Otter sat with him, not so neatly. Kestrel sat too.
The grass here on the ward-side edge of the meadow was tall, full in that season of drifts of purple aster and goldenrod just opening, sweet smelling in the sun, loud with bees. Sitting in it they were tucked away, hidden. Hiding was not a thing people did much in Westmost: It was better to stay in sight. Better to be able, at any instant, to see the shadows on all sides, to be able to summon help.
Kestrel had pulled off her bracelets and was casting patterns between her fingers. Even children in Westmost might cast patterns to amuse themselves, to practice — but Otter knew that Kestrel was not practicing. She was keeping watch for the dead. Otter herself kept her face toward the palm, to watch for the living. And Cricket’s eyes turned inward.
“Now,” he said, softly — and there was a strange tremble in his voice, as if he was afraid. “A long time ago, before the moons were named, there was a binder named Birch. And she had a daughter, a binder named Silver. And she had a daughter, a binder named Hare. And she had a daughter, a binder named Spider, who later was Mad Spider, and a hero, and that is as far as the memory goes.
“Now, Mad Spider was not a hero born. As an infant, she did not sing instead of crying. As a child, she did not run and make the wind jealous. As a sunflower, she did not cook for the queen of the bees. She was a living woman, and she had power and she worked it well, but she was human and sometimes she was a fool.”
There was a prickly cluster of narrow-leaf yucca growing beside him: this year’s spires green-and yellow-blossomed, last year’s black as wet flint. Cricket snapped off one of the dark ones.
“So.” Cricket rolled the black stem between his hands and the seedpods rattled. Hissed and rattled. “So. Little Spider, who was not yet Mad, was not much more than a sunflower when her mother died, and her mother’s second too, in the winter fevers, a fever of blisters. And so she became first binder of a great pinch while her hair was still wholly black. Oh, young. So young. She was frightened. She did not want to let her mother go.”
Otter swallowed.
“She was frightened, but she went out anyway,” said Cricket. “She went out to bind the dead.” The yucca pod, spinning like a drop spindle, made a hiss. “Now, it was said of Little Spider that she could tie a knot in living bone. She had that much power. What she bound stayed bound.
“But what does a spider do when it catches a rabbit?
“Little Spider bound Hare, who was her mother, high in the scaffolds, under the pale sky. But the wind did not take Hare. The rain did not take Hare. The ravens did not fly her far. She was bound there, with her bones knotted, and she stayed bound.
“Little Spider’s knots were troubled. She felt the pull on them. She began to be afraid. And then, in the moon where the sap rises, she realized why. One night she went out to the scaffold grounds, alone. And when the moon rose, she saw it: bound high above, neither living nor dead, a thing with white hands.”
Cricket fell silent. The three of them sat there a moment, knee to knee. Kestrel lowered her bracelets slowly and said: “I have never heard this story.”
Cricket looked away. “It is a secret of the storytellers,” he murmured. “A great secret.”
“Cricket,” whispered Kestrel, shocked.
“Flea has been teaching me,” he said, with his face still turned aside. “She has — she will not live much longer, and she has no successor.”
But to teach in secret, to teach a boy —
“You think the pinch can survive without its stories? That because there are no knots in them, they are not important? If you think that, you are wrong.” He looked over at the earthlodges, at the handful from which no cook smoke rose. “There are not enough of us. We must hold on.”
“But a secret of your cord —”
“Yes,” said Cricket. “I know. They could take my status — such as it is — and keep me forever a child. They could tear out my tongue. They could send me to walk into the West alone, under the eyes of all the dead. I know.”
“Cricket,” breathed Otter. This was nearly as shocking as what Willow had done, though Cricket’s soft voice, and the flush that was creeping up his neck, made it less so. Willow hadn’t been fearful, embarrassed, shy. She had snapped normality in half like a twig, and dropped it like a ripped shirt. She’d been past any shame. Otter was afraid for Cricket. But she was not afraid of him.
“They won’t, though,” said Cricket. “Flea would have to … Flea wouldn’t. And this is the story, Otter. This is the story you need, I think. You are my friend and I am a storyteller. I will tell you the story you need.”