Page 98 of Shifting Hearts

THREE

DAGAN

A single footfall at the edge of my trees awoke me from my unending slumber.

I could have slept within my standing form for a night, or an eternity.

Time meant little to me within the stoic boughs of my forest. I let out a sigh that rippled through the leaves from the center all the way to the edges of the forest. There, sunlight warmed my edges.

Here in the center where the shadows were darkest, I remained cool.

Another footfall rumbled the ground beneath my roots, jerking me out of my inertia.

I hadn’t expected to see her until after the sun rose to its zenith, letting my conscience sink deep to my roots.

My coolest, quietest place. But the arrival of a presence between my trees, the first step beyond the light—that intrusion brought me back to an aching, present state that I resented.

Only in sleep could I rid myself of the need to touch her, to bind her to my trees and watch her struggle and make soft sounds that would ease the pain of existing here for so, so long.

Once I’d a woodsman, living alongside the forest’s creatures that overpopulated the grove with their calls and playfulness. Once, I loved, and my trees were fruitful, their shadows few, their branches strong and healthy.

And then I watched the children be taken, one by one by one.

The life of one tree for me, though it took centuries of what became their lives.

This place was a twisted playground for hidden things.

Curses that I unknowingly rent deep in the soil as I held a child in my arms, one who ran and ran and ran, but who never made it out of the shadows.

For a while, I kept their secrets, those who stole the children, until I, too, was as twisted and dark as the evils I harbored.

Then I watched.

And I savored.

All the things that I understood about the world as I retreated from it in disgust.

Because once I fought. Once, I protected.

Until one day it became too much. My axe grew too heavy, laden with the sins of those I cut down in favor of saving the lives of those who walked the paths through the darkwood that were no longer clear to me.

My legs grew heavy, rooting into the soil, until I could not walk. Then, I retreated into myself.

The paths disappear. The forest grew dark. No animals lived here. And the children who were brought through my trees were no safer than ever before.

I slept and the years… passed.

A shiver passed over me at the oldest memories. The ripple didn’t make it as far as the edge of the forest, the rustle of leaves limited to this grove. Unfortunately the wolf was right in his pithy, short lived existence.

I never touched, and I never interacted with those who entered my trees.

Not anymore. Not until her.

Bryn.

I heard her name once, spoken by the children. Usually they didn’t learn her name, with her too short a time. They knew nothing about her at all except that she traveled between the trees and that with her alone, they were safe.

Like they used to be with me.

Unless they had done something wrong. Something abhorrent to earn their punishment.

Runaways. Unable to behave. Shut up. Sit still.

All the things adults expected of children that they often couldn't do because of the pure energy bursting out of them that nature provided. .

My leaves whispered their secrets to me. I stored each one away for safekeeping, and remembered everything.

One footstep, and I knew exactly who tread my paths, rearranging them just for her as she needed them, never doubling up on a path that she already knew, a puzzle just for her.

Reaching through my roots and shifting the ground beneath her with the faintest tremble I created new twists and turns through the trees.

Waited for the hint of scarlet she often wore to stain the shadows I couldn’t let her escape.

Paths that led not to the other side of the forest, but to me.

What the fuck am I doing?

The wolf’s vernacular had infected me. I wasn’t the predatory one. Wolf took that mantle on with the pride of his kind. But me? I didn’t want to devour her. I wanted her as my…

Plaything.

My leaves whispered above her head as Bryn strode determinedly forward. Her chin lifted, defiance lit of their own kind of flame within her eyes.

Absolutely perfect.

I might have smiled, should my trees have let me. Instead, I let her reach the first forked path, a distance from the forest’s edge where no one would hear her sounds before I raked my gnarled fingers through her hair from above.

Bryn screamed, and ran. Or perhaps she tried to run, but her feet weren’t quite on the ground anymore. I let her dangle like that, a breath above the earth, screaming and failing at nothing at all.

Then I let her go.

She tumbled to a heap in the dirt, small and fragile and warm.

Her trembling form lunged forward and shrank back all at once, not cowed like I might have expected.

Breaths came fast as she swiped at the stilled air around her.

I laughed softly, gusting wind around her in tiny eddies that picked at her hair, the seams of her clothes in the most intimate of caresses without being there at all.

She batted at her clothes, panting softly, and wrapped that pretty red cloak around herself like it might offer herself some form of protection.

What is it the wolfman said at times like these?

Ah, of course.

Spoilers. She was wrong.

Stepping from tree to tree I reached out, patting her soothingly.

Bryn’s head snapped up. “Stop!” she shrieked, waving her hands at the nothingness above her head, where I had been mere breaths before, but didn’t stay to torment her.

Or maybe I did, but not there. My laughter strained through my trees, a creaking sound I could not stop.

Breath interested me. I no longer used air the way she did, coveting it away inside her body only to expel it seconds later in a poisonous cloud. I wondered what would happen if I cut her air off, if only for a second.

While I was lost in my head of fantasies, the girl beneath me ran. Sprinted like a dryad who found her feet. She pounded the cold soil of my indifference, curved around corners I created just for her, leading her to the absolute center of my forest where she had never been before.

And there she stopped. Right where I stood in human and tree form in the middle of the clearing. The darkwood's heart. There, my skin marled with the patterns of ten thousand trees, she found me.

Right where the paths ran out in a star pattern, every one leading her to this place. As she stepped into the grove that was nothing more than a patch of bare, sunken earth, my trees closed around her in a tight circle blocking out every exit except for the one who would come to find her later.

“What the hell are you,” she panted. Whitened knuckles gripped her sides in fists, ready for that fight or flight response she expected from her body, when it chose to do neither.

I frowned, throwing one gnarled hand out as though to catch her fingers.

Her soft skin contacted my harder form, a clash of sensation.

I creaked as she gasped. Taking care not to splinter her fragile form, I uncurled her fists from where she clutched at her skin until it bulged beneath her thin dress, the cloak torn and shredded in her flight across the forest floor.

Reaching deep, I drew every fragment of her red cloak to me, gathering the pieces of cloth like breadcrumbs of her trail from her flight.

Coveted pieces for my collection of memories of her, and stored them in a hollow tree for later, the scent of her within me.

A shot of need coursed through my branches and my creaks grew louder. Deeper .

Bryn crept forward as I retreated into my solid form, urging her closer. I couldn’t touch her again in this place until she reached me, and I didn’t think either of us were ready for that just yet.

Another step brought her almost within reaching range.

“Stop that.” My voice creaked through the sunken grove. Not quite a whisper, a mere thought creeping across my leaves.

But she heard my strange voice. Like the wolf heard me.

And she answered.

“Stop what?” Bryn stared around wildly.

Her ruined scarlet cape fluttered weakly behind her in a n incomplete spiral.

She followed its path in reverse, almost subconsciously, turning on her bare feet to note the emptiness of the grove, the lack of escape route before her gaze rested on me.

The only thing left that might have spoken to her.

The tree with a face, if not quite a body.

“What are you?” Her breaths panted faster, though she tried to control them, closing her mouth so the air puffed from her nostrils instead.

“I am the trees.” I watched her, letting an alien smile curve my lips. My whispery voice filled the clearing enclosed on every side with thick trunks, impossible even for her slight form to slip between.

A place where escape was unimaginable without help.

Here the ground was stained slightly darker than the rest of the forest. This was a place of sacrifice.

Wolf was right. I cracked first.

He should have bargained harder.

But after a few millennia, even a tree god grows bored.

“You are where you are meant to be,” I murmured, sliding forward on toes of roots, scraping the earth, drawing deep rants in the ground beyond me. Tiny roots sprang from the tips to carry me forward as she stumbled backward.

A base creation, I decided, as, rather than watch me in horror, Bryn’s dark gaze that matched my shadows narrowed.

“You’re the one who’s been touching me. Haven’t you,” she hissed her accusation.

My little fallen leaf trembled. But not with the fear I anticipated.

But with fury.

“So strong. So… I don’t know your word,” I whispered.

It had been too long since I spoke her language to anyone other than the wolf, and our conversations were scant enough.

I talked only to my trees, and we only spoke of what was necessary.

He circled me in a dance I understood. Bare feet crossed over one another as I glided closer, reaching out.

So soon my branches like fingers would contact her skin, feel its softness depress beneath my hardened surfaces.

Then I would haul her into the air and?—

“You really can’t keep your hands to yourself, can you?”

The brittle announcement from the singular exit I left open, hidden behind one heavy trunk and invisible to Bryn from where we stood, broke through our playtime.

“Wolf.” I sighed, letting my arms sink. Every action seemed heavier than it should be as though even this moment sucked away the last of my connection to the human before me.

My roots touched the floor, sinking into the earth that parted for me, understanding my needs.

I stretched higher, aiming toward the canopy but not reaching it.

Just tall enough to gaze down upon them both as I retreated yet again.

“My furry friend. You have never been the patient one.”

“Look who’s talking, treeman.” The wolf shook his head. His blackened eyes fixed not on me, but on her.

Our prey.

Bryn stared between us. Her neck snapped side to side as she backed away from my increasing girth. I dug my roots deeper into the soil, fixing myself in place and enjoyed her terror.

This twisted creature I had become. Was this what she wanted, or were we taking from the only pure being in this place?

But from what the wolf described earlier of her nighttime activities when everyone else but both herself and him were asleep, I knew our Bryn was far from pure.

The wolf stepped into her space. His true form fluctuated under the skin that contained his beast, rippling outward until fur consumed him, one inch at a time.

“What the fuck is he? And you—” Bryn’s scream left my forest rippling in a different sort of shudder.

A grayed palm slapped over her mouth, cutting off her breath. My trees stilled as I watched their interaction with curiosity. Unmoving, sinking deeper into the earth and reconnecting with my forest.

Wolf might think he succeeded in stealing her from me, but this was my realm, and neither of them would walk away unscathed.

Wolf wasn’t the only one who watched her. Craved the female he held still in his arms when she should be writhing and screaming. Running .

His eyes glittered as he stared at her, and my branches moved softly.

Perhaps we could… Share.