Published in The Book of Hopes, edited by Katherine Rundell, Bloomsbury, 2020
There is a legend that glowing hummingbirds live in the deepest darkness of the maze. If you find one, the sorrows in your life will fly away and you’ll smile so joyfully that all who see you will fill with happiness.
Every year, children slip into the maze to search for the birds. Some return downcast, having found only empty corridors swathed in gloomy shadows. Others return with tales of grotesque monsters, defeated by acts of great bravery. None, however, return with the hummingbird’s smile.
Until she was eleven, Nadia had no desire to go into the maze. But when her little brother lost his favourite toy, he missed it so intensely that nothing could comfort him. Nadia loved her brother and ached to make him happy. So she set off to find the legendary hummingbirds. She carried a ball of her mother’s yarn, tied one end to a rock outside the maze then stepped inside.
Darkness closed around Nadia. Cold squeezed her chest. But Nadia pulled her shoulders back, clutched the yarn tight and strode onwards.
Whispers swished near her feet. Icy tendrils snaked down her neck. Sour scents and low groans slid from ominous tunnels. The further Nadia crept, the more her heart thumped with fear.
Nadia didn’t feel the yarn snap, nor did she feel it slip through her fingers. She only felt the sudden emptiness it left in her hand. Her tether home was gone. Lost, terrified, alone in the darkness, Nadia crawled on hands and knees, desperate to find the yarn. When her fingers closed around a strand, she rose, elated. But the piece was just a torn fragment.
And yet … Nadia stood in the desolate dark and imagined how she might use it. Could she weave a compass to point the way home? Divine her way with the thread, like a dowser using a twig to find water? Or make a snare to trap one of the unseen creatures that pattered by, then ask for its help?
Plan after plan wound into Nadia’s mind, all spun from one loop of yarn. None were perfect, but she kept dreaming, believing that if she did, she would think of a way to get home.
When hope stirred inside Nadia, she heard a noise from within her ear. A soft creak. A gentle crack. A rustle and a tickle. Out from Nadia’s ear flew a tiny hummingbird, with shining green and blue feathers. A smile bloomed on Nadia’s face, radiant with joy.
The hummingbird grew, larger than Nadia. Light and warmth thrummed from its buzzing wings. It nudged Nadia, until she climbed on to its silk-soft back. Then the bird zoomed from the maze, carrying Nadia, whooping with delight, into the brightness of the sky.
Far below, Nadia’s brother saw the hummingbird, and his sister flying on its back smiling the hummingbird’s smile. His eyes lit up, his sorrow flew away, and he filled with happiness.
Sophie Anderson 