Hana smoothed down the map’s edges. “Excuse me, but can you help us find a field?”
The map shivered on the floor. A crescent-shaped mountain range formed over its surface, creasing the page. The map rippled and carved a field into the range’s inner curve. It shook, as though asking Hana if this was the field she was searching for.
“A field with wildflowers and a temple,” Hana said. “And a stream.”
The mountains over the map receded, leaving the paper as smooth as it was before they had appeared. The map folded itself back into a rectangle.
“Maybe the next map will know where it is,” Keishin said.
Hana spread out a second map and asked it the same question.
The map refolded itself.
Keishin chewed the nail on his thumb.
Hana unfolded the third map and asked it about the field. She spoke slowly to make sure that the map understood every word.
The map lay flat and still.
Hana reached for the fourth map.
The third map trembled. Two mountains rose over opposite corners of the blank sheet, leaving a valley between them. Thevalley creased and formed a temple. A strip ripped across the middle of the valley, exposing the floor beneath it.
“Kei…” Hana stared at the rip, transfixed. “I think that’s a…”
“Stream.” He squeezed her hand.
A train rumbled over his voice. Cheers erupted through the camp. A fourth of the people on the platform scurried around, stuffing their belongings into bags and balancing things that couldn’t fit in their arms. A man made his young daughter ride on his shoulders as he ran toward the train with two bulging bags in each hand. His daughter bobbed as he ran, hugging a small potted plant to her chest. The small group they had shared a tent with chased after them to wave goodbye.
Keishin ignored the commotion, focusing his attention on the long strip of paper hovering over the map. It twisted in the air, shredding itself into tiny petallike pieces. The shreds turned the palest blue before falling like rain over the map and scattering over the paper valley. “Wildflowers…”
The map grew still. Its shreds re-formed, and in less time than it took to blink, the map was pristine and whole. Brushstrokes slowly appeared over the page where the valley had been, revealing the field’s location one carefully painted word at a time.
“We did it!” Keishin threw his arms around Hana as the train pulled away from the station.
More words formed on the map. Hana’s eyes darted over the completed directions. She stiffened in Keishin’s embrace.
Keishin released her. “What’s wrong?”
“I know where the field is.” She stared at the empty tracks. “And we just missed the train the map told us to catch to get there.”
—
A blanket of quiet settled over the tent village as its residents retreated into their makeshift homes and went to bed. A few pockets of hushed conversation remained, exchanged between groups huddled around bonfires. They had talked about the same thing for hours, none of them growing tired of reliving the excitement of the train’s arrival earlier that day.
Hana sat among a small group gathered in a circle around a fire, warming her hands by the flames. “What if the train never comes?”
Keishin put his arm around her. “It will. It has to. We’ve come too far to give up now.”
“You’re new here, aren’t you?” said an elderly man sitting next to Keishin.
“We are,” Hana replied.
“Welcome. I am Ono Aritomo. I can always tell who the new arrivals are.” The man flashed a nearly toothless grin. “They are the ones in a rush. I was that way too when I arrived here with my mother.”
“Your mother?” Keishin tried and failed to hide the surprise in his voice.
Aritomo smiled. “I was a young boy then, barely twelve. I wed and raised a family here. My wife’s train arrived ten years ago. Our son went with her.”
