Logan stepped toward her and extended his hand in greeting.
“It’s very nice to meet you, El.”
She clasped his forearm in the traditional greeting as he continued.
“My name is Logan Hammersmith, from Solan Bay.”
A wave of sadness washed over him as he thought of home.
“At least, I used to be from Solan Bay, before it was destroyed. I guess I’m not from anywhere now.”
Logan turned from the girl in embarrassment and sadness. Her question followed him.
“Oh?”
Logan chose to ignore it and El’dreathia let it drop. He looked around the clearing at the bodies strewn about.
“What are we going to do with them? Are there any rites or rituals your people perform for your dead?”
El’dreathia walked up beside him and laid a delicate hand on Logan’s shoulder for support.
“Don’t worry about that, I notified my village a few moments ago and preparations are already under way. They should be here shortly to transport the fallen back home for burial.”
Logan nodded, though he really didn’t understand how she’d told her village. But even as he prepared to ask about it, figures began emerging from the trees. A dozen tall slender males entered the clearing though Logan suspected that more remained hidden amongst the trees. All of the newcomers were simply dressed in jerkins and breeches of forest greens and browns. All had long hair pulled back into tight tails and each held a long staff loosely in his hands.
Logan had to admit that he was impressed. Even his sensitive ears hadn’t heard them coming. They just sort of appeared like ghosts in the woods.
They watched Logan warily as one of the elves moved up to consult with El’dreathia in that strange language of theirs. There seemed to be some animated discussion and a lot of gesturing before El finally turned away from him to face Logan. The other elves began to gather up their fallen comrades.
Logan was surprised to see the elves gathering up the body of the fallen tiger. They quickly tied several heavy branches together, creating a platform on which to lay the cat’s body. Two of the elves lifted the narrow end of the platform and were able to drag the heavy cat along with them as they left the clearing.
Logan tried to watch the elves leave but El stood directly in front of him blocking his vision and demanding his full attention.
“You will come with us, of course?”
It was really more of a pronouncement than a question, but Logan found the thought of warm food and the possibility of new clothes extremely appealing. Of course, that assumed that elves didn’t just kill their visitors. Logan sighed in resignation. He’d just have to take his chances. Besides, the elves were already leaving.
Chapter Sixteen: Traveling With a Whole New Crowd
Logan’s initial amazement at not hearing the elves approach quickly turned into total awe as he traveled with them. Even though they carried the bodies of their fallen warriors, the creatures made no noise as they moved through the forest. It was as though they simply melted into the bushes and trees around them. Even the two who dragged the tiger along between them seemed to move in perfect, silent unison.
El slowed her pace to match his and the others quickly outdistanced them. Even at the slower pace Logan had trouble keeping up. El’s longer legs allowed her to move much faster through the tangled brush than he was capable of and he found himself staring at her back for a good portion of the journey.
Logan hadn’t had an opportunity to really appreciate the female elf’s beauty. Now, as he followed her through the mass of flora and fauna that comprised the forest floor, he couldn’t help but notice the tall elf’s more obvious attributes.
Her legs seem to go on forever, he noted. And, wow, they end in the most perfect …
Logan stumbled heavily as his foot caught on a root he hadn’t noticed in his distraction. He blushed fiercely as El glanced back at him. He shook his head in frustration and self-recrimination, carefully regained his balance, and they continued on. This time, he made a concentrated effort to keep his attention on the road before him.
The occasional glimpse of brown fabric here or light mauve hair there was the only noticeable indication that he and El were not alone in the forest. Even his sensitive ears only rarely picked up the sound of branches breaking underfoot or leaves rustling at someone’s passage. He realized, with a start, that he wasn’t even sure that he and El were being shadowed by the same group of elves that had shown themselves in the clearing. It was quite possible that an entirely new set was now keeping an eye on them.
Another near miss with a tree root and the forest floor quickly drew his attention back to the task at hand.
He had become so intent on keeping up with El’s pace that he hadn’t realized she stopped until he almost ran into her. The elves that had been keeping pace with them materialized out of the surrounding forest. Logan recognized none of them and figured that this must, in fact, be an entirely new group. A well-tanned elf with metallic blue hair stepped up to El and spoke to her in what he was coming to assume was the elfin language. El listened intently for a moment and then barked out a laugh. Logan looked on in curiosity for a moment before finally asking.
“What did he say?”
El turned to him, a smile spread across her lovely face.
“He said you kept up well, considering.”
Logan was surprised to find that he was still breathing hard. He was just managing to catch his breath. Even with all his time working at the forge, these new muscles he was using seemed to drain his energy quickly. Still, he had done his best and the elves seemed to appreciate that. He shot El a lopsided grin.
“Well, I try.”
El translated his comment to the other elves. They all broke out laughing. Logan knew they had been referring to his shorter legs. He didn’t care. He’d been shorter than everyone else all his life. Logan even managed to chuckle a little himself. He had thought he was short when compared to the humans. Compared to the elves that now surrounded him, it was nearly ridiculous. The tallest of them stood nearly two feet taller than him. Besides, he thought, it wasn’t exactly something he could change, even if he wanted to, so he might as well share in the humour.
The elves were still chuckling amongst themselves as Logan started studying the surrounding forest. They had been travelling steadily northwest the entire time, so he guessed that they must be near the very heart of the Great Forest. The trees here seemed to support that assumption. They had grown bigger than any he had ever seen and with trees, bigger meant older. Yet, even amongst these goliaths of the forest, Logan was unable to find any sign of an elfin village.
“So? Where to now? I don’t see a village around here?”
Again, El translated his words to the others. This comment was met with peals of laughter from the gathered elves, some of whom even felt the need to hold their sides. Logan blushed slightly in embarrassment before frowning deeply at the gathered elves. Now, he was starting to get annoyed. He didn’t like being kept in the dark. Being made the fool because of it, impressed him even less. El must have seen the look on his face as she turned back to him.
“No,” she said gently and rested one of her delicate hands on his shoulder. “They’re not laughing at you.” Her touch was so soft it made his skin tingle. Logan felt even clumsier than he normally did.
“Oh?” Logan’s right eyebrow rose slightly as he looked sceptically at her. She smiled gently at him again and Logan found it hard to stay annoyed with her.
“It’s just that we’re almost on top of the village right now. Or maybe underneath it would be more accurate.”
El pointedly looked up toward the forest canopy. Following her gaze he almost fell back in amazement.
Several hundred feet above him, the branches of thirteen massive trees criss-crossed back and forth. They created a labyrinth of paths and bridges. Along these branches, Logan could make out the shapes of elves, tiny in the distance, moving about
in their daily business.
The lower branches were wider and heavier and seemed to be the main roads for this city in the sky. As the trees reached higher, the branches became narrower. In some cases, they were only wide enough for a single elf to pass. Scattered amongst these branches, Logan noticed what looked like large acorns. His jaw dropped as he watched the tiny figure of an elf emerge from one such seedpod. He realized with shock that these must be the elves’ homes. He squinted to get a better look. Sure enough, the massive acorns had openings in various places.
Windows and doors no doubt, he thought.
As Logan gazed on in wonder, he realized that El’s terminology had not done this justice. She had called it a village. This was no more of a village than the great sea was a lake.
When El finally coughed to regain his attention, Logan found that the others had already disappeared. He hadn’t even heard them go. El stood before him a serene smile across her delicate features. She spoke softly.
“You see, no one was laughing at you.”
Logan blushed under her steady gaze.
“I’m sorry. I thought ...”
She waved off his apology and gazed at him intently.
“Your reaction was quite understandable. But, I promise you, I wouldn’t make fun of you.”
She blushed slightly and an awkward silence fell between them for a couple of heartbeats. If Logan didn’t know better, he’d think El was just as uncomfortable as he was. He finally broke the silence.
“So how do we? I mean …”
Logan looked back up toward the village hundreds of feet above them.
El gave him a conspiratorial wink and turned to the base of one of the massive trees. She stepped toward the trunk and gently, almost caressingly, pressed a small knot in the tree about four feet up its trunk. A portion of the tree trunk swung open before her exposing a hollow in the tree itself.
He peered past her into the darkness. With the aid of light from the doorway he could make out the beginnings of a stairway that seemed to almost mould itself into the inner trunk of the tree.
“Please, after you,” El motioned him forward.
As he took his first hesitant steps into the trunk of the giant tree, he cast a last glance back at El. She gave him a reassuring smile. He smiled back, turned toward the stairs and with a deep breath to gather his resolve, he began his ascent.
He heard a faint rubbing sound as El closed the door behind them. The sudden absence of light was more than a little disconcerting and almost made him miss his next step. Thankfully, his dwarven ancestry quickly made its presence known and his eyes adjusted to the dimness.
As his vision improved, he looked around the stairwell. He noticed a faint luminance that seemed to run through the outer wall of the tree. The luminance cast an eerie blue glow through the stairwell. It was not a great deal of light, but more than enough for his needs.
With a final look back to assure himself that El was still there, he mounted the stairs. His confidence slowly returned as he climbed ever upwards.
Chapter Seventeen: Daddy!
The climb up through the trunk of the massive tree seemed to take just this side of forever and after his forced march through the forest, Logan wasn’t sure he’d be able to make it. To distract himself from his exhaustion he tried to concentrate on his surroundings. As he climbed, he found he was able to make out more and more details in the walls and stairs around him.
The luminance that seemed to pulsate around them came from small worms that crawled through the trunk of the great tree. The tiny creatures gave off a strange blue glow that seemed to move and writhe, much like the creatures who produced it. Logan didn’t care to guess how many of the little worms it took to light the entire stairwell.
The stair wound upwards in a counter-clockwise direction around the central core of the massive tree. He figured that the core itself was at least twenty feet in diameter, though it was hard to be certain with the constant upward spiral.
He looked for tool marks or other signs of physical manipulation to the massive tree or the stairs within it, but he could find none. It was as though the stair had developed naturally, level upon level, questing towards the sky. He couldn’t be certain, but somehow he doubted that the average tree grew with a perfectly spaced stairwell in its centre. No, he had a feeling that the tree had had help, if not physical help than perhaps magical.
“These stairs, there aren’t any tool marks in the wood. How did your people create them?”
He stopped on a stair and looked back at El. She gave him a mysterious smile.
“We had a need and we asked the tree for its assistance. The tree was gracious enough to grant us this gift,” she replied.
Well that cleared that right up, thought Logan. He shook his head and continued to climb.
Eventually, he became aware that the luminance was beginning to fade. It happened so gradually that he nearly hadn’t noticed it. As he looked up ahead he could see the darkness softening into daylight. He had no idea how far he had climbed. The muscles in his thighs burned from the effort and his heart was pounding heavy in his chest.
As he stepped out from the great tree and onto one of its massive branches, his breath caught in his throat. As spectacular as the village had been from the ground, nothing could compare to seeing it from here. Logan beheld the maze of branches criss-crossed back and forth at various levels around the great trees. Some branches were almost fifteen feet wide and looked like major thorough-fairs with dozens of elves moving back and forth. Others were no more than one or two feet wide with no room for more than one elf at a time. What was most disturbing was the fact that there was not a railing to be seen, even on the narrowest branch. Yet, the elves, it seemed, had no fear. They moved with purpose and certainty across walkways so narrow, they would make Logan panic even if they were only a few feet off the ground. Never mind several hundred.
Taking a cautious step forward, he peered over the edge of the wide branch to the forest floor far below. A wave of nausea and dizziness surged through him and he had to close his eyes as he resisted the urge to leap. El’s hand on his shoulder steadied him before he lost his balance.
“Careful,” she warned.
“The heights can be intoxicating if you’re not used to them.”
Her sure hand pulled him back away from the edge.
“This way,” she said as she guided him slowly along the branch, making sure to keep him to the centre on the pathway. He had to admit that he kind of liked the feeling of El’s hand resting on his shoulder, guiding him. The thought made him blush fiercely and he was glad that she was behind him and unable to see his reaction.
Besides, he thought darkly. What would such a beautiful creature want with a clumsy freak like me? Gods, normal women aren’t even interested in me.
Logan stepped to the side slightly to let a golden-haired male elf pass from the other direction.
What chance do I have? His mind taunted him. Especially, when the males of her race look like that.
He shook his head slightly as he put aside such depressing thoughts and tried to concentrate on the architecture around him. The massive tree city was incredibly beautiful. As he had noticed from the ground, the tree’s seeds were being used as homes. The living quarters seemed to be carved right into the core of the seed itself.
No, he corrected himself. That wasn’t quite right. They weren’t carved, that was too violent a description. They were more formed. It was as if the tree had actually grown into the shape of the homes. Magic must definitely play a part in their creation.
He eventually noticed that El seemed to be guiding him toward the centre of the community itself, toward the largest of the thirteen trees. Unfortunately for Logan’s aching thighs, this entailed climbing several more sets of stairs. At least he could take solace in the fact that the paths they traveled remained quite wide.
Eventually, they approached a gable of small branches intertwined into an arch over the path they we
re on. To the left and right of the arch, the intertwined branches formed a wall that reached around a central chamber. Similar archways stretched over other paths on either side that also seemed to lead into the central chamber.
Blocking their passage through the arch were two armed elves. Both stood at attention and held heavy wooden staffs at their sides. They were clearly guards. The question was, what were they guarding?
Logan’s critical eye took in the elves’ weapons and armour. The armour itself seemed to be made from the moulded bark of a tree. It fit quite snugly, but the blacksmith in Logan questioned its ability to withstand attack. He’d be interested in seeing it in action. He also noticed that the staffs the elves carried were made from simple wood. There was no metal capping on the ends or metal banding along the shaft of either staff. The lack of metal seemed odd to Logan but, the more he thought about it, the more he realized that he hadn’t seen any metal at all amongst the elves. Could it be that they didn’t possess it? Living isolated in trees, he could see that metal would be hard to come by. It made sense that the elves would have learned to get by without it.
But, what did they use for tools, wondered Logan?
El stepped past him to approach the two guards. She addressed the guard to the right and it wasn’t until then that Logan realized the guard was female.
Logan laughed at himself.
Here I am amongst the most beautiful race of creatures that I’ve ever seen, he thought. And I’m so busy studying their armour and weapons that I don’t even noticed the incredibly attractive woman before him.
She was absolutely stunning with long shiny black hair, she was also very clearly a warrior who probably knew how to use the staff she held quite effectively. He’d have to be more careful; such oversights could easily cost him his life.
The female elf seemed satisfied with whatever El told her and made a quick gesture to her fellow guard. Both elves stepped aside to let them pass while El turned back and ushered Logan ahead through the arch. He stepped forward into the most spectacular chamber he had ever seen.
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