The Schism
Part Two
The Holt in the newgreen: the Waykeeper and a young visitor explored the forest floor together.
“We call this one Dancer’s Oak,” Littlefire explained. “It’s where the Hunt lay their dead, most of the time.”
“Why not under the Evertree?” the cub asked as he squinted at the roots of the oak tree. Bluestar had come to spend the summer months with the Wolfriders, the end of a long tour across the face of Abode. After a year and a half spent on the high seas and the high desert, he was taking to the forest with the boundless curiosity of a wolf cub.
Littlefire smiled. “The Hunt prefer the oldest Way – feeding their wolf-friends rather than the trees. They let the creatures of the forest scatter the bones. But it doesn’t matter. It all feeds the Tree in the end. And this is part of the Evertree, whether they realize it or not.”
Bluestar looked back down the game trail. “We’re… a quarter-league from the Holt,” he stammered. But he was a bright cub, this nephew of Littlefire’s, and already his mind was working to make sense of this new fact. “The root systems are joined?”
Littlefire nodded.
“Didn’t think that was possible.”
“The Tree is ten thousand years old. It gets big.”
Bluestar whistled. “Even the Grandfather Tree doesn’t live that long. Aunt Venka said it’s died… five times, I think. But they regrow it each time from the roots.”
“They’re not like us, the green-growing things of this world. We die, and we stay dead. But as long as their roots live, a tree never truly dies…”
“And this Tree is stuffed full of elf-spirits! I can feel them when I’m asleep. All the souls of the Wolfriders who’ve come and gone since the days of Goodtree.”
“Not all. But many. Some choose other paths, but many of Goodtree’s blood prefer to form their own spirit pool here. That’s why the Evertree has never sickened, never given in to rot or decay.”
Bluestar scrambled up onto a dead tree, half-uprooted and leaning at a steep angle between two smaller trees. Fungal growths were already consuming the base of the deadfall.
“How’d this get here, then?”
Littlefire arched an eyebrow. “Even a child of the College should know that’s not an oak.”
It was a small cedar tree, its trunk already rotting, its branches withered. Bluestar examined a pinch of dried needles. “Guess not all trees live forever,” he pronounced gloomily.
“Yes. It was never a healthy one. It tried to compete with the Evertree, but its roots weren’t deep enough. But it will decay into the earth, and feed the Evertree and all the life around it. And life will go on. We call those kind nurse logs, because they – uh, Bluestar, come down, please!”
“Yes, Auntie Kit,” Bluestar said in a mocking tone as he continued to climb the deadfall, arms outstretched for balance.
“You don’t know that was Kit talking.”
“Yes, I do. And look, I’m fine. I’ve run out of tree to climb.” Bluestar hugged the trunk of the tree as he slowly turned around. Balanced some four elf-spans off the ground, he could look all around at the forest understory.
“Lots of oaks,” he remarked. “How far do the Evertree’s roots go?”
“As far as the river to the west, the crags in the east, and nearly a half-day’s ride both north and south.”
“Huh. So the spirits keep the Evertree alive long after it should decay. And it keeps growing, and steals all the water and soil the other trees need… and feeds off the dead… until the forest is nothing but oaks and mushrooms.”
A muscle under Littlefire’s left eye began to twitch.
* * *
The Holt in death-sleep: the whole tribe, and many more elves, gathered under the boughs of the Evertree.
It was time to howl for Sunstill.
Elves came from all over the world to pay their respects; Skywise was kept busy ferrying mourners from all the major holts. Sunstill’s whole family, Wolfrider and otherwise, reunited for this solemn task. Young Bluestar was back, standing solemnly beside his parents. Swift herself even made an appearance, though not Rayek. Several elves remarked on his absence.
At dusk Sunstill’s family brought her out, having washed her body and laid her on a simple deerhide. A blanket of moss and fallen leaves covered her naked flesh, and her gray hair was woven with creepers and dried grasses. The assembled elves gathered around one of the larger trunks of the Evertree. At the base of the trunk, the roots forked outwards, creating a sort of hollow where tree met ground. Mushrooms of all shapes and shades bloomed in the cold ground, despite the advancing season.
Gently, the family set Sunstill down on her blanket of deerskin, her head nestled in the crook of the tree’s roots. She looked at peace. Her face, so often pinched in weariness and discontent, was now a mask of serenity. Her lips were slightly parted; she looked as if only asleep, gathering her strength for her transformation.
The Waykeeper remembered when she was born. It seemed so long ago now: a gentler time, a simpler time. Chief Redlance had held their small tribe together. The Go-Backs had yet to descend from the north. The Way had been easy to see, a single clearly trodden path through the forest. Now the ground had been trampled by too many footsteps. Now it seemed everyone was stumbling blindly through the woods.
Sunstill had stumbled more than once in her long life. By all rights, she should have been chief after Wren resigned his chief’s lock. She had been brought up to it, prepared for it. Yet when the trials had come she had not proved strong enough.
A chief-wolf who lost a challenge rarely lasted long in a pack. The stubborn ones were killed, while the submissive ones might eke out a meagre living as bottom-wolf – shamed and bullied at every opportunity: the perfect target for a pack’s frustration. A cruel way, but necessary. Better they pick only one wolf slowly to death, than weaken the whole pack through in-fighting.
Elves are supposed to be better than that we’ve chosen to live with the worldsong we must respect it but there must be limits there must be a line drawn in the dirt and a voice shouting “enough!”a shout in the dark so loud too loud but we’re sick to death of the silence!
The Waykeeper’s face twitched irritably. Two souls in one body did not mean always mean two voices united.
Sunstill should have left should have gone to her parents or her brother her cubs were grown her lifemate would have followed her anywhere she should have taken a healing and left the wolves behind but she loved this life she always believed there was something good something needed here she wanted to stay and fight even if she was bad at it ahhhh but she was good at tree-walking even old and bone-weary she kept her balance Moonshade died tree-walking Sunstill wasn’t Moonshade poor Sunstill she wasn’t anyone but herself.
As the elves stepped out of the way, the roots began to move. The ground slowly subsided under Sunstill’s body. Her long steely locks began to rustle as little rootlets wound through her hair. As her body sank deep into the soil, the roots grew up and around her, like two hands cupping around a precious treasure.
“Another life has returned to the green!” Sparkstone called out, his voice raw with emotion.
The Wolfriders and their bond-beasts tipped back their heads as one and howled long into the falling night. The visitors joined in as best they could, or settled for a single-note hum. Even old Pool tried his best, though his hoarse voice made for more of a croak.
The Waykeeper did not howl. Littlefire clenched his fists tight by his sides to keep from covering his ears. His shared eyes searched the circle of mourners until they alighted on Furrow, chief of the Hunt. He was all sharpness: pointed nose and chin, eyes perpetually narrowed to angry slits; dark hair bristling with a pair of stag’s antlers; right cheek cleft by a century-old scar.
She was good at tree-walking!
Swift came up to him after the howl. “‘No elf must die,’” she sighed ruefully. “I remember when I made that vow. I was just a stripling chief, and I sought to go against how we’d lived since the days of Timmorn Yellow-Eyes. But I had seen death strike at the heart of my family, and I had seen the safety of Sorrow’s End. The Way is simple… too simple for a ‘busyhead highthing’ like me. Its limits choked me… and I sought to give the Wolfriders a world without limits.”
“And you did,” Littlefire said.
“Well, I had help. And together with the Palace, we did build a world without limits. But somehow I didn’t notice at first… that where I saw limits in the Way, others saw comfort. I see its comforts tonight.” She glanced back at Sparkstone and Duskwind. “Grief tempered by acceptance. ‘No elf must die.’ And yet they do… and the Way helps their loved ones to bear it.”
Even as both souls felt a stab of misery, Littlefire’s facial muscles tensed, provoking a weak smile. Which soul had ordered that? Perhaps they were both equally reluctant, but equally polite.
Over their long time together, Wesh and Tayr had learned that elves tended to perceive the Waykeeper in one of two ways. Either Littlefire’s body was a shared set of leathers, donned in turn by two distinct souls, or else Wesh and Tayr had become so mixed together, like two paint colors, that they could never be separated.
Neither was true. They supposed the best way to describe it was a braided leather rope. The two pieces were separate, but bound together – more tightly in some places than others. Stronger for being joined, but always distinct.
“Some bear it better than others,” Littlefire said.
“Yes,” Swift admitted sadly. “And some can never learn how.”
“Death is not always a failure,” Littlefire said.
“I know…” she protested, in the small voice of a cubling scolded by her elder.
“And it’s not always something to be borne, either,” he muttered under his breath.
Pool was next to approach the Waykeeper. Thick tears filled his milky eyes. “Such a beautiful howl,” he whispered. “Such a beautiful Way – this giving to the Tree – this ‘return to the green.’ I find myself thinking of my father’s death… all alone in the desert. I used to pity his death. But I can see now the triumph in it. His flesh would become food for the desert creatures. His bones would nourish the soil. I feel a great affinity with scavengers, you know – those beings who cause no death, yet who find a way to make use of it. Carrion birds… insects and worms… toadstools and fungus… they help us along on the wheel. The act of killing is such violence – I shall never swayed from that! But in decay I have learned to see the beauty of rebirth.”
“Killing is such violence,” Littlefire agreed, searching once more for Furrow in the crowd. But he had disappeared. And now other family members were drawing close, wishing to offer their love and kind words.
* * *
The visiting elves all left the next day. The Evertree hadn’t the den space to hold them all, and the Hunt was always skilled at making guests feel unwelcome. There was little reason to tarry, anyway. The howl was done. Life moved on.
The Waykeeper set to work together on the howlbook of Sunstill’s life. Wesh and Tayr spent the morning grinding stones and mixing paints, trying to capture the perfect shades of copper and silver. They hummed as they worked, two distinctly different notes duelling each other, then weaving in harmony. A miniature wolfpack. It steadied Littlefire’s hands.
“Augh, I can never get used to that!”
Littlefire looked up. Foxglove had come to visit, bearing a freshly caught ravvit.
“Only because you keep forgetting there are two of us in here,” Littlefire replied with a gentle smile.
Foxglove held up her kill. “It’s a good size,” she said proudly. “Thought you could use the hide for your new howl. And you must be getting sick of punkin mush and mushroom stews.”
“Thanks. But could you clean it outside? Pool sleeps next door and he can’t abide the smell of blood.”
The huntress made a face like she couldn’t believe it.
“Littlefire couldn’t either. Long ago. Actually, he still probably can’t. But he just doesn’t smell anymore. It’s better that way: Kit handles all the smells.”
Foxglove settled down on the furs next to them. “Can I watch?”
“Shouldn’t you be off hunting?”
She shrugged. “We should be dancing for Sunstill. I still can’t believe Duskwind forbade it. I thought Furrow would push for it – you know, take the Hunt out somewhere beyond the Holt’s borders where we could give ourselves up properly. But he won’t. He said, ‘If her own mate can’t be bothered to dance for her, why should we?’ And I know Furrow never liked her – but it still seems awfully mean-spirited of him. Of both him and Duskwind!” she added sharply. “Sunstill gave up her life so someone else could be born! That should be celebrated.”
This time Wesh and Tayr acted in perfect accord as Littlefire threw the paintbrush down onto the furs. “She didn’t ‘give up’ her life! She wasn’t Redblade, leaping under a stag! She fell from the Tree and broke her neck. We all heard her scream. Did that sound like someone choosing death?”
Foxglove recoiled from their combined anger. The twin souls tempered themselves. They had to remember, she was only a cub.
But something in the way she furrowed her brow and wrinkled her nose made Littlefire speak up. “Who – is someone saying she let herself fall?”
“It’s nothing,” Foxglove squirmed awkwardly. “Here, I’ll go dress that ravvit.”
Littlefire rose and took her hand. “Sweetgrass, this is important. Is someone saying Sunstill meant to fall?”
The use of her old cub-name got her attention. “I… I only said what I heard from Sparkstone. He said she must have done it on purpose. Because she never tree-walked anymore, you see. And why would she now, unless she meant to fall. It’s a quick death. It’s the kind of death I’ll want, when the time comes. Waykeeper… what is it? It’s a good thing – it means she chose. Isn’t that what we all want?”
* * *
He’s wrong he must be Sunstill would never do that never give up like that and Duskwind! her own lifemate a healer yes they’ve been drifting apart for years why why lifemates are for life but it happens when one is mortal and one is not and neither will change we were the lucky ones but no she wouldn’t do it Sparkstone is wrong!
Thoughts in a jumble, they went to see Sparkstone. The Holt chief seemed to have aged overnight. The flesh under his cheekbones was beginning to thin, as it had with his mother. There were new wisps of gray in his facefur that they hadn’t noticed before.
“She had a mass on her lung,” Sparkstone explained in a soft voice. “Like a burl. Father told me. He could have healed it, easily. But she didn’t want him to. She asked ‘Can you heal years? Can you make me young again?’ Of course he couldn’t. Not without removing her wolfblood. So she said ‘Leave it. This wolf’s hunt is almost done. I’m ready to move on.’”
Duskwind’s den was one tree-trunk over. Littlefire and Sparkstone went together to see him. “It’s true,” Duskwind admitted. “She said she had had enough healings. ‘No point in stitching this old hide together – it’s become more stitches than skin.’”
“How long did she have, before the burl on her lung killed her?”
Duskwind shrugged. “Two years. Maybe more. Maybe less. It was small. And it wasn’t growing fast. But an old shell… it’s like a dying tree. Sometimes rot sets in. And sometimes the shell forgets… and starts growing things it shouldn’t. You can never predict.”
“The dying… would it have been hard?” Littlefire pressed. Duskwind closed his eyes and set his jaw.
“Probably,” he whispered.
“And… do you think she might have chosen... a quicker death?”
Duskwind looked up sharply. “Never!” But almost as swiftly as it came upon him, the anger subsided. “Maybe,” he admitted. “I don’t know. I didn’t know her anymore. It’s no secret we had stopped seeing eye to eye long ago.”
“‘Soul meets soul when eyes meet eyes,’” Sparkstone murmured under his breath.
“And may you and Willow never know the pain of losing sight of each other’s souls,” Duskwind snapped irritably. “She has some wolfblood, at least. It may be enough.”
“You blame the wolflblood?” Sparkstone bristled.
“You’re pokin’ right I do!” Duskwind thundered. He began to rise, but Littlefire’s hand on his arm held him down. “Forgive me, Waykeeper,” he said. “But you have no idea, son! No idea what it’s like to look at your lifemate and see the rot inside her, spreading more each passing year. What it’s like to know she could choose to thrive, but prefers decay. To know…” he closed his eyes tight against the tide of tears, “to know she loves the Way more than she does you.”
He let out a long breath. “I envy Wren. There, I’ve said it. I envy him a lifemate who would choose forever for him. And I envy how he was able to watch her age… with eyes still so filled with love. I couldn’t. I couldn’t! I could no more choose death than she could choose eternity, and it chipped away at our love.”
“But she has chosen eternity, Father,” Sparkstone insisted. “She lives on in the Evertree. While you cling to one shell, she has embraced something greater! You could too.”
Littlefire stared at Sparkstone in wide-eyed alarm. Duskwind only shook his head miserably.
“But I like my shell, Sparkstone.”
They were losing the thread of the matter. “Sparkstone, why do you think your mother killed herself?” Littlefire asked.
“Is it not clear to you? She wanted to die at a time of her own choosing.”
“But why now? She was still in good health, as far as any of us could tell.” In good enough health to have a shouting match with Furrow over the death of Redblade, back when the leaves were still fresh on the branches.
Furrow it keeps coming back to Furrow why was he so late joining the others why was he so quick to agree to no Death Dance he hated Sunstill he should have gotten piss-drunk and screamed his joy to the moons.
“Perhaps she felt it more than she let on,” Sparkstone said. “Perhaps she hoped to bring about a new birth sooner rather than later. She said something to me… perhaps an eight-of-days before she died. We were talking about Rue and her cubling-to-be. And I said it was sad that it could not be born to one of the Holtbound. We all miss Bluestar since he left, and High Ones know the Hunt never let us have a hand in raising their young. And Mother said – very solemnly – that she would see to it that the next Wolfrider cub would be raised in the Holt. I thought perhaps she meant to tempt Rue to the life of the Holtbound, but then she died, and I wonder – did she mean to spark a new Recognition?”
Look at him eyes so greedy he wants one for Ivy or maybe Hollyhock more little bloods of chiefs maybe even Willow once more why not she’s still young enough and they only have the one cub all of them so cub-mad they want trophies not children oh Furrow will be howling for joy once he gets a new pup in his little band of hunters that’s all he wants a chance to breed again and again mindless rutting stag Rue we need to talk to Rue…
* * *
Littlefire found Rue at the tanning pools, soaking hides in the tannin-rich water. “I’ve no leather to spare, Waykeeper,” she said. “Three hunters need new winter furs, and whatever’s left over I’m saving for my newgreen leathers.” A flash of defensiveness furrowed her brow and narrowed her dark owl-eyes. “I’ll be heavy with cub by then – I’m owed them!”
Her suddenly ferocity made them wonder what sort of challenges she had dealt with since her Recognition. “Of course.” Littlefire sat down next to her. “How are you? Does the cub thrive?”
She shrugged. “Suppose so. Quickhatch makes sure I get enough to eat.”
“And… it’s good, between you and Quickhatch?”
“Why wouldn’t it be?”
“Only… you Recognized Stripe.”
She bent her head, letting her curly hair obscure her face. “That’s all behind us now. And better him than another,” she laughed humorlessly. “I think Softdew would have killed me if I’d met eyes with Eyetooth.”
“And the maidens are treating you well? Softdew and the others.”
“Better than ever. Suppose I should enjoy it while it lasts, eh?”
“You mean, until the birth?”
Rue glared up at them. “You’re the Waykeeper. You know how it works.”
“Yes.” They take them the strongest females of course they do only the strongest females can be mothers wolves do it too we’re not wolves at least they don’t kill the elf-pups like wolves would Rue understands they all understand they were all brought up by elves not their lifegivers the cub belongs to the whole tribe or at least the strongest in the tribe the fittest they have a right the lifebearers have to share they made us share Mink oh High Ones I still hate them for it!
“You don’t sound happy about it.”
“Doesn’t matter how I feel about it. It’s the Way.”
“But you’d like to keep your child, nurse it yourself, raise it yourself…”
“Maybe if I were chieftess-wolf. They can get away with it sometimes. Dancer never shared her cubs.” Rue closed her eyes tight. “But I’m the bottom-wolf. I know my place.”
Yes your place is to watch others raise your cub watch your child grow to scorn you for a bottom-wolf set themselves higher than you because they’re fiercer you shouldn’t be in the Hunt child you’re our many-times-granddaughter you should be in the Holt.
“You could fight for your cub,” Littlefire insisted. “We could help you.”
Rue smiled sadly. “Now you sound like Sunstill.”
Littlefire grew very still. “S-Sunstill? How do we sound like her?”
“Never mind. I have to get back to work. These hides need to soak for two full changes of Mother Moon before I can start to stretch them out–”
**Rue.**
It was a harsh method: to use sending against a lower wolf. But they needed answers. And like all bottom-wolves, Rue submitted. **She said I could leave the Hunt if I wanted. Quickhatch too, if he could grow the stones. We could live in the Holt and become… I don’t know, fishers or something. And I could raise Redfawn myself.**
**And you wanted it. A way out of the Hunt.**
**I told her Furrow would never let me go. Not now that I’ve got the cub. He might let me crawl away after I’ve whelped it, but he’d never let new blood out of the Hunt. None of them would.**
“And what did she say to that?”
Rue swallowed a lump in her throat. “She… she said she’d fight for me – that all the Holtbound would fight for me, like I was worth fighting for. I asked her why she’d risk a war with Furrow over me of all elves.”
“What did she say?”
Rue rubbed at her eyes, now prickling with tears. “She said… she knew what it was like to be a bottom-wolf. And that she had learned how to fight for what she wanted, but too late to do her any good. She wouldn’t let me make the same mistake. And she said ‘Have you forgotten? Your grandmother was my grandson’s child. You’re Blood of Chiefs, Rue, blood of the only chiefs who matter. I’m old enough to remember Redlance’s scent, and I can smell it on you too. And in Redlance’s name, I will knock your teeth out the next time you say you’re not worth fighting for.’”
She broke down in sobs. It was probably the first time anyone had praised her for herself, not her worth in the hunt. Littlefire reached out to pat her hand, but Rue wrenched the hand away.
“And now she’s dead!” she spat angrily. “I told her Furrow would never let me go, and she didn’t listen.”
Wesh and Tayr felt their blood run cold.
“You think Furrow had a hand in her death?”
“What do you think, Waykeeper? Do I need you to draw you a picture in the dirt?”
“No… no, I don’t think you do.”
They left Rue at the tanning pools. They could hardly offer her sanctuary now, when she had no faith in the Holtbound’s ability to safeguard their own.
We can’t accuse Furrow without proof what more proof do we need he came late to join the others he was the first to call her dead but elves don’t kill each other why not when wolves do we’re not wolves she was good at tree-walking!
Littlefire returned to their den. In his own private chamber, Pool was stretched out on the furs, eyes closed. “Pool,” Littlefire said. “Pool, wake up.”
“I’m not asleep,” Pool replied. He did not bother to open his eyes. “What is it?”
“Have you ever known an elf to kill another? I don’t mean in the heat of battle… or through some neglect or misstep. I mean killing in hate.”
“Why do you ask?” Pool asked, his eyelids slowly retracting.
“We think Furrow might have killed Sunstill.”
Pool struggled to sit up. “What? Why?”
“He hated her. He always has. He used to accuse her of living too long, taking up space in the tribe that might be filled by a new life. And just before she died, she offered Rue – one of the hunters – a place with the Holtbound. Rue’s with child. She doesn’t want to share it with the rest of the Hunt. Sunstill said she’d protect Rue from Furrow’s wrath. And now she’s dead.”
“Can you prove Furrow was up in the trees with her? Did anyone see him?”
“No,” Littlefire admitted.
“Furrow… I saw him arrive. He came from the other side of the Holt… long after I made it out of my den. He couldn’t have been up in the trees.”
“Ah, but he’s good at tree-walking too.”
“It’s still not enough to accuse him, I think.”
“No… it’s not. To call him a kin-killer… without proof… it would lead to war between the Hunt and Holtbound.” Littlefire tugged a lock of hair nervously. “It could break the tribe forever.”
Bend or break that’s the Way always bend never break but one can’t bend forever sooner or later the bow has to unbend the arrow has to be loosed!
Silence fell. Pool’s eyes drifted closed again. Littlefire rose to go.
“You asked if I’ve known an elf to kill another in hate,” Pool said calmly. “I have. Not an elf’s body… but his blood… the very essence he means to pass down through his children. I think of Sunstill going into the ground, and I cannot be sad. Because her spirit lives on inside this Tree, and her blood – mortal and immortal alike – it goes on and on in the veins of her cubs. And their cubs. And their cubs. It is its own kind of immortality. An immortality denied to me.”
“Pool? We… we’re sorry, but we don’t understand. You have a child.”
“No, I do not. Not anymore. She has severed all bonds of blood between us. She has erased me from her very cells. Out of hate. And I swear… when I think of the harm she has done to me and mine… I wonder if I might not kill her, given the opportunity. It’s best I’ll never have the chance.” He looked back up at Littlefire. “I don’t know if your Furrow committed this violence. But I know our race is capable of it.”
* * *
No closer to an answer, the Waykeeper considered their options. Little point in speaking to Furrow – he was brazen enough to just smirk and shrug and say nothing… then go back to Rue and vent his rage on her. A cub on the way would only protect her so much.
Rue was likely in danger anyway. If Sunstill had confronted Furrow – if she had made clear Rue’s wish to the leave the Hunt – it chilled them to think about it. Another leader might simply cast Rue out after the birth. Furrow would not be so merciful.
And Sparkstone would make no move against the Hunt. He had had his chance to lead them once and had let another topple him. No, if something was to be done, it would be up to them to do it.
But first they had be certain.
Must be careful this isn’t like walking the astral plane I know we could lose ourselves in the Tree we’ve nearly done so before I know but what choice do we have there is only one witness who’ll speak the truth.
They uncorked a skin of their strongest dreamberry wine, and retired to their bed to drain the full measure. The potent brew lit a fire in Littlefire’s veins and made his head spin. They let it spin. They let their body fall into the furs while their spirits climbed upwards, into the bones of the Evertree.
It was not like moving on astral plane, where distance meant nothing and anything could materialize out of the dark. Moving through the Tree was like swimming against a fierce current, in a river choking with debris. The sparks of a thousand little lives jostled against them, like schools of fish. Their spirits clung tightly to one another to keep from being separated.
Must remember how to get back hold onto the lifeline remember the sound of our heart don’t let it hold us past our time.
**Sunstill,** they called as one. **Sunstill, daughter of Mink. We must speak with you.**
The more violent a death, the longer it took a spirit to awaken. They heard no immediate answer.
**Sunstill, it is your grandmother, Kit. I’m so sorry, cubling, but you must wake up!**
**We need to know,** Wesh added his own powerful sending. **We need you, Sunstill!**
They were caught in the Tree’s great bloodstream. They felt themselves borne along by the pumping of the spirit-heart: drawing life up from the roots, spreading it throughout the many branches. Water and nutrients travelled to the branches. Fresh air exchanged with spent in the cells of the tree. Wounds were healed, and dead matter was broken up and pushed down deep underground, to be consumed and repurposed by the fungal growths. And throughout every process, the pulsing spirit-magic trickled on, ensuring the stream ran ever clear and swift.
They heard whispers of Wolfriders past, familiar voices riding the stream with them. Waykeeper, we honor you… How fare the seedlings? Does the Holt thrive half so well as the Tree?… You see how we grow ever stronger… Our life-force is eternal… we are the High Ones now… Tayr, will you never join us…?
This last voice was one not heard in millennia. Tayr’s spirit stumbled, drawn towards the sound of her true name. Wesh caught her before she could drift too far and drew her back to him.
**Don’t listen.**
It is so much better here…
**Curse it, One-Eye, she told you not to call her that!**
Will you not see for yourself?
**Sunstill!** Wesh shouted into the spirit pool. **Tell us how you died!**
There is no death here…
**You feed on death!**
And we breed life. We change death here, deep in our roots. We change stillness into movement, silence into song. But you cannot change… will not learn how!
**You changed, Sunstill!** Tayr snapped. **You went still! You fell and you went still. Why did you fall? Why did you fall, granddaughter?**
The voices began to change, the many whispers becoming one strong voice. Falling wind the ground rushing up the ground will welcome me the Tree will welcome me.
**Before you fell,** Tayr pressed. **What happened?**
He could not have her we met high in the branches his choice too many ears down below could not be seen to parley with his rival I owed him this courtesy if I expected such a sacrifice from him why not I know how to tree-walk the Tree saw the Tree knows…
**Did he push you?** Wesh demanded.
Can’t have her I have claimed her I will fight for her I couldn’t keep my chief’s lock couldn’t keep my lifemate’s love but I will fight for Rue and her child what can he do I will challenge him if I have to but why not agree now no agreement so the fight will come I rise to leave there is a breeze a breeze rustling in the branches the Tree hears my scream the Tree knows the betrayal no elf must die before her time but it is not my time I have too much still to do!
**Will you share this with the tribe? They must know the truth.”
The Tree knows the Tree feels – the betrayal the pain – he killed me – he killed an elf!
The whole world seemed to contract in some violent spasm. The current grew stronger, and the walls of the stream closed in around them, as if a giant fist were trying crush them. Wesh tightened his grip on Tayr even as he searched for the distinctive heartbeat of their shared body.
BETRAYAL! PAIN! HE KILLED AN ELF!!
The two spirits flew through the veins and arteries of the Tree, racing back to the den where Littlefire slept on. Dozens, hundreds, thousands of voices chased after them, screaming in pain and rage.
Littlefire sat up with a shout, and struggled to look around. Blurry vision slowly resolved – it must be the effects of the dreamberry wine, but it seemed as if the very walls were moving.
They are moving!
They were pulsing, expanding and contracting in time with a rapid heartbeat. Little bits of bark rained down around the bed as the writhing tree shed its brittle skin.
Littlefire vaulted out of bed and flew into Pool’s chamber. “POOL! Get up now!”
“Wha…?” Pool looked up groggily. Littlefire wasted no time. An arm under Pool’s armpit and another under his legs and he hefted the emaciated elf easily. As Pool let out a yelp, Littlefire leapt through the open window.
His floating powers slowed their descent. Still holding Pool in his arms, Littlefire shouted “Everyone out! Out of the Tree!”
Cries came from all the dens as the daysleep was interrupted by the upheavals within the oaks. The entire Evertree was in revolt. Its branches thrashed like the tentacles, and its roots roiled under the ground. All the spirits that lived within its trunks were screaming at once; the air was filled with a psychic cry of distress.
Wesh and Tayr added their own. **Out now! NOW – if you value your lives!**
The Waykeeper’s sendings were legendary. Everyone heard and everyone heeded. The Holtbound all gathered in the circle around the great stone firepit. Some of the hunters were present too: Foxglove and her sometime-lovemate Elm, Half-Arm and his brother Woodsmoke.
“Waykeeper – what’s happening?” Foxglove ran up to ask them.
“We made a mistake,” Littlefire said tersely.
Stupid stupid cubling’s mistake we had to know but not like this!
“What is it doing?” Pool looked up in horror. The stand of oak trees was swaying, bending with a nonexistent wind. Branches interlaced and pulled one trunk flush against another. Like the braiding of souls into Waykeeper’s spirit-rope, the Evertree seemed to be tying itself into one massive knot.
Sealing them inside.
“Oh no…” Littlefire breathed. “Out of the circle! Run!”
Some of the elves were already fleeing. Littlefire flew Pool out through an archway of boughs that was rapidly shrinking. The others followed as fast as their feet would carry them. But the ground heaved and buckled as the roots underneath the soil convulsed. Elves fell to their hands and knees. The great firepit came apart, stone by stone, as new shoots sprouted up through the ashes.
Stragglers continued to make their way down from the higher dens. Those outside the circle watched in horror. One elf-maid leapt from her den and struck the ground hard. She did not rise immediately, and when she did, it was with a pained moan. Littlefire looked behind him for Foxglove. But she was still inside the rapidly shrinking circle. She had lingered to help Duskwind and young Ivy out.
“Are there any more?” Littlefire heard Foxglove shout up into the trees, over the sound of creaking wood and rumbling earth.
“Leave them!” Elm hollered back. “Foxglove, come on!”
“Go, go!” Foxglove pushed Duskwind and Ivy towards one of the few openings that remained. The Tree was contracting into one huge trunk. Ivy flung herself through the gap between two writhing trunks. But then she heard a shriek behind her. Foxglove’s.
Littlefire deposited Pool on the ground none too gently, and raced to the last opening left between the tree trunks. Ivy had turned back to help Duskwind. Foxglove lay on the ground, her hip bloodied, a large stone from the firepit pinning her leg. Duskwind was trying to move it, but he lacked the strength.
Littlefire tried to squeeze through the opening, but it was too small. Wesh and Tayr could only watch as Duskwind and Ivy together freed Foxglove and tried to lift her between them.
“Hurry!” Littlefire called, extending an arm through the gap.
The trio limped towards escape. But they were too far away. The ground crumbled away under their feet as the roots rose up, like long brown fingers slowly closing in a fist around them. The last thing Wesh and Tayr saw before they had to wrench back their hand were countless little rootlets, as nimble as strangleweed, threading around the three luckless elves.
They pulled their arm free just before the gap sealed closed. They floated back out of the way as the Tree continued to contract, the trunks and branches cinching closed ever more tightly. The creaks and moans of the contracting wood echoed through the forest. As the elves all looked around, they saw the smaller satellite oaks of the Evertree began to sway inwards, towards the great Tree at their center.
“Fall back,” Sparkstone ordered. “It’s not over yet!”
**Foxglove! Duskwind! Are you alive in there?**
The outer ring of oaks all surged inward sharply, and the sound as twenty different tree trunks all snapped at once was ghastly. Long-buried root systems lurched out of the ground like lashing whips.
**The river!** Sparkstone commanded. **We make for water!**
The frightened and wounded elves withdrew, dodging the serpentine roots that continued to unearth themselves. Littlefire seized Pool again and carried him over his protests, all the way to the gentle brook that watered the Holt.
Willows and ferns dominated at the waterside. The oakroots did not follow them. The two eights of battered Wolfriders gathered on the mossy banks, taking stock of their injuries. Sorrel had broken her leg in her jump to freedom, and several others had cuts and bruises from the lash of the roots. Again Littlefire tried to send to Foxglove or Duskwind, and this time received a faint answer.
“They’re alive,” he told Sparkstone. “Your father, Foxglove and Ivy.”
“Thank the spirits.”
“Don’t thank them yet. They’re the ones who’ve done this.”
“Why? What – what happened to the Tree? Why has it cast us out?”
“Ask Furrow,” Littlefire said brusquely, before turning to Pool. The old elf leaned against a tree for support. His slender legs knocked together under the too-thin cotton trousers he wore.
“Can you still heal others?” Littlefire asked.
Pool beamed with pride and nodded. He started to push himself upright, but his arm trembled.
“Yes… but I think you’d best bring them to me.”
“You and you!” Littlefire singled out Elm and Woodsmoke. “Bring the wounded to the healer. And guard the elders. Ford the river if the roots come for you.”
“Where are you going?” Elm asked.
“To rescue the others.”
* * *
“I’ve sent for Furrow,” Sparkstone said as he struggled to keep pace with Littlefire’s flight. “He will meet us at the edge of this… transformation.”
If he comes why would he if you could command anyone in sending you’d still be a proper chief that’s not fair he led just now yes led away ran like a ravvit what else could we do Foxglove and Duskwind and Ivy are still in there!
“You know what’s happening, don’t you, Waykeeper?” Sparkstone pressed.
“Partly.” **Foxglove, can you hear me?**
**Waykeeper?** her sending was faint, fractured by panic at the edges. **Help us, please. I’m so scared.**
**Stay calm. Tell us what is happening.**
**The Tree… it’s stopped moving. We – we’re stuck inside.** An image flashed before Wesh and Tayr – a cage of branches woven so thickly that it sealed out almost all the light. Sensations flooded them – a constricted chest, short sharp breaths that smelled of mold and decay.
**Are you hurt?** they asked. **Can you breathe?**
**Well enough. But we can’t move. It’s like strangleweed. My leg hurts.**
**The others?**
**I can’t see them. I can’t turn my head. But Ivy is crying. She won’t answer me – not even in sendings. I’m so afraid – if the Tree starts moving again–**
It will crush her.
They came to the limits of the Evertree. They could see the bloated braided tree trunk in the center of the glen. The worst of the transformation was complete, yet everywhere came the sound of snapping branches, as the Tree settled into its new shape.
All the satellite trees had fallen over, but their roots had all pulled themselves out of the ground and looped up into the tree, like guide wires for a Sun Folk tent, or aerial roots of a banyan. The larger branches of the Evertree were too heavy to support themselves, and so they arched down to the ground. From their safe distance, the Tree had the air of some giant leafy spider.
“Redlance help us…” Sparkstone whispered.
A rustling sound radiated out from around them, as the canopy shivered as one.
“Don’t think he will,” Littlefire muttered.
Behind them, the snap of underbrush. Four mounted Wolfriders came charging out of the woods. Sparkstone stepped aside as Furrow drew up his massive wolf just short of knocking him over. The Hunt chief leapt off his mount and stared at what remained of the Holt. Behind him, still mounted, were Softdew and Burl, and between them – looking for all the world like a prisoner – lifebearing Rue. Furrow was clearly taking no chances with her.
“What rot-brained magic are you playing with now, Waykeeper?” he demanded. “What have you done to our Holt?”
Again the angry rustle as hundreds of branches dipped at once. “Furrow, wait–” Sparkstone began, but Furrow stalked over the broken ground, scowling at the exposed roots.
**Your Holt? YOU DARE? Kin-killer! No elf must die before her time!**
The sending echoed openly, an amalgam of many voices. Furrow and Sparkstone both winced in tandem at its power. Littlefire stood firm.
“Who sends?” Furrow looked up at the thinning canopy. “Who challenges me?”
**We who are many. We who are without end! But you ended one among us!**
“Furrow, get away from the trees,” Sparkstone warned.
Littlefire remained silent.
Dried leaves crunched under Furrow’s boots as he swung around, first to his left, then to his right. He spun himself in a circle, his eyes tracking the trees overhead for some sign of the mysterious sender. “Is this one your tricks, Waykeeper?” he demanded. “Sending in both voices at once?”
He did not see the root rising out of the leaf litter.
One of his hunters did. Burl hollered “Furrow, watch–” but it was too late. The rootlet wrapped itself about Furrow’s left ankle. He lurched backwards, caught off-guard, and another root erupted out of the ground and coiled around his right leg.
“Furrow!” Burl and Softdew cried out. The root-snakes yanked hard, throwing Furrow to his back. Then they began to pull, retracting towards the Tree, dragging Furrow behind them like prey.
The hunters scrambled off their wolves, Burl and Softdew running after their chief, Rue bolting to Littlefire’s side.
Furrow thrashed and twisted, his hands groping for something – anything – to hold onto. His leathers tore on the uneven ground, and he shrieked as the roots dragged him over an exposed rock. The roots pulled him all the way to one of the arching trunk-legs of the great Tree-spider, and then they hoisted him up into the air and bound him, upside-down onto the arch.
Burl and Softdew raced to assist their chief, weapons drawn. But more root-snakes burst out of the ground around him, and the hunters backed off, wary of provoking the Tree further.
“Whatever happens, Rue, stay behind us,” Littlefire whispered.
**No elf must die before her time!** the sending raged. **All things have their day, and hers was taken from her!**
“What are you saying?” Sparkstone shouted at the Tree.
“You know what it’s saying,” Littlefire countered.
**We grow ever stronger, our life-force eternal. We feed on death and we breed life. We change stillness into movement, silence into song. But you… you change life into death!**
“Curse you!” Furrow wailed, thrashing his head from side to side. “I won’t listen to this!”
**Death-breeder. Kin-killer! We are without end, and you ended us!**
“I never did anything to yo–aaaaaah!” Furrow shrieked as the roots tightened about his chest.
“Spirits of the Evertree,” Sparkstone called. “We your children beg you – speak plainly. Tell us what you want.”
The core trunk of the Evertree began to shiver. A small fissure opened between two of the braided tree-trunks. Something began to emerge – an ear, long and poined, and covered in a fine dust of crushed bark and moss fragments. For a moment, Wesh and Tayr both dared hope that the Tree might release the three prisoners inside. But what slowly emerged from the cleft in the wood was like no elf they had never known before.
A head poked out, followed by a pair of shoulders. The shape twisted until the head stared directly at the elves. A elfin face, carved out of hardwood, crowned with mossy hair. Sharp cheekbones, a pointed chin, a high forehead and long nose delicately sketched in lichen.
They all knew that face.
“Mother?” Sparkstone whispered tremulously.
Eyelids of bark slowly lifted, revealing empty knotholes for eyes. The shape suddenly lurched out of the tree, freeing a long gnarled arm and a four-fingered hand.
“We are more than your mother,” the Sunstill-shape said, her voice creaky as old wood. “We are many seeds, many souls. We are the Evertree.” The shape raised its hand and pointed at Furrow. “And you have killed us!”
Elfquest copyright 2016 Warp Graphics, Inc. Elfquest, its logos, characters, situations, all related indicia, and their distinctive likenesses are trademarks of Warp Graphics, Inc. All rights reserved. Some dialogue taken from Elfquest comics. All such dialogue copyright 2016 Warp Graphics, Inc. All rights reserved. Alternaverse characters and insanity copyright 2016 Jane Senese and Erin Roberts.