A small breeze rose and caressed their faces. Anna pushed her vision deep into the stars. They seemed to sit wider apart than she remembered, appearing less tethered. Despite the remnants of her grief, she wanted to ask Solomon a question about the sky.

Did she dare? What if he grew angry and reminded her that girls should not ask questions, as her father always had?

But if Solomon thought she was a boy, could not boys ask questions?

Anna weighed the urgency of her curiosity against the heft of fear. She decided that she needed to know. “Why does the wind not blow away the stars?” she asked.

Solomon raised his eyebrows and drew on his pipe. He chuckled and exhaled a mouthful of smoke. His mother had been right. The child was brave. Gentle. And open to miracles.

He thought about how Zahra might have answered the question. After a moment, he cleared his throat. “It is the stars themselves that make the wind,” he said. “Can the one who makes the wind be blown by it?”

Anna frowned.

“Do you make your own breath?” Solomon asked. Anna nodded. “Then try it,” he said. “Try to blow yourself down.”

Anna puckered her lips and blew, hard as she could, against her chest. Solomon laughed at the innocence and admired the child’s pluck. “See there?” he said.

Anna smiled. And for just a moment, forgot her pain.

Solomon sucked heavily on his pipe. Soon they were entwined in a shawl of sweet smoke. He looked deep into the sky’s belly. “Brother,” he said, addressing Anna. She noted that he did not demand to know her name. “There are different ways of looking at things,” he continued. She followed his gaze, trying to intuit his meaning. “For example, some people see patterns, or constellations, as outlined by the stars. There is a hunter. There is a bear,” he said, pointing. “But there are other people, other believers, who see patterns, or spirits, outlined by the spaces between the stars. Dark shapes. Like ravens, and trees, melting through the black.”

Anna was jolted by the idea. She had never thought to look between the stars. She squinted, trying to make out the figures, her vision freed by this new perspective.

“It is important to remember that there are other ways,” Solomon said, returning his gaze to the flock.

At some hour of the early morning, Anna had a dream. In the dream, a wreath of fingers slipped around her neck and tugged on the medallion at her throat. She struggled to stand and fend off her attacker. But when she woke, there was only stillness. And the moon overhead.