“It is a long walk,” said Udinny from behind him as they pushed through the undergrowth of Woodedge. Cahan grunted. “Your creature—”
“Segur is a garaur,” he said as it loped past him. Segur had joined them as soon as they were away from the village. Like all garaur it had an unlimited appetite for running, part of what made them good herders. Cahan’s feet already ached, Segur did not even pause for breath.
“These garaur,” said Udinny, “do they bite?”
“Segur will not bother you if you do not bother it.”
They walked on in silence. Cahan stared through a break in the canopy at the mistline which formed around the tips of the cloudtrees of Wyrdwood, arrogant in their majesty.
“I had heard tell they were big,” said Udinny joining him. “I am from Tilt, and people talk of the god trees at the rim of the world, but when they say they are big you do not really understand how big they are until you see them. Even if only from a distance.”
“They will get bigger still,” said Cahan, “a lot bigger. The trees of Wyrdwood are so massive that they look nearer than they really are. You walk and you walk and they become so big you are sure they can get no bigger, but they do. Eventually their size will steal your breath away, and you will still be far from reaching them. From understanding just how big they are.” More words than he had spoken at one time in many years. He picked up the pace a little, hoping it would keep the monk quiet. He had found, as they walked through Woodedge, that the monk talked a lot. He hoped it was not catching.
“I have heard,” said Udinny − she had quite a high voice that he was beginning to find annoying − “that there are people in the forest that live forever and do nothing but build towers. And no man or woman can understand the use of them.”
“Aye, the swarden. But they are not people.”
“I would like to see a swarden.”
“Pray you do not.”
“Why? I have never heard of them hurting anyone.” She sounded a little out of breath so he walked faster.
“Think on that, monk.” She was quiet while she thought on what he said. He wondered if she would remain silent.
“Oh,” she shouted as they tramped along a path in the scrub. “You mean that only those who are not killed by these swarden ever get to tell about them.” He did not answer. He did not think her words needed an answer. “I suppose many of the creatures of the forest are like that, are they not?” He stopped, and the monk almost walked into him. He turned to find her looking up at him, a smile on her face.
“Do you always talk so much?” he said.
“No,” she said.
“Good,” he turned and began to walk. She followed.
“Mostly I am alone in my travels,” she shouted as she ran to catch up. “So there is little point talking as there is only me to talk to. I very rarely have a companion, so I feel I must catch up on all the talking I have not done whenever I have one.”
“I believe we are, for this journey at least.” She trotted along beside him. “It is good for companions to know a little about each other.” He began to think he knew why she was usually alone. “I have not always been a monk, for instance. I have been many things. I have lived low in the towers with the rich, I have begged on the streets of Tiltspire I have…”
“… had your nose slit for being a thief.” Mention of such a shameful wound would silence most people.
But not the monk Udinny.
“Yes, it is true, an eventful life leaves its scars, and my life has been eventful. I once…”
He stopped again, turning to confront her.
“We are on our way to Harnwood, the start of the true forest, monk.” She nodded, looking around at the scrubby brush and shrubs that marked the end of where Woodedge was no longer tamed by the village grazing their crownheads and harvesting the trees. The growth here was mostly saplings, thin and wiry, reaching up to touch the light in the few hours they were not in the shade of their greater brethren dotted among them. The trees would become thicker and taller the further in they went. Their way would become harder, the paths less obvious, the wood deeper and darker and more dangerous. “The forest and its creatures have little love for us. There is a reason whole armies go in whenever there is treefall in Wyrdwood, and that is because it is not safe for people.” He nodded at the way they would go. The monk only stared at him from wide eyes, still smiling. “Even here in Woodedge, the shallow forest, it can be dangerous. I am sure our search for the child will lead us into Harnwood, maybe even Wyrdwood itself. The best way for us to get in and out alive is not to be noticed.” The monk looked at him, blinked twice.
“It sounds like a grand adventure,” said Udinny, still grinning.
“An adventure likely to get you killed,” he said, and turned, walking on.
“I understand you,” said Udinny, running after him again, “Ranya says, do no harm and do not be harmed.”
“Well, in that she is wise,” said Cahan.
“She is wise in all things,” said Udinny.
“The way will be hard, monk,” he said. “We will try and follow the paths even if they do not seem to go in the right direction, so we do not have to cut our way through the forest. A thing we will only do if there is no other choice. We make no fires, and most of all, we make as little noise as we can.”
“No talking?” she said, tipping her head to one side as she strode along with him.
“Aye, no talking. Or as little as we can get away with.” A flyer landed on the monk’s forehead and she went to slap it. He caught her hand, pulling them both to stop again and brushed the creature off her as softly as he could. “We move through the forest gentle, Udinny, monk of Ranya, as much a part of it as we can be.” She nodded. “We have been following the child’s tracks through the fern, but I have lost it because of your chatter. While I look for it, if you would do something useful look for fallen trees and find yourself a stout staff like mine.” He held up his carved staff. “They are good for moving the vegetation out of the way, it disturbs it less than cutting and will ease your way.” She nodded at him and went to look for a staff, giving him some welcome quiet while he searched for the boy’s path. It was not hard to find, the child was not attempting to conceal his way. Those who are foreststruck do not think to hide their tracks. Cahan found broken branches, a scrap of material caught on a thorn. Then waited until the monk returned. She held two sticks.
“These were just lying there,” she said. “I did not know which one was best.”
“The forest provides.” He took the larger stick from her. “We will leave this one for someone else who needs it.” Udinny nodded and weighed the staff he had left her with, finding the place which was most comfortable for her to hold it. She looked very pleased with it. Cahan called for Segur; the garaur appeared from the underbrush with a histi in its mouth and he took the creature from it, gutted and skinned it, leaving the offal for the scavengers. The monk stared, a question forming on her lips. “The garaur is of the forest, it is natural for it to hunt here.” He used his knife to cut the fillets from the histi and threw the rest of the carcass to Segur, who jumped into the air to catch it then proceeded to crunch the bones up in its strong jaws. Cahan held out a fillet to the monk.
“What do I do with this?” she said, taking it from him. “We cannot cook it, you have said no fires.”
“There are other ways,” said Cahan as he sat on the floor and removed his boots. Then he cut the fillet into two thin strips, wrapped them in leaves and placed one inside each boot. “Do this,” he said, “the action of walking on the meat will cook it, in a way.”
“I do not think I want to eat shoe food,” said the monk.
“Then give yours to Segur,” he said, “but do not complain of hunger this evening.” The forester did not mention the dried meat in his pack. Better the monk got used to trail food now. She stared at him, shook her head, then sat on the ground. She split her fillet as he had and put them in her shoes.
“Let us walk,” said Cahan.
“It is unpleasantly squashy to do so,” said the monk. “I do not think I am going to like being a forester much.”
“You will get used to it,” he told her, and they set off down the path.
The forest was a strange place. You could journey for days within it and get nowhere, and sometimes it was only hours and you were further in than you had ever wanted to be. The child had found the most direct possible route through Woodedge, and they made their way through quickly.
Cahan did not generally like entering the true forest; despite what the villagers thought of him he did it rarely. He travelled to Wyrdwood even less. The life of the forest around him made his skin crawl. He was too aware since he used his cowl to help the trion, Venn, and the forest was a temptation. “As we walk,” he said, to take his mind off the itch of the cowl, “I will be tracking the boy, but the forest provides plenty to eat. Fruit and berries at a height you can reach can be taken at will. If you see a tree that looks like it has been tapped for sap by people or animal then tell me, and we will bleed it a little. But do not dig up roots, it does not like that.”
“What of mushrooms?” she said. “I like a good mushroom.”
“They are mostly fine,” he answered, “though some types will kill you if you eat them, and others will kill you if you so much as touch them.”
“I think,” said the monk, “I may pass on mushrooms.” Cahan smiled to himself.
“And if you see food high up, or gasmaws, or anything that looks like a gasmaw eating from a plant, avoid that plant. Whatever it is will be poisonous to you.”
“Oh,” said Udinny and they stood, blinking while Cahan moved on through the undergrowth.
The air became more chill as the light moved through the sky. They neared the end of Harsh. At the start many of the trees lost their coats, dropping them to the earth but now the first buds and leaves of Least began to push through. It was never truly warm in the north, not since the last tilt, but if the new Cowl-Rai could bring all of Crua under their rule then at midyear, when the light was at its highest, the great sacrifice would be made and the world would tilt again. Warmth and glory would come to the north, and the south would be plunged into the cold. Any northerner would tell you they deserved it for stealing the warmth from the north in the first place. And so it went, again and again, each generation feeding on the resentment of the last while the gods waxed and waned and their priests and monks fought for power.
Fools, all of them. Cahan wanted no part in it.
“How deep will we go?” the monk said, at least she whispered now, though there was no real danger in Woodedge.
“The boy has a good start on us.” He pulled a branch nearer, the thin twigs on the end broken where someone had passed. The buds were a beautiful pink colour. “We will go as deep as we need to. If you wish to turn back, monk, now is the time. By tomorrow we will be in Harnwood, and it is dangerous to be there alone if you do not know its ways. You will not be able to go back.”
“Ranya sent you to me. I will stay with you.”
Cahan nodded, and they carried on along the path. Fewer saplings grew, replaced by more mature trees and the ferns and small bushes that grew between them thickened. The air became heavy with the verdant scent of growing things. Mosses and vines crowded the branches of trees and hung from them in streamers, ropes and blankets. Cahan heard forest creatures moving, calling to each other, branches shook as beasts jumped from one tree to another. Nothing of it felt out of place. This was normal and normal in the forest was good. The real danger came from things that were other, they lived by their own rules. The animals were understandable, motivated by hunger or fear, the other less so. But here in Woodedge they were unlikely to find them, even though orits had been found near Harn. That worried him. They were beasts of Harnwood, natural ones, but to be out of Harnwood was not right for them.
Cahan used his staff to move aside branches loaded with moisture which fell in a pearlescent rain. He pushed through undergrowth as they headed down a run worn by the forest creatures, passing through arching tunnels of fern thick with cloying pollen that dusted their clothes and made Udinny sneeze. Such paths were mostly made by wild crownheads, smaller and faster than the domesticated version, and shy, as together with the stilt-legged raniri they were hunted by almost everything. The trees grew taller and he stopped looking only in front of them, but now looked above, too. Through the canopy he could see the dark green lines of floatvine twisting round trunks and branches until it reached the tops, and from there it grew straight up to wave in the circle winds, bulbous bladder leaves on either side holding it in the air. With the floatvine came the myriad creatures that fed on it, and the creatures that fed on them – all some type of gasmaw, bladder-backed and tentacled. He stopped, putting out a hand and stopping the monk also, then crouched down among the ferns.
“What is it?”
“Gasmaws,” he told her quietly.
“They are harmless,” she sounded confused. “I have seen them in towns and…”
“They are not harmless,” he said. “You have only seen them domesticated, made safe.” Eight gasmaws came into view, floating between the trees. They were large, much larger than the juveniles bred in the pens, their stinging tentacles removed.
They were the same shape as the domestic ones; a large lozenge-shaped gasbag made up most of their bodies, covered by almost white skin that could change colour to hide them within the vegetation. Tentacles grew from their heads, four for manipulation and four that hung down, trailing through the air. Behind the tentacles were the gasmaws’ eyes, one facing down, one up, and two forward, though the number of eyes on gasmaws varied wildly.
“Made safe?” said Udinny.
“The trailing tentacles you see.” He pointed at the tentacles hanging lank and limp beneath the gasmaws. “They are removed on domesticated ones as they are poisonous.” The monk looked alarmed. “They would probably not kill us, but they hurt, and they scar, and can make you sick for days on end.” He pulled up his sleeve to show a thick line across the skin of his arm. “That is a gasmaw burn.”
“What do we do?”
“We wait,” said Cahan, “see how round they are?” Udinny nodded. “It means they eat plants, we are of no interest to them if we do not bother them. They will pass on.” One of the gasmaws stopped at a tree, its tentacles searching the trunk for food while the rest of the herd moved away. After a while of searching and finding nothing that interested it, the gasmaw floated away, the faint hiss of air from the vents on its back driving it forward. It left a floral smell in the air that was faintly narcotic and made the songs of the flyers in the trees sound sweeter. He turned to the monk, less used to such things, and found her eyes had glazed over.
Something shot out of a tree, like a gasmaw but sleeker, skin mottled in light and shade. Its stinging tentacles shooting forward, piercing the grazing gasmaw, which made a strange, high-pitched bleating sound. Manipulatory tentacles fought the attacker, but not for long, and the predator pulled it close, sharp beak grinding into the body of the dying creature.
“A spearmaw. The poison of that one,” he said to Udinny, “that would kill us. And it will hunt us if it sees us.” He grabbed her arm and pulled her on further into the wood. She was still wide-eyed from the gasmaw narcotic, or maybe in shock from the sudden violence they had witnessed in the canopy.
“It would eat us?” said Udinny.
“Aye, given a chance,” said Cahan.
“That it can eat us, but we cannot eat it seems unfair,” said the monk.
“They cannot live off our flesh,” whispered Cahan. “They simply enjoy the hunt.”
“Such is life in Crua,” said Udinny, and they moved on.
They spent the day following the boy’s trail. He went in an almost straight line where the wood allowed him; when it did not he tracked back and forth along paths until he was going in the direction he wanted. Always north, always towards Harnwood and Wyrdwood.
Cahan stopped them in a clearing where four trees had been brought down by something. Whatever it was it had done it long ago, two years at least from the size of the saplings growing in the gap and the bright fungus and waving ferns growing over the fallen trunks. The forest glade was dappled with light from above, grassed with dense, short grass that was spongy underfoot. Whether it was an illusion, because the break in the trees let in more of the slowly dying light than when they had been under cover of the wood he did not know, but this place felt good. Safe. Most places in Woodedge, Harnwood or Wyrdwood left him feeling nothing; they simply were. But some felt oppressive, dark, and he had quickly learned to avoid them. However, he liked it here and that was enough for them to stop. Walking round the clearing he found he was not the only one who had felt that way. There was the remains of a nest in the grass, the faint shape of a small body and around it the stones from some of the fruit hanging heavy from the trees.
“Something lives here,” said the monk. She sounded nervous. Cahan shook his head.
“No, the boy slept here, that is the shape of a child in the grass.” Udinny crouched down and stared at the nest.
“Or it could be a rootling,” said the monk.
“Maybe, but I think it was the boy. Either way, they would not stay here if it was not safe.”
“A mystery to me how you can tell, Cahan Du-Nahere, but I believe you.”
“We should sleep here,” he told her. “I think our journey will be long and the light will die soon. Tomorrow we will be in Harnwood.” He looked up. “It seems the fruit of these trees is safe to eat.”
“I have been waiting for you to say we should stop,” the monk said. She looked at the fruit suspiciously then sat, cross-legged. “I do not think I have walked so far in such a determined fashion in my whole life.” She began to pull at her boots, seemingly untroubled by news of how close Harnwood was.
“Get used to walking, it will only get harder.” He sat a good length away from her and whistled for Segur. The garaur came bounding out of the forest. If it felt any tiredness it did not show it.
“I think my feet may fall off,” said Udinny, finally pulling off her boot and almost falling over backwards. Cahan’s boot slid off easily and he reached in and took out one of the meat fillets. It was soft and warm to the touch, but the action of walking on it all day had made it palatable. The monk watched as he took a bite then she reached into her boot and took out one of the fillets he had given her. She sniffed it and made a face.
“It need not smell good to fuel you,” he told her. She took a small bite. Her eyebrows raised and she nodded to herself.
“This is surprisingly tasty for something that smells of feet. I have eaten worse.” She took another bite and then said, through a mouthful of meat, “I do not like how your creature is staring at me.” The garaur was indeed staring intently at her, strings of saliva falling from its jaws.
“Segur is hungry.”
The monk ripped a bit of meat off the fillet and moved towards Segur, stopping when it let out a low growl.
“A fine way to react to someone who is bringing you dinner,” the monk said. Segur stood taller on its stubby legs and hissed. The monk raised her hands. “Very well, you are as antisocial as your master.” She threw the meat to Segur and it was snapped out of the air. “Cahan,” she said, “I have some sweetcakes in my pack,” the monk pointed at it, “will you growl at me like your beast if I offer you one?”
Despite himself, he found he could not suppress a smile.