Witch, Wolf, Woods

CHAPTER 4: FINALLY FITTING IN

"It's copper," she said, grateful to the metal for sharing its name with her. She found herself wanting to spend more time with this metal and, while she was relieved to hear she was correct, she was also reluctant to hand the copper back to Tante Bettina.

Katja easily identified the next three metals, including two she'd never heard of before—palladium and magnesium—but thankfully, the song always supplied the metal's name, and she repeated the pronunciation as best she could.

When it came time to identify the last metal, Katja took a deep breath before carefully wrapping her hands around what was handed to her.

This metal was hard...cold...unyielding and unchanging, its melody slow and rhythmic, with low notes that spoke of darkness and solitude, of incessant pounding and hammering, and the sense of time passing. This metal wasn't particularly receptive to connection, although Katja could sense something like interest when the song finished and asked her to introduce herself.

Concentrating intently, Katja attempted to convey more of herself to the metal, to explain what she was doing and the importance of having an affinity. She heard herself producing notes inside her mind, a few at a time, as she tried to adapt to communicating without words, but at least some of what she conveyed must have made sense, because the metal—which identified itself as iron—responded, and not only in her mind...she felt it moving inside her cupped hands, as well, changing as they communicated.

Katja offered up more of herself to the iron, and the metal did the same, allowing her glimpses into its past deep in an underground mine, as well as the terror and excitement it had felt at being removed and taken somewhere new, hoping it would be put to a good use rather than forced to undergo constant changes until there so little left it was simply discarded.

Katja understood the desire to find a purpose, to feel useful, and, more than anything, to fit in with no chance of being excluded. The iron became warm against her skin, and she felt it shifting, turning soft and malleable, changing with her thoughts as the iron replied, agreeing or disagreeing with the images she presented until something reverberated deep inside her bones, almost making her drop the metal.

Somehow, she managed to keep hold of it, and when it offered a final goodbye melody, she was shocked to hear some of her own music now intertwined with the song of the iron.

Opening her eyes, she slowly uncupped her hands and gasped—there where a chunk of iron had sat was a dark grey heart with smooth, rounded edges.

Tante Bettina leaned forward, her eyes wide, as she and the other girls marveled at the heart.

"How did you do that?" asked Tante Bettina softly.

"We did it together," Katja tried to explain. "The metal and I...we made it."

"Can you tell me more?" prompted the blacksmith.

Katja ran a finger along the edge of the heart, amazed at the smooth lines she'd somehow created using only her mind.

"I could tell the metals apart because they told me their names through their songs," Katja explained, finding the words inadequate at conveying the truth of what had actually taken place. "Each metal had a different song, but even though there were no words, I could still understand it. I tried to say something back, but I couldn't speak...whatever I thought turned into music, and the music made me feel things."

She looked down at the iron heart in her hand. "We shared the music we each made and then, I started hearing new music that hadn't been there before. And somehow we created this." She raised the heart a little higher into the air, loathe to let go of it until she absolutely had to.