Excerpt: Moon Lake

Hazel skipped along ahead of her brother, examining leaves, following animals, now singing, now silent. The dark evergreens and the richly colored mosses and lichens perfectly complimented the colors in her dress and eyes, and she disappeared completely into the background when she held still. Nabhan wore his customary gray, and walked along easily and steadily while she bounced, danced and flitted around him. At length, and for reasons that would have been completely opaque to outside viewers—had there been any—Nabhan stopped and sat on a rock, and closed his eyes. Without really paying attention Hazel’s constant and erratic motion also stopped moving forward and instead turned into a constant orbit around her stationary brother.
Finally she too stopped running, crawling, and climbing, and sat on a half-decomposed log near her brother. Pulling at the surface of the log, crumbling pieces of it between her fingers, and humming quietly, she appeared to be listening in some obscure way to the woods around her. Finally she spoke.
“They really are okay, aren’t they,Nabbie?” She said, looking up at her stalk-still sibling.
“They are. But Ferrin…” He let it hang in the air.
“I don’t know about him either. He could be nice. But he acts so clever all the time. Can we tell him?”
“He hasn’t asked.” He replied, eyes still closed. Hazel nodded once or twice, then she also closed her eyes.
Hazel gasped. “Did you hear it?” Nabhan nodded. “I can tell where it came from…kind of…Can you place it?” Nabhan tensed up his face in concentration for one minute, two minutes, then replied. “Yes. I know where it happened.”
Hazel nodded, eyes still closed. At length they both grew still, and opened their eyes. “Oh Nabbie, we’ll know the answer! We can take them to the Lake!” He nodded solemnly.
“And then, sister mine,” he replied as they stood up and started walking back to town, “Then perhaps they can help us find out who created this world. And why.”