Anne-girl is nearly finished the second bookcover for me. I am so excited. Here is a picture she made for me, and below that is an excerpt from Ariana's Island.
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| (rough draft) |
A Stormy Night
The rain
started the next morning, softly at first but gaining strength. By the late evening, Ariana and her falcon
took shelter in her wreckage to wait out the storm. Ariana lit her candle and wrote some more in
her journal.
August 15
It’s raining. The wind is picking up and the sky looks
angry. I would hate to be on the sea
tonight. I am quite content to stay in
my airplane wreckage with my bird and feast on berries and seaweed.
Ariana reached
up and stroked her falcon’s spotted chest.
The bird blinked sleepily and made a contented coo. Ariana took up her pen again to continue
writing.
I wish I knew what kind of bird she
is. All I know is that she is some type
of bird of prey. My brother Eric would
have known. He loved birds.
I named her Cochina. The pilot whose plane we rented said he had
named his plane “Cochino” because it meant “master of the skies” in his
language. So I named my bird Cochina,
hoping it means the feminine version of the same. She is amazing in the air – it takes my
breath away to watch her.
I found her half-grown and injured, and I
nursed her back to health. She didn’t
trust me at first. I still have a scar
from her early panicked attempt at self-defense.
Ariana paused
to look at the silver scar on her arm.
It had healed well, but she didn’t think it would ever disappear
entirely. “Some wounds are like that,”
she murmured. Cochina cocked her head at
Ariana’s voice, and Ariana smiled at her.
“Don’t worry – you were worth it,” she assured the bird. Then she turned back to her journal.
Gradually, she learned to trust me. She is still fickle in her loyalties,
though -- sometimes she is with me and
sometimes she is not. On nights as
stormy as this one, however, she prefers to be in here with me. She closes her eyes and makes this funny
little contented noise in her throat when I stroke her. I wish Eric could see her.
Ariana paused
again and then blew out her candle. She
tucked her journal on a shelf and pulled her blanket up to her chin, listening
to the storm raging outside.
Eric would
have loved to see Cochina. Ariana could
hear his voice in her head, reciting obscure facts about birds. Falcons were his passion. He would have known everything about Cochina.
Thunder boomed
and Ariana turned over in her bed, pulling her blanket over her head. It was a good night to be in a dry
shelter.
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