Dream d2070-s: Seed-Name for the Carried Thing

I had a dream where...

I had a dream where the Hummingbird Wardens found us at the hedge-gap before we even knew to stop.

There were seven of them, maybe eight - small bodies in close formation, hovering at the exact height of a cloaked shoulder. They moved in passes that were neither welcoming nor hostile, only precise. One swept past me so close I felt the draft on my cheek, and then it was gone, and a faint char-smell went with it, a spore I had been carrying since the Foundry without knowing. The Builder let out a slow breath beside me as they swept her too, working with particular attention around the arm she held wrapped against her ribs. She did not flinch. The Wardens did not pause. When they finished the circuit, they simply moved aside, and the gap in the hedge stood open.

The Weather Reader had been watching their flight pattern. "Same pass every arrival," she said, not as a question. "Down to the interval."

"Like a gauge," the Builder agreed.

Inside, the light changed. The canopy above was woven so densely that the sky came through filtered and gold, and below it the terraced plantings ran in rings, each tier a different green, each green a different instruction. Nest-rows hung between the canopy strands - the Weaverbird Loomkeepers' work, thousands of small tight knots - and I understood without being told that the knots were not decoration.

A Loomkeeper flew to us and dropped a twist of grass-thread at our feet. No words. The custom was clear.

Rurik understood first. He sat very still, his tail wrapped around his paws, watching the thread. "A seed named for a deed," he said. "What do we name ours?"

Lano's ears went up. She padded forward, nose tipped to the ground where we were meant to plant.

The Book of Readings was in my pack, heavy against my spine - heavier than it had been before, or I was just more aware of the weight now. I eased it out and held it so the others could see it. The spine was singed black at one corner, the leather blistered and pressed flat again by the carrying. Every page inside was whole. We had all touched it during the flight out of the Foundry, one hand or another steadying it in the dark.

"The carrying-out," the Builder said. "That's the name."

We pressed the seed into the soft terraced earth together, four hands and a cat's weight resting at the edge. The ground took it without ceremony - just closed over it, the way ground does when it means to keep something.

Above us, the Starling Chorus wheeled once in a long arc and called: "A new knot for the nest-rows."

The Weaverbird Loomkeepers were already at work.