The wind came from deep within the woods, carrying the sweet-sharp scent of resin and damp earth, wrapping around Samira's ankles like a soft bandage. She carried Karim on her back, each step pressing down on leaves untouched for years. With every footfall, the crunching sound reminded her: this weight was no longer flight, but arrival.
Karim's head rested against her shoulder and neck, his breath light as a newborn creature's. Post-fever sweat had plastered his bangs into fine curls. When she turned her head slightly, she could catch the familiar milky scent—war, separation, trains, and explosions hadn't stolen it. Samira remembered Ilyas's words as he scattered the last ashes into the fuel tank: *Fire doesn't go out; it just changes its name and keeps burning.* Now, that fire was named Karim. It was also named Samira.
The forest path flickered in and out of the afternoon sunlight. Her phone was long dead, the compass lost somewhere along the journey. The pinpoint—the ember that had guided her through tunnels, across bridges, and past explosions—remained dark. Samira felt no panic. She knew that when a wick finally finds its oil, it no longer needs to flicker a warning. True direction had settled into her blood, moving at the pace of her heartbeat.
The path ended at an orchard swallowed by vines. A rusted wire fence sagged like an old man's slack jaw. In the center stood a red-brick pump house, its roof caved in at one corner, exposing beams and sky. The door hung broken from its hinges, leaning against the wall. Faded Cyrillic letters were painted on it, just legible: ДЕТСКИЙ САД—Kindergarten.
Samira laid Karim on a long wooden bench beneath an apple tree. The backrest was carved with crooked knife marks. One inscription caught her eye: *Мама, я здесь.* (Mama, I'm here.) The writing was childish yet deeply etched, as if trying to reach through the wood to someone's heart. She traced the grooves with her fingers; they suddenly felt warm—not from the pinpoint's lingering heat, but from the bench itself, from the stubborn hope of countless children who had waited here to be claimed. Echoes hadn't faded; they'd just found new hosts.
Karim frowned in his sleep, murmuring indistinct Arabic. Samira took his hand and found a small, charred piece of wood clutched in his palm—the final remnant of the wooden bird. Its edges were curled by fire, the grain distinct, like a miniature map. She held it up to the sunlight. Ash sifted through her fingers onto the tree roots, smoothed by the breeze.
"Sis," Karim opened his eyes, his voice thick with sleep, "I hear Mama singing."
Samira crouched, pressing her forehead to his. "Sing it for me."
The boy closed his eyes and softly hummed a melody—the lullaby their mother used to sing. The words were lost, only the tune turning in his throat. Samira hummed along, her voice so low only she could hear it. The two voices entwined in the afternoon light, like threads reconnecting, stitching fragmented memories whole.
The singing hadn't stopped when footsteps sounded beyond the orchard. Samira's head snapped up, her hand instinctively shielding Karim. An elderly woman stood there, pushing a creaking bicycle. A wicker basket hung from the handlebars, holding a few early plums. She wore an old cotton dress, its hem spattered with mud, but her eyes were startlingly clear. She stopped at the gap in the fence, speaking first in Russian. Seeing Samira's confusion, she switched to halting English: "Child sick?"
Samira's throat tightened. The woman leaned her bike against a tree, approached, and crouched down. Her rough, warm palm touched Karim's forehead like a stone smoothed by time.
"Fever," she murmured. "But breath steady. Where from?"
"Across the river," Samira managed, pointing back through the woods.
The woman nodded, unsurprised. She opened her basket, pulling out a small jar of cloudy honey, a few dried mint leaves, and a small aluminum spoon from her pocket. "Cool first, talk after." Her movements were practiced. She placed a mint leaf on Karim's lips and fed him spoonfuls of honey mixed with water. Sweetness spread in the air like an ancient incantation.
As Karim swallowed, his eyelashes fluttered, and he drifted back to sleep. The woman finally looked up, her gaze settling on the faint pink mark on Samira's collarbone—a healed wound, or perhaps a new vein.
"You have no papers." It wasn't a question.
Samira pressed her lips together. The woman smiled, the wrinkles at her eyes fanning out. "Papers are paper. Paper rots. Names matter. What is your name?"
"Samira."
"Karim," she answered for the sleeping boy.
The woman nodded. She pulled a handkerchief from her bodice, unfolding it to reveal a faded photograph—two girls stood at the orchard gate, the red-brick pump house behind them. One was clearly the woman, young. The other girl's face made Samira's breath catch: the eyes, the curve of the pressed lips—it mirrored the profile in her mother's old photograph.
"Her name was Aisha," the woman said softly. "Thirty years ago, she left from here with your mother, going across the river to find songs. Later, only the songs came back."
Samira's fingers trembled. The date on the photo's edge was blurred but discernible: 1995. A year her mother had never mentioned, a corner deliberately folded, now suddenly opening to reveal its searing core.
The woman placed the photo in Samira's palm. "Aisha left words: 'If children from across the river ever come back, the orchard will remember for me.'"
Wind rustled through the fruit trees. Green apples knocked against each other on the branches with soft *tinks*. Samira looked up. Small wooden tags hung from every tree, names carved in different languages: Maria, Hassan, Leila, Yusuf… Some inscriptions were weathered, others clear. On the apple tree nearest the pump house, a new tag hung blank, half-carved with an "S". The woman handed Samira a small knife, its handle wrapped in faded red thread.
"Finish it."
Samira took the knife. As her fingers touched the wood, the pinpoint in her chest pulsed faintly—not a flare, but an acknowledgment. She took a deep breath and carved: *Samira & Karim*. As the final stroke was made, the tag swayed gently in the breeze, like a bird finally landing.
The woman pushed her bicycle forward, gesturing for Samira to place Karim in the cushioned basket. "Town has clinic. People who help. But the path is yours to walk." She pulled a hand-drawn map from the bottom of her basket—simple pencil lines marking Shadowhunter blind spots and the roofs of those who sheltered strangers.
"The orchard remembers you," the woman said, patting Samira's shoulder. "You remember the orchard."
The bicycle wheels crunched over leaves, a sound like countless tiny bursts of applause. Karim woke in the basket, plucked a falling apple blossom petal from the air, held it to his nose, and smiled. The purity of that smile made Samira's eyes sting—she suddenly understood that the fire Ilyas had kindled with ashes was now burning in her brother's pupils.
As they left the orchard, Samira looked back. The woman stood in the doorway of the pump house, her silhouette edged with sunlight, like a photograph developing. Vines swayed on the fence; the wooden tags clinked together, a clear, chiming sound. It traveled through the trees, through the years, across the river where smoke still lingered, finally reaching her ear as a whisper:
*Names written in ash—wind won't take them, fire won't burn them away.*
Samira gripped the handlebars, bent down, and kissed the crown of Karim's head. Ahead, the rooftops of the town rose in the morning light, threads of chimney smoke curling upwards like a soft ladder to the sky, waiting for them to cimb ,stop by stop.