by Awert, Wolf
Even the animals had difficulty navigating this thicket. Some crawled along the ground, but most of the larger animals lived just beneath the treetops, where they were safe from aerial enemies and had the space between the branches to move in.
Dakh-Ozz-Han talked twigs into bending, branches into moving and old, long-dead climbers into hugging their trunks again.
“Without magic the only option’s a blade in here,” Brolok said, earning him a glare from the druid.
“I like it here,” he said. “It’s so full of life, of smells and odors. And the silence – it is a language unto itself. It is full of implications, and even its silence says something.”
They stopped for a moment and enjoyed the quiet that was only interrupted by falling droplets of water and birdsong.
“We should keep moving.” Brolok grew impatient, but Brolok was not nearly as receptive to Wood magic as Dakh and Nill. It took a few days for them to reach their goal, where the impenetrable green finally gave way to a sliver of blue sky above.
“Finally!” Brolok cheered. “A clearing up ahead! I was beginning to feel like the grip around my neck would never loosen. Not much longer and I’d have gone green myself.”
“It’s not a clearing,” the druid countered with twinkling eyes. “It’s the great tree.”
“You’re joking,” Nill said. “Air and light ahead, that’s supposed to be the great tree? And all this around us is probably just some shrubbery, right?” Nill indicated one of the giants nearby.
“You’ll see,” Dakh promised. “Until then, I’d advise you to enjoy the sky. This is the only place you can see it from.”
The forest was breathing. The trunks grew further apart and the overgrowth retreated. The ground poked its nose inquisitively into the air and had even gone so far as to decorate its face with a few flowers.
“This is the edge of the clearing that isn’t a clearing.” Dakh took a deep breath. “Can you feel the magic?”
Brolok shook his head and took a few steps forward, then stopped dead. Baffled, he stared at the dark brown wall before him, whose ancient furrows were only interrupted by even darker holes. Where in the name of all demons had the sky gone?
Nill slipped.
“Careful. We’re going down here. This,” the druid announced, “is the great tree. Some call it Grandfather Tree, or old Creakhorn.”
His voice was solemn with a hint of humility that the two boys were not used to from the old man.
Nill understood now why the tree was called the great tree. It had never bothered to grow to the heights other trees aspired to, but its circumference more than made up for it. The tree was wider than Nill could ever have imagined. It was so huge that up close he could not even see it curving.
The bark was a rock-hard set of armor, cracked under the brutal fist of time. Tears and cracks widened to entrances; these caves had walls that reminded him of Ringwall’s foundations. And yet, beside the stony armor, the walls were so rotten that Brolok had no difficulty in plucking wood straight from them with his hands. Healthy strands seemed to have the effect of carrier beams in the soft duff, giving Nill the impression that he had just left a forest for another, much darker one. He put an illumination on the tip of his staff to give enough light to see anything at all, for inside the tree it was pitch-black.
“The tree is wider than it’s tall,” Brolok stated.
“Yes; it grows from the inside out. Where once was its core, it is no more. The Nothing has taken its place.”
“Damn it, Nill. You always ruin everything,” Brolok attempted to joke, but he regretted the words immediately. Brolok, shut up, he told himself. Especially in a place like this.
Nill had not been listening. “The center must be about there…”
Something cracked dully and Nill was gone.
“Nill?”
“Down here. Be careful, the ground isn’t stable.”
Brolok stared down through the hole. “How deep?”
“About as deep as I’m tall.”
“I’m coming down.”
“You can’t!”
The warning came too late. A small avalanche of wooden splinters and mulch, and Brolok broke through the ceiling and knocked Nill to the ground.
“Where are you?” Dakh called.
“Down here between the roots!” Nill called back. “I’ve got earth under me, roots on all sides and Brolok with his luggage on top of me.”
“We’re coming down,” the druid announced, but he was the only one who came. Ramsker refused to jump into the dark unknown.
Nill, Brolok and Dakh found themselves in a maze of thick, tangled roots, bearing the colossal tree’s weight on top and digging further down into the rocks below.
“The legend says its roots go into the very core of the world,” Dakh said.
“Creakhorn is hardly a tree anymore. It’s a lot of trees now. What’s the difference between a root and a trunk if the root is as thick as ten of us put together?” Brolok asked.
“It’s dying,” Dakh said. “Trees don’t last forever. But before it leaves Pentamuria behind, it allows one seed to grow. It’s like the firebird that burns out when it dies and rises from the ashes.”
Brolok caressed the petrified roots.
“It makes me sad to see something so mighty, so sacred, dying without a fight.”
“Yes, but remember that every end heralds a new beginning.”
Nill was not listening to the conversation. He gazed up at the black, matted ceiling, enjoying the strong smell; he looked around at the pale white walls that had lost their color with the contact of the roots, and he cautiously kicked against the black earth with his heel.
“Black, white, black,” he murmured. “What’s it saying? I know the symbol. Where from?”
“Can you feel something?” Dakh asked.
Nill turned to his companions, but it was Brolok who answered. “Nothing except for a bit of Metal under my feet.” Nill shook his head.
“Are you saying you’re not feeling anything?” Dakh rumbled. “The air is thick with Wood magic, the tree is breathing Wood, the Earth has hidden beneath Wood and the ground we’re walking on is soaked with Wood. Did you learn nothing in Ringwall?”
“That’s not it, Dakh,” Nill said thoughtfully. “The time of Wood is over. I wonder whether the tree will ever be reborn.”
“Of course it will. It always has and always will,” Dakh attempted to convince him, but his words rang hollow, more a formality than an honest answer.
Nill could not have said what troubled him. Black, white, black – it had woken a memory in him that he did not understand. It kept slipping away just as he was about to grasp it, leaving him confused, then it came back and wagged around his head only to escape again. Nill walked mechanically onwards, not knowing whether he was leading or following, while more and more blurry images crossed his eyes. Leaves, wildly thrashing branches, broken bark and two eyes, a nose, a mouth in the old trunk. He blinked and the face vanished. What he had thought to be an eye was merely the scar left over from a broken branch, the nose a mere bump and the mouth no more than a trick of the sunlight. Nill rubbed his eyes. What was this? He was standing in the middle of a cave underground, in a maze of roots, far away from the green leaves and sunlight. And yet the face came back, and this time it did not leave at his blinking.
“What’s wrong, Nill?”
“Can’t you hear it?”
Dakh listened, his head tilted slightly. For a moment all was quiet. Then he shook his head. “No, nothing.”
“The tree is speaking. In thoughtspeak. Difficult to hear.”
“What’s it saying?”
“It’s greeting us.”
“And what’s it doing?”
“It wants me to greet someone.”
Brolok tipped a finger to his forehead as if to show his doubt at Nill’s mental health.
Nill listened closely to the voice that seemed no more than a far distant rustling of the leaves, the
creaking of trunks bent by wind. And underneath it all was a vibration, coming from the ground as if the roots were banging on a great bell.
“I give you my name in case you meet him in the Waterways or in Earthland. Traveling.”
The old tree’s huge eyes were serious and piercing.
“Please treat the name with care. Do not lose it.”
Nill promised to pay good attention, even though he did not quite understand what the creature wanted.
“Here it is. Listen closely.”
The lips of the broad mouth pouted and blew pale bubbles. The plump hands threw bits of branches and leaves through the air and its left foot drummed an irregular rhythm on the ground.
“That is your name?” Nill asked.
The tree nodded with its branches. Only Nill could see the nod, but Dakh and Brolok jumped when they heard the sudden rustling of the leaves.
“But how am I to pronounce it?” Nill asked.
“With your heart or with your spirit, with a handshake or a deep look in the eyes. My friend will understand. All that matters is that you remember him and that nothing breaks off him. Otherwise you can never get rid of him and he will be a part of you forever.”
“I’ll pay attention,” Nill said, only just realizing that what he had just agreed to was more than a small favor.
“Who is your friend, Grandfather Tree? How will I recognize him, and what do you want me to say?”
“You will know him when you see him. Just tell him my name and give my farewell. Tell him Haimar is entering a new time.”
“Who is Haimar?” Nill understood less with each passing moment.
“Haimar is the name of the world. Haimar is what you call Pentamuria, and yet it is so much more.”
“And the new time?”
“Read the prophecy.” The tree smiled one last time and Nill felt a gentle embrace and the tickling of leaves on his neck, a warm breath of spiced air and the smell of farewell without sadness. And then:
“There is no firebird, Nill.”
“What happened? What did Creakhorn say?” Dakh had felt the connection between Nill and the old tree, but that was all.
“He told me there was no firebird, and that we must read the Book of Prophecy. Then we would understand, he said. Come, we have to reach the book.” Nill’s voice was hoarse and nasal; despite his swallowing, the sound got stuck in his throat.
“We live in wild times indeed if certainties are no longer reliable. But still. The legends say that Master Arhk, the dragon and the firebird control time. And now, the firebird doesn’t exist?” asked Dakh. Nill nodded, but did not understand why the druid suddenly looked so concerned.
Nill squeezed through a gap in the soft wood and found himself in a small room. Framed by two slender branches, leaning up against the pale wall and dimly lit by the green twilight stood a stone tablet.
“That could have been easier,” Brolok said, “but who could have guessed that the cave has another entrance?” Dakh and Nill left him to grumble and huddled around the stone. “Arun. I can’t believe it. The runes are ancient, difficult to read. That one might mean ‘human.’”
“Hey, Creakhorn!” the druid shouted. “Why did you never show me this tablet?”
Even in the dim light Nill could see Dakh’s face go purple. Nill was concerned.
“What’s wrong?”
“The swine,” Dakh blustered. “The bandit, thief, cheater and jester of fate. Oh, I love him.”
“What did he say?”
“‘Why should I?’ he said, as if I wouldn’t have been able to read the symbols anyway. If he wasn’t so much older than me, I’d…”
“Sedramon-Per was able to read them, and I think I can, too.”
To the druid’s amazement, Nill laid a hand on his shoulder, pushed him gently aside and began to read out loud.
When the humans believed that the magic was too simple for the many miracles of life that surrounded them, they tried to change the world. As there was dawn and dusk between darkness and light, taking color from things; as there was a mid-realm between this and the Other World that stopped the here from colliding with the beyond; as there were plants, humans and beasts living between heaven and earth, the humans were sure that the magic of hard and soft, light and shadow, high and deep could not be all the magic in the world. Mountain ridges and valleys meet in slopes, sea and land fight along the battlefield we know as the coast, and the bushy heads of branches and the gnarled bare roots are connected by the clear, straight trunk. Here and there, and whatever is in-between – that is the three.
The realms of the Third Circle will give the world no peace as long as the third power is unknown. What one cannot feel becomes a matter of faith, and so the kingdoms will wage war upon each other and in the name of the third power kill everyone who sees the world through other eyes. The period of change that follows the realms of the Third Circle will be the only one that is redemption rather than destruction and will remain an exception in our future.
Nill and Dakh stared at each other. Dakh indicated two lines at the foot of the stone that had been written by another hand in a different writing. Nill began to spell it out with difficulty, and this time the druid took over reading duties.
“I found these words on a stone. But when the stone saw me, it was frightened and crumbled. Here I have written what I have read and what remained in my memory. The rock broke faster than I could read and the light was bad. Perhaps another wanderer may find another stone and finish my tale for me. Hrafwijk.”
“So this is supposed to be the Book of Arun.” The druid’s face showed boundless astonishment. “I should have imagined something like this.”
“Are you saying this isn’t Arun?” Nill was horrified. The idea that he had been running after a shadow was more than he could bear.
“Who can tell?” the druid sighed. “As old as the stone and the words on it are, it is no more than a fragment of the prophecy. Either the Books of Prophecy never existed, and there was never more than these few sentences, in which case we will never know what our future holds; or, they might be in another place.”
“And who is Hrafwijk?” Nill asked.
“I don’t know. There have been many holy and great people in our long history and no one can expect to be remembered in legend. The name bears resemblance to others in the Waterways. Perhaps someone there remembers him.”
“The other books I found looked similar,” Nill said, his interest in the unknown author disappearing as quickly as it had come. “In the Book of Wisdom it said that the Book of Eos was given a guardian of Fire. I met this guardian. Eos is in the Borderlands of Fire and its text is not much longer than this one.”
“Then perhaps there is no more than the message of the realms coming and going. But has that not always been so?” Dakh-Ozz-Han was disappointed.
“I don’t know, I don’t know,” Nill murmured. Suddenly he remembered what the black, white, black pattern had roused. “The magic of light and dark. I know it. It’s what I felt back in the Forest of Unhappy Trees when we crossed through Earthland for Ringwall. I found it again there, guarded by the falundron. It was the magic that ruled Pentamuria before the kingdoms of the Third Circle rose, and there is a gigantic hall in Ringwall, supported by pillars where light and shadow oppose each other. The hall is full of symbols and messages, and presumably full of wisdom, too.”
Nill swallowed hard as he remembered his pitiful attempts at reading them.
“Dakh, I think I know part of Pentamuria’s future. The collapse, the Great Change everyone fears, is a change in magic. The same way the realms of the Third Circle overtook the ancient magic, they were replaced by the magic of four elements. If we find the Book of Mun or can ask Sedramon-Per about it, then we will learn that the magic of five elements rose from the previous one. Air was no longer a force, and into its place stepped Metal and Wood.
“The kingdoms that come and go are not the important thing, Dakh. It is the magic that changes,
and the realms follow it.”
Dakh gazed deep into Nill’s eyes.
“It takes a young fellow like you to tell an old man what a mule he is. We should swap roles; you should be my teacher.”
Nill lowered his eyes, abashed.
“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean it like that.”
“Sorry, sorry,” the druid flared up. “Don’t you understand what you have given me? All I need now is quiet and some patience to think about the things you have just told me. The magic is what causes everything, and a change in magic changes everything. Understanding that is not easy. I think I won’t like a lot of things. Not at all.”
Nill looked questioningly at Dakh.
“The Oas, for one,” Dakh said, rubbing his nose. “If what’s written here is true, which I don’t doubt, then the Oas must be a remnant of truly ancient times. I never thought they were so old, because the druids and the Oas are bound together, just as we share a common past with the mages. But we druids are no older than the five elements. What were we before then? And how did we get together with the Oas if their people are so old?”
Nill listened intently.
“It’ll have to wait,” the druid said gruffly. “For now we need to move on. I suggest we rest here tonight and travel waterwards tomorrow. Straight through the forest until we reach the coast.”
“Why the Waterways?” Nill wondered. “We only just came from there. It’s not the most hospitable place.”
“Would you rather traverse the misty forests and pass through the mountains to end up in the Fire Kingdom? Do you think there’s more than one book there?”
Nill shook his head silently.
“But that means you’re taking us to the Borderlands!” Brolok did not like the sound of that at all.
“No, not quite.” The old druid smiled. “It’ll be a surprise. I do not intend to roam the marshes on my own on the way back. In the Waterways you need a guide to travel comfortably.”
