Bright Ones

The low fire in the hearth cast a warm, flickering light over their quiet work. Outside, the wind howled its familiar winter song against the stone walls, a sound made distant and unimportant by the small circle of warmth they shared. The girl sat cross-legged on the floor, her small fingers carefully sorting a collection of dried seeds into separate earthen bowls, her expression intent and absorbed. Across from her, the newcomer worked a pair of wooden cards through a mound of raw wool, the rhythmic scrape and pull a soft counterpoint to the crackling fire. It was a peaceful, domestic sound, one that had become the backdrop to their shared days as the snow piled deeper outside.

After a time, the only sounds were the fire and the soft scrape of the cards. Then the girl looked up from her task, a single pale seed held carefully between her thumb and forefinger. Her eyes drifted towards the shuttered window, as if she could see through the wood and the stone to the frozen garden beyond. “What will they look like,” she asked, her voice clear and soft in the quiet room, “the sun-coloured flowers, when spring comes?”

The newcomer stilled her hands, setting the wooden cards carefully on the pile of soft wool. A smile warmed her face as she met the girl’s curious eyes. “They will be just as you imagine them,” she said, her voice warm and full of a gentle certainty. “Tall, with strong stems that stand up straight to the sun, and their faces will be wide and open, the colour of honey and light. They’ll follow the sun across the sky all day, a whole bright row of them, like they’re keeping a secret with it.”

Nyra, her own hands never still as she mended a worn blanket, added her low, unhurried voice to the quiet air. “The waiting is part of the growing,” she said, her eyes distant, as if seeing seasons turn in her mind. “The dark and the cold have their purpose, same as the sun.”

The girl returned to her small, careful task, her fingers once more sorting through the tiny, dormant seeds. But a quiet warmth had settled in her chest, a gentle comfort against the winter’s chill. She held the image of the sun-coloured flowers in her mind, a bright, unwavering row standing tall against a clear sky. It was a secret picture, a shared promise that bound the three of them together, a quiet, steady current carrying them all through the deep, quiet dark and toward the certain light of spring.