Mrs. Robin's Arc

Chapter 8 of 10

Morning came gray and damp. Mrs. Robin checked the nest edges before her babies woke. Three small chests rose and fell in the center of the woven bowl. She smoothed a loose reed at the rim, then looked out past the branch. She knew where the berry cluster was. One patch. One trip's worth. After that, nothing. She flew to the fallen log at the forest's rim and landed on the stems. The berries she had left yesterday were still there, but fewer than she remembered. Something had been at them in the night. She tore what she could and carried them back. Her babies ate. She said thank you after each one. When they slept again, she counted what remained on the branch beside her. Enough for one meal. Maybe not even that by evening. She pushed off the branch and flew wider than before. She followed the slope up past the swamp, past the wet ground, into drier trees. Her wings ached. She almost turned back. Then she smelled it, a sharp sweetness on the air, and dropped down through the leaves. At the base of an old fox den, wild berries grew in a thick tangle protected from the storm. Red, blue, dark purple, heavy on the vine. More than one bird could eat in a season. She landed on a stem and steadied herself. This was the source. This would feed her babies for weeks. But she could not fly here three times a day. The distance was too far. A hawk could take her on the return. A hard rain could strip the vines before she came back. She needed to carry the food closer, and she needed somewhere to keep it dry. She remembered a hollow in a tree not far from her own, a split trunk with a dry inner chamber where wind did not reach. She had passed it a hundred times without thinking. She flew there now and looked inside. The wood was sound. The opening was small enough to keep larger animals out. She could fit shelves of leaves. She could stack berries by color, the firm ones deep, the soft ones near the front. She made the trip six times that day. She lined the hollow with dry grass. She packed berries in the back and lighter fruit near the opening. She worked until her wings would not lift, then rested on the rim and looked at what she had built. A pantry. Her own. She flew home in the last light. Her babies were awake and hungry. She fed them from what she had carried in her beak, and she said thank you after each berry, so they would hear it. Tomorrow she would not fly to the edge of the forest. Tomorrow she would fly to her pantry, and the day after, and the day after that.