Garnah smiled brightly at them both. “In the meantime... I was just telling Hamon here how much I would really like grandchildren. I think you should name one after me.”
This time she couldn’t help it: Daleina laughed out loud.
Sneaking away from home and traveling north alone was not the best decision that Arin had ever made, but Queen Naelin and Champion Ven hadn’t left her much choice. She’d packed what she’d been able to scrounge from her parents’ kitchen: several loaves of bread and a cake, but she hadn’t eaten meat in days.
On the plus side, nothing had eaten her.
Probably because I smell bad enough to churn any predator’s stomach.
She hadn’t dared descend to the forest floor to wash in any of the streams. The safest route was midforest, so that’s what she’d stuck to. Now, only a few miles from the border, she wished she’d braved a stream.The border guards are going to get one sniff of me and say, “We don’t want your stench in Semo.”
For the past several miles, she had been trying to think of what to say to get past the border guards. Queen Naelin had been invited.Me... not so much.
If only they hadn’t left her behind, this would have all been much easier.
And I’d be able to protect Queen Naelin, like I promised I would.It had been obvious to everyone that the queen and Champion Ven were waltzing into a trap, and it was obvious to Arin that she could help.But I can’t if I’m not there!
She reached the end of a rope bridge and plopped down on the platform to rest. Above her, she heard the sweet birdlike song of a canopy singer—a wordless melody. Leaning her head back against the trunk, Arin listened as the gentle music drew closer.
And then it cut off abruptly.
She sat up straight. Had the singer fallen? Been attacked by spirits? Arin scanned the nearby branches for any movement, but saw nothing.
“Hello, young traveler!”
Arin yelped as a woman swung in front of her—she was upside down, dangling with her knees around a skinny branch. Her frizzy hair puffed down in a cloud beneath her head, and she was smiling happily, as if finding Arin had made her day.
“Um, hello.” Arin bent her head to the side, trying to see the woman right side up.
“It’s unusual for people as young as you to travel so close to the border by themselves. But I’m not going to ask if you’re lost, because I can tell you’re not.”
“You can?” Arin didn’tthinkshe was lost, but it was difficult to be sure. “I’m traveling to Semo. I heard the passage through is north?”
“Only a mile more. But you’ll want to cross at dawn. The Semoian spirits are fussy—they think everyone who crosses at night is an invader, and they tear them apart.” The woman swung back and forth, and her poofy hair swung with her.
Arin wanted to reach out and grab her, but the woman didn’t seem worried about falling. “Definitely don’t want to be torn apart. Thanks. Are you the canopy singer I heard?”
“My name’s Sira. I was preparing the trees for sunset. Everything changes for them when dusk comes. They can’t drink the sunlight anymore, and different birds and creatures scurry across them. I always thought it must be scary for them, so much change every day. So I sing to comfort them.”
“Yeah, night can be scary.” Arin wasn’t sure what else to say to such a speech. And it was true that nights alone in the forest had been terrifying. Suddenly, she didn’t want Sira to leave. “Where do you go at night? Do you have an extra place to sleep?”
“There’s only enough room for my mother and me, and sometimes my brother, when he comes to visit. But now he’s gone to Semo. Oh! There are others on their way to Semo!” Sira smiled even brighter. “You may wish to join them. I’ll take you to them!”
She scampered squirrel-like over the branches, and then swung from a rope to the next tree, laughing as she swooped through the air. Arin hurried to follow as Sira swung from rope to rope, tossing back the ropes each time. It reminded Arin of when she and Daleina were little, before Daleina went to the academy, when they’d race all around the trees. She soon found herself laughing too, until at last Sira stopped on a platform.
To the north, the vast oaks and pines switched to slender birches. In between them, not far away from Arin and Sira, campfire smoke snaked up to the sky. “Mother is with them,” Sira said, “either advising them or yelling at them. Possibly both. You’ll be welcome by their fire.”
“You aren’t coming too?” Arin didn’t love the idea of approaching strangers, despite the fact that Sira had been a stranger ten minutes ago.
“My feet won’t touch the forest floor until it has stories to tell me. I’m not done with the trees yet.” She said it so matter-of-factly that Arin bobbed her head in agreement, as if this statement made perfect sense.
Arin glanced back at the figures around the campfire—she counted four. Three were seated and one stood, but it was impossible to see more detail than that. She turned back to ask Sira another question... but the canopy singer was already swinging back through the trees and then climbing, without ropes or ladders, even higher toward the precarious treetops.
My first canopy singer, Arin thought.And she was just as strange as I’d always imagined.It was known to take a special kind of person to spend their lives so high up that the branches might or might not hold your weight.I liked her, though.
Arin located a rope ladder descending from the platform, and she climbed down. By the time she reached the forest floor, the sun had set, and the brightest light was the campfire.
She walked toward it, telling herself to be brave like Daleina. In the distance, she thought she heard the soaring voice of the canopy singer, but the wind stole away half the melody.
