Rowan Switched's Arc

Chapter 16 of 25

Rowan woke at noon with a throat full of gravel. Two nights left. They tried the first note under their breath and it came out as a scrape. They tried the second and coughed. The ground root jar on the sill was empty. Ten rehearsal passes in the mushroom hut had stripped the voice clean. If Rowan tried to sing the completion phrase over the deed at the dark moon in this state, the notes would break in the middle and the deed would void the moment they cracked. Selene Nightshade drifted in through the wall. She listened to Rowan try the low note again. "That will not hold," she said. "You have two days. A throat like that needs a week." Rowan asked what could shorten a week to a night. Selene said, "A hand that knows voices. Not a healer. A singer who has sung through worse." Rowan thought of the red-haired woman who had leaned against the wall of the mushroom hut and counted on her fingers. Melody had said the woman forgot on command. Rowan doubted that now. Selene said the woman lived above the birch stand in a tree house strung with drying herbs. Rowan went that way with the empty jar in their pocket. The tree house sat high in a crooked oak, its rail wrapped in vines and hanging bottles. Rowan climbed the ladder and knocked. Luna Meridian opened the door with a stringed instrument still in her hand. She looked at Rowan's throat before she looked at their face. "You blew it out," she said. "Sit down. Open your mouth." She pressed a thumb under Rowan's jaw and made them hum. The hum broke. Luna set the instrument aside. "You sang from the throat again after I told you not to. Two nights is enough if you shut up until then. No talking. No humming. Warm water. Honey and salt. I will give you a paste. You breathe steam over it twice tonight and once at dawn." She mixed something brown in a clay cup and handed it over. "Drink half now. The rest before you sing. You will get three clean notes out of it. Not four. Do not waste them practicing." Rowan drank. The paste burned going down and then went cold. Luna watched Rowan's throat work. "You have one performance in you," she said. "Make it the real one." Rowan nodded. Luna added, "Elspeth Moonwhisper sent word you would come. She says the promise she owes runs through you now. Do not miss the note." Rowan climbed down the ladder with the cup wrapped in cloth and their mouth shut. The voice would hold for one night only. No rehearsal left. One dark moon. Three notes. Then the deed would speak for itself, or not at all.