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Nine-year-old Tansy leaves Willowmere when the Naming Rill stops carrying names. With a cartographer's compass, a bright bird called Murmur, and quiet courage, she follows echoes into Fogwood, untangles a lonely hoarder of names, and brings the village song home.
Willowmere smelled of warm bread and river moss. Morning light folded itself into the low roofs, painting ladders and wheel ruts gold. Tansy Brook sat on a low stool by an open window, her fingers stained with indigo ink, the tiny needle she used for stitching names catching the sunlight like a shy fish. She traced a ribbon across a map, knotting each name into a little loop so that the river could carry it gently away.
People in Willowmere tied names to reeds the way people in other places might tie wishes to trees. Babies' first nicknames were written in mint ink; grandparents' old names were written in thick brown ink that smudged like stories. At dusk, the whole village would gather near the Naming Rill. They would whisper the syllables into their palms, tie the ribbons to the reeds, and wait. The river always took the names. It did not drown them or throw them away. It cradled them, hummed over them, and set them somewhere safe beyond the bend.
Tansy liked to imagine where the names went. She drew maps with dotted lines and little arrows, noting where the arrows trembled the most. Her map room smelled of paper and lemon oil and the feathers she sometimes used for signing the big letters. She kept a small wooden box beneath the stool with twine, spare ribbons, and a compass with a chip of blue glass. It was not a navigational compass; it pointed to the sound of people laughing. Tansy pressed it sometimes to her chest when she felt small.
This morning, as she cut a pale yellow ribbon for old Mr. Gable's cat, she heard something she had never heard before. The reeds near the river were still. The usual distant hum, the tiny bell that chimed when the rill took new names, did not ring. It was as if someone had covered the village with a soft wool blanket and tucked the sound into it. Tansy set down her needle. The river looked the same—green-brown and calm—but the space over it felt empty, like a pocket without a coin.
She slid off the stool and, without thinking, went barefoot across the warm boards. Outside, the river's bank had more empty loops than usual. Ribbons flapped on some reeds, limp and unattended. Tansy picked one up. There was no name on it. Only a thin ghost of ink, like a finger wiped across a page. She felt the cold of surprise along her spine. A moment later she heard a small voice behind her.