This week, I jumped into the way-back machine and found a prompt from 2015 to write a story using the following words: pattering, melody, crack, and bear.

Lyryk walked the paths, learning forest moods the way other bards learned ballads: listening until the silence leaned into meaning. Rain fell in a pattering whisper through the leaves, a thousand soft fingers drumming on bark and thicket. Biscuit trotted ahead, tail low, nose busy with the sodden news of the path. Lyryk followed, lute slung across her back in a weathered case, cloak hooded, boots finding their own cadence through the mire.

The roads turned to slush as she wound her way out of the mountain pass. Glad of the change, though not happy with the muck pulling at her boots, she thought of tunes she’d play when the pair reached town. She always did as she approached a new place. A melody could mend a room the way a stitch mended cloth, and she carried songs and news ready in her chest. Her half-elven blood lent patience with the long things and urgency with the brief; it kept her restless between places, content only when she moved and sang. Tonight she moved toward Riverford, where lights and stew and coin waited, or so she told herself. The truth tugged somewhere else, an ache like a hairline crack in glass.

Biscuit paused and glanced back, honey eyes alert, dander rising.

“Easy,” she murmured, not stopping. Her voice sounded right in the icy rain, low and even. Biscuit trusted her tone as much as her words. He turned and trotted on, paws quiet despite the wet. The forest accepted them with the indifferent grace of something that had seen many travelers pass and fail.

Lyryk’s thoughts drifted, as they did when she walked. Remembering Jarla’s hands, always quick to box her ears. Then, she remembered Tony’s fate, his fingers bent and twisted. She remembered leaving too—how the world had opened when she entered the bard’s college, how it had closed after meeting Lady Sharla. Memory always walked beside her, not ahead or behind, and she had learned to let it pace her rather than lead. Not liking the direction of her thoughts, she shook them off.

The rain thickened, pattering harder, and Biscuit slowed, hackles raising, a low growl deep in his chest.

‘Ware, Howl, the words a warning in her mind.

Lyryk caught the scent then, iron and wet fur. She reached for the hilt of the rapier at her hip without thinking. Her pulse quickened, a drumbeat she could not quiet. The path bent, and there it stood, massive and dark against the green: a bear, shoulders slick with rain, muzzle lifted to taste the air.

Biscuit froze, a statue of tawny wet fur. Lyryk stopped, breath shallow. She did not draw the blade; did not run. She let the moment stretch until it thinned. Bears were stories on legs if you listened, and stories had rules. She lifted her hands slowly, palms out, and hummed. The melody rose from her breast unbidden, old as lullabies, simple and steady. She shaped it soft, a river not a flood.

The bear’s ears twitched. It huffed, a sound like wind through a cave. Lyryk kept the tune steady, gaze low, her mind focused on the rumble of sound in her chest rather than the sight of teeth and claw. Biscuit edged closer to her boot, pressing his flank against her leg. She anchored herself in his warmth, accepting his courage. The bear shifted its weight, turned its head, and after a long, brittle pause, lumbered back into the trees.

Lyryk let the hum taper away. Her hands trembled. She exhaled and laughed once, sharp and small.

Good song, she heard Biscuit in her mind. He shook, sending droplets everywhere, then sneezed, affronted by the musty forest smells. They waited a moment longer, then moved on, steps careful, senses wide.

Riverford rose out of the rain like a promise kept, lanterns bobbing along the palisade, smoke curling from chimneys. Lyryk paid the gate fee with a copper and a smile, and Biscuit gave the guard a full-body wag until the man grinned despite himself. Inside, the town breathed warmth. The inn glowed brightest, its sign creaking in the wind. Lyryk felt the familiar pull toward it, the place where her work waited.

The common room buzzed with voices and steam. She found a corner by the hearth and picked up her lute. Biscuit settled at her feet, nose on paws, eyes half-lidded but alert. Lyryk tuned quickly, fingers sure despite the chill. She listened for the room’s tone, the note everything leaned toward, and found it in the clink of mugs and the sighs of tired shoulders.

She played. The song with which she started braided rain and fire, road and rest. It lifted the mood in the room by degrees, coaxing smiles, easing backs straight. Coins gathered at her feet like shy birds. Lyryk felt the songs move through her and out, a clean exchange. When she finished, applause washed over her, warm and generous. She bowed, half-elf grace making a small show of it, and Biscuit thumped his tail as if he had helped.

Afterward, she ate stew thick with mutton, barley, and root vegetables. She listened to stories and shared her news. A farmer spoke of wolves near his fields; a tinker mentioned a bridge that had taken a crack, boards splitting like old bones. Lyryk filed it all away. Stories were maps and songs, and she collected them even when she didn’t plan to follow.

Later in the loft, rain ticked its staccato beat against the roof. Biscuit curled close, his warmth, and regular breath a steady comfort. Lyryk lay awake, idly fingering her lute without making a sound. The bear’s dark bulk still loomed in her thoughts, not as fear but as a question. She thought of balance, of how songs and silences held each other up. She thought of the road beyond Riverford, of where it might bend next as she walked toward Blackford and beyond.

Sleep came eventually, carrying her into dreams of strings turning to paths. In the morning, the rain had softened to a mist. Lyryk packed and paid, slung her lute, and stepped back onto the road with Biscuit trotting at her side. The forest waited, patient as ever, and she walked into it, listening for the next melody that would ask her to sing.

For more of Lyryk’s story:
Lyryk’s Song, Part 2
Starting at the beginning: The Cost of Naivete