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"Sir Ignatious," Ashlynn called over her shoulder as she faced the crowd. "Could you do me a favor and extinguish all the flames in the hall save for the fires in the hearths?"

"With ease, my lady," the fallen inquisitor said, stretching out his hand before suddenly making a fist, as if he was snatching a mosquito out of the air.

In an instant, countless flames on the chandeliers throughout the hall were snuffed out, plunging the great hall into a soft darkness broken only by the flickering, golden light of the fires burning in the hearths that kept the autumn chill outside from creeping into the festive great hall.

Nodding her thanks to the powerful vampire, Ashlynn called even more power to her hands, holding them up high before hurling the energy down at floor in front of the raised dais.

There, her energy flowed smoothly into a large circle, painted on the floor with a mixture of cedar sap and wood ash before the freshly cut cedar boughs were laid down for the celebration.

Her emerald energy flowed like green flames all the way around the circle before flowing across the circle in a series of interconnected lines.

As the flames spread, several eldritch runes appeared within the design, representing ’change’, ’strength’ and ’light.

’ As impressive as the circle was, however, it was only a guide to help her shape and strengthen the magic she was preparing to unleash.

Spreading her arms out wide, as if to encompass the entire hall, Ashlynn began to speak, filling her voice with the power to bend wood to her will and calling on the final traces of life that still lingered in the freshly felled cedar boughs.

"Cedar branches, mountain-born,

Though from your mother tree you’re torn,

The power flows in every grain,

Through drought and flood, through sun and rain,

Still holding the essence of your grace,

Now lend your power to this place."

Throughout the hall, every branch and fallen cedar bough began to glow with dull green aura.

The traces of energy that each branch held offered themselves up to Ashlynn’s desire, flowing toward the magic circle at the front of the great hall and mingling with her energy there.

The two energies never mixed, but instead swirled around each other, as if Ashlynn’s energy was welcoming the earthy, wooden cedar power as a partner in a complex, intricate dance.

At tables across the hall, nearly everyone with even a little bit of knowledge of sorcery stood up from their seats, leaning forward to watch Ashlynn’s great working with an interest that went far beyond mere professional courtesy.

For a sorcerer, a few words were often enough to bind their power to their will and give it shape, but Ashlynn used an entire verse as well as a circle on the ground and yet her witchcraft was only just beginning to give shape to the power of the world!

At the head of the hall, Ashlynn’s soft smile widened as she felt the cedar’s energy dancing across her hands.

It was eager, playful, almost like a kitten delighting in the simple joy of having a partner to play with and eager for the real game to begin.

Now, however, was the moment when things became the most delicate as she moved from calling forth the energy of the cedar boughs to giving them new form.

"Let grain flow smooth as water’s course,

While heartwood bends to shaping force.

What once stood separate, now unite,

In forms that dance before my sight.

Through cedar’s will and witch’s art,

Let wood reshape, each willing part."

This time, when Ashlynn spoke, it wasn’t merely energy that flowed across the hall, but the cedar branches themselves.

Several startled cries echoed across the hall as branches moved underfoot, flowing across the hall as though they were caught on a fisherman’s string being pulled toward the glowing circle at the front of the hall.

Lifting her arms up in front of her, Ashlynn clutched her hands into fists pressed up against each other before slowly pulling them apart.

As he hands moved, the fresh, green cedar needles were stripped from the branches, swirling in the air and dancing on an unseen wind that prevented them from falling to the ground while Ashlynn focused on the branches themselves.

Soon, the branches began to bend and twist, braiding themselves into something that resembled the trunk of a tree at the center of the large magic circle.

Ashlynn’s hands danced through the air, weaving the rich, warm cedar energy through her fingers like ribbons, guiding the energy into a new shape that matched the vision in her mind.

Before the wide eyes of the audience, the bark on the cedar branches seemed to melt like wax before flowing like glue over the separate branches.

Where the flowing bark passed, it left behind branches that were not only smooth and polished, but wood that looked like it had been fused into a single piece with looping whorls of woodgrain in patterns that seemed to carry a trace of the magic circle’s inner structure

Once the ’tree trunk’ had grown to a diameter of five paces and stood just over ten feet tall, Ashlynn changed the motion of her hands, spreading the energy wider and forming it into an ever-growing disk.

The cedar branches bent and twisted to her will, flattening themselves out as they flowed together, forming a platform that was nearly twenty paces across.

The surface was perfectly smooth and glowed with the luster of freshly polished wood, smelling faintly of the cedar forest of the Vale in the depths of night when the mists were thickest and dew gathered on every branch and leaf.

Still, Ashlynn wasn’t done as she turned her attention to the cedar needles she’d carefully set aside earlier in her working.

"Each needle green with life’s own fire,

Now burn with light that won’t expire.

As countless candles filled with grace,

Drift gently through this joyous space.

From cedar’s crown to floating flame,

Let light eternal stake its claim."

Ashlynn’s words echoed across the hall as she made a sweeping gesture with her arms, as if she was gathering the cedar needles to her chest before tossing them high into the air.

With that simple motion, thousands of cedar needles were flung high into the air, spreading throughout the hall as they began to glow with a soft golden light.

Now, rather than being lit from above by the pure, shining light of the gilded chandeliers, the hall was filled with softer motes of dancing light that drifted through the air at every height from just above the great hall’s stone floor to the space between the ancient beams supporting the ceiling.

It was a soft, shifting light that seemed to call to everyone in the hall, inviting them to reach out, touch and feel the wonder of the witchcraft of the Mother of Trees.

In scattered pockets throughout the great hall, several people, including most of the young children in the hall, did exactly that, reaching out to touch the soft golden motes of light.

Whenever they did, the glowing cedar needle exploded in a brief shower of harmless light with faint crackles as though it had been thrown into the flames of the hearth, burning brilliantly before fading away.

For a moment, silence filled the transformed great hall as hundreds of people stood transfixed by the floating constellations of lights drifting through the air around them.

Even the most powerful sorcerers present had never witnessed magic that felt so alive, so joyous, and so completely removed from the disciplined practicality that so often limited their arts.

For a sorcerer, a display like this would place incredible strain on their bodies, and not a single one of them would have wasted so much energy on transforming the cedar needles into dancing lights when they could have lit the wicks of the chandeliers with much less effort, but for the Mother of Trees.

.. it felt like she had barely exerted herself at all to produce such a dazzling display!

At the table of honored guests, Helga reached up hesitantly to touch one of the glowing needles, gasping in delight as it burst into harmless sparkles across her palm.

"It’s like touching starlight," she whispered to Kaisen, her eyes bright with wonder. "It doesn’t burn at all, it isn’t even hot like sparks from the fire.

It’s just warm and gentle and... and amazing.

Do you think, do you think that our little Heila could do something like this?

" Helga asked as she looked from the dancing lights to her diminutive daughter standing before the high table and back to her husband again.

"This much and more," Ipiktok said with a hearty chuckle as he recalled Heila’s skill in the arena, both when she faced off against him and against far greater threats. "Your daughter is a wonder in her own right," he praised.

All across the hall, people reached out one by one to tap the lights, releasing showers of sparks as they marveled at Ashlynn’s display of witchcraft used not as a weapon of war, but for something as pure and romantic as creating this moment to share with her betrothed and all of them as well.

"My love," Ashlynn said, turning back to face Nyrielle and feeling her heart fluttering in her chest as she caught her lover looking at her with an expression of pure, joyous wonder at the enchanted environment her witchcraft had transformed the great hall into.

"The musicians are ready," she said, nodding to a dozen men and women standing to the side of the hall.

Stepping from the cold stone dais onto the slightly higher wooden platform, Ashlynn held out her hand toward Nyrielle, inviting the vampire to join her atop the platform.

"Will you lead me in a dance?"