The Girl Who Drank the Moon(42)

“Caw,” cawed the crow. “Luna, Luna, Luna.”

“Hush,” Luna scolded. “I’m trying to think.”

The crow was black and shiny, as a crow ought to be, but when Luna squinted and looked at it aslant, she saw another color, too. Blue. With a shimmer of silver at the edges. The extra colors vanished when she opened her eyes wide and looked straight on.

“What are you?” Luna asked.

“Caw,” said the crow. “I am the most excellent of crows,” the crow meant.

“I see. Make sure my grandmother doesn’t see you,” Luna said. “Or my swamp monster,” she added after considering it. “I think you’ll upset them.”

“Caw,” said the crow. “I agree,” it meant.

Luna shook her head.

The crow’s being did not make sense. Nothing made sense. And yet the crow was there. It was sure and clever and alive.

There is a word that explains this, she thought. There is a word that explains everything I don’t understand. There must be. I just can’t remember what it is.

Luna had instructed the crow to stay out of sight until she could figure things out, and the crow had complied. It truly was an excellent crow.

And now, here it was again. On the lowest branch of the fig tree.

“Caw,” the crow should have said. “Luna,” it called instead.

“Quiet, you,” Luna said. “You might be heard.”

“Caw,” the crow whispered, abashed.

Luna forgave the crow, of course. As she walked on, distracted, she tripped on a rock, tumbling hard to the ground and falling on her satchel.

“Ouch,” her satchel said. “Get off me.”

Luna stared at it. At this point, though, nothing surprised her. Even talking satchels.

Then a small, green nose peeked out from under the flap. “Is that you, Luna?” asked the nose.

Luna rolled her eyes. “What are you doing in my bag?” she demanded. She threw open the flap and glared at the shamefaced dragon climbing out.

“You keep going places,” he said, without looking her in the eye. “Without me. And it isn’t fair. I just wanted to come.” Fyrian fluttered upward and hovered at eye level. “I just want to be part of the group.” He gave her a hopeful, dragonish smile. “Maybe we should go get Glerk. And Auntie Xan. That’s a fun group!”

“No,” Luna said firmly, and continued her ascent to the top of the ridge. Fyrian fluttered behind.

“Where are we going? Can I help? I’m very helpful. Hey, Luna! Where are we going?”

Luna rolled her eyes and spun on her heel with a snort.

“Caw,” the crow said. He didn’t say Luna this time, but Luna could feel him thinking it. The crow flew up ahead, as though he already knew where they were going.

They followed the trail to the third cinder cone, the one on the far edge of the crater, and climbed to the top.

“Why are we up here?” Fyrian wanted to know.

“Hush,” Luna said.

“Why must we hush?” Fyrian asked.

Luna sighed deeply. “I need you to be very, very quiet, Fyrian. So I may concentrate on my drawing.”

“I can be quiet,” Fyrian chirped, still hovering in front of her face. “I can be so quiet. I can be quieter than worms, and worms are very quiet, unless they are convincing you not to eat them, and then they are less quiet, and very convincing, though I usually still eat them because they are delicious.”

“I mean, be quiet right now,” Luna said.

“But I am, Luna! I’m the quietest thing that—”

Luna snapped the dragon’s jaws shut with her index finger and her thumb and, to keep his feelings from getting hurt, scooped him up with her other arm and cuddled him close.

“I love you so much,” she whispered. “Now hush.” She gave his green skull an affectionate tap and let him curl into the heat of her hip.

She sat cross-legged on a flat-topped boulder. Scanning the limit of the land before it curved into the rim of the sky, she tried to imagine what sorts of things lay beyond. All she could see was forest. But surely the forest didn’t go on forever. When Luna walked with her grandmother in the opposite direction, eventually the trees thinned and gave way to farms, and the farms gave way to towns, which gave way to more farms. Eventually, there were deserts and more forests and mountain ranges and even an ocean, all accessible by large networks of roads that unwound this way and that, like great spools of yarn. Surely, the same must be true in this direction. But she couldn’t know for sure. She had never traveled this way. Her grandmother wouldn’t let her.

She never explained why.

Luna set her journal on her lap and opened it to an empty page. She peered into her satchel, found her sharpest pencil, and held it in her left hand—lightly, as though it was a butterfly and might fly away. She closed her eyes, and tried to make her mind go blank and blue, like a wide, cloudless sky.

“Do I need to close my eyes, too?” Fyrian asked.

“Hush, Fyrian,” Luna said.

“Caw,” said the crow.

“That crow is mean,” Fyrian sniffed.

“He’s not mean. He’s a crow.” Luna sighed. “And yes, Fyrian, dearest. Close your eyes.”

Fyrian gave a delighted gurgle and snuggled into the folds of Luna’s skirt. He’d be snoring soon. No one could get comfortable quicker than Fyrian.