Page 14 of The Hummingbird’s Gift

She sat down on the bank, looking defeated. “You don’t take me seriously either.”

Rohahen took a moment to decide how to respond. Childhood was always a more difficult time than it appeared. And he’d been trying to take her seriously.

May was still splashing in the creek, her dress now entirely soaked through. She looked like she didn’t have a care in the world.

Ro sat down beside Nina. “I’m sorry. I should have treated you more like an adult. I spend a lot of time with May, and she’s much younger.” Only by three or four years, but at this age it made a world of difference.

“I want to be a Sentry Leader. Like Kayla,” Nina proclaimed, like she was expecting a confrontation.

“Alright. That sounds like a good fit for you. I think you could do a very good job of protecting the tribe. You’ll have to get a lot of experience and education, but if you work hard I’m sure you can do it.”

She shook her head, pulling her knees to her chest. “Not if I’m a heart-singer.”

From behind the thin blanket of comfort that Achak had wrapped around him, Rohahen felt his heart opening again. He’d lived with the wrong gift for so much of his life, but seeing it in someone else was somehow worse. Especially when she was so young. She shouldn’t even have gotten her animal form for another six years or so.

“What’s wrong?” she asked.

“Huh? Oh, um, nothing. I still think you could be a sentry if you want it enough.”

“Being a sentry isn’t the same as being the Sentry Leader. And you’re lying. I can tell. Remember? Heart-singer?”

Someone would have to talk with her about using her gifts more delicately. She certainly didn’t have any of the warmth and tact of most heart-singers. If anything, she sounded like Kayla.

“You know, you do sound a lot like our Sentry Leader.” Who had all the tact of a rampaging bull.

“OK, you’re telling the truth about that, but I’m not sure if it’s a good thing. I still want to know why you got all sad. It’s about me, so I should know.”

Ro took a deep breath. “It’s mostly about me, actually.” He hadn’t actually said this to anyone yet, even Declan. But if anyone understood, it was this fierce, precocious girl.

He tried to shape his swirling thoughts into words. “When I was young, I was convinced I would be a heart-singer. I used to spend all of my time in the heart-singer’s house, learning from Achak, when I wasn’t following the Guide around, listening to his stories.

“Sounds boring,” Nina commented.

Rohahen managed not to laugh. “The thing was, though, that when it came time to receive my gifts, I didn’t get to chant the heart. I was gifted with sharing strength instead.”

“Ohhhhh…” she breathed. Then everything came out in a torrent of words. “When I was trapped in that cage, the others told me that the shots the scientists gave me would make me shift, but that maybe if I thought really hard, I could choose my animal and my gift.

“Everyone was supposed to help each other out there, you know?” she explained. “The little animals could be sneaky, and the big ones could protect them. The one who was sort of our Chief, I guess, got to be an opossum, so that her thumbs could steal things and pick locks.

“The stupid humans didn’t even know about our gifts. They just kept taking blood samples to figure out how to make us shift. Or, to make us shift back into humans. I guess they already knew the animal part. So when they gave me the shot, I thought about being something big and ferocious. Like a cougar or a wolf.”

“Black bears are pretty ferocious,” Ro chimed in.

“Yeah,” she agreed. “That part worked. But I forgot to ask to be a strength-sharer. Like, I thought it would just happen.”

“Yeah, I thought it would just happen, too.” Ro agreed. He’d gone into his journey with no expectations, confident that the gods would make the right choice for him. Now he wasn’t so sure.

“But now I’m stuck, I guess.” She picked up a rock and threw it so hard that it hit the opposite bank of the creek and bounced back into the water.

“Careful, Nina,” he warned. “May’s playing there.”

She sighed.

“You know, I feel pretty stuck, too. But Declan? He has a different idea.”

“Yeah?”

“He says that sometimes he feels like he’s a little bit like a man and a little bit like a woman. And sometimes he feels like he’s a man, but a totally different type of man than, I guess, men usually are. He was saying that maybe I could be a different type of strength-sharer that's more of a heart-singer. Or maybe I’m just a heart-singer and no one else can see it.” He hadn’t quite admitted this to Declan or himself, but he’d been thinking about it.