The Waterstone by Rebecca Rupp Read Free Book Online Page B

out his hands, empty, palms up. He showed them all that there was nothing behind his back, nothing hidden up his sleeves. Then suddenly, out of nowhere, there was an orange bittersweet-berry ball — then two, then four. He juggled them expertly, throwing them high into the air. First they circled in front of his face, then behind his back. Around and around they went, faster and faster, until — the children gasped — they were gone again, all in an instant, and his hands were empty. Then he produced a shiny pearlstone from behind Tad’s ear; and then, stepping back, Uncle Czabo pulled a scarlet bandanna out of his mouth that grew longer and longer until it was impossibly long, and then —
whap!
— he clapped his hands together and the bandanna somehow knotted itself up and turned into a butterfly. Tad and Birdie stared in amazement. Uncle Czabo bowed again, chuckling, and sat down.
    “Enough tricks for now, eh?” he said. Tad didn’t think he’d seen nearly enough tricks. He could have watched all night.
    Then Pondleweed told stories, pointing out all the people and places in the clear night sky overhead: the thick hazy band of stars that was called Rune’s River (the Hunters called it Rona’s Path), the long-handled Fishing Net, and the enormous Swimming Frog. Then the music began. Nobono played a wooden flute and Uncle Czabo strummed the strings of a painted lutegourd while Branica and Pondleweed sang. They sang a song that Tad had often heard his father sing around the family campfire at home.
    Keep the floating stars alight
    In the River of the Skies.
    Make the midnight moon shine bright
,
    Make the morning sun arise.
    Make the rain around us fall
,
    Nurture lake and pond and stream
,
    Keep the forest proud and tall
,
    Keep the world forever green.
    Tad had always thought of it as a happy song, but tonight somehow it sounded heartbreakingly sad. He tried his best to stay awake, to listen longer, but he just couldn’t. Before he knew it he had fallen asleep.
    He awoke sometime far into the night with a pointy rock digging into his left shoulder blade. The campfire had burned down to ashes. He could see the dark heaps that were the sleeping bodies of his family and the Hunters — Uncle Czabo was snoring — and, glittering in the moonlight, the bulging eyes of Pippit the watchfrog, hunched beside them. A little wind rustled dry leaves and chimed the hanging bells on the frame of the Hunters’ caravan.
    Tad lay awake. He was thinking about what Branica had said, sounding so superior and amused: “To stay in one place, then that place comes to own you, no? When you find a place you can no longer leave behind, that is not to be whole.” To travel, free as the wind. It sounded gloriously exciting.
But it would be lonely if I had no place to come home to
, Tad thought. It’s not that a place owns you — it’s that the water smells sweeter there and the wind blows gentler and your feet know the feel of the grass.
You need to have roots
, Tad thought.
    From somewhere far away, deep in the forest, came the hooting cry of a hunting owl.
Hoo-oh! To-hoo-oh!
    A last thought flickered before Tad fell asleep again.
Who is Ohd?

The morning dawned clear, cloudless, and sunny with a light breeze blowing out of the west. They crawled out of their blankets with much yawning and rubbing of eyes. Branica was already bustling about, directing the packing of the caravan and shouting at Bodo and Griffi. After a cold breakfast of sweet rootbread with blackberry butter, the families prepared to go their separate ways.
    Bodo shouted saucily to Birdie, “We’ll play another pebblehop at the Gathering! We’ll see who wins then!”
    Kelti, peeking between the wagon’s skin flaps, waved a fat fist.
    Ditani, scarlet skirts swirling, called to Tad, “I’ll see you at the Gathering!”
    “Until the Gathering!” Uncle Czabo bellowed, sounding more than ever like a bullfrog. He pointed a long finger at Tad. “I teach you my