A Dragon Born (3 page)

Ariana realized that the trees did not so much speak with words as suggest thoughts, which she likened to the difference between speaking normally and whispering. Eventually, the tree agreed to let her go so long as she promised she would do it no harm, and that she would not use her mage fire in the forest. The tree knew Ariana was being truthful through the strange connection it had made with her, one that she discovered she now shared with all the trees and, in delight, she had met many of them during her journeys among the branches. It had become a joy to visit so many of them, even if it was just to touch them briefly as she explored the nearby forest, and she tried not to get too upset that they still treated her like she was a child. They were trees, after all, and she understood that they did not mean anything by it.

Keira, on the other hand, frustrated Ariana to no end, and she had not made up her mind whether she should consider the elven woman a friend or not. Keira had been pleased that Ariana had convinced the tree to let her go and deemed it proof she was no longer a child. Now, she simply called her girl as though that was some kind of improvement, and had decided that Ariana should learn how to travel the forest properly if she was to ever amount to anything. Since she had no idea where she was and realized that she truly was at the mercy of the elven woman and possibly even the trees themselves, she decided to go along with what Keira wanted her to do, which was mostly a form of training.

At first, the idea of running and leaping among the branches of the great trees had seemed a little dangerous, but once she had felt the trees with her bare feet, she realized she could sense where they were all around her, even without touching them. It was easy to fly from branch to branch, once she could feel where they were, and she suppose it as much like the way squirrels ran among the branches, but now, Keira had decided to call her Squirrel, which seemed like lesser than being called girl, but Keira seemed to think it was an improvement, and had only given her a new name because she had shown that she was learning. Still, it irritated her that she would not simply call her by her real name.

"I don't understand," Ariana said, giving up on trying to figure it out.

"You do not understand why you are called Squirrel? Perhaps you are still a child."

"No," Ariana said, worried the woman would reduce her to child status again. "I understand why you have now named me Squirrel. Thank you for the name, or I suppose I should thank the trees. They do have a sense of humor. I just don't understand why it matters."

"It doesn't matter."

"What do you mean? It doesn't matter?"

"You are who you are, are you not?"

Ariana stared at the woman in disbelief. Keira smiled at her with a glimmer of amusement in her eyes. Ariana had a thousand things she wanted to ask and a few more she wanted to say, but she bit her tongue. It would only result in more ridiculous talk of names, but she had to say something.

"Of course, I am who I am."

"Good," Keira said. "It is important to know such things."

"So I'm a squirrel?"

"No." Keira shook her head. "You are Squirrel and you are you."

"Oh, that makes perfect sense." Ariana could not help her sarcasm but Keira either did not notice or she simply ignored it.

"I am glad you are coming to see that," she said. "I have been asked to bring you to the center of the rings. It is very strange that the elders should allow one so young to stand among them, but they have asked and it is their realm to decide such things, so I will do as they ask."

"And what if you decided not to do as they ask?" In her frustration, Ariana was feeling belligerent.

"I would not deny them in this way," Keira said.

"But what if you did?"

"I would not. They are the elders. They are the light and the heart of the tree and I am but the shadow cast by a leaf, not a branch nor a twig, nor even a leaf. A leaf does not sway the tree and I am not even that, merely the shadow of the leaf."

"One leaf might not sway the tree, but the tree does not sway itself. That takes many leaves," Ariana told her, turning the idea over in her mind. "The shadow of the leaf does touch the tree and, depending on where the light falls, the shadow can touch many places, while the leaf itself stays fixed on the branch."

Keira smiled again, pleased at what Ariana had said.

"Perhaps you are no mere squirrel, but that will be for the elders to decide. With the coming of dawn, we will travel to the center of the trees. Take your rest and be ready at first light."

Keira swung herself out of the opening of the hollow and leapt to a nearby branch, flitting off into the forest and Ariana lay back on the small bed and sighed. She was not sure how long she had been here, but it had been many days since she had awakened in the forest, healed of her wounds, but kept here, unable to leave the forest, like a prisoner yet not. She gazed up at the intricate patterns of bark inside the hollow of the tree and remembered how she had been trapped within it, held by the tree itself and now it seemed like a memory from the distant past. She reached out with her power and felt the tree around her, its gentle energy flowing from its roots to its branches. The tree murmured at her power, as though awakening from a deep sleep.

"Tree," she said aloud. "Why is Keira so confusing? She speaks in riddles."

"She speaks in words, as do you," the tree whispered. "Words are riddles enough."

"Yes, but most of the time the things she says are like riddles. It is as though she wants to confuse me."

"Words are riddles," said the tree. "Keira wishes to teach you things that have no words, that is all."

"What about you? You don't speak in riddles, and you can use words."

"I do not like words, but they are part of you so I have learned to speak them, just as you have learned to speak with me."

"Yes, but why not be plain about things? Why talk of leaves and squirrels?"

"They are thoughts that contain many words, many thoughts."

"But why not just use many words? If something is hard to explain, then take more words to explain it. Don't just say things like the branch has many twigs or the river flows in more than one direction."

"Words change their meaning. I cannot speak of the river, for I know it not, but a leaf will always be a leaf and a squirrel will always be a squirrel."

"But I won't always be a squirrel," Ariana pointed out.

"Perhaps not, but you are not merely a word, nor are you rooted to the earth. It is your nature to change."

Ariana reached out her hand and touched the tree, feeling the almost imperceptible warmth of the living wood. The tree responded to her touch, vibrating softly, and she felt the gust of a cool breeze rustle its leaves, the gentle sway of its branches, the damp earth nestled around its trunk, the trickle of water deep underground at its roots. It was always like this when she touched the tree, as though she was somehow a part of it, connected to its every fiber, and she even felt the cool places where the shadows cast by the leaves touched the other leaves, the branches and even the rough bark of the trunk of the great tree.

*****

Ariana was already awake when Keira appeared at the edge of the hollow, early the next morning. The elven woman gave her a leather satchel and told her to gather her belongings, for it was unlikely that Ariana would return to the tree. The clothes she had worn and the jeweled dagger that had belonged to her mother lay untouched upon the small table where Keira had left them. Ariana folded the dagger into the blouse that was clean but still torn from where Dakar had stabbed her then she rolled it and the other articles into the green cloak that Aaron had given her and she stuffed the bundle inside the satchel, which she slung over her shoulders. Keira waited as Ariana placed her hand upon the tree and sent it a warm thought of farewell. The tree swayed pleasantly to her and told her it would await her return then the two women leapt from the hollow, beginning their journey across the many branches that reached deeper and deeper into the vast forest.

They traveled the better part of the day, stopping only briefly to rest or refresh themselves, and the sun had already crossed the sky before they neared their destination. The tall trees in the part of the forest where Ariana had stayed with Keira were much smaller than those that grew deeper in the forest. Some of the branches seemed almost as big as trees themselves and Ariana could barely guess how old they might be to have grown so large. After a while, they encountered a kind of city that had been made among the branches, but it was unlike anything Ariana had ever seen before.

The dwellings looked as though they had been grown instead of built, like they were part of the trees themselves, except they were made of a combination of wood and stone, each intertwined with the other, which Ariana found to be both strange and beautiful. She asked Keira about it and the elven woman shrugged and said that stone was earth as much as earth was stone, and she did not see why such a thing would be strange at all. Ariana decided that whether it made sense or not, it was the way of things in the elven forest, where many things were different than the world she had known before.

As they traveled further into the city, the simple dwellings gave way to more elaborate structures, all sharing the same curved and flowing look, though none of them were exactly the same. They also began to encounter more people, elves going about their business, most of whom looked with interest at the two women as they passed. A few stopped and stared at Ariana, which she noticed a few times and the obvious scrutiny made her somewhat uncomfortable. Thankfully they did not stop, continuing at a brisk pace toward the center of the city in the trees.

The light of day that flickered through the thick canopy of leaves was starting to fade when the two women finally arrived at their destination. It was a strange place, where the trees seemed to come together and stretch upward, towering high above. The way the trunks and branches were arranged seemed both natural and unnatural and Ariana asked Keira how they had come to grow in such a manner. Keira told her the trees had grown as they had been asked, not offering any further explanation. Ariana marveled at how the giant trunks had created a kind of wall, with the gaps between them filled with a latticework of smaller branches that looked impenetrable, even to the smallest creatures of the forest. Ahead of them, along a branch that was as thick as a road, there was an opening that was large enough fit a sailing ship through. At the foot of the opening stood a group of elven guards, who wore a kind of light armor made of a greyish-green metal and matching leather colored in similar tones and worked with elaborate patterns. They carried bows and long, thin swords that hung in scabbards at their belts. Keira slowed to a walk and Ariana fell in behind her as they approached the guards.

"Greetings. I am Keira, and this is Squirrel. We have been summoned to the inner rings, to the heart of the tree." Keira bowed her head briefly to the guards while keeping her eyes up and Ariana did the same, remembering at least that much of her etiquette training about formal elven customs. One of the guards pressed his hand to the wood of the tree that made up part of the portal and his eyes took on a faraway look for a moment then his focus snapped back to the two women who stood before him.

"You are expected," he said, nodding politely at Keira then at Ariana.

"Many seasons to you both," Keira said.

"And to you," the guards said, both of them now staring at Ariana.

"Many seasons," Ariana awkwardly repeated the elven greeting as she followed Keira past them.

The guards nodded at her, but continued to stare, and Ariana hurried after the elven woman, feeling more and more self conscious and glad to be away from their searching eyes. Her reprieve did not last long. Inside the portal, there were many more people, all of whom were dressed in much more elaborate clothing than the elves Ariana had seen in the rest of the city and all of whom stared openly at Keira and Ariana as they passed. Compared to the elves in the inner city, the two women were very much out of place in their simple forest garb and Ariana ducked her head, worried that they were also staring at her face, which she knew was covered with ugly scars from where she had been burned. She had not thought about the scars on her face for many days, living out in the forest with Keira, but now, under the eyes of so many people and unable to hide under the hood of the cloak that was tucked inside the satchel, Ariana felt herself shrinking away from them, ashamed at how she must look.

The buildings, if they could be called such, in the inner city were taller than the ones in the rest of the elven city, reaching up to the sky above, which was open and uncovered. The last glow of sunset cast an orange hue among the giant trees, but for some reason, as the light finally fade, it did not grow dark in the city. The white stones that intertwined with the branches seemed to glow with a gentle, white light that illuminated the city.

Ahead, at the center of the circle of trees that surrounded the inner city was a structure that seemed familiar to Ariana, though it was as different as the dwellings in the elven city compared to the houses that lined the streets of Maramyr. She knew immediately that it must be the palace, for it resembled her own palace, with its high walls and its many spires, as though it had been built in a similar fashion even though it was distinctively different, similar to the way cousins or siblings might closely resemble one another, yet still be entirely different. Ariana also noticed that, unlike the other buildings in the forest, the palace was made entirely of stone, the same white stone that illuminated the forest. It was beautiful and majestic and, as Keira led her up to its gate, Ariana felt unsure of herself, of whether she should even be in such a place.