The whisper of the wind through the branches is louder than ever. It seethes and pulsates, developing a rhythm. The skeletal arms and fingers of the branches are above us, crisscrossing the star-speckled tapestry.
How did I not notice it before? There’s definitely a rhythm to it. Almost like music; like the pounding of drums and the rise and fall of strings.
Child.
What was that? A voice whispering in my mind?
Child, don’t despair. You’re under our protection. Hidden from us for far too long. How could we have missed you?
Another voice joins the first, speaking alongside it.
Child. You are bound up in a shroud of your mother’s own making. You have the seal of protection upon you. Come now, it is time to break it.
A third voice joins in, over the top of the other two.
She has no heart-seed. How can she be grown, and yet have no heart-seed?
The voices grow louder; more insistent. There are a dozen different conversations going on at once. It’s as my head has become a busy hall, filled with a crowd’s endless chatter.
“Stop,” I try to whisper, but Kinnivar’s terrible arm has cut off my ability to speak.
My body feels strange. As if my heart is a woven tapestry, and each painstakingly woven thread is being violently unravelled.
Everything’s coming undone.
These voices are going to make my head explode.
Stop.
“Take her to the carriage. We’ve already lost too much time.”
Rough hands grab me.
The voices are deafening.
The stars above swirl and twist, and the sky itself cracks.
It cracks.
But then the cracks move, and I realize that they aren’t cracks at all, but branches, stretching downwards.
Am I hallucinating, or are the trees really moving? The winter-stripped branches stretch downwards, long and thick like limbs, the twigs at the end forming fingerlike projections that twist and writhe, no longer angular sticks; now sinuous and reaching, grasping, extending toward me.
Twigs have turned into tendrils.
The branch extends toward Kinnivar and wraps itself around his neck like a snake, yanking him backwards with brutal violence. He doesn’t even have time to shout.
I hear a sickening crunch. Then a thud. In horrified fascination I dare to take a look.
Kinnivar’s severed head is lying on the snow, several feet away from his decapitated corpse. The branch hangs down, fingerlike twigs brushing against the snow, as if it were a willow tree.
The voices in my mind grow louder and louder; an intolerable cacophony.
I pull myself into a sitting position and look around wildly. The guards are just standing there, staring at their fallen leader in silence.
At first, it’s as if they don’t even notice me.
Then one of them—the largest of the three—turns, and his eyes are glowing that same eerie shade of green.
He doesn’t speak. He just starts to shuffle toward me, his movements stiff and mechanical, as if he’s a machine.
Why do I get the feeling he isn’t entirely sentient?
With the cacophony in my head, I can barely bring myself to move, but I force myself to anyway, rising shakily to my feet. The tree sways and reaches for the guard, wrapping its fluid branches around him. The tendrils slip beneath his leather armor.
I stare, frozen in horrified fascination as a whispering sentient tree squeezes a fully grown man from the inside, turning him into a limp ragdoll.
And yet he still moves, and his eyes are glowing, and his expression is terrifyingly blank, as if he feels no pain at all.
I rise to my feet, clumsy and disoriented, stumbling as I struggle to regain my balance.
I try to run, but I can’t because the trees are reaching for me too, and the branches are wrapping themselves around me like snakes, restraining me.
I scream.
Hush, child. We only seek to protect you. Do not fight. Do not despair. Wait a moment while we eliminate these undead aberrations from our land. Come here, Finley, daughter of Aralya, who was hidden from us for so long.
I’m utterly helpless as the trees wrap their fluid branches around my arms and legs; as they slip around my waist, drawing me away from the bodies and the guards.
Behind me, they close in on the remaining two guards, forming an inescapable net.
And the guards are destroyed.
And then they go after the unmoving horses, who’ve done nothing wrong apart from just standing there.
The sounds that reach me through the chatter of a thousand voices are sickening.
The crunching of bones. The crushing of soft flesh. A foul stench permeates the air. And the trees have me now, and they’re pulling me up into their dark canopy, and it’s cold and terrifying, as if I’m being sucked into a vortex.
What just happened? I accidentally tasted Kinnivar’s blood, and then my world turned to insanity, the same as when I drank Corvan’s blood and melted that chair, only this is a hundred times worse, because the trees have me, and I can’t escape.
Did… Kinnivar’s blood do that? Is it because I accidentally drank magic?
I try break free, but I can’t move at all. The trees feel stronger than steel, and my arms are still bound behind me.
This is the worst.
I close my eyes and breathe deeply, trying to fight the sheer panic that threatens to overtake me.
The trees didn’t kill me.
They killed everyone else but me.
And surely Corvan has heard me. I pray he heard me. He’s the only one powerful enough to fight this… whatever it is.
The wind surges again. The bare trees sway back and forth.
Be calm, child. We aren’t your enemy. You are one of ours.
The pressure at my back lessens. The restraints loosen. They’re unravelling the tight rope bindings.
The ropes fall away, and suddenly I can move my arms. My joints pop and crack as I bring my arms in front of me, trying to shake out the stiffness.
But then the cursed branches are there, twisting around my arms, suspending me in mid-air.
“Stop,” I cry out, my voice a hoarse whisper. “Release me.”
Not yet.
The tendril-like branches wrap around my neck, but they aren’t forceful. It’s a dark caress that I’m helpless to resist. They prise open my lips, and something enters my mouth.
Eat, child.
The voices in my head grow louder. I can’t distinguish one from another anymore.
And then they all start saying the same thing, in unison.
Eat.
The thing in my mouth is small and round. It tastes sweet and salty and bitter and aromatic, like cinnamon, all at the same time.
I have no choice. I swallow it.
It burns a little. Warmth enters my chest and flows through my body. A sensation close to pain—but strangely pleasant—shoots through my limbs.
The serpenstone bracelets around my wrists shatter and fall to the ground. They were supposed to contain my unfettered power, but it seems to be all for naught. The ancient tree’s power is far, far greater.
“What is this?” I cry.
You ate my heart-seed. Now, you will carry a piece of me wherever you go.
“Who… what are you?”
My name is Eulisyn. I am your Source.
“S-source?”
A child of Eresus. Our Creator. Hidden in plain sight. It was the corrupted blood of Hecoa that broke the seal and revealed you to us. Now you are bound to me, and my power is your power.
My body feels like it’s filled with molten lava. My limbs feel both powerful and weak. Although the voices no longer crowd my mind, Eulisyn’s presence is overwhelming.