Heartfelt Sounds Read Online Free Page B

set the bags down. With my hands on my knees, I cough. I choke and go silent. Shanti listens when I gasp at a single length of fabric.
    With uncertain fingers, I reach for the fabric. Hold it up to the ceiling. My eyes follow swirls that seem to move. Seem to breathe. Like the eye of a tornado—swirling and swirling, only to stop. Only to reverse direction and blow sparkling dust across the length of the bright fabric.
    “Magic.” I murmur. “Is it magic?”
    “Do you remember now?”
    I shake my head. “You're a sorceress?” I ask her, mystified. Taken aback. East of Felicity sat the Arden Vale—the only place that accepted the rare magical gifts some women had. They were a select few that populated a whole nation. But beyond the Vale, many people were overbearingly superstitious of magic—unsure of what they couldn't understand. The Orthella's patrons often spoke of that place with malice—they hissed that the sun and moon did not exist there because the Vale turned its back on Order. Therefore condemning the Fates—the gods.
    I did not know sorceresses existed past the Vale.
    I can't bring myself to look at her—I've never seen anything like this. First the jars littering Akane's parlor, and now this? I began to wonder if all the women living here had some sort of talent. Some sort of magical power.
    And then, there was me. Without my zither— what was I?
    What talent did I possess?
    Gently, Shanti slides the fabric from my grasp—which has become sweaty. I knead my fingers against my thumbs in an attempt to make them dry. In an attempt to throw away my worries—but this only makes them worse.
    What was I?
    Shanti smiles at her work, admiring it with glowing eyes. “Does this bring back memories?”
    But I've gone deaf to her words. I look around the room and realize that this table isn't the only thing in desperate need of cleaning. My eyes fall to that enormous loom and I feel a shiver ripple up my spine. Creeping—creeping like a snake. I can't operate that thing—though the strings remind me of my zither—maybe I could make noise on it, but I couldn't craft fabric from that as Shanti has. But around it, I notice piles of ripped threads. An archway opens up beside the loom, and I notice a gnarled stick attached to a brittle broom.
    I may not be able to do much—but I can clean. I can help her get this place in order and then—and then…
    I race for the broom as if it plans to run. I grasp it by the handle. Bringing it over to the overflowing table, I begin to sweep the fabrics that have fallen upon the floor and push them beside the wall. I think to separate them once they're out of the walkway. I think to place them into neat little piles once I'm done moving them.
    Shanti nods. Moves to sit down at her loom and begins moving thread pieces down towards her lap as she quietly weaves a pattern trimmed with gold.
    As the day passes, white light creeps through the open window near her loom. Marking the time. Telling us when morning has come and gone.
    Beneath the table lays an old stool and I right it. I sit and begin rearranging the fabrics upon the table. My mind is blank when Lore's voice rings in my ears. It's a whisper as it glides upon the soft wind outside. It is like a silent rain—and I hear our song. The Orthella's song. Old verses weaved by Yarne. Old mother Yarne.
    My hands still, floating in midair. Lightly touching fabric.
    I hear:
    White, blankets the peak of a distant mountaintop.
    As the snow falls, my sorrow for you crumbles into ashes,
    Can snow grasp how beautiful the fallen flower is?
    Her voice is lower than my own. Masculine at times, but beautiful all the same. Lore pauses. She waits as a memory comes rushing back to me.
    Whenever a songstress chooses her apprentice, they must sing a duet for the house. One set of hands glides across a zither of twenty-four strings, as another set holds a bamboo flute to her lips. As one blows life into the flute, the other must complete the