Chapter Seventeen: The Twisted Treeloc

“There are three things all brave men fear—a love that goes only one way, a man with no face, and the first step on a journey away from home.”

On the morning of the second day, the trouper on lookout duty let out a cry that brought the caravan to a halt.

“There’s something in the distance,” he said, squinting from his vantage point atop a large crate. “I can’t tell what it is, but it looks dangerous.”

The horses snorted uneasily among themselves, craning their necks left and right. Herod dismounted and pointed to three other men. “Go ahead and scout it out,” he instructed.

The men nodded and dropped lightly onto the ground, arming themselves with shortswords and bows. Evaine peered over the side of the wagon, watching them disappear into the trees.

“They’re not being very stealthy,” Garax remarked.

“Why’s that?” she asked.

“The green and gold help them blend into the landscape during spring and summer,” Ein answered, making his way to the edge of the wagon. “But during winter they’ll be spotted from a mile away. Then again they’re troupers, not rangers. I doubt the colours they wear have anything to do with practicality.” He dropped to the ground, bow in hand.

“I wouldn’t bother going after them if I were you,” Garax said with a hint of a smile.

“Why not?” Ein frowned. “If something’s out there, they’ll need all the help they can get.”

“Oh, you’ll see.”

True to his word, the scouting party returned a few minutes later. They’d unstrung their bows and were laughing.

“It’s just a tree,” one of them said. “Nice one, Tam.”

“A tree?” Herod frowned. The trouper named Tam flushed.

“It’s funny-shaped,” another said, climbing back onto the wagon. The horses gave a relieved grunt and began moving. “Otherwise, it’s harmless. Nothing to be concerned about.”

“A funny-shaped tree,” Evaine murmured. “Could it be…?”

Realization dawned in Ein’s eyes. “Of course…”

“I take it you know what they’re talking about,” Garax chortled. “Though I’m surprised you two have been this far out.”

The tree in question came into view a short while later, surfacing from the mesh of snow and pine needles that made up the surrounding wood. It stood twisted and tangled in the centre of a copse, an ancient husk of an oak towering over its neighbours, black and leafless and gnarled like an old man hunched over in pain. Its limbs splayed out like crooked fingers reaching towards the sky, its roots rolling out across the ground in a seething mass of tendrils. There were two holes shaped like eyes in its trunk and another that resembled a mouth opened in a perpetual scream. Even in broad daylight it cast an ominous shadow.

“I remember when we first saw that thing,” Evaine said, snickering. “You screamed your head off.”

“You would have too if you hadn’t almost bitten off your tongue,” Ein retorted.

“I’ll give you that,” she admitted. “Though it wasn’t anywhere near as bad as what happened to Merrill. Remember?”

“Yeah. We had to stop him from running off in the wrong direction. I think that was the last time we played together in the woods. I can still feel the pain on my backside where Father hit me.”

“Yes,” Evaine nodded. “Mother and Father didn’t take too kindly to us playing together after that.” She smiled wistfully. “It looks a lot less frightening in daylight.”

The tree drew closer and closer as they lumbered towards it. Ein, Merrill and Evaine had encountered it once as children, back when they’d still been allowed to explore the woods. It had been a particularly daring expedition, one Ein remembered well, since it’d been the furthest they’d ever travelled away from Felhaven. They’d fully intended to explore outside the Sleeping Twins that day, as well as they could with their two days’ worth of rations and their combined savings of three coppers, but their adventure had been cut short after encountering the tree on the second night. They’d fled back to Felhaven with their tails between their legs, just in time to cross paths with Alend, Sanson and Nath, who’d set out after them. That day had marked a turning point in their lives—Ein and Merrill had begun working shortly after, and Evaine had come of age. That was the last time they’d played together as children, free from responsibility and the worries of adulthood.

“The tree has an interesting story behind it,” Garax said, as they passed under its branches and clattered their way across the twisting carpet of roots. “In the old days, the locals called it the Twisted Treeloc.”

“Treeloc?” Ein frowned. “What’s that?”

“During the Age of the Magic there was a race of creatures called the Treelocs. As their name might suggest, they were spirits that took on the form of trees.”

“You mean this thing was once alive?” Ein exclaimed. The tree suddenly seemed a lot more ominous.

“Indeed,” Garax answered. “By nature, Treelocs were conservative and preferred to make their homes far away from civilisation—but when people came chopping down their forests they got mighty angry. To them, the trees were sheep and they the herders.”

“That’s not the only reason.” Aren, who had been listening, nudged his horse closer to the wagon so it fell into step beside them. “Have either of you heard the Lament of Levine?”

Ein and Evaine shook their heads. Garax scoffed.

“You can do the honours,” Garax said, as Aren cleared his throat.

“There once was a Treeloc called Levine,

A spirited fellow was he,

With elegant roots and a lovely leaf-line

He was the most handsome oak tree.

The Treelocs came from across the Reach

To ask for young Levine’s seed,

Rosewood, Willows, red-and-gold Beech,

But none of them did succeed.

Levine would never settle for less

Than a comely purebred pine,

With lovely bark, a graceful noblesse,

And maybe a thin waistline.

So Levine roamed to the ends of the earth

And there it was he found she,

A beautiful pine of the purest birth,

Alas, she was just a tree!”

“Mother used to sing that to me,” Evaine said, once Aren had finished the song. “It was a good story, especially for children.”

“Indeed,” Garax nodded. “Poor Levine searched far and wide for the fairest partner and he found her—but in the end, she was just a tree. It’s a lesson applicable to real life. The story teaches you to think about what you really value—a pretty face, or a sharp mind?”

“There are plenty of women out there with both,” Aren said. He winked at Evaine, who scowled. “But also plenty with neither.”

“What happened to Levine after that?” Ein asked. “How did he become the Twisted Treeloc?”

“There’s some speculation that the pine Levine found was actually right here in the Sleeping Twins,” Garax began. “When the twins Fel and Brackenburg came and lopped her dead to build their village, Levine became mad with grief. He struck Brackenburg down in one blow, almost killing him. In response, Fel called down lightning from above, just like Lady Reyalin from the Age of Legends, and killed Levine in a single strike. They say that the tree is what remains of Levine, still screaming in pain from where the lightning struck him.”

They finished passing the gnarled tree, and as the wind struck it it shivered and shook, almost writhing in pain. Then it was gone, sunken behind the layers upon layers of spruce and pines, a faint outline in the forest. Ein thought he saw a cloaked figure in the distance, standing beneath the tree next to a horse, but when he blinked it was gone.

They stopped later at noon to eat lunch, and Garax taught him more of the Way of the Wind. The storyteller was by far the more skilled of the two, wielding his fencing stick with an elegance that reminded Ein of the Brackenburg. At times he came hard and fast, crashing through his defences with more force than a river through rocks. At times he hung back, lulling, moving just enough to avoid being struck, and at times he ebbed and flowed between attack and defence. While Alend’s teaching had been blunt and effective, it had also been rigid. There were strict rules in place, be all’s and end all’s about which moves to make in what situation, which parts of the body to attack, how to move the feet. Ein learned all manner of movements, techniques, tips and tricks and quirky manoeuvres he never could have dreamed of. He was taught to improvise, to adapt depending on the situation, to overcome whatever was thrown at him no matter how out of left-field it came.

Their training never lasted longer than a few minutes. Although Garax was experienced, he was also old and lacking the vigour of youth.

“You’re still distracted,” Garax said. He sighed and thrust his stick point-first into the dirt and snow. “We won’t make any progress if you don’t clear your mind. You think too much, whether it’s about the battle or not. You need to stop doing that.”

Ein nodded, though he’d only taken in half of what the old man had said. His mind had been on a million things, two of them being Evaine and his father.

As they finished refreshing themselves by the waters and headed back to the troupers and their carts, he heard a high, clear sound. It was hollow like the wind and sombre, yet there was a hint of hope in the short, sharp notes that accompanied each verse. As he listened, the tune took him away from the riverside and through the woods, through the snow and trees and along the worn paths to the quiet village that lay nestled between two tall mountains. It took him back to the forge, in front of the crackling furnace and the ring of iron and steel, and to a time when the broad-chested man and the petite woman had been his only mother and father.

Ein was still shaking long after the tune had stopped. Evaine was looking at him with a flute held a little way from her lips.

“Did you like it?” she asked, smiling. “Aren says I’m a natural. Baird thinks with proper training, I could become one of the greatest in the land.”

“What… was that song?” Ein asked. It felt vaguely familiar, the sensations he’d felt, the memories that had been unearthed. He cast his mind back and remembered bits and pieces of a dream—a dream where he’d rested, where a voice had told him to be well again.

Evaine shrugged. “I just put it to my lips and played,” she said. “I’m still a bit rough around the edges, but it’s only been a day.” She looked towards the wagon where Garax and the troupers were beckoning to them. “Come, it looks like we’re leaving.”

She left him standing by the trees, still breathless, his heart aching as if a large hole had been carved inside it. He placed a hand against his chest and swallowed. With a start, Ein realized it was the furthest he’d ever travelled from home. The village was behind him. The Twins were behind him. The Twisted Treeloc was behind him. Everything from here on was completely new ground. The fact hit him like a blow to the gut, and it was with a great force of will that he managed to take a step back towards where the caravan was waiting, and then another, walking further and further from everything he knew.