Willow's Arc

Chapter 3 of 5

Willow walked back to camp with the bird's song still ringing in her head. The traveler sat near his yurt, feeding sticks to the campfire. The flames cracked and jumped inside the ring of logs. He did not look up. She sat across the fire and pulled her guitar around to her lap. She found the first notes slowly. They were the red bird's notes, low and sad. She let them fall into the fire's hiss. She did not sing yet. She only played the shape of the grief she had carried out of the woods. The traveler stopped feeding the fire. His hands went still. She watched him from the corner of her eye. He stared into the flames and pretended not to hear. But his shoulders bent toward her. After a minute he shifted closer, one seat, then another. He crossed to her side of the fire without seeming to know he moved. Willow kept playing. She was afraid to break the spell. The melody rose and fell like the bird under the willow tree. The man's jaw tightened. His eyes went wet in the firelight. Still she played, note for note, the way she had learned it. The last note faded. For a moment neither spoke. The fire popped. "That's beautiful," the traveler said. His voice was rough. "It reminds me of the song my wife used to sing to Fiona when she was but a wee lass." Willow's hands froze on the strings. Fiona. The girl from her dream. The red-haired ghost who had begged her to carry a message. Here was the father, naming her first, before Willow had said a word. "Fiona," Willow said carefully. "Your daughter." He nodded. He reached into his coat and drew out a dried thistle. Its purple head had gone pale and brittle, but the spines still held. He turned it in his fingers. "She picked this the week before the fever took her," he said. "I've carried it since." He looked at Willow across the low flames. "How did you find that tune? I haven't heard anything like it in years." Willow set her hand flat on the guitar. She had the melody now, and she had his trust leaning toward her. But she did not have the words yet. Fiona's message still lived only in a dream. If she spoke too soon, she might break him instead of freeing him. "A bird in the woods," she said. "It sang beneath a willow tree. I only copied it." The man's face changed. "A red bird?" Willow's breath caught. "You've seen it." "Twice," he said. He rose, the thistle still in his hand, his eyes bright and strange. "Play it again tomorrow night. Your music is healing my soul.” He walked to his yurt and ducked inside, a little of the grief had melted away. Willow looked down at her guitar. She had the song. Now she needed the words by tomorrow evening.