Sarenca rested in her meditation
pose in the shade of the white-blooming azara tree, inhaling its sweet
fragrance with every breath. She easily set aside the sounds of other people in
the courtyard. A few distant notes of music caught her attention, though, even
in her trancelike state. A half-remembered tune made her fingers twitch, and
she suddenly longed to play once more.
A gasp, a few exclamations pulled
her back into the here and now. Her eyes flashed open, brilliant blue against
her deep black skin. She didn’t move, observing the people stopping in their
tracks to stare at her. In front of her. She glanced down and tears filled her
eyes.
“Do you play?”
“Is it real?”
“Will you play for us?”
An old woman approached and
crouched down on the other side of the yeberen, that hadn’t been there when
Sarenca first settled under the tree. Where had it come from? Sarenca thought
of the memory, her hands caressing an instrument she hadn’t seen in decades.
The old woman reached her hand
over it, but did not touch it. She looked down its length, then up to Sarenca.
“No one has heard this in over a hundred years!”
Sarenca smiled sadly. “Well, not
quite that long,” she replied in a voice that was itself an instrument, soft
but strong, carrying a sweet tune of its own across the gathering crowd.
The old woman smiled uncertainly.
“Would you…could you…play it for us? I would like to hear it once in my life.”
Sarenca bowed her forehead to the
ground, honoring the old woman and the instrument between them. The old woman
backed away, and Sarenca reached a fingertip to the oblong wooden frame before
her. Would she even be able to play it after so long?
At her touch, the wood shimmered
and a pure tone flowed out over the people around her, drawing them closer with
every breath. As if she had never stopped, Sarenca played. Her fingers ran over
the wood, caressing it with light touches all over the delicate inlays and
carvings she remembered so well, even though she had never seen this one
before.
The crowd was mesmerized. They
drew close, silent, breathing in unison, sighing in rapture as the music swept
over them, through them. It restored love, hope, dreams, faith. Strangers
clasped hands. Parents swept their children into tight embraces. Lovers wrapped
arms around each other.
And still Sarenca played. The
crowd grew, eerily still and silent as the people filled the courtyard and
flowed into the streets around it.
And still Sarenca played. The
sun’s light crept deeper into the shadow, and the moon which had risen early in
the day shone bright above them. No child cried, no one grew restless, no one
left.
A staccato beat intruded on the
yeberen’s sweet music, then wrapped into it, adding an unexpected harmony.
Dogs in house
|
Houdini, Brindle
|
Time writing:
|
~50 minutes
|
September word
count:
|
13,686
|
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