They gave the singer two days before launching a fishing boat.
Deren argued for one. Merla argued for an afternoon. Veyna stood between them with the lake samples on a tray and asked which bowl they would like their children to drink.
Nobody drank any of them.
By the second morning the pink bloom had thinned from the near channel. The singer’s pulse ran clear, though the end of each phrase still wavered. It rolled more slowly than before. Ysabet watched the swollen patch through a borrowed lens and saw small crabs working along the cut she had made.
“Will it heal?” Deren asked.
“I expect so.”
“That’s better than not knowing.”
“Sometimes.”
