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He’d no knowledge of the further pain he would soon endure.
All at once he found his mind clearing. The horrific wailing had abated to a mere murmur. With some effort he was able to open his eyes and sit up. The trees were quite still and the wind had died away, though its cold shadow remained. A white mist had developed near the ground and only his head and shoulders emerged from it.
He was unsettled by the continuing murmur for he couldn’t locate its source. It seemed to come from all directions. He shook his head briskly, as though to clear it. He wouldn’t waste a moment at this dreadful scene. He focused his mind on Liam and the task of retrieving him, though he’d no idea where he’d gone. Musing over the impossibility of so much that had taken place, Petyr took a last glance at his enemies as he got to his feet.
The blood drained from his face.
He reached for his axe on instinct. It was such an innocent mistake. It was the mistake of a farmer forced into battle, of a father seeing a child in danger, of a man …
Petyr heard wings flapping. A great creaking sound filled his ears as he stared upwards in disbelief.
The ground began to tremble.
Liam’s eyes snapped open as he felt himself lifted off the ground, but his mind remained firmly shut. He couldn’t think. He couldn’t feel, or react, or understand. He could only see.
He saw a branch grasp him by the middle.
He saw the ground retreat beneath his feet.
He saw the limbs of both oaks reaching for him.
He saw new branches emerge where none had been before, saw their twiggy fingers pulling him up.
He saw his body passed from one branch to another, higher and higher.
He saw the tops of the trees.
Then he saw his legs and arms stretched apart, saw his left hand and foot shackled to one trunk, and his right to another.
He saw the twigs begin to weave about his legs.
The world rushed back in. Liam felt a new pain: terror. His body hurt where the oaks held him, and his head hurt from the wailing. But the terror was worst of all. It made his breath catch and his eyes bulge. It made the forest tilt and shift. It made the world huge and then small and then huge again.
He’d felt terror like this only once before.
The branches worked quickly. They’d already moved over his knees. The branches were like arms and the twigs were like fingers. It wasn’t right for a tree to have hands and arms that could move on their own. He looked down at the twigs all moving together, covering his thighs. He decided never to look at them again.
When the cage reached his chest, he began to struggle. A moment ago Peter had been about to set him free. A moment ago he’d been rescued. Liam’s vision blurred. He pulled at the manacles with all his might but couldn’t get free. He thrashed about in anger. He wanted to scream.
This was just like
before
.
Liam wanted to go back to
before
. He wanted to go back to before Shallah, before Trallee, before the forest, before, before,
before
.
He wanted to go home.
But he couldn’t.
The twigs wound together like braids. They cut into his back and his shoulders and his neck. He couldn’t turn his head. He looked down because there was nowhere else to look.
He saw Petyr lying on the forest floor.
Liam stared. He couldn’t tell if Petyr was dead or alive. His body was so small and still. He willed Petyr to move. His lips trembled with the desire.
As the twigs began to weave over his ears and chin, it occurred to Liam that they would soon cover his eyes and he wouldn’t be able to see Petyr. This was too much. The little boy’s eyes filled with tears – tears that would never fall.
For, all of a sudden, the wailing became much softer. Liam looked down.
He saw Petyr stir.
He saw him stand.
He saw him look up.
They stared at one another.
The owl’s screech was like a whisper. Liam felt the prickly motion of the twigs come to a halt just over his cheeks.
Then a sound like the snapping of a thousand branches filled the air.
The oaks began to tremble.
Petyr nearly lost his footing as the ground beneath him buckled and rolled. The creaking seemed to come from all sides, and just as with the wailing, he couldn’t locate the source. In bewilderment he looked from Liam in his cocoon high above, to the trees that held him, to the leagues of trunks all around. He knew this could be a manipulation. The oaks thrived on trickery.
The ground shook more violently still and he lost his grip on his axe as he flung his arms wide to regain his balance. It flew into the underbrush over his shoulder and he turned to seek it out, falling to his knees.
“Not now, not
now
,” he muttered under his breath as he plucked at the earth, squinting in the dark.
Leaning back on his haunches to take a breath, he felt a prickling sensation at the back of his neck, a feeling he remembered from childhood when his brother would sneak up behind him and yell in his ear. Petyr began to tremble as he strained to see his attacker out of the corner of his eye. He knew in an instant that all his cocky bravery in the face of these foes had been a farce.
He felt his blood run cold and closed his eyes.
He was too afraid to turn around.
All had gone quiet.
Petyr stood still as a statue, his breath billowing before him. He’d just begun to think it was safe to turn around when he felt a rush of wind at his right side and ducked on instinct, looking over his shoulder. What he saw would remain in his memory as the most amazing sight of his lifetime, one that still brought a chill of fright to his heart years later.
The black oaks had advanced upon Petyr while his back was turned. As he swung to face them, he found the beasts towering over him, their massive trunks planted no more than a foot away, Liam’s cocoon swinging between them. In their rage, they’d grown precariously in height, their branches doubling in size, their trunks thickening. Their very bark had spiked with fury, and their branches swung wildly, searching for a victim. But it wasn’t the might of the trees that bewitched Petyr, nor their sudden proximity. As he cowered before them, he was suddenly dazzled by a blinding light which, for an instant, brought everything to a halt.
Liam’s cage began to throb, flexing in and out like the beating of a gigantic heart. A pure light began to emanate from its depths. It spread to the edges of the cage, appearing to Petyr as a fiery star against the canopy, before bursting from its confines, blasting the forest with a display of light so brilliant it brought tears to his eyes.
Colours emerged. The shrivelled leaves of saplings opened, gleaming, to the warmth. Matted grass perked and stood on end. Birds and small rodents shot out in all directions to escape the sudden onslaught of light. And at the heart of the eruption a tiny figure hung, throbbing like a swollen wound, as from its centre daylight flowed freely, lighting the wood.
Petyr saw all this in an instant before being jerked back to his own peril as a branch cut through the air like a knife and embedded itself into a tree trunk, not three feet above his head. If he had not ducked at that exact moment his body could easily have been sliced in two. Almost instantly another branch jabbed at him from the front and he had to roll aside, grateful for the incredible light that allowed him to spy his axe a few feet off.
He went for his weapon on his hands and knees, dodging blows at every pace, now on his stomach as the oaks swung for his ribs, then leaping to his feet as they struck low to the ground. Oaken limbs smashed into one another left and right, spraying splinters. His axe in sight, Petyr reached for it with all his strength, his fingers brushing the handle, when a twiggy claw caught him by his surcoat, wrenching him to his knees. Stripping off the garment, the branch sprang away and he fell backwards, spread-eagled, rolling to avoid a stab through the chest. On his feet again, Petyr lunged another time for his weapon, impeded this time by a root gripping his ankle. Cursing, he looked down and saw more roots pushed out of the soil, binding his feet to the ground.
He was so distracted that he missed the thick branch swinging at him from the side. The bark impacted with his arm.
Bones cracked.
Petyr roared.
With the strength of agony he jerked a foot free before flinging himself to the ground, averting a swipe at his head, banging his broken arm painfully. Dizzy with pain, he threw himself across the last yard and grabbed his beloved axe. Weapon in hand, he aimed for the roots at his feet.
Free at last, Petyr turned upon his assailants. He struck out at all sides as the dual trunks stood firm, their limbs thrashing. At once he severed a branch clean through, jumping back as the dead wood fell. A piercing squeal rang out and a root as thick as a man pulled the branch into the earth. Exhilarated, Petyr kept on, aiming not to maim but to break. The oaks hit back at triple force, their branches reproducing at will, coming at him from all sides. Though Petyr fought with all he had, his wounded arm was sapping his strength and he felt himself slowing.
He knew he couldn’t hold them off for long.
Liam felt each blow.
There was light everywhere – so much light. He couldn’t avoid seeing it all. His cage shuddered with each hit, and with each hit he cringed. He couldn’t forget that he was inside these beings that were fighting Petyr.
It was almost as though he were fighting Petyr himself.
Liam watched the action like a hawk. If Petyr were to fall, he wouldn’t miss it. If Petyr were to die, he’d be there with him. He wouldn’t leave him alone. He wouldn’t make that mistake again.
Utterly consumed by the battle, the boy failed to notice the unusual quality of the light all around him. He didn’t realize that the light shone more brightly as his emotions surged, that it poured more light on the places he set his gaze. He didn’t see that when Petyr’s arm was hit and tears filled his eyes, the light flickered like a flame licked by the wind.
The battle was all he knew – nothing else mattered. Nothing else seemed quite as real.
He wished he could do something to help Petyr. If only he knew how to make the oaks stop. If only he knew how it would end. He tried with all his might to see into
after
, but it was no use. A
fter
had gone dark for him. He let his body go limp, the strain of concentration falling away.
Then he saw it.
At first he didn’t realize what he was seeing. He saw Petyr fighting on, looking haggard. He saw the oaks begin to hold back. He saw Petyr frown as the branches retreated to their trunks. He saw his eyes widen.
The branches were winding themselves into one, much like the twigs had braided themselves to bind him. They became two enormous branches, one from each trunk, each one thick as the trunks themselves. In a flash, he saw the oaks from Petyr’s view.
It looked like a giant doll with Liam’s cage as its head, its enormous arms reaching.
Liam felt Petyr’s surge of alarm.
He stood frozen, his axe held limply in his hand. Liam saw the boughs catch him by the waist. He saw him struggle in vain.
He saw him fall.
Unsure if what he’d seen was present or future, Liam opened his mouth and screamed. The sound reverberated against the trunks. For a moment, it was as though time had stopped. Then he felt himself falling. His bindings no longer held him. He felt the air against his skin and a wonderful sense of gladness came over him.
His last thoughts were of the sky.
When Petyr opened his eyes he wasn’t certain he had survived. Above him, a myriad of stars twinkled gently in a sky he’d never seen before. He watched them for a long time, breathing in the cool air, and with each breath the spots of glowing light seemed to draw nearer. He felt sure that if he reached out he would touch their jewelled surface, but he made no such attempt. Instead, he shifted his gaze and saw a great wolf sitting by his side. His eyes glowed yellow in the dark and the sound of his panting was loud in Petyr’s ears.
He was watching him.
A strange calm fell over Petyr as the wolf’s gaze met his own. He felt no fear at all, no urge to run and save himself. Instead, he felt strongly that all would turn out well. It was as though peace itself was stored within the wolf, and it was being extended to him, offered up through his stare. Petyr dared not look away.
After a time, the animal got to his feet. Petyr could feel his breath against his skin. The wolf stood looking at him for a moment more before turning, as though called away, and trotting off into the wood. Petyr closed his eyes and drifted back into sleep.
When next he awoke, it was to a cold hand on his cheek. As he stirred, a great burning lit up his arm and he groaned. He opened his eyes to see Shallah leaning over him in the gloom.
“Are you alright?” she asked, her voice tight. “What’s happened?”
“Is he with you?” Petyr asked, a terrible scream echoing in his ears.
“No,” Shallah said in a whisper, for she feared the worst. “What went on? Has it taken him again?”
He shook his head.
“They’ve gone away,” he said. “Something frightened them off. They might have let him go.”
Shallah didn’t seem to know what to make of Petyr’s ‘they.’ She stared at him. He had to remind himself she couldn’t see.
“Do sit up, and look about,” she urged. “He might be close by. Are you injured?”
Petyr grimaced as he pushed himself up with his good arm.
“Not much,” he lied.
He waited for his eyes to adjust to the dark. He couldn’t see Liam anywhere, nor the oaks. Oddly, there was no evidence that a battle had taken place either. Not one chopped branch or trampled bush remained.
In place of battle scars, a white powder covered the entire area. It blanketed the earth like snow, but didn’t melt on his skin. It hung on the bark of the trees all around, on the leaves of the shrubs and ferns, and in his own hair.
Touching Petyr on the arm, Shallah found her hand covered in the fine dust. Confused, she wiped it away. “You must explain it to me, Petyr,” she said intently. “I don’t understand it. I don’t understand this wood.” She had that tormented look on her face that Petyr knew so well. He’d seen it on his children after their mother died.