Legend

Tallulah Totonka’s Compass was made long ago by the river people, of bone, silver and dark wood. At its heart they carved a tree with spreading roots; around it, a ring of the signs of the sky; below, a crescent moon full of stars and a pair of outstretched wings. It had no needle at all.

On a moonless night Tallulah found a boy beneath the old tree by the river. He was asleep, curled up among the roots, barefoot, his hands tucked under his arms.

“I ran away,” he said when he opened his eyes. “I was always a stranger to them. I don’t belong anywhere.”

Tallulah sat down beside him and laid the compass in his palm. For a long time the boy turned it over, trying to see which way it pointed.

“Put your other hand on the bark.”

The bark was rough and still warm from the day. Under his fingers he felt the trunk sway, barely, in the wind off the river. Through the branches the stars showed – the same ones carved on the compass.

“It doesn’t show the way,” said Tallulah. “It shows what you belong to. To this tree, to the river, and to the sky above it.”

The Compass stayed with Tallulah Totonka. The boy stayed by the river – and no one ever called him a stranger again.