Luna's Arc

Chapter 16 of 29

At first light, Luna rolled the map open on her knee. She had studied it all night. Lines and marks she almost understood. She traced a path to a wide blue circle deep in the trees. Water meant fish. Fish meant her group could eat. Food first, then the house. The answers could wait until the children were fed. She stood, gripped her carved pole, and told them to move. They walked for hours. The little ones stumbled. Luke lagged behind, dragging his feet. "My legs hurt," he said. "Can we stop?" Behind him the others whined the same thing. Luna felt the ache too, deep in her own legs. But she could not let them sit down. If they sat, they might not rise again. She crouched to Luke's level. "Look." She pointed to the blue circle on the map, then off through the trees. "Fish. Berries. Not far now." She squeezed his hand. "You've come farther than any of them. Show them how it's done." Luke wiped his nose and nodded. He straightened. The younger kids watched him and pushed on. The trees thinned. Water flashed ahead. The children ran to the edge of a broad clear pond. Fish moved under the surface in bright, shifting rows. Thick clusters of berries ringed the bank, red and purple and heavy. The kids shouted. Some fell to their knees and cupped water to their mouths. Luna set down her carved pole and got to work. She cut a straight branch with the multitool. She unlaced one shoe and tied the lace to the tip. A long thorn from the bank made the hook. Her hands knew the knots. She had built this pole before, on her first day in the woods, alone. Now twenty faces waited behind her. She fished for hours. She hooked one fish, then another, then more. The children gathered wood while she worked. The oldest of them started a small fire. By late afternoon Luna had caught enough for everyone. They roasted the fish and filled their laps with berries. For the first time in days, no one cried. Luke sat beside her, greasy-fingered and smiling. "We did it," he said. "We did," Luna said. She looked at the pond, the fire, the fed and sleeping children. She had led them here and kept them alive. But the map lay open in her lap, and the house was still far off. She marked the pond on it with a bit of charcoal, so she could find water again. Then her eyes went past the pond, to the deep dark part of the map where the paths tangled and the house waited. They would sleep here tonight, safe and full. Tomorrow they walked into the deep woods. The answers about her parents lay at the end of that path, and now she had the strength to reach them.