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Reaching into the wound in her chest delicately, Ashlynn extracted a small, delicate seed that had grown seemingly hundreds of tiny roots.

Gingerly, with her eyes closed tightly against the pain that felt as though she were pulling the bones out of her chest one by one, she tugged the seed free of her own heart.

As she did, her bow-shaped lips moved from one word to the next, her voice speaking in a steady rhythm to guide the energy toward the person who would come to bear the seed she’d nurtured all these months.

"By wood’s deep strength and sentinel’s stance,

Where guardian’s shield and power advance,

This seed of might, forged firm and true,

Holds gifts of magic, from me to you.

Beside my heart it learned to stand,

With balanced powers at your command."

When Ashlynn chose the Cypress tree for Ollie, she didn’t just choose any cypress seed.

There were a number of varieties available in Amahle’s vast library of seeds, and so Ashlynn chose the one that she felt would offer Ollie the greatest flexibility in choosing his path.

Already, she felt like she’d taken far too firm a hand with him, tearing him away from the life he had known and the parents who loved him.

When it came to his seed, though there were some things that she would decide for him, what she most wanted to give to Ollie was the ability to choose for himself how he would develop his witchcraft.

Where Heila’s seed of witchcraft was anchored in the Willow’s strengths of wood and water, Ollie’s seed contained great power and strength of wood, but it kept the other elements in near-perfect balance.

While some cypress trees kept their needles evergreen year-round, Ollie’s seed had come from a tree that turned flame red in the autumn, shedding its needles and growing them back fresh and even stronger the following spring.

With needles that would dance and burn in the wind and roots that sank deep into water and soil, he could bridge between many forms of magic and find a path that belonged to him and him alone.

The seed contained everything Ashlynn wanted to give the young knight.

The strength and might of wood to shield himself from harm, the cycle of rebirth and renewal that came each year to restore himself from the wounds he might suffer in the battles to come, and the infinate possibilities to go in any direction he chose, fighting where he believed it was right to make his stand and protecting any who were precious to him.

When she took that seed, containing all of the power and strength along with the hopes and cares she’d placed within it over the past several months, it seemed almost eager to reach out to Ollie, extending its roots toward the wound in his chest even before she could place the seed in his chest.

For Ollie, the pain of receiving the seed was greater than anything he’d ever felt in his life. Worse than accidental kitchen burns, and far, far worse than any injury he’d ever suffered when training with Thane and Marcel in the months since coming to the Vale of Mists.

The roots of the seed burrowed deep into his chest, like white hot awls, piercing into his flesh and twisting, writing ever deeper until they wrapped around his heart, pulling the seed into his flesh.

The pain didn’t stop there, however. Instead, each time his heart beat, he felt like the pain radiated outward, following the flow of his blood as it radiated out to every inch of his body.

The pain was so great that, no matter how stoic and strong he wanted to appear before his liege lady and ’big sister’ Heila, he surrendered to the pain, throwing his head back and howling in agony.

"AAAAAAARRRRRRGGGGG!!!"

Standing outside the circle, Virve flinched at Ollie’s cry, her claws unconsciously digging into the blankets she held, waiting for the ritual to end so she could help him rest.

The young man hadn’t made a sound during Thane’s powerful blows, not even when that third strike had knocked the wind from him had resulted in more than a grunt as he struggled to regain his breath.

She’d seen seasoned soldiers cry out under less punishment than the heavy slaps handed out by the vampire knight, yet Ollie had stood tall and stoic through it all.

But this... this was different.

The veteran soldier’s eyes remained fixed on the seed burrowing into Ollie’s chest, her eyes trembling as she tried to imagine what it must feel like for the young man to roar in such agony.

She’d endured arrow wounds, blade cuts, and once, a crushing blow that had cracked the bones of her forearm, leaving her in a brace for almost a year while it healed.

Pain had been her constant companion through decades of service, leaving a map of scars across her fur-covered body. Yet watching Ollie’s face contort in agony, she wondered if any of her experiences would prepare her for what awaited her when her turn came.

Would the Oak seed feel different than this Cypress one? Would her years of learning to endure and push through pain during battle serve her any better? Or would she, too, be reduced to primal howls, limited to wailing like a newborn cub before the power of Lady Ashlynn’s witchcraft?

"It’s okay, Little Brother," Heila whispered, stroking his back gently with one hand while the other supported him, keeping him from toppling over as the seed spread its roots throughout his body.

"Let it out," she said softly, releasing a spill of gentle silver-green energy from her hand on his back, numbing his body and easing the pain.

"Rrrrrggghhh," Ollie groaned through gritted teeth, screwing his eyes shut against the pain and trying to endure even as his heart began to race and strange energy began to flow through his body.

At times, the energy was calm, like the still water of a pond in summer, and warm, like the flames of a cookfire.

Other times, it was fierce, like the stinging winds of winter, howling from somewhere dark and terrifying, carrying with it the sounds of whispering voices whose words were too faint to understand.

But no matter how tightly he shut his eyes or covered his ears, there was no escape from the wave of forces tearing through his body, burrowing into his flesh and melding with his very bones as the roots of the seed spread within him.

"There’s no shame in surrendering now," Heila said gently, reaching up to wipe sweat from his brow and pulling his forehead down to touch hers so she could ease the strain that tortured his mind. "The first part is over. Let me carry away the pain while you rest."

"By willow’s touch where gentle branches sway,

Sweet rest and comfort wash all pains away."

Heila’s lips trembled as she spoke, her mind consumed with the effort of easing Ollie’s pain without disrupting the ritual, but slowly, as she held her ’little brother’ close, the tremors wracking his body subsided and he slowly drifted off to sleep in her arms.

"Virve," Ashlynn said, pressing a hand to the wound on her own chest and releasing a steady stream of emerald magic to slow the flow of blood.

"It’s safe for you to enter the circle now," she explained as the ghostly cypress tree and the rippling pool of energy were drawn into Ollie’s slumbering body, fueling the transformation taking place even now within him. "Help Heila, lay him down."

"Yes, my lady," Virve said, rushing forward with the soft blankets that Ashlynn had prepared for this night. Unintentionally, her claws had punctured the blankets in one or two places, leaving small holes as testaments to how anxious she’d been watching Ollie struggle through the ritual.

Ashlynn smiled softly while she focused on her own injuries.

She watched Virve and Heila gently wrap the blanket around Ollie and ease him into a comfortable position to sleep.

It wasn’t the same as the way Heila had faced her own trial, but the differences weren’t because Ashlynn looked down on Ollie’s strength, or because she intended to baby him through this trial.

For Heila, lying out on a sandy island in the middle of the Briar might have been acceptable in the midst of the summer heat, but Ashlynn had no intention of making Ollie’s trial any harder on him than it needed to be.

The cold and damp of the Vale of Mists would quickly sap Ollie’s strength if they didn’t care for him while he faced the trials that Ashlynn had prepared.

And while knights like Sir Thane might see resisting the elements as a proper, knightly or perhaps a manly method of meeting their struggle during the vigil, when it came to the rituals of joining her coven, Ashlynn had a distinctly more ’motherly’ approach.

Already, Ollie’s eyes had fallen shut, and his mind had been drawn into the seed of witchcraft within his chest. The trials he would face there would be hard enough. From now until he emerged successfully, it would be Heila’s job to care for him, as a big sister watching over her little brother.

She would have help, of course. Milo would be allowed to return in the morning, and Ashlynn was certain that others would come to stand with him as well.

She herself would visit as often as she could, but unfortunately, they had too little time for her to spend every minute standing watchfully over the young man’s trial.

She would stay with him until close to sunrise, and then, she would set things in motion for the next member of her coven.

After all, it would be best for Virve and Ollie to complete their trails close together so they could grow and learn at the same time.

All she had to do was visit the Ancient Oak, and hope that it didn’t harbor any of the lingering dangers that had come along with the Ancient Willow.

If it did, then Virve’s trial would be at least twice as hard as Ollie’s... and if that were the case, then the veteran soldier’s success was anything but guaranteed.