Chapter 14
I had a suite almost to myself and I was alone in the inner bedroom. I was alone in the inner bedroom where the walls were of white marble with a sparkling surface that glowed with ambient shine lighting up the room as bright as overhead lamps. There were veins of gold through the walls that I suspected were real gold. The crown molding and floor baseboards were of burled wood with twisting holes through it that rang with a melodic hum like a base horn and were icy cold to the touch. The floors were a reddish wood inlaid with knurls that looked like polished eyes and scattered rugs akin to Persian masterpieces graced the large expanse of bare floors. I recognized them from my Mom‘s drooling over reproductions at Ethan Allan‘s. The outer rooms were not so fine, underfoot with guards, waiters, maids and courtiers, all intent on servicing my needs and whims. Save for the one thing I really wanted and they couldn‘t give me back, my Mom and Dad.
The bed was a queen-sized four poster with a deep pile mattress that made me feel as if I was in a boat. I almost needed two steps to get into it. The sheets were satin, and I slid around as if I were greased. The coverlet was filled with feathers and smelled like honey and sunshine, all in a pale gold that complimented the walls. I sank into the mattress and suppressed a giggle as I almost disappeared.
I slept like the dead, never noticed them coming in every two hours to check on me. I didn‘t notice when they removed my boots and clothes. They let me sleep for six whole uninterrupted hours and woke me by gently rubbing my shoulder.
I turned over, pulled the covers over my head and promptly ignored those trying to wake me. This elicited a stronger response, which consisted of someone pulling the covers off me entirely, and as the cold hit me, I sat up complaining bitterly. "Okay, I‘m awake, Mom!" I yelled and paused in confusion as I looked around at a score of strange faces that stared expectantly from all three sides of the bed. "What‘s up?" I asked the man I knew, the one called Revenal Jurist or something. He stepped forward with a robe.
"We need you to speak to the Elders, Jadewyn," he announced.
"I‘ll speak to them whoever they are," I muttered under my breath. "Don‘t know what I‘ll say, though." I got up disdaining the robe and pulled on the clothing I‘d worn the day before. I had no idea what time it was or even what day. When I was finished dressing, I went to the door and stood waiting for them. He opened it and the honor guard surrounded me as I followed them out into the corridor that led deeper into the heart of this massive skyscraper.
It could have been a conference room; it was as large as a ballroom and its ceiling soared over our heads towards what looked like skylights. A huge tree split the middle, growing straight up like a telephone pole before it split into branches like the ribs of an umbrella. The leaves were golden and round, with a curious green spot in the center making it appear that the tree had a million eyes watching softly on those below. It gave off the odor of the air after a thunderstorm, acrid, but not unpleasant, clean and crisp.
As I stepped under it, I noticed two things---that my escort stopped and went around so that they were not beneath the tree‘s shadow and that as soon as I did, the ting shifted and leaves began to fall from the crown‘s great height landing in a circle around me. Everything ceased. The sounds of a busy workplace, voices, machines, the rustling of a wind that I had only heard subliminally.
"Well, this is just too weird," I muttered and it got weirder. All of the...men around me dropped to their knees and slapped their hand to the left shoulder in a salute. Sort of like the Romans did to their Centurions.
"Uh, dudes, what‘s going on?" My voice echoed down the long room and hung out there like a lone crow in the snow. My answers came from behind me, and I swiveled around to stare at four incredibly old men in fancy business suits. They bore a decided resemblance to wise old monkeys. Not dark haired like Revenal but gray, they stood taller than those around me and clearly were not of the same genetic stock as the Dursvan. Their eyes were a luminous green, a green as deep as ocean water and as mysterious as those depths. Without an iris. Green like my own strange eyes.
"It has been millennium since the Great Tree has seen fit to grant us here favors, My Lord," the nearest said and bending at the waist in both a reach and a bow, he picked up a handful of the leaves. Handing them out, he dispensed them to the approaching Dursvan, the other Elders and me.
I turned it over and found that it resembled my coin. "What do I do with this?" I watched as the others slowly placed the leaves in their mouths and chewed. They must have been some kind of drug because the looks on their faces were ecstatic and blissful. Only the old dudes did not show such effect as the leaves passed their lips. I was afraid to try it until I noticed that it was melting in my hand and left a tingling that filled me with warmth and a longing for something I could not express.
"You are the Guardian of the Tree, Jadewyn. It is the source of Power for the Seillach Pangorum, the wielder of all strings you so effortlessly follow."
"What if the tree is destroyed?" I asked and walked up to the trunk. It was larger than I thought and the air around it seemed thicker, richer, more like walking through water. He followed me but came no closer than twenty feet from the smooth iron colored bark. It was as thick around as ten men, straight as an arrow and when I touched it, my hand burned at the amazing heat that rushed up its length. I muffled a scream and tried to pull my hand away. I could not. Struggled.
I fell to my knees and landed on soft grass-like stuff that was the color of rubies. Images flared through my head and I could see them flowing down the tree‘s veins into my hand and up my arm to explode behind my eyes with mercy or subtlety. I saw my mother, my birth mother, not a queen or a ruler but a simple woman with a strange predilection for a warrior‘s life and as a trainer of soldiers. She was very good at it and there, she met and wooed my father. He was a noble‘s son sent to learn the art of warfare and was an apt pupil of both the arts of love and war.
So, my mother, Madaras Ethelyn became pregnant with me. An event that never happened with trainees because they were chosen before puberty and treated so that such could not happen. Yet, here I was.
I saw their early years together, felt her joy and happiness as he followed her campaigns.
Felt her sorrow when he returned to his family demesnes and she would not go with him. He vowed to return for both of us when the war he fought was over. Instead, word came that he was murdered before he reached his castle‘s safety and Druz were on their way to take his son and wife.
She broke her contract, snatched me and ran, ran for a year until that day in the forest where the Druz had cornered and killed her. She had used the last bit of her essence and the Seillach coin to pull both of us away from the Druz assassin and hide in the pit on another plane.
It took great power and the essence of a life to travel from one Plane to another. Unless you had the Seillach Coin, the knowledge and the means to use the Power of the Tree to open the Gate.
I understood their language now. In my head was a riotous mix of many languages, giving me a headache that left me sick to my stomach. I felt my hand slip from the trunk and I hugged it to my chest until I could bear to look at it. In the center of the palm was a red burn that looked like the coin. Before my eyes, it faded to become a white scar itching until even that faded. I looked up, saw that the entire assemblage was still gathered at the edge of the tree‘s shadow and were staring at me.
"Jadewyn?"
"How much time has passed?" My voice was rusty and hoarse. I sat up wearily.
"I do not understand," the oldest frowned.
"How long have I been laying here?" I rose to my feet and felt no worse than if I had slept too long.
"You fell down only seconds ago. Since you entered the Tree‘s space, it has been only a short time. Mere minutes."
I stepped out of the thick air and stared into his eyes. I saw no deceit there. "Who are you?"
"I am Oriel, the Keeper of the Tree, the oldest of the Elders. You would call me a...priest or perhaps a scribe. We keep the records and lore of the Tree. To answer your question, the Tree cannot be destroyed."
"Can it be controlled?" I asked.
He nodded. "You spoke to her?"
I shook my head ruefully. I had a headache, a migraine. "She pushed things into my mind. Images, memories and languages."
"Follow and I will bring you to our rooms where we will explain the rest and I will arrange for some tea and medication for your headache."
So off we went towards the end of the hall and a room barely large enough for the entire group. In it was a large table, a few chairs and nothing else.
I sat and the others followed. Oriel spoke to one of those seated and he left, to return presently with a crystal pitcher of water and a bottle of Tylenol, which he opened and sat next to me. I hesitated.
"I assure you, they are not drugs other than what they proclaim to be. I thought you would prefer something from your own experienced plane rather than from your true home."
"Bring me a sealed bottle," I said and out the door went the...man. He came back with four still plastic sealed as were several bottles of water. I chose one at random, opened the inner seal and swallowed them dry. I went through the same procedure with the bottles of water and finished them off in four swallows. My stomach gurgled as the water hit it. Oriel raised a hand and images of another existence hovered over the table. He showed me the hone world of the Druz, my own and how they had wreaked havoc on a plane that had known no such warfare in a thousand lifetimes until the Druz had invaded looking for the way to return to their own world.
"Why don‘t I just show them the way and exile them on it?" I asked. They stared at me.
"They would not go and only bring their entire world back to as many others so they could destroy those, too."
I shuddered. Their world was dark and sadistic, not a place I wished even on the worst of this world. "What do you expect me to do?" I asked. "I‘m only a fifteen year old kid."
"You are the Holder, the Wielder of Strings. Through your hands run the life cord of every living thing. You carry the Seillach Pangorum, you are tied to the Tree." He looked puzzled as if I should have all the answers.
"I don‘t know the way to their home...plane. Before a few months ago, I didn‘t even know they existed. I don‘t know what I‘m supposed to do, what you want me to do." It came out a pathetic wail.
"You will know what is right when the time comes," he patted my hand as he showed me other images of the life and hierarchy of my mother‘s world until I understood the life and culture. Somewhere in the midst of his lessons, I fell asleep.