Free Wind Rider by Teddy Jacobs

dark lord.
    Carolina smiled. Will that suffice?
    Helga the tree mother smiled. You have my three
gifts and my blessing. I spit you back out into the world of men, tree-friend.
    I felt myself moving, and then I was outside, in
the air, the sap absorbing into my lungs, my mouth filling with air again. I
coughed once and gasped, blinked in the sunlight. I looked down at my hands and
saw the sword in my right and a light brown shield in my left. Something light
and hard pressed against my chest. My sword went back in its scabbard.
    Around me I could feel every branch of the tree,
the life in every leaf. Down on the forest floor the shrubs, the plants and the
smaller trees raised their voices together in song. I could feel the life in
every plant, the potential for growth in every seed. A tear welled up in my
right eye and fell, hitting the branch below me. I looked down. There where my
tear had fallen the dark bark turned green, and from it burst forth a new
branch, and I reached out and touched it and heard the last words of the tree
mother: Go forth now, Anders. Your group awaits you as the Dark Lord gathers
his forces.
    I caressed the new branch one last time. Then I
walked down the tree. A group of tree folk who had gathered to watch — perhaps
to see if I emerged alive and whole — parted as I approached, and whispered
together words that I could understand now. “Farewell, tree friend.”
    Then I felt Ulrike’s hand on my shoulder. When I
turned and stared at her, it was as if I were seeing her for the first time.
She no longer looked transparent. I wondered at her green beauty. I stared at
her for so long without blinking that her face turned red and she turned away. I
stopped you so you could wave farewell and bless the tree-folk and their tree
mother, not so you could stare at me, tree-friend.
    I stare at you because my eyes have been
opened. Your beauty is blinding.
    Enough. Bless them and let us move onward.
    I nodded and the words bubbled up from my mouth
before I had time to reflect on them, on what it all meant. To me it was just
melodious sing-song, tree-folk speech, and I did not listen to the words. Later
I would wish I had, for a blessing is always a blessing.
    I was transfixed by her beauty until she touched
me once more on the shoulder. My shoulder tingled, but I stopped staring and I
listened. She told me in tree-folk speech: “Later, if you want, we can talk.
Now the sap speaks in you. Let us go down and meet the rest of our party,
before they begin to worry.”
    Tree-sap or blood, I did not know what made it so
hard for me to stop staring at her. But I touched my sword, and felt energy and
a message rise up from Carolina. Get going, Anders!
    I walked then down behind Ulrike. The song of the
tree that surrounded me and the running sap faded to a dull roar, and I felt my
head clear a little bit. The bright plant life that surrounded my companions
was blinding. But the plant energy was not just around my friends, it was in
them — we had all been marked by the tree mother. As my eyes calmed, I tried to
look only with my two outer eyes but it was no use. Everything was bright with
aura and the inner eye would not close.
    My companions came forward to look at me and touch
the shield that I carried still in my hand. Kara fashioned silently for me a
kind of sling, so I could put it on my back. I had difficulty focusing my
vision. Although Kara glowed when I looked at her she was nothing compared to
Ulrike and her cousins, who glowed liked beacons. “It’s too much,” I said at
last, and by the look of Elias and Woltan , I realized
I must be speaking in Tree-tongue.
    Ulrike spoke to me then in the same language. “I
will try to help calm your sap and your inner eye, Anders. But then you must
focus on the tasks at hand, which are many.”
    I nodded.
    I wanted to grab her and pull her to me, to
squeeze her in my arms. But she was grabbing my head, and pulling my head to
her lips, and she kissed me, not on