Six years previously

After Nor Nor had showed Seng Nu her ability to make an apple pop and fall from a tree, Seng Nu was keen for Nor Nor to teach her. As they walked back to the cottage, She slowed herself to walk alongside Naw. But she already knew that the lesson had already started, so waited for instruction. When they got back, Nor Nor sank into a chair, while Seng Nu lit the stove. Later they sat, drinking cups of steaming herbal tea and watching the world wake up. This was their usual morning routine and they passed it in silence. They could sit together for hours, even days without talking, without feeling the least bit uncomfortable.

“Seng Nu, what do you hear?” said Nor Nor as she sipped her tea.

Seng Nu couldn’t remember the last time Nor Nor had asked her a question. Normally it was her that did the asking. Nor Nor knew so much.

“I can hear a crow...maybe twenty trees away. The stove is bubbling, I can hear that. A bug..I think it’s a bee, maybe a wasp. it’s buzzing somewhere behind the house, actually there are two of them.”

“Your ears work better than mine.” said Nor Nor. “That’s good. But listen without them.”

Seng Nu didn’t understand.

“Hear what makes no sound” said Nor Nor, taking a deep draught of forest air and closing her eyes.

Seng Nu closed her eyes too and tried to listen without her ears. She could hear the two bees still buzzing behind the house and tuned them out, trying to focus. The water on the porch stove was simmering. Dupadupadoopadupadoopa it said, and as she concentrated she started to hear each individual bubble of boiling water pop at the surface. Dup dup doop dupa doop.

“You’re still hearing sounds that anyone can hear” said Nor Nor. “Let me give you a different way to think of it. When the panther is hunting in the forest, when she is looking for that first track to follow, you might think that her mind is as tense as her body. But it’s not. Instead she keeps her eyes and ears open and lets the forest come to her. And it’s the back of her mind that notices those little things out of place, the sapling that is curled just a little too unnaturally, the pad of hooves on dry leaves in the distance, the way the low branches sway after something other than wind moves them. She does not search for these things like a squirrel searches each branch of a tree for a nut, but she finds them like the snake who sleeps with his eyes open, unthinking but ready to pounce if something comes near.”

“The panther is looking for deer, what am I trying to find?” Said Seng Nu.

“The panther looks at the whole picture and lets the details come to them. Do the same and let the voice come to you.”

Seng Nu didn’t exactly understand but she tried again, tuning out the bees and the bubbling pot, the squawking crow and everything else. She felt her body tense as it strained to hear what could not be heard. Then she let it relax. Soon she heard something.. It was faint, as though it was coming from far away, but it was there, she could hear it. It was a rumbling, softer than thunder but deeper than rain. It was a pure sound, with no beginnings or endings. It rushed on, unbroken.

Seng Nu opened her eyes. Nor Nor was looking at her.

“So?” Said the old woman, her eyes faintly twinkling behind their misted glassy windows. “did you hear something else?”

“I heard something” Said Seng Nu, “a rushing rumble. It was far away but I heard it, it felt so real, but...” She bit her lip and looked anxiously towards Nor Nor for confirmation.

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“Interesting” said Nor Nor. “you have good hearing”

“So...I did it?” Said Seng Nu.

“no, you heard the river.” said Nor Nor. Seng Nu slumped down in her chair “don’t expect to get it straight away. It took me years.” She sighed. “I should have begun teaching you this earlier”.

“What happens when I hear it?” Said Seng Nu.

“You speak back to it”

“and then?”

“and then you can work with it. Once you find the whole picture, then you will be able to find the smaller voices. The trees, the leaves, the rocks and the branches.”

Nor Nor put her tea down and pushed herself up to her feet with a groan and walked over to Seng Nu.

“Show me the bruise”.

Seng Nu hesitated. Then she drew up the sleeve of her tunic. There on her arm was a faded purpley mark. The same colour as an apple from the tree.

“You went to the camp” she said. It was not to scold, not to warn, simply to confirm. Seng Nu said nothing but nodded.

Nor Nor knew there wasn’t much time. She had taken responsibility of a child who was becoming a young woman. There was beauty in that. But there was danger too.

Putting a hand on Seng Nu’s chin and gently lifting it, she looked into the young girl’s eyes.

“Did they hurt you anywhere else?”

Seng Nu shook her head before Nor Nor could finish the question. “I just wanted to speak to them, but they grabbed me.”

“And then?”

“I shook them off and I ran” said Seng Nu, and as the memory of fear became fear itself, she began to cry.

Nor Nor put an arm around her, one that comforted Seng Nu and also hid her own tears. After a while she let go and went into the house. She came out pulling a cloak around her shoulders and carrying some freshly cut leaves in her other hand. “Mix these with water and then rub them into your arm” she said, handing them to Seng Nu. “They will help the bruising go down.”

And then she walked off down the forest path. “I’ll be back soon, don’t worry” she said, and Seng Nu noticed that although she still walked with a hunch and a limp, her legs seemed to stride with a purpose.

A few hours later she returned. She was no longer striding, but she hobbled slowly down the path to the house. She looked up at Seng Nu and smiled. It wasn’t the awkward forced smile of a woman trying to make a scared child feel welcome in her home. It was a real one, an unconscious expression of relief.

Seng Nu had set their table. Wild yams and red berries and then green apples and honey for after. She helped Nor Nor into her chair, and waited until they had finished eating to ask where she had been, even though she already knew the answer.

“I snapped a tree in half,” said Nor Nor. “And then told them I’d do the same to any arm that touched things it shouldn’t.”

They ate in comfortable silence and then Nor Nor went to sit outside while Seng Nu put a pan of water on the stove to boil for tea. Then she joined Nor Nor and they sat outside to watch the forest dimming. The bubbles in the boiling stove went dup dup dup dup.

“Poor tree”. Said Seng Nu.

And two bells rang out to herald the sunset.

It was still dark when Seng Nu woke up that night with the feeling that something was missing. There was an absence. She knelt next to Nor Nor, who still had a daisy in her hair, though the white petals had begun to curl like tiny grasping fingers. Not knowing why, she kissed Nor Nor on the forehead.

Stepping out the house, her body shivered in the chill of the night. It would be dawn soon, she could feel it. She looked out into the darkness. How many animals and insects had died here tonight?

She listened to the forest. A nocturnal bird hooted far away. She heard the beating wings of the tiny nightbugs flying behind the house. Could hear water hitting rock endlessly as it ran down the river.

She strained herself until she broke. Just let go. And then, while the deep black of the night was giving way to the deep blue dawn. She heard the world waking up.