Keith Baker - The fading dream

“Let me guess,” Thorn said. “The king lets him go, Boldrei herself appears to bless the union, and everyone lives happily ever after?”

“That’s how it plays out in Tasker’s play,” Cadrel replied. “The original story is darker. In this tale, Marusan learns that the city of the tree moved between Thelanis and Eberron, and that time passes differently in the faerie court than it does here. In the week that he’s been imprisoned by the elves, a century has passed in the world beyond. His beloved is long dead, having married another.”

“Well,” Thorn said. “I do love a happy ending.”

“What happens next?” Drix said.

Cadrel smiled. “Marusan realizes that he left his heart in the city of the tree, with the woman who helped him escape the grim pit. He tries to go back to the city, but he can’t find it; the forest has swallowed up the trees. He spends the next few years wandering the woods, trying to find the lost path, and when he finally returns to his domain, he finds the elf woman waiting for him. She’d followed him out, leaving her city behind.

“The story ends there. Maybe they were married and ruled a great kingdom. Perhaps it didn’t last.” Cadrel shrugged. “A week ago, I would have told you that it was just a story. That it was a fable about patience. That was before I saw this. A city that is a tree, hidden in what was once one of our greatest forests. It still seems amazing that it could have been here all this time.”

“I don’t think it was,” Drix said. “They were reluctant to talk about it when I was there, but I think the city does move between the planes, that it isn’t always in the woods. And even when it was, it was hidden. Somehow, when they stabbed me, that concealment was wiped away.”

Cadrel looked over at Thorn. “Tell me that doesn’t interest you, my dear. Magic that could hide a thing like that-keep it hidden so well that we know of it only through an all-but-forgotten story.”

“I’m sure it interests you as well… and for the same reason.”

Cadrel smiled. “Ah, Thorn. We live in different worlds, you and I. You serve one of the greatest powers of Khorvaire. Your masters seek to determine the fate of Galifar and Khorvaire. I am only concerned with protecting my people. There are so few of us left. I wish to know the truth that lies behind the Mourning. But it will take more than a cloak of invisibility to bring back fallen Cyre.”

He sounded sincere and for a moment, Thorn wondered if she’d misjudged him. Then she remembered the sorrow in his voice when he’d spoken of the torments Marusan had faced in the dungeons below the city of the tree. He told a good story, but he was a spymaster too. “And your friend Cazalan Dal? Any new thoughts on him?”

Cadrel heaved a great sigh, and for an instant, he seemed to be a much older man. “I still have no idea what those madmen hope to accomplish. It was a mistake for my lord to send our best into such peril and a loss to our nation that they have fallen to madness. There are too many mysteries in this world. At least the answer to one of them lies before us.”

“Let’s hope so,” Thorn said. They’d almost reached the great tree, and she could see a gate down at the very base of the trunk, nestled in the valley formed by two spreading roots. “It’s interesting that the Mourning destroyed all the other trees and left this one alone.”

“We are the ones who felled the trees.” It was the knight in the horned helm, the first time he’d spoken since they’d begun traveling. “You saw what became of them in the grove where we found you. After the blood of our prince and this one soaked the soil, the greenery that survived the tainting grew thirsty. The plants sought our blood, and the region had to be cleansed. The hungry trees you saw are mild compared to the savage roots that besieged us in the first days.”

“What else can you tell me?” she said to the eladrin warrior, tapping Steel’s hilt as she spoke.

“It is not my place to speak to you,” the knight said. “I will let my queen tell you what you need to know.”

Steel was more forthcoming. I have to agree with Cadrel, he told her. It is a wonder. One of the rarest products of Aerenal is what the Aereni call viraletha-livewood. These trees are infused with extraplanar energy, and this sustains them even if the tree is uprooted. I’ve seen a ship with a livewood mast with a dryad living inside it.

Thorn ran a finger along Steel’s blade, lingering on the tip. It was a signal she’d established after one too many long-winded explanations: Get to the point.

This tree is not an artifact. It’s alive. And it doesn’t belong here.

Thorn tapped the hilt of the dagger. Yes?

When the soldiers teleported in your earlier fight, they weren’t teleporting in the same way that heirs of Orien do. After the teleportation effect, each of them was suffused with extraplanar energies. I believe that they slipped out of our world and into Thelanis, returning at a different point in space and time. Something is anchoring them to this plane, though. They can only remain in the Feywild for a split second before being forced back here.

Thorn ran her finger along the point again.

I’m sensing that same energy flowing through the tree. It validates what Drix said… and even Cadrel’s story. It’s not of this world. It’s a piece of Thelanis anchored here.

Thelanis… Thorn knew all about the history of the Five Nations. She knew twenty ways to kill a man during a waltz. She even knew a touch of magic. But metaphysics and planar cosmology weren’t one of the core subjects at the King’s Citadel. Still, every child of Khorvaire knew the basic stories of the outer planes… shadows of the world, realms embodying certain aspects of reality. Dolurrh, the domain of the dead. Shavarath, the heart of war. And Thelanis, the faerie court, a place of magic and mystery. In the stories, the powers of the lords of Thelanis seemed limitless. A faerie king might lay a casual curse on a mortal that would afflict the hapless person’s bloodline for generations to come, or turn dirt to gold with a snap of his fingers.

Or replace a boy’s heart with a crystal shard, Thorn thought.

The energy flowing through the tree is almost overwhelming. But the necrotic energies suffusing the soil are equally powerful-far stronger here than they were within the mists. The Mournland is consuming the energies of the tree, and that’s responsible for the decay that you see.

They walked between the vast roots of the tree, which rose around them like walls sculpted from silver. There were no sentries standing watch at the gate, though Thorn saw archers looking down from the ledges formed by the wide strands of withered ivy. A face was carved into the door. Once it might have been a handsome male elf, but half of the face was worn away, and the other side was starting to crack. With all that they’d seen and all that she’d heard, Thorn wasn’t terribly surprised when the wooden lips moved and a deep voice issued from the gate.

“Two come before me I’ve not seen before. Tell me, Sir Casoran, should I open the door?” It spoke in the Elven tongue with an accent Thorn had never heard before.

The commander took a step forward and answered in Elven. “I bring visitors to see the Lady of the Tree. Open your door. I will stand for their actions.”

A crack ran down the center of the gate, and it slowly swung inward. The knight led them inside.

The hall that lay beyond the door was vast, as grand in its size as the entrance to Brokenblade Castle in Wroat. Yet Brokenblade felt alive. Even when Thorn had visited late at night, the castle was bustling with guards, pages, and emissaries attending to critical business. By contrast, the Silver Tree felt abandoned, a haunted castle whose inhabitants had vanished in a time long past. No one was waiting inside. A few floating globes of light, scattered far apart and flickering and unsteady, created scattered pools of illumination in the gloomy hall. It took only a moment for Thorn to realize that they moved. One drew close and she saw that it was a tiny, winged sprite, glowing with an inner radiance. It shivered, faltering in its flight, and that was when the light faded. It caught itself quickly, and the light returned.