The Refuge Song by Francesca Haig Page B

rubbed at his absent eyes. “It explains everything. Why the Council’s been driving up the tithes and the land restrictions, these last few years. They’re pushing us toward the refuges.”
    â€œAnd do you think you could put it in a song?” I said.
    He reached down to place a hand on the neck of the guitar. “There’s a song in your story, that’s for sure, though it won’t be a pretty one,” hesaid. He hoisted up the guitar, stroking along the top with his thumb, as if waking it gently.
    â€œLike Cass said: it’ll be dangerous, spreading the word,” said Piper.
    Leonard nodded. “True enough. But it’s dangerous for all of us, if word of the tanks and the refuges doesn’t spread.”
    â€œIt’s a lot to ask of you,” I said.
    â€œYou’re not asking it of me,” Leonard said. There was no music left in his voice as he spoke—his words were grave and quiet. “But you told me what you know. And now that I’ve heard it, I have an obligation.”
    Î©
    For hours, while I took my shift at the lookout post, I could hear Leonard and Eva working on the song. First they built the tune itself. The occasional word reached me: No, try this. Hold off on the chord change until the chorus. How about this? But mainly they didn’t talk. It was a conversation that took place in music. He’d pluck out a tune, and Eva would echo it, then play with it: varying the melody, adding harmonies. For hours they sat together, passing the tune back and forth between them.
    Even when Eva had settled down to rest, Leonard kept working, adding the words now. He sang slowly, trying out different versions of the words. He was stringing them onto the growing melody like beads on a string, sometimes unthreading and rearranging. When Piper relieved me at the lookout post, I fell asleep listening to Leonard’s singing, the graveled edge of his deep voice.
    When I woke later, the moon was rising in the darkening sky, and Leonard was still playing. I walked down to the spring. The music followed me all the way to the water, which might be why Zoe didn’t hear me coming. I saw her standing close to where the stream burst from the rock, about twenty feet ahead of me. She was leaning against a tree, one arm wrapped loosely around it, her head resting on the trunk asshe tilted her face upward. She swayed slightly to the music that filtered through the trees. Her eyes were closed.
    I’d seen Zoe naked, when we washed at rivers. I’d seen her asleep. I’d even shared her dreams, her sleeping mind a window onto the sea. But I’d never seen her as unguarded as at that moment. I turned away, as if I’d seen something shameful, and began to retreat. She opened her eyes.
    â€œAre you spying on me?”
    â€œJust fetching water,” I said, lifting the empty water flask like a flag of surrender.
    She turned back to the spring. When she spoke, she didn’t look at me. “There used to be a bard who came through our parents’ village, a few times a year. She played the violin like nobody you’ve ever seen. Piper and I were only tiny, then—we used to sneak out after bedtime to listen.”
    She said nothing more. I hesitated before speaking—I was remembering her blade at my stomach, after she’d learned that I’d seen her dreams.
    â€œIf you want to talk—” I said, eventually.
    â€œYou’re meant to be the expert on the future,” she interrupted, striding toward me and grabbing the flask. “Concentrate on that. That’s what we need you for. Keep your nose out of my past.” She knelt at the spring and wrenched the stopper out before filling the flask.
    We stood facing each other. I watched the water drip from her wet hand, and I tried to come up with words that she couldn’t throw back at me.
    Before I could speak, the music stopped suddenly. From up the hill, Piper was