas roared. He swung his arm at the sky. The hawk broke off and beat upward, screeching. It circled once and settled on a high branch, watching. Freida reached slowly into the roots. The lizard hissed, then went still. She cupped it in both hands and lifted it out. Its scales shimmered, amber and gold, brighter than any lizard she knew. "I've never seen this kind," she said. "Not in twenty-five years." Silas leaned close, forgetting the hawk. "Nor me. And I've fished every inch of this bog." The lizard's breathing came shallow and quick. Blood pooled in Freida's palm. The hawk still waited above, patient. Freida stood, holding the small creature to her chest. "It won't last out here. I'm taking it inside." "That bird won't forget an easy meal," Silas said. He glanced up at the branches. "And you don't even know what it eats." Freida looked down at the strange amber lizard, then back at her shop. She had wanted the swamp's secrets. Now one bled in her hands, and she had no idea how to keep it alive.