Rowan Switched's Arc

Chapter 20 of 25

Rowan looked at the red bottle on Elspeth's shelf. The label was written in a hand meant for a father speaking to the living. Not Rowan's bottle. Not Elspeth's to give. Rowan asked whose it was. Elspeth said the name was scratched off years ago, but the maker still worked from a tent past the low field. If Rowan wanted the voice, Rowan had to find the maker before the moon cleared the ridge. Rowan climbed down the ladder and ran. The low field was wet grass and no lights. Rowan had no map and no time to knock on doors. The moon already sat behind the pines. Blind searching would burn the last hour. Rowan stopped at the fence and thought of the one person who had touched a bottle like it and lived to speak of the price. Rowan turned toward the singer's camp near the twin towers. Luna Meridian was packing a case when Rowan crossed the firelight. Rowan held up the dead flask. "Paste is gone. Elspeth says there is another. A red one. A father's. I don't know the owner." Luna set the case down. "The old woman in the stitched tent past the orchard. Elara. She keeps the red one for a man who never came back for it. Go now. Tell her I sent you and that the note is real." Rowan ran through the orchard. The tent stood at the far edge, ribbed and stitched and hung with small bones. Elara Rootwhisper stood in the doorway before Rowan finished crossing the last row. She had already lifted two vials off her belt. One gold, thick as slow honey. One red, corked with wax. "Luna sent me," Rowan said. "The paste died. I have to sing three notes before the moon clears the ridge." Elara looked at the flask, then at Rowan's throat. "The gold coats the cords. The red carries the note whole. Both, or neither." Rowan asked the price. Elara did not soften it. "The red belongs to a father who owed a child a song he never sang. If you drink it, the debt moves to you. You will owe a child a song before the next dark moon, or your voice closes for good." Rowan counted the arc. One night to sing three notes. One month, after, to sing to a child Rowan did not yet know. Rowan said yes. Elara pressed the gold into one hand and the red into the other. "Drink the gold now. The red at the graveyard wall, one breath before the note." Rowan swallowed the gold. It went down warm and stayed warm. Rowan ran for the animal graveyard with the red bottle against the chest and the deed against the ribs. The moon touched the ridge. The old debt was gone. A new one sat in Rowan's pocket, waiting for a face.