And when the little bird found the jewel, he saved the city,” Peregrine read, voice unwavering. He stared at the picture in the book that lay before him. A black bird stood in a dark cave, brandishing a glowing red gem in his right claw.
Peregrine sat on the floor of his hut with his mother, his brother and sister sat beside him. Sun glowed through the ceiling, and an open window cast a beam of light across the pages of the book, making the black bird in the picture glow like some kind of deity. But Peregrine’s mind was anywhere but the present. He was still thinking about the previous afternoon and Sage’s story about the red canaries.
“Good job, Peregrine,” said Peregrine’s mother. “We’ll have to find some harder books to challenge you. You can go and play now.”
“My turn,” said Mal, Peregrine’s sister, hooking the book towards herself with her toe. Peregrine knew that she was better at reading than himself, and she did too. Everything Mal read was read in a condescending voice as though she had to explain to her intellectual inferiors all that the little bird had to go through in order to save the city. Needless to say, Peregrine was more than eager to escape his house to go play with Gia.
Peregrine flapped over to Gia’s hut. It was woven of grass as many of the huts were. Woven leaves were amazing for building, but they were expensive to preserve. “Gia!” he called peering into the door.
“I’m right here.” Peregrine jumped and looked around for the source of the voice. On the branch above, a canary was silhouetted by the sun.
“Gia!” he said, flying up to the branch. Now that the sun wasn’t in his eyes, he could see the true colors of the canary before him.
Gia, at 4 months, was a whole month older than Peregrine, and yet somehow the two of them had ended up best friends. It probably had something to do with their mothers being friends. Ever since Gia could fly, she visited Peregrine’s house with her mother. Her mother’s intent may have been for her to befriend Mal, but Mal was simply horrible. Pel, Peregrine’s brother, was okay, but Peregrine was the best of the three of them, according to Gia. He was brave, curious, and optimistic, and those were excellent qualities.
With one month of growing on Peregrine, Gia was taller and slimmer, her patchy brown feathers long and smooth. But Peregrine thought he saw something different about her now.
All canaries grew brown feathers at first. But not all black canaries were black. Some of them had grey feathers as well. Even though canaries attained their full adult plumage at a year old, feathers that fell out grew in with their adult colors. So it was always interesting to look at young birds growing in their feathers to get a clue of what they would look like all grown up.
Peregrine didn’t see any black feathers at all. He didn’t see any grey ones either. But there were two feathers, distinctly red, sticking out of the brown like a couple of rubies in the dirt.
“Gia,” he said seriously. “Some of your feathers are red.”
“I know,” she said, staring at her brand-new feathers like they didn’t belong to her. “It’s kinda freaking me out.”
Peregrine always knew she’d been adopted, but a red canary? “How come we didn’t know about this?” he demanded.
She puffed up. “I think I’m about to find out.” She shot down towards her hut and slid through the doorway. Peregrine fluttered in after her, perching in the doorway and peering inside.
“Mom,” Gia said. Gia always had a way with adults that Peregrine admired. Somehow, she always told them what she wanted in a way that made them respect her. Maybe they even feared her.
“What is it, Gia?” Gia’s adoptive mother, Adelia Leaflow, was shorter than her and her feathers were black as pitch. There really was no semblance between them. The biggest difference wasn’t appearance, however. While Gia was boisterous and headstrong, Mrs. Leaflow was gentle and soft spoken.
“I think I’m a red canary,” Gia said, pointing an accusatory beak at her feathers. “Why didn’t you tell me about this sooner?”
Mrs. Leaflow took a deep breath. “I wish your father was here…”He’s probably out weaving huts, thought Peregrine. Both Mr. Leaflow and his own father were weavers by profession. “Should Peregrine be here for this?” Mrs. Leaflow asked.
Peregrine turned around in preparation to leave.
“He can stay. He already knows I’m a red canary. What can you tell me that could be worse? Anyways, anything you tell me I would just tell him afterwards,” Gia said.
Mrs. Leaflow nodded. “You can come in, then, Peregrine.”
“Thank you Mrs. Leaflow,” Peregrine said, hopping into the room.
“You’ve always been all manners,” Mrs. Leaflow said, looking at Peregrine.
Peregrine nodded, even though it wasn’t true.
Then Mrs. Leaflow looked at Gia, and Gia alone. “Your parents were red canaries. That much you can probably guess. They became mates, even though it was illegal.”
“It’s illegal for red canaries to take mates?” Gia asked.
“Yes, dear. When they realized your mother was going to lay an egg, she left it here with us. They were preparing to flee the forest, but they were not yet ready to raise a child. So your father and I chose to raise you, Gia.”
“Okay, so why didn’t I know about this?” Gia asked. She picked at the weaving between her toes.
“I did not tell you that you were a red canary because I wanted you to live a normal life, at least for a little while. It wouldn’t do well for you to tell the wrong birds about your background. I’m sorry if this hurts you.”
Gia pressed her beak together tightly, staring out the window. Then she whirled back to stare at her mother. “Okay.” She clearly saw the reason in this. “But no more secrets.”
Mrs. Leaflow nodded. “You’re grown-up now. There’s no reason for secrets between us.”
“Thank you for telling me, Mum,” Gia said, but her eyes couldn’t meet those of her mother. Instead, they kept finding the floor.
Peregrine suddenly felt like he was watching something meant to be private. He decided to fly out to the branch above the house. There he waited for Gia to come back outside. Gia popped out, looking sad and thoughtful.
“Gia!” he yelled from the branch. Gia frowned and peered up at him. Then she landed beside him, plastering a smile on her face. She’s smiling, but she doesn’t seem okay, thought Peregrine. Still, he didn’t ask about it. There were more important matters to discuss.
“Gia, I have something to tell you. It’s about the red canaries. We need to go somewhere. Private,” Peregrine said urgently. He took off, flying north, not even waiting for her to follow.
“It’s the first time you lead me anywhere,” Gia said, cheerfully flapping after Peregrine. “Usually I do the leading.”
Peregrine smiled absently. He was thinking about what Sage had said. Sage had told him not to share the information with anyone. But Peregrine decided that Gia, a red canary, deserved to know, just as Sage said he deserved to know.
The day before, the abandoned nests seemed like a creepy place to Peregrine. But now, with drops of sunlight replacing the rain that had been there before, they seemed like the perfect place to share with a friend. Peregrine wondered how many birds knew about it.
“You’ve been getting better at flying,” Gia said, performing a neat aerial flip. “Have you been practicing?”
“Yes,” Peregrine said. His wings were reminding him of this fact with every painful flap.
Not very far north of the village was where the abandoned huts were located.
In the sunlight, they still looked sad. But more than anything they reminded Peregrine of old bee hives that had lost all of the menace they may have posed while occupied.
Peregrine landed on one of them. “Look at this place!” he said. “I found this yesterday.”
Gia landed on another nest and picked at the tan leaves it was composed of. “I wonder who these all belonged to.”
“The red canaries, of course,” said Peregrine.
“How do you know that?” Gia asked, staring at the huts harder as though woven in them was some clue to their makers.
“It’s a looong story, but I think you deserve to know,” Peregrine chirped.
“I think so too,” said Gia.
“Well okay, but don’t let anyone know I told you this,” Peregrine said.
“I promise I won’t tell!” Gia looked like she was about to fall off her perch, the way she was leaning forward.
Peregrine was no master orator like Sage, but he didn’t skip a piece of the story.
By the end of it Gia was horrified by the red canaries' fate.“Well, I guess I know why my parents left now.”
Peregrine nodded, and a terrible question emerged in his mind. “Does that mean you’re gonna leave too?”
Gia’s gaze hardened. She clutched the hut beneath her with her claws, hard. “No,” she said. “This is my home. I’m not gonna run away scared. I’m not gonna chance it with the falcons. I’m gonna live here.”
And that was that. Not a doubt could be had. Gia always did what she said she was “gonna” do.
