Daisy and Torv approached the cattail shallows of the pond hand in hand, each holding their creation in their free hand. His trouser legs were rolled up to the knee, and her dress was bunched up in similar fashion. They bowed formally to each other and placed their boats in the water, taking up kneeling positions behind their own vessels so that the wind from their mouths could propel their tiny sails.

Several days earlier, Torv had been folding maple leaves into boats when Daisy appeared. She watched him silently for a time, folding, tucking inwards deftly, and finally puffing them gently away from shore, watching as they made their way out into more and more treacherous waters of the pond beyond the cattails and his gentle puffs of air where the real open waters lay for the little leaves.

-What are you doing?

Her voice made him jump and he turned to see her looking down at him, the sun haloed behind her head.

-Hi Daisy.

-Hi Torv. What are you doing? She repeated. Are you making boats?

He nodded sheepishly, embarrassed easily around the girl whose eyes were so light she still squinted as the sun made its final forays down past the hills in the distance in the evenings.

-Mind if I join?

He did not.

For days, they experimented with the best materials: maple leaves, cattails, field corn cobs whittled and hollowed out, and many more. They’d stop for lunch and for Torv to smoke his pipe, and they’d talk about their boats, about how the fall was coming and soon the pond would be clogged with leaves, and then frozen over entirely white. It wasn’t a particularly beneficial use of their time as some adults grumbled. The wiser adults, those still most young at heart shushed the others and insisted to let the young folks be. They were happy those days in the fading sun of late summer, and after four days believed they had cracked the code. Each of them constructed their own boat from the secret formula and planned to meet the next morning at sunrise to have their official race along the shallows. It was to take place from the most prominent outpost of the cattail shallows with the dock as the finish line.

After their formal bows, when they were knee deep in the pond ready to begin…

There was a tremendous rush of wind and it took all of her strength for Daisy to hold onto Fen as they were blown down the tunnel at tremendous speeds. All the while, lights flashed by her in streaks of orange from the windows.

-Glad my burrow doesn’t look out onto travelways! Fen shouted over the roar of the wind in their ears.

You could be reading stolen content. Head to the original site for the genuine story.

Daisy attempted to nod in confirmation that she had heard him but settled instead for a weak smile, her lips blown back from her teeth as she did so. She wasn’t sure how long they flew, but when they finally stopped the gust tapered off gently, setting them down in their destination on their feet. It looked as if they had gone nowhere at all. Daisy looked around at their surroundings as she ran her hands through her farm girl hair, cropped short by necessity; even still it was a mess.

-Underground has its benefits, Fen said, absentmindedly rummaging through his veritable library of pockets looking for his clay pipe. But there’s admittedly a dearth of scenery.

-How far have we gone? Daisy asked.

-Not so far. No more than a hundred leagues.

Her pale eyes grew large.

-A hundred leagues? On foot that would take...well

-Weeks, he said. But we’re still behind. Come, we’ve some walking to do now before the next crossing.

The walking tunnels were considerably narrower and darker than the tunnels of the Wran Travelways. There were only occasional gas lamps, and even those seemed haphazard and out of place, often askew on the tunnel wall, throwing their light in unplanned angles, creating eerie shadows. Fen seemed to notice none of it, but puffed quietly on his pipe, allowing Daisy to follow the sweet scent of tobacco rather than learn to see in the dark as well as a Wran. They had been walking for some time when Daisy walked straight into Fen and nearly fell backwards. He was rather solid. She heard the familiar scratch of a lit match and then Daisy saw he had turned to look at her.

-Fancy a quick rest?

Unbeknownst to Daisy, they had reached a point where travelers often stopped to take rest. When Fen bade her follow and stepped to his right, it looked as if he simply ceased to exist, walked straight into the shadow realm of memory. But it was nothing so complicated. There was a small, comfortable room just off the tunnel for rest. With another match, Fen lit the room’s lamp and the decor revealed itself. There were two comfortable chairs with a long, shared footrest, the lamp bolted to the wall, luckily at a consistent angle unlike some of those they had recently passed, and of course, inlaid bookshelves overflowing with texts. Fen saw Daisy’s eyes linger on the shelves.

-You wonder why we bother.

-I don’t know, actually.

-You’ve noticed the lack of scenery, no doubt?

Daisy laughed. Reaching across the footrest between them, Fen offered a wrapped parcel to her he had pulled from a pocket just below his right shoulder. It was a particularly memorable pocket, as it had what appeared to be an iron draw string with teeth that clamped together, closing it up.

-You’ll need to eat this, he said. Or you’ll start to get the sickness. All above grounders get sick after spending too much time underground eventually.

-Thanks, she said, taking the parcel. It was dry berries she didn’t recognize.

-I won’t lie to you, Fen said. You’re not going to enjoy those.

She swallowed the handful down as quickly as she could. They sat in silence for moments before Fen spoke once more.

-It keeps us alive, he said. The books. Even Wran can’t live underground forever with no consequences. We must be reminded of the wider world. For the Wran who have forgotten...their minds become unwell. Isolation is a cancer in the long run, and books are a tonic, a salve of sorts. They are not, I am sure, a solution, but we have long used them to maintain a mental equilibrium until such time as we can live as free people again.

-In Torv’s house...Daisy began.

Somehow she knew. It was clear and unshakeable in her mind.

-You were looking for a book.

Fen lowered his gaze, looking at his rough, clean hands for a few moments before lifting his eyes to meet Daisy’s.

-Yes, he said. But I didn’t find what I was looking for. It wasn’t there. We were...so sure it would be.

-Who is we?

-One question at a time, Daisy Heartfand. One at a time.