Days passed. The swamp returned to its usual chorus of frogs and cicadas. Elara checked on the bird morning and evening. She talked to it—about the beaver that had drowned her young taro shoots, about the great blue heron that had fished the same pool for a decade, about the daughter who had not called in six months. The ibis listened. Slowly, it began to eat.
“Alright,” she said. “Alright.”
A bird. A scarlet ibis.