Heartwood..... Part 7

It was not so much the difficult terrain that slowed their progress as the heavy rain, which had beaten down incessantly since Pirin and Karis had started to make their way back to Crelda’s cottage.  At one stage it had become so heavy that they had interrupted their journey, draping oilskins over flexible saplings and sitting under the limited, but welcome, cover they provided.  When the rain eventually did cease, the tracks they had been following had become slippery and the dampened undergrowth they brushed past soaked their clothing, leaving them chilled and uncomfortable.

As they finally reached the bluff overlooking Crelda’s cottage, it was Karis who was the first to notice anything different.  For a brief moment Pirin continued wearily on, the oilskin draped across his head and shoulders obscuring his view.  Realising his friend had stopped, he threw back the makeshift cape and wiped his forehead with cold-numb fingers.  Both stared disbelievingly at the scene before them.  The cottage itself was hardly recognisable, as if a huge green blanket had been draped over it and from an ugly hole in the roof a tall tree had punched it way through, like a clenched fist.  The shutters lolled at odd angles and the door had been ripped off its hinges.  Crelda’s carefully tended garden had been despoiled; broken pots and uprooted shrubs now littered the grassy clearing.

For a moment nothing happened.  Pirin and Karis stood motionless.  Then without warning Pirin threw his bag on the ground and ran down the slope, knocking aside intervening branches and hurdling over fallen trunks.  Karis, sweeping up his friend’s bag, followed behind, struggling to keep up.  Finally Pirin came to a halt and stared at the desecrated familiarity of the cottage he knew so well.  For a short while there was again silence.  Then, scarcely able to speak, he turned to Karis:

“What sort of magic is this? Only yesterday evening I sat in this very cottage and ate warm oatcakes by the firs. It’s as if nobody has lived here for years.”

Distraught, Pirin dropped to the floor and placed his head in his hands.  Karis moved closer and rested his hand on Pirin’s shoulder.

“I should never have left her alone.  Something was wrong.  Maybe the vixen spoke the truth.  I was in danger and I led whatever it was straight to the cottage…how could I have been so foolish?  So selfish!  I’m too frightened to go inside – I just know that my actions are responsible for this derelict shell!”

Pirin suddenly stopped talking and his face froze.

“Did you hear that?”

Karis looked baffled.

“What?”

She is still here.

“There it is again.  Can’t you hear it?”

“Hear what, Pirin?” replied Karis, with growing concern for his friend’s state of mind.

The voice was clear and persistent with its message.  Again it echoed around Pirin’s head:

She is here.

Pirin stood up and went to move forward into the cabin, but Karis held him back, pointing at the ground.

“Look” he whispered, indicating the compacted earth, “Footprints. Do they not look familiar?”

Pirin stared at the elongated impressions in the soil.  Around them the grass was speckled with dark bloodstains.  Karis handed him a billhook.

“If you’re hearing voices again, who exactly is doing the talking?  And how can you be sure they have friendly intentions?  We should go in together.”

Both men moved cautiously towards the door.

As they drew steadily nearer, a low, threatening growl emanated room the open doorway.  Heart pounding, Karis placed his hand on the frame and cautiously peered in.  The growl rose in pitch and intensity and he automatically stepped back.  As he did so, Pirin squeezed past him.  His eyes adjusted slowly to the darkness and he blinked several times until Trisk’s pale, crouching form became visible in the gloom.  The dog’s blue eyes blazed wildly with a mixture of fear and determination.  Matted blood streaked his shaggy neck and his left ear had been torn, the tip missing.  Pirin slowly lowered his billhook to the ground and stretched out both palms.

Do not be afraid, Trisk.  It is Pirin.  Your friend.

Pirin inched towards the dog, maintaining eye contact all the time.  The growl began to fade, although Trisk’s teeth remained bared in threat.  Karis looked on, hearing nothing of the interaction between Pirin and the dog.  Eventually Pirin stopped, his face level with Trisk’s huge head.

I mean you no harm.  I am Pirin.  Friend…friend.  Remember, Trisk?

Trisk’s eyes looked into Pirin’s.  Very gradually the dog relaxed, his head tipping forward to reveal an angry would to the back of his neck, fresh blood still oozing from it.  Exhausted, he slumped into Pirin’s arms and, closing his eyes, began to shiver.  The voice inside Pirin’s head called out in anguish.

She is here! She is here!

Silence ensued.

Struggling to cradle Trisk’s considerable bulk in his arms, Pirin gently lowered him to the floor and beckoned Karis over.  Between them they carefully lifted the dog and edged a blanket underneath him, resting his head on one of the rolled oilskins.  Pirin poured water from a flask into the palm of his hand and placed it under Trisk’s nose, encouraging him to drink.  He lapped at it feebly before eventually sagging into an agitated sleep.

Karis walked warily over to the large tree that now formed a new centrepiece for the room.  Running his hand over the bark, he looked around at the wrecked interior of the cottage. Ivy clung to everything, scaling the walls and climbing the overturned and smashed furniture.  The surface of the large central table was riddled with woodworm holes and ear-like orange fungi protruding from the woodgrain.  Karis put pressure on the corner of the table with his knuckles and it gave way, woodlice and earwigs scattering from the exposed papery decay.

“I am no believer in magic.  As far as I am concerned it is all tavern tricks and deftness of hand that deceives the eye.  Yet this is starting to undermine even my entrenched scepticism.  You say you were here only last night?”

Pirin nodded.

“Well you are not mad and I am not mistaken.  Heh, what’s this?”

Karis ran his hands over the surface of the wooden table, tracing the outline of two hands stained into the wood with what appeared to be a green dye.

Pirin moved nearer to examine the table’s surface.  Leaning in he rubbed the green image with his fingers.  Stooping down he sniffed at it, staring straight ahead with a fixed frown as he tried to identify the smell. 

“It’s elecampane.”

Karis looked confused.

“What’s that?”

“Elfwort.  It has an aromatic root and is believed to attract woodland spirits.  I’ve never paid much attention to the stories about it, but it grows in a few isolated places in the forest and its smell is not unpleasant.  Crelda always tended it in her garden.”

Pirin slowly gazed around the wrecked cottage and once again he withdrew into thought.  Finally he spoke.

“Whoever was doing this was looking for something.  There is a lot of damage, but nothing has been taken.  If this had been done by brigands or woodlanders they would not have overlooked those cooking pots, or the tools in the store.  They are in sound condition and would fetch a good price in a tavern.”

Bending down, Pirin lifted the bowl that had held the oatcakes on his last visit to the cottage. Tipping it, he watched as accumulated rainwater trickled to the floor.  Letting the bowl drop, he turned to his friend.

“Karis, I want you to go back to Crowfoot and tell your father what has happened.  Do not go to Ketu and raise any general alarm yet.  Trisk thinks that Crelda is still here.  I am clinging to the hope that she is not dead – we have found no body.  I know I’m grasping at dandelion clocks, but the short of it is I intend to stay here a while longer.  I’m not sure why, I just feel compelled to.”

Karis spoke firmly as he looked Pirin straight in the eye. 

“I am not prepared to leave you alone.  Whoever did this may not have found what they were looking for. They could be back.”

Pirin met Karis’ stare.

“That’s what I’m relying on.  If I’m to be honest, at the moment my desire to find out what happened here is just about holding sway over my fear.  If necessary I can hold my own in hostile company, but should the odds become too great against m, I will seek refuge in the woods.  Few know them as well as I do.  Meet me tomorrow in Crowfoot.  Wait for me in the morning at the usual place.  Don’t worry, I will be there.  Now that’s the end of the matter.”

Noticing that Karis still looked uncomfortable at the idea, Pirin placed his hand on his friend’s shoulder.

“If anything you will be more at risk travelling between here and Crowfoot. It will soon be nightfall and if woodlanders are responsible for this, they could be lying in wait along the main track.  Use the badger path that runs parallel to the Silkstream. It may take you longer but I think you’ll be safer.”

Reluctantly, Karis gathered together his backsack and wrapped a half-length woollen cloak around his upper body. Then he paused and looked straight at Pirin. 

“Until tomorrow morning, then”.

Without another word, he left the cottage and headed for the trees, his bulky form son dissolving into the failing light.  Pirin watched Karis leave before turning and walking slowly back into the cottage.  Placing a blanket around his shoulders, he sat cross-legged in the doorway and stared out across the clearing.  Concealed underneath the blanket, he gripped his short-bladed knife with the antler hilt.  Darkness gradually enveloped the cottage, while blackbirds called loudly as they prepared to roost.  Eventually only a robin sang thinly until it too succumbed to sleep and the wildwood was again silent.  Only Trisk’s hoarse, rhythmic breathing and periodic drips of water from the exposed beams above interrupted the stillness.  Pirin felt his mind relax and his thoughts began to meander.

His conversation with Crelda in the same spot not two days earlier seemed very distant.  He mulled over her words.  His life had known crises before and he had somehow managed to ride them; the loss of his father and mother in quick succession from marsh fever had tested his emotional stability to the extreme.  Their sudden and marked physical decline, combined with the appalling inevitability of the affliction had been difficult to come to terms with.  The only tiny morsel of comfort for Pirin was that it had affected them both – he had always known that they would not survive long on their own, such was their devotion to each other.  There were those in the village who believed that such a young sapling as he, at the age of sixteen, would bend and break under the strain.  But, like most people, they had underestimated the resilience of green wood and he had proved them wrong.  Life had indeed been difficult and loneliness had settled upon him many times in his little hillside cabin.  Now he was generally untroubled by solitude, and enjoyed company.  Life, he felt, was somehow dulled if experienced alone.  Some had tried to persuade him to move to the city, but he always knew that without the wildwood his life force would surely have withered away like a malnourished seedling.  For one thing, he hated crowds: large numbers of people made him restless and agitated.  Pirin chuckled quietly at the irrational logic.  Here he was in a ruined cabin, all alone in the dark, waiting for some unimaginable horror to return.  And yet he would not exchange the tranquillity of this woodland evening for the heaving humanity of the city and its relative security.

Perhaps it was because death held no real fear for him.  Like most, Pirin did not relish the prospect but, although he did not consider himself a Godly person, he had been raised to be comfortable with the concept of the universal Creator.  He did not fret about the meaning of life.  After all, why did life have to have a meaning? All that mattered was that he existed and his heart revelled in the world around him: the crisp rawness of the first snowfall of winter; the thin seeps of redwings migrating unseen overhead in a dark autumn sky; the waxy lustre of fresh foliage in May.  These were the creations of a God with a love of life and beauty. And for that reason Pirin had faith.  He disliked ceremony and costume and ritual and all the trappings of formal religion.  The wildwood was his temple and despite its often indifferent cruelty, he elated in it.

Crelda’s revelation had, however, jolted his comfortable view of the world to its foundation. Indeed, he would frequently talk to animals that he encountered and he knew that they always responded well to soft, whispered tones.  But the idea that his innermost thoughts could be accessed and responded to had unnerved him deeply and left him feeling insecure and vulnerable.  Karis’ words had reassured him temporarily but doubts and worries had again started to gnaw away at his sense of stability.  Security and stability.  The two things that Crelda had provided in his life since the death of his parents had been wrenched from him in little more than a day.  She had become the significant constant in his life, a foundation stone that had now been dislodged.

Pirin breathed a deep sigh and blinked hard at the inky darkness before him.  The cloud cover had dissipated and pallid moonshine illuminated the cottage.  Sitting still for so long had allowed the chill to filter slowly into his body and he felt cold to the bone.  Pirin sensed a movement at his side.  Looking down, he saw that Trisk had moved alongside him, sitting upright and staring across the clearing in the directions of the trees.  Pirin followed his line of sight and again blinked hard.  A shape began to crystallise from the murk, two eyes like glittering jewels looking straight back at him.  Pirin returned the stare but felt the hairs on the back of his neck and on his arms start to rise as fear took hold.  Steadily the eyes began to move nearer until Pirin was able to discern a shape.  It was the vixen.  Cautiously she looked about her as if prepared to bolt for cover in an instant.  Her eyes again turned on Pirin.

Close your eyes.

Pirin’s heart thudded against his chest as he heard the voice in his head.

Have faith, Pirin.  I have warned you of danger once before and will do so again. Trust me.  Close your eyes.

Hesitantly Pirin placed his hand on the back of Trisk’s head for reassurance and slowly allowed his eyelids to drop.  A feeling of warmth flooded through his body and his head began to swim.  For a moment an empty darkness filled his mind.  Then colours started to flash across his vision: greens, reds, yellows – all exploded in profusion.  Gradually they began to coalesce and take form until eventually Pirin found himself sitting in a large grassy clearing fringed with tall spikes of purple flowers.  A light breeze caught the fluffy seed heads, which floated into the air in clouds.  The sun was bright and warm on his face but Pirin did not feel the need to squint as he looked at the scene before him. 

Directly in front of him was an enormous tree unlike any other he had ever seen before.  The trunk was bulbous at the base, tapering sharply nearer its crown.  It had smooth, grey bark and branches that spiralled upwards, becoming thinner until eventually bending over and cascading whip-like towards the earth.  The leaves were small and shaped like teardrops, although nearer the top of the tree they were more elongated and had fine serrations along their edges.  Pirin noticed that whereas the leaves were a pale lime-green at the tips o the branches, towards the middle of the tree they were warmer in colour, turning to reds and russets and, even more unusually, despite only a slight breeze, the branches were swaying wildly as if caught in the violent eddies of a storm.  From its uppermost branch a throstle began to sing, its voice fluting, deep and rich. Pirin focussed on the bird and watched as its creamy throat and speckled, puffed out chest trembled in song.  The bird poured out its heart skywards and Pirin found a great calm descend upon him as he listened to the notes, which flowed together like no bird song h recognised.  He felt his head sag as though it was sinking into a yielding, feather-filled pillow.

Pirin.  It is I, Crelda.

Pirin’s heart leapt at the sound of Crelda’s voice and he felt a surge of emotion sweep through his body, a mixture of relief and apprehension.  He swung his head from side to side as he scanned around the clearing.

“Crelda?  Is that really you?  I can’t see you.”

I am here before you, but you must keep your eyes closed or the spell will be broken.  Focus your mind once more on the tree.

Pirin concentrated hard and found his attention drawn again to the trunk.  Crelda’s face smiled back from the centre of the tree, her outstretched arms where once there had been branches.  No longer was its bark smooth, but deeply furrowed, long sweeping lines flowed downwards to form the folds of an elegant gown festooned with leaves of juniper and rowan berries, all loosely held together by pale green shoots that were never still, twisting and entwining with Crelda’s movements.  Although instantly recognisable, her face appeared younger, its complexion bearing a rich earthy lustre, her lips full and with the redness of a ripening apple.  Her hair swept down in long green plaits of willowy leaves.

Maintain your concentration, Pirin. Focus on me.

Pirin screwed up his face and pursed his lips as he fought to sustain the image.  As he did so, Pirin felt the urge to run and embrace her.

No Pirin, hold fast.  Stay where you are.  It is important that you hear what I have to say.

Pirin cried out in frustration.

“This is cruel trickery, Crelda!  I need reality, something solid that I can feel.  I want my senses to confirm what I am seeing and hearing.  I need to touch you; feel the warmth and solidity of a living being.”

Oh, I am here before you Pirin.  I exist, but not in any fixed physical form.  What would your senses tell you – that you had touched fur, or feather, or bark?  Or perhaps nothing at all.  Would that help?  Probably not.  Not all things exist within the sensory world. Have faith in your mind’s eye.  It sees the spirit.

Crelda’s response left Pirin even more uncertain and confused.

I’m sorry Crelda, but I still don’t understand.  What do you mean?

Pirin jerked backwards, almost opening his eyes in surprise.  He had spoken and yet his lips had not moved.  It had definitely been his voice.

There is magic in this and I don’t like it at all!

Crelda smiled and shrugged her shoulders.

A typical human reaction to the unfamiliar.  Magic is the name that you give to things that you do not comprehend.  In your world you operate within a set of ideas that you understand – what the scholars and mathematicians like to call ‘laws’.  Laws are not laws at all but simply constraints on your imagination.  Anyway, name me a law that cannot be broken. When your comfortable assumptions about life are challenged, humans usually dismiss it as sorcery. You believe only what your senses feed you, but how trustworthy is that information?  What colour is the sky, Pirin?  What do your eyes tell you? Blue? Find me some blue sky and keep it in a bottle for me!  It is a great arrogance and the fundamental weakness of your kind.

Pirin frowned.

What do you mean, ‘my kind’?

Crelda paused before answering him.

I am Dyrian.  We live all around you and among you and can assume many forms, animate and inanimate.  Humans have given us many names, but most refer to us as piskies.  A few with special talents such as yourself, know of our existence, but are ridiculed by the majority for their knowledge, or are feared and hounded as witches because they understand the power of plants, or can interact with the thoughts of fellow creatures.  I am a wood spirit – my soul belongs here in the wildwood.

Crelda hesitated for a moment as if uncertain of whether to continue or not.  She looked around her at the other trees in the clearing, as if seeking, Pirin felt, approval.  She eventually spoke, slowly and with deliberate care in her choice of words.

For a great time, longer than it is possible for you to imagine, this land was in the grip of ice.  As the strength of the sun began to grow, so its hold began to diminish and slowly, season by season, life began to claw its way back.  The melt-waters and wind-blown loess offered sustenance to mosses and liverworts and algae that clung tenaciously to the bare rocks of the mountains.  Also in the wind came the trees, most to die in the skeletal soil, but some succeeded.  Birch, sycamore and aspen – pioneers of the wildwood.  We were with them, nomads of the ether, dancing and rejoicing in every unique guest and eddy of the wind, living off minute airborne particles and droplets.  Our physical bodies had all the constancy of clouds.  We were as shadows to shapes and echoes to sounds, and we loved it.  But we yearned for one thing – substance.  Form.  And in the youthful wildwood we found it, in the shape of a tree, which we named ‘mera’, which in our tongue means ‘ image’.

The mera possessed the ability to adapt to their surroundings faster than any other tree.  A limb torn off in a storm could regrow in minutes.  The mera could turn and follow the sun or cower from a root-wrenching wind.  Their leaves could change colour and shape, not just with the seasons but also with variations in the weather.  We exulted in its vivacity, its thirst for life, and we entered into its being, its tissue bonding with ours, its sap becoming our blood.  Unlike other trees, whose life force pulses just below their bark and whose interiors are simply lifeless pith, the heartwood of the mera is the source of its energy and power.  Merely to touch it imparts heightened sensitivity and the ability to change, something which the Dyrian have nurtured and cultivated so that it is almost innate, although we must have direct contact with heartwood to achieve our full powers.  I can alter my body shape to suit my mood, my company and my context.  Watch.

Pirin looked on as a pale green light began to surround her.  Her image blurred and then reformed.  Pirin looked into the amber eyes of the vixen.

Remember the badger sett? It was I that warned you, Pirin.  You were, and still are, in terrible danger.

The vixen threw back its head, letting out a howl that increased steadily in pitch.  As it did so, the fox’s image faded and diminished to be replaced by a smaller glow, the howl becoming a beautiful warble and the throstle hovered effortlessly in the clearing.  Pirin watched, transfixed, as the bird’s image became indistinct and started to grow, its neck stretching and its head and body expanding.  Finally out of the light a voice spoke.  At first Pirin did not recognise it.  Although it was familiar, it sounded somehow different.  Realisation suddenly dawned on Pirin as he watched his own image distil from the coloured lights in front of him.  Smiling broadly, it spoke.

We can mimic anything we want to.  It gets easier with age and practice.

For Pirin however, this was too much, and he protested loudly, shaking his head and waving his hands in the air as if trying to erase the image from his mind.  Crelda’s laughter rang out and the apparition melted once more into the shifting spectrum of light.  As it began to subside, Crelda was once again recognisable before him.

I am sorry, Pirin.  The Dyrian have a mischievous sense of humour and mine sometimes lets me down.  I apologise, that was unfair of me.  Few people ever hear their voices as others do. I promise – no more games.

That is kind of you, thought Pirin sarcastically.  At least through all this your sense of humour has not deserted you.  However despite all that I have just witnessed, I still find your ability to change form, almost on a whim, hard to comprehend.

A knowing smile spread across Crelda’s face.

And yet you can accept that a caterpillar can emerge from a chrysalis as a butterfly or a tadpole can become a frog.  Your face is not the same as it was a year ago and will change through your life.  Does the forest ever stagnate or remain the same? All life IS transformation.  It is the ultimate paradox that the only constant in life is change.  The Dyrian simply learned how to influence it and later its rate.  My ancestors lived in the forest long before humans even walked the earth and discovered the power that plants possess.  You, of all people Pirin, should understand what plants are capable of.

Pirin was quiet for a while as he took in Crelda’s words.  It was the undeniable truth that his trusted friend had indeed appeared before him in a number of different guises in less than a matter of moments.  Then a thought occurred to him.

With all your powers, why have you spent so long in human form?

Crelda did not hesitate with her reply.

In short, Pirin, I fell in love.  Humans often cite love as an emotion exclusively their won, as something which separates them from the rest of Creation. How conceited!  I defy you to look into Trisk’s eyes and tell me that you do not see love and devotion in abundance.  Akin captured my heart.  He was appointed Woodward of the Crowfoot Enclosure at an early age and took his duty of stewardship very seriously.  He was in love with the beauty of the forest and wandered widely in the remoter wildwood, where few other humans had ever been.  I often observed him, and read his thoughts; his emotional bond with the trees touched me deeply.  I knew I wanted to be with him, so I took on a human form – one that I knew would be pleasing to his eye.  I worked in Crowfoot, which was much smaller then, in the Boar’s Head as a beer maiden and we courted as any other couple would.

Crelda paused.

We were so in love, Pirin.

Did Akin ever know the truth, Crelda?

The truth?  What is that then, Pirin?  That we were happy, and in love and shared complete contentment?  That we lived fulfilled lives in each other’s company?  Yes.  That I was Dyrian? No.  That knowledge I could not have shared.  My form spell would have been broken and our relationship would have changed forever.  Akin’s spirit now dwells in Orfana, the twilight world, where he awaits me.  Although not of your kind, I too am mortal.  When my life force finally fades, I will join him there and our spirits will be united once more.  We will travel together to the Forest of Sallithi, where we will wander, dallying in contentment forever.

Crelda paused, and her expression changed to one of sadness.  Pirin, on the other hand, felt anger rise within him, and hot tears that he could not quell began down to run down his cheeks from his closed eyes.  Suddenly the repressed emotion burst from him.

You deceived Akin and you deceived me!  You talk about your world.  What about min?  All the assumptions and values that have underpinned my life have dissipated into thin air. It seems that deceit and falsehoods are the cornerstones of everything I hold dear.  I want to return to reality.  I am sitting here in a world where my eyes are closed and yet I can see.  I can hold a conversation with a fox but my thoughts are for all to share.  I can even look myself in the face.  This is a nightmare from which there seems to be no awakening.

Crelda looked downwards and both she and Pirin remained in silence save for his rapid breathing.   Eventually she raised her eyes and spoke.

I am truly sorry, Pirin.  Your pain touches me deeply.  But remember this: Love underpins everything.  You talk of reality.  This is the only reality you need to know.  What makes me real?  My physical manifestations may change, but my essence remains unaltered. I loved Akin as truly and as faithfully as any human and still do. Is that real? Is the pain I feel now genuine, or a worthless imitation of the real thing? I did not want events to turn out in the manner that they have, but sometimes circumstances overtake us.  The last two days have been as harrowing for me, I can assure you.  At this very moment I am being sought.  So too are you.

Pirin could see the pain and resignation behind Crelda’s otherwise calm expression and immediately began to feel guilt at his outburst.  His anger revolved around self-pity – his loss, his confusion, his deception.  How easily he had forgotten the support and love he had always received. Nevertheless, he still kept his tone cold, attempting to hide his regret.

What do you mean, “sought”?  Pirin could not imagine Crelda’s meaning.

Pirin, despite appearances to the contrary, the wildwood is not boundless.  Far to the north the wooded slopes of the Calandrian mountains sink into the mire that is the flatland.  The harshness of the forest in winter is as nothing to the bleakness of that place.  It is where earth meets sky.  It can barely be called land because water saturates everything.  A dense, suffocating blanker of reeds smothers all else.  Any trees that cling t life are malformed and sag under the weight of foul-smelling colonies of reptile-birds that plunder the eels infesting  the muddy waters.  It feels like perpetual winter.  Great storms brew in grey skies, sending fierce winds across the reedbeds like waves on a tormented sea. In the single heartbeat that the weather relents as a token to summer, swarms of blood-biters rise from the fens, making life misery for any creature that does not take to the water.  Huge migratory herds of marsh kwoths graze the fresh reed growth, themselves prey to the wolf packs, ice bears and great tusked golgir, which follow their progress like parasites around a single, restless beast.  Few humans have ever been there and not one has ever returned.  It is a cruel, unforgiving environment that has spawned a community equally ruthless.

For the first time Pirin sensed real fear in Crelda’s voice.  She continued.

It is the home of the creeches.  They are a kind that place scant value on life but delight in taking it.  They are accomplished predators, hunting with stealth, persistence and stamina. Creeches are without sentiment – they care nothing for sacrificing their own, either in the chase or in battle.  In their domain, nothing is safe.  Theirs is a disparate society of quarrelling tribes that struggle for ephemeral supremacy amid a sea of reeds.  That is until now.  A leader has emerged to unite the clans; his name is Skirras.  Not only does he possess the strength of a timber ox and the stealth of a mountain lion, but he has powers of the mind that may even exceed those of the Dyrian.  Every generation throws up an individual with exceptional talents, and he is one such.

Crelda hesitated and her voice diminished to a whisper.

We may not be alone in this place.  He may be eavesdropping our thoughts at this very moment.

Crelda peered around the clearing as if to reassure herself before continuing.

Over time our relationship with the mera began to develop a darker side.  Pleasure and corruption are such comfortable bedfellows!  Our obsession with the mera soon evolved into an addiction.  And from addiction comes dependence.  We began to exploit the mera, abuse them and one by one, spent like spawning salmon, they died.  Then we discovered something about the mera that should have been obvious, but which we overlooked in our naivety.  It was a tree that had the will to survive.  We could conjoin and leave, refreshed and invigorated, while the mera was drained of its powers.  Quite simply, the mera did not let us go.  We needed each other to survive – we became as one.  They live within us. We are mera.  Each Dyrian has a remnant of Heartwood, a vestige of former abundance.  If kept dark, and cool, its power is retained and we can return to recharge ourselves.  Unfortunately, with intoxication also comes corruption and mistrust.  We have transformed ourselves from social to solitary, carefully and jealously guarding our priceless life source.  I am sad to say that I am no exception.  Skirras found a heartwood cache and with it a Dyrian named Fariel, a weak individual who betrayed our secret to a ruthless killer.  It did not save his life, but instead only served to confirm what he already knew – he had discovered something exceptional, which would only add to his powers.  Imagine something which could create an instant disguise for a predator.  Skirras is exceptional, and sufficiently so to realise the power he has unearthed.  He is now in the wildwood to search for more.  Before Fariel died, in a last vain attempt to save his life, he told Skirras that some mera do still exist in the remotest wildwood beyond the Clembrian Crags.  Fariel hoped he would be spared if he promised to help find them.  Skirras – the hunter, tracker and unfortunately for Fariel, mind reader, did not take up his offer.  His greatest strength is the capacity to instil fear into the minds of his opponents.  To overcome him will require physical fortitude as well as mental guile and agility.

Why have the creeches never moved south and infiltrated the wildwood before? Pirin enquired.

Crelda paused for a moment.

Disunity. They have made isolated forays in the past but have always destroyed themselves through infighting and jealousy.  Everything has its niche.  They are beings of wide open places and life is a struggle.  They cannot cope with abundance.  It is in their nature to strive against hardship and shortage.  Gratification of base urges and satisfaction of hunger are uppermost – hunting, fighting, eating, rutting – and in no particular order.  Their nature does not allow them to exist for long in the wildwood.  Skirras knows he has found the one thing above all others that will unite the Wudu – envy.  What better than a tree that can provide an inexhaustible supply of firewood to a kind that have always tolerated the discomfort of perpetual chill?  A tree that can heal the wounds of battle and allow warriors to cheat death?  Skirras knows this and is simply using the clans as expendable pawns.  He is devious and more than capable of manipulating others for his own purposes.

Pirin rubbed his forehead with the palms of his hands.

I am beginning to get an uneasy feeling that this is all leading to something that I’m not going to find particularly palatable.  I’m right, aren’t I?

Crelda stared at the ground in quiet acknowledgement of Pirin’s correct assumption.  For a moment there was an uncomfortable silence and then she spoke, looking him straight in the eye.

The creeches will descend upon Crowfoot and other outliers like it.  A bloody fate awaits every man, woman, child and beast.  Tolerance and coexistence to them are not options to be considered.  Yet to warn your kind would be a waste of time.  Ketu and his motley militia would be swatted aside like an irritating midge if they offered assistance.  To flee the forest will only delay the inevitable; they are born hunters and relish the chase.  The only chance of survival hangs on whether an assassin can find Skirras first and kill him.  Although formidable, he is still only flesh and blood and can be slain.  Without his leadership to unify and coordinate them, the creeches will soon once again lack the cohesion to pose anything more than a temporary threat to the inhabitants of the wildwood.  They would soon retreat to the sanctuary of familiarity – the hardship of the flatlands.  But first he must be found.

Pirin went to speak but Crelda held a finger to her lips. She continued.

Pirin, you know the forest better than anyone living.  It is your domain, embedded in your soul.  You are its natural guardian, as Akin once was.  And, whether you choose to believe it or not, you would be prepared to forfeit your life to preserve it.  Of this I am certain.  Physically you may not be his match, but you are at least his equal when it comes to powers of the intellect.

Pirin lowered his head and held his arms open.

But I have never willingly killed anything in my life!  It goes against everything I believe in.  You know that!  I am no weakling and can give a good account of myself in a tavern brawl but I am not a natural fighter.  I prefer debate and compromise, not using my fists.

Pirin shook his head in bemusement at the horrific and final implications of Crelda’s words, the notion that he should set out deliberately to take a life.  But she persisted.

Your physical prowess and skill in combat are not necessarily what will carry the day, Pirin. You are not a warrior, nor ever will be.  Heightened perception is only one of your qualities.  There is fire in your heart.  Do not underestimate your resolve, your capacity for personal sacrifice.  No human in Calandria is better equipped to stop Skirras than you.

Pirin sighed.

When you put it in those terms, how can I possibly refuse?  Yet I am still at a loss to know how I can kill him.  Where do I even begin?

Crelda began to speak, but stopped abruptly.

That…

Her face froze.  When she spoke again she did so with urgency.

There are creeches close at hand.  We must hurry from this place. I am no seer, Pirin, and I cannot view the future. How you kill Skirras will be a matter of opportunity and circumstance.  I believe that he has used the heartwood he already possesses to disguise his appearance, and at this very moment stalks the wildwood.  Now listen to me Pirin, time is short.  You must seek out the remotest point of the Clembrian Crags, a stone circle known as the Birchen Grove, which lies at the source of the Torvus.  There you will find a drumlin named Limptwigg.

Who?  asked Pirin.  What is a drumlin?

We have no more time for questions.  He has in his possession something which you will need to defeat Skirras.  Do not let him persuade you otherwise.  Now leave here…the creeches will soon be upon us.

With that Crelda turned away, her image beginning to fade almost immediately.  Pirin felt as if a weight had been lifted from his eyelids.  He opened them just in time to see the vixen return once more to the forest.  Extending his hand down, he felt Trisk still sitting at his side.  Beckoning the dog to follow, Pirin slipped silently from the cottage and they joined the silvery shadows of the moonlit wildwood.