Nira and the Falling Shadows

The shadows changed before the wind did.

Nira noticed because she was tying bean strings.

The afternoon sun lay behind the west ridge, throwing long narrow shadows from the garden poles across the soil. Each pole made one dark line.

Then, for three breaths, every line blurred.

Nira stopped with the string between her fingers.

The shadows sharpened again.

Sella, working two rows away, kept tying.

Nira looked up.

The sky above the gardens was still blue.

A low grey bank sat beyond the western ridge.

Rain, Nira thought.

She tied the string off and watched.

The shadows blurred again.

This time they did not only soften.

They moved sideways.

Not much.

Enough to make the bean leaves flash light, dark, light.

“Sella.”

“What?”

“Look at the poles.”

Sella squinted.

“They are poles.”

“The shadows.”

Sella looked longer.

A soft dark band passed over the garden.

Then sunlight returned.

“Clouds,” Sella said.

“Maybe rain.”

Sella glanced at the sky.

“We had rain yesterday.”

“That does not stop today.”

“It should.”

Nira smiled despite herself.

At the far end of the terraces, Maer Iven was laying seed trays on a low warming wall. Thin wooden labels stood from the soil. A linen cover lay folded nearby.

Nira looked back toward the ridge.

The grey bank had a hard lower edge.

But she could not see rain beneath it.

She climbed onto the path wall.

From there she could see the chimney smoke from the dye house.

The smoke rose straight for a little way.

Then bent east.

Nira frowned.

If the grey bank were only rain moving toward them, the smoke might still turn.

But wind was arriving above the village before it reached the gardens.

She jumped down.

“What now?” Sella asked.

“I want to check the reeds.”

“Of course you do.”

The irrigation pond sat below the bean terraces.

Nira ran to it, then slowed before the bank.

The water surface was mostly smooth.

Along the western edge, little dark scratches appeared and vanished.

Wind touches.

Not enough to move the whole pond.

Yet.

Nira crouched beside the reeds.

Their dry tops leaned east, lifted, fell still.

Leaned east again.

She picked up a pinch of dust and let it go.

Nothing.

A second later, the dust skittered across the path.

Nira’s stomach tightened.

She knew that feeling.

That did not make the feeling evidence.

She looked for more.

The willow leaves below the pond turned their pale undersides toward the ridge.

A hanging strip of cloth at the dye house snapped once.

The grey bank rose higher.

Nira went back to the garden.

“Maer Iven.”

He was pressing soil around the last seed tray.

“Yes?”

“I think strong wind is coming.”

He looked at the blue sky overhead.

“Rain?”

“I thought rain first.”

“What changed your mind?”

Nira pointed.

“Smoke is bending east. The pond is taking wind from the west edge. Willow leaves have turned. The cloud has a hard front but I cannot see rain under it.”

Iven studied the ridge.

“How soon?”

Nira opened her mouth.

Closed it.

“I do not know.”

That answer felt smaller than she wanted.

It was also true.

Iven nodded.

“What would you do if you are right?”

“Cover the seed trays. Tie the tall beans. Bring loose baskets down.”

“And if you are wrong?”

“We waste a little time.”

Sella had reached them.

“And I get to say Nira made us tie beans because of shadows.”

Nira looked at her.

“Yes.”

Sella grinned.

“Worth it.”

They worked.

The first linen cover went over the seed trays.

Iven weighted its corners with flat stones.

Nira and Sella tightened the longest bean strings and lowered two empty drying frames from the wall.

Other gardeners saw them and asked why.

Nira gave the short version.

“Wind may be coming. We are securing loose things.”

Not: a storm is coming.

Not: I know.

May be.

The difference mattered.

For ten minutes, nothing happened.

Sunlight warmed the path.

Sella tied the last basket stack.

“I am preparing my speech.”

“What speech?”

“The one about shadows.”

Nira looked toward the ridge.

The grey bank had reached the first ash trees.

Then the trees bent.

All of them.

At once.

“Speech later.”

The gust crossed the lower fields in a visible line.

Grass flattened.

Dust rose from the cart path.

The dye-house cloth snapped straight.

“Inside the wall!” Iven called.

They moved behind the stone terrace.

Wind hit the gardens.

Bean leaves turned silver-green.

The linen cover pulled hard against its stones.

One unfastened bucket rolled three rows before catching in the hedge.

The gust lasted less than a minute.

Then another came.

And another.

No rain fell.

By the time the grey front had passed, the sky overhead was bright again.

Sella climbed back onto the path.

She looked at the covered seed trays.

Then at Nira.

“I need a different speech.”

Nira went to the pond.

Wind still marked the surface, but the sharp dark scratches had spread into broad ripples.

She looked at the willow.

Most leaves had turned green-side up again.

Maer Iven joined her.

“You were right.”

Nira shook her head.

“I was right enough to cover the trays.”

He smiled.

“That is usually the useful kind.”

Nira considered the sentence.

She liked it better than being told she had known.

The next afternoon the pole shadows blurred again. Sella looked at Nira before Nira could say anything.

“Wind?”

“Maybe.”

They checked the ridge. A small cloud was passing directly across the sun. The dye-house smoke rose straight. The pond stayed smooth. The willow leaves did not turn.

Nira waited until the shadows sharpened.

“No action,” she said.

Sella made a disappointed face. “I had the baskets ready.”

“Good. Now leave them where they are.”

That second afternoon pleased Nira almost as much as the first. A useful method had to be able to tell her when not to make the exciting prediction too.

The shadows had not warned her in words.

They had changed.

Smoke had bent.

Reeds had leaned.

Leaves had turned.

Each sign could mean more than one thing.

Together, checked against one another, they had been enough to act carefully.

Behind them, Sella called, “Nira?”

“Yes?”

“The bucket escaped.”

Nira turned.

It had rolled under the hedge and wedged itself upside down.

Sella pointed at it.

“Did the shadows predict where it went?”

Nira picked up a bean string.

“No.”

“Pity.”

They went to fetch it.