"It has stopped breathing," the stranger said, his voice like gravel. "And with it, the songs of the valley have gone silent."

One autumn evening, a stranger arrived at her shop. He was tall, dressed in a coat that seemed to swallow the light, and he carried a heavy box wrapped in oilcloth. Without a word, he placed it on her counter and unfolded the fabric. Inside was a device unlike any Alalia had seen. It looked like a brass lung, intricate and wheezing, with hundreds of tiny glass pipes spiraling out from a central core.

When the stranger returned, he didn't take the box. He simply looked at Alalia and smiled. "You’ve given the valley its voice back," he said. "Keep the machine. It needs a heart that knows how to listen."