Arrow frowned. “Yes, I do.”
Petari shook her head. “Maybe. But mostly you want us to leave for another reason. You’re hiding something.”
This girl was smart. Too smart.
Arrow didn’t reply, just watched her.
“So,” she continued, “I’ll keep your secret on two conditions.” She held up a finger. “One, my friends and I stay in the village. We won’t go over the bridge and into your precious forest, but at least let us stay there. There’s more food in the trees than we’ve seen in years. We need this place.”
Arrow’s eyes dropped to the ground. He knew I wouldn’t like them staying, but they were humans—his kind—and they needed help. He didn’t know what the world outside was like, but how could he refuse?
“And two,” Petari said, holding up another finger, “you tell me everything you know about this stuff.” She held up the leaves.
“About the malva leaves?”
“Yes. And more,” Petari said. “If you know about this mulchy stuff and stink bugs and snakes, you must know other things too.”
Arrow’s toes dug into the soil. He was feeling something I couldn’t quite make out. Uncertainty? Delight? Pride? I could tell that he liked this idea. He wanted to help them. And perhaps he wanted her to see how useful he was.
“I…” Arrow’s voice trailed off, as though he knew what he should be saying but couldn’t get the words out.
“You want us to leave, but we’re not safe out there. In here, you’ve got things that can help us.” Petari must’ve been able to tell how soft Arrow’s heart really was. “That baby needs you. We all need you.”
Arrow glanced in my direction again and said, “I can’t.” Good. “You should leave. I told you, it’s too dangerous.”
“It’s not too dangerous for you,” Petari said, then quickly put her hand to her mouth. “Oh! Is that how you lost your hand, to one of those cats or caimans or something?”
Arrow glanced at the point of his arm, then shoved it behind his back. “I was born like this.”
“You were?” Petari took this in, then smiled. “There you go, then. You haven’t been eaten in the forest, so I won’t be either.”
Arrow narrowed his eyes but didn’t say anything. He didn’t like where this was heading any more than I did.
“And besides,” Petari said, “if I bring the rest of my group into the forest with me, it won’t be as dangerous. All those people, trampling around in the trees. I don’t think anything will harm that big a group.”
“That’s what you think,” Arrow muttered, his nerves making a pool in the soil beneath him. He thought for a few breaths, then looked at her again. “If I show you, you have to keep the others away.”
Petari couldn’t contain her smile. “Got it.”
“And after I’ve shown you, you can take whatever you need, then leave.”
“We could just stay in the village,” Petari said, her voice small.
“You have to leave,” Arrow replied, more forceful.
Petari tucked her hands behind her back. “Okay. Okay. You teach me all about the food and leaves and stuff, then I’ll get everyone to go. It’s a deal.” She grinned at Arrow as she twisted two of her fingers together.
I didn’t understand her movement, but there was something about her energy I did not like.
Relief flooded the soil around Arrow. Even though he knew Petari and the herd had to leave, he was excited to show one of his own what he could do.
“We’ll start tomorrow,” he said, turning back toward the village.
“Great.” She followed. “I’ll tell the others I’m going on a run to the Barbs.”
“The Barbs?”
“Yeah, you know, out there.” She motioned vaguely north. Perhaps she was talking about the outside world.
“Yeah…” Arrow frowned but didn’t ask again. “I’ll meet you south of the tree line when the sun’s ray is like this.” He tilted his forearm to a diagonal.
Petari gave a short laugh. “What is that? Like nine o’clock?”
Arrow eyed her quizzically.
“Okaaaay,” she said. “Like that it is.” She copied his arm movement and grinned. “Oh, I’m Petari, by the way. If we’re going to be friends, we should probably know each other’s names.”
“Friends?” Arrow’s heartbeat raced.
“Sure. Friends hang out and show each other stuff, so we’re kinda like friends. Don’t you think?”
Friends on conditions, but I doubted Arrow saw it like that.
“Petari.” Arrow rolled her name around his mouth.
“So, what’s your name?” she asked. “You have a name, don’t you?”
Arrow paused. He knew names are important. They have power. You protect them. I had taught him this, and no doubt it was going through his mind right now. But this was also new to him. He had never been asked his name before by another human. He had never even talked to another human.
“I’m Arrow,” he said at last.
“Arrow. Like a stick with a point at the end?”
Arrow glanced at his arm and straightened his shoulders. “Yeah.”
“I like it. Okay, Arrow, see you tomorrow at…” She tilted her arm the way Arrow had.
He smiled. They had reached the edge of the tree line, and the huts of the village were within sight. “Remember our deal,” he said. “Don’t tell them anything.”
“I know.”
Arrow nodded, then turned toward me. He took off over the roots. Curly waved an angry fist at Petari from his shoulder, but a thrill was in Arrow’s every step.
A smile drifted onto Petari’s face as she watched him go. Once he had disappeared into the trees, she slipped inside the village.
* * *
“I know what you’re going to say,” Arrow said when he and Curly got back to me.
“She tricked you into showing her more. You do know that, don’t you?” I said.
Arrow sighed, swinging a tired Curly down from his shoulder. “Remember what you told me when I had that fight with Dark Brow?”
“That old howler monkey didn’t like you pulling his hair.”
A smirk swept across Arrow’s face at the memory. “Yeah, but you said if I treated him with respect, he’d do the same for me. And you were right. Dark Brow and I became friends.”
Friends. Some of the Forest Dwellers had thought the Imposters were friends. Humans seemed to have trouble living up to that word. But it was what Arrow wanted. While I understood his actions, I didn’t want him to be disappointed.
“Do you think that will happen with the human girl?” I asked.
Arrow grabbed some acai berries and nuts and put them in the hemp hammock he kept hanging down from the branch by his nest.
“I don’t know,” he said, pulling himself up to his nest. He hoisted up the hammock and took a bite of berry. “We’ve at least started to be friends now. And as my friend, she’ll respect me and keep the herd out of the forest like I asked.”
“We’ll see. But you must have caution. She’s still from the outside world. She cannot be trusted.”
He sighed. “I know.”
That night, as Arrow slept with a small smile on his face, I kept a close watch on the human herd. The girl had said she would keep the others out of the forest, keep Arrow and the bridge secret, but I was not convinced.
Cockroaches lent me their eyes, sending images of the village. What they sent was blurry, but I could tell no one ventured south of the huts.
I listened, too, through the vibrations in the air. The conversations were light, filled with laughter. Joy and contentment soaked into the land, and I had to admit it was nice to feel so much human energy in the forest again. They teased one another, talked of plans, of ones they’d left behind. Sadness mixed with the happiness then, and some anger.
But one human stayed away from the rest of the herd. The only time she talked was to ask Mercou what time the sun’s rays would be at the angle Arrow had shown
her. After he calculated it, estimating around eight o’clock in the morning, Mercou asked why, and Petari said she was figuring out when shade would hit a section of the village because she wanted to plant a seed she’d found. After that, Petari lay on her back, gazing up at the stars, excitement pooling beneath her.
Good girl.
12
IN A CROP OF BANANA TREES NEAR THE CENTER OF THE FOREST, ONE STRUGGLED TO BRING FORTH ITS FRUIT FOR THE MONKEYS THAT LIVED NEARBY. IT TRIED, TRIED, TRIED, BUT NONE WOULD GROW. THE MONKEYS MOVED ON.
While Arrow and the rest of the diurnal forest slept, I kept watch. Only the night hunters, beetles, and moths were awake, as well as the human called Luco, who sat on the steps of the village’s main hut, his eyes alert to every flash of a firefly. Eventually the lullaby of the crickets weighed on his eyelids too. Then I reached out to the root network, satisfied that we were safe from the young herd until the sun was in the sky.
I poked at the places that hadn’t communicated for a few moons, but still no reply was returned. Dead patches in the fungi that bridged the roots were more plentiful every day, and it was becoming harder and harder to connect with every part of my home.
But there was something unusual: The sickly taste in the earth of the Burnt Circle was getting thicker. I reached through the root network to the soil there. I needed to know for myself what was disturbing the ground.
That taste had sunk deeper into the earth, but I couldn’t see any reason why, until something plopped onto the surface, and the taste deepened even more. I waited, waited, waited, but nothing happened. I was about to investigate another area when the plop came again. This time, I expected it to return, and when it did, it was the flitter of a hummingbird’s wing sooner. With each plop, the sickly taste spread.
The rainbow liquid.
The seal Arrow had made in the metal bird must’ve weakened. Perhaps the liquid had eaten through the sap. We could not have the rainbow liquid in the forest.
“The metal bird is bleeding again,” I told Arrow when he had woken. He and Curly were already preparing to meet Petari.
Arrow froze, his leaf-colored shirt halfway over his head. “In the same place?”
“Close to there, yes.”
Arrow pulled his shirt completely on, then shook his head. “I should’ve put more sap on it. Do you think it will catch on fire?”
“I don’t know, but it’s dangerous.”
Curly squealed, pointing at the sun. Arrow glanced up, and nervousness escaped from him. “I don’t have time to go and fix it now. I’ve got to get to the meeting place. If I don’t show up, I’m worried Petari will tell the others in her group about me.”
“That would be bad.” I ruffled my leaves. “There are too many dangers in the forest right now.”
Arrow nodded. “How badly is the rainbow liquid leaking?”
“It’s a slow drip but getting faster.”
“Okay.” He frowned in thought. “I’ll go and meet Petari, show her the things she wants to see, and make sure she gets her group to leave. Then I’ll go to the Burnt Circle.”
“That’s a good plan.”
I didn’t tell Arrow I was worried the human herd would not want to leave, even if the girl said they would. This is what Imposters did, made promises they did not keep. This girl did not speak for the herd, and it was easy to see they all liked the forest. Why wouldn’t they want to stay?
“I’ll monitor the rainbow liquid, but hurry. We don’t want it to spread too far.”
“I will,” Arrow said, as he and Curly jogged away.
Petari was already at the tree line when Arrow and Curly walked up. Eagerness radiated from the girl, and a nervous joy came from Arrow, too. Even though he knew he had to get the humans to leave, they were like magnets. He wanted to learn more about them, and in turn, perhaps learn more about where he had come from. I hoped he wouldn’t be disappointed.
The only one who wasn’t happy about their meeting was Curly, who pouted at Petari from Arrow’s shoulder, not liking the competition for his attention.
“I’m here.” Arrow glanced around, making sure they were alone.
“Hey,” Petari replied. “Don’t worry, my brother thinks I’m with Luco and his team, who’ve gone to find supplies. And they think I’m going to visit Mrs. Shalla in the Barbs. I could spend hours at Mrs. Shalla’s place, and no one ever wants to come with me.”
Arrow looked at her quizzically, and I knew he wanted to ask who Mrs. Shalla in the Barbs was, but he had more important things on his mind. He had to push his curiosity down deep.
“Good,” he said. “Let’s go. I can’t be long.”
“You’re in a hurry,” Petari said, stumbling after Arrow.
“There’s a lot to show you,” the boy said, keeping an eye on the movement of the sun above.
He took her first to a tall capirona tree and rubbed the bark with the fingers on his right hand. “These trees are all around here because they like being near the river. Feel how smooth their bark is.”
Petari followed his lead. Her fingers were tentative at first, then pressed harder to get the full silky effect. “Wow.”
“The bark changes color over time and sheds, like a snake’s skin. See?” He lifted a piece of the shed bark from the forest floor and held it out to Petari.
“Eww.” She shivered, but still took it.
Arrow smiled. “If you have a cut, you can boil the bark, and it helps to stop bleeding. But if you need something quicker, you can use the blood leaf.”
He started off again, but Petari said, “Wait. I have to get this down.”
She swung a gray lump from her back, tugged on what looked like a thin metal leaf, and sliced the lump open with a ziiiiiiiiip sound.
“Stop! What are you doing?” Arrow touched the lump, then pulled back his fingers. He looked surprised, as though the material felt strange. I had seen items like this with the Imposters, but this was a first for the boy.
“I’m opening my backpack.” Petari frowned. “Don’t you have a backpack?”
Ahh, that’s what the girl Storma kept her tools in, a “backpack.” Arrow shook his head, gaping at the unusual item.
“They’re mega useful, especially in the Barbs. When you’re scavenging, you’ve got to carry a lot, and the zipper makes it really easy.” She closed the backpack’s wound with another ziiiiiiiiip, then sliced it open again. “I found this one behind an old apartment building and cleaned it up. I think it used to be pink. Look.” She showed him a small strip at the bottom that was the color of a tongue.
Arrow crouched down and took the metal leaf Petari had been pulling to open and close the backpack. Pressing on the backpack with the tip of his arrow arm as Petari had done with her hand, Arrow tugged the metal leaf and smiled when the ziiiiiiiiiip sound rang out.
“It’s like a hammock that closes,” he said, and I liked his comparison. I had taught him to weave small hammocks like the Forest Dwellers had done, so he could carry fruit and nuts back to his nest. It had been his idea to haul the hammock up with a hemp rope. Smart boy.
“What’s a hammock?” Petari asked.
Arrow smiled. “It’s kinda like this, but different. I’ll show you one.…” He stopped, no doubt realizing that if he didn’t show her today, he wouldn’t get the chance. A thread of bitter sadness leaked into the air.
But it was lost on Petari, who had been too consumed with her own task to fully listen. She pulled out of her backpack something else I had not seen since the Imposters were here, a book, but this one looked different from the older ones. Its pages were thin on the edges and thicker in the middle. Next she retrieved a pencil, placed the bark carefully in front of her, and began to draw.
“What are you doing?” Arrow asked, kneeling next to the girl.
“I’m putting it in my notebook, so I’ll remember everything later.” She peered at Arrow, then at the book. “Oh, right, you’re probably wondering why this book looks so weird. I painted over all the wo
rds on the pages so I could use the paper again. Mrs. Shalla said it wasn’t one of her favorite stories and she had collected two copies anyway, so she let me have one. I write everything I want to remember; then when it’s full, I read it again and again until I’ve remembered it all; then I paint the pages and start again.” She grinned, proud of her own ingenuity. “The paint makes the pages thick in the middle, but it’s worth it. Brill, right?”
Arrow blinked. “Brill.”
“Have you seen Mrs. Shalla’s library in the Barbs?”
The boy shook his head. He didn’t even know what those things were.
“It’s amazing. She’s collected thousands of old books, some that were left behind when people died in the Barbs and some that were thrown out of the Stilts when they made everything digital.” As she talked, Petari etched the likeness of the piece of bark onto her painted page, then scribbled words next to it. “The Stilters get to read whatever book they want, whenever they want, with a click of their finger. They’re so lucky. But I like the paper books too.”
She leaned back, gazing at Arrow. “You are from the Barbs, aren’t you? You came here through the same hole we did?”
Arrow shook his head. Curly chattered. She didn’t like where their conversation was going.
“Really?” Petari’s nose wrinkled. “Huh. I thought everyone around here who wasn’t from the Stilts was from the Barbs.”
She picked up her drawing and showed it to Arrow. He lit up when he saw her rendition of the bark.
“That looks just like it.”
“Not bad, eh? I haven’t had any lessons either. Okay, what’s next?” Petari carefully placed the book, pencil, and piece of bark into her backpack and stood up.
“Oh, yes.” Arrow had been so interested in the girl’s outside world, he had forgotten why they were here. “I’ll show you the blood leaf. There’s a bush this way.”
Arrow led Petari to the leaf that helped heal cuts, then the pink-flowered shrub whose roots boost strength and energy. He climbed the towering tree whose spherical fruits can disinfect wounds, and showed her the anise with its tiny white flowers and long fruits that help stop flatulence, among other things. They both laughed at the idea of flatulence. It seems that all humans find that funny.
Arrow Page 8
