Chương 7: Chapter 8: The Heartwood Awakens- Part II

Garrick pushed the rusted gate open a moment later and stepped carefully into the garden with the expression of a man already regretting several recent decisions. Two people followed behind him. The first was Merrow, carrying a satchel large enough to qualify as a siege weapon. The healer stopped just inside the entrance and stared openly at the grove surrounding her. The second visitor lingered near the gate with considerably more caution.

An older woman wrapped in layered river-gray robes stood quietly beside Garrick, one hand resting against a polished wooden staff carved with flowing patterns that resembled water currents more than decoration. Thin silver charms hung from the staff and chimed softly whenever the wind moved through the garden. Aibell glanced toward Garrick.

"You brought reinforcements."

"I brought complaints," Garrick corrected while gesturing toward Merrow.

"She threatened bodily harm if nobody checked whether the druid had collapsed into a tree."

"That feels dramatic," I muttered. Merrow gave me a flat look.

"You disappeared into an overgrown ruin for multiple days while feeding your strength into magical forestry."

"When you phrase it like that-""Because that is exactly what happened," she interrupted. Her eyes shifted toward the grove around us afterward, and for the first time since I had met her, the healer looked genuinely unsettled.

"This place was dead last week," she said quietly.

"It's improving."

"That sentence should concern me more than it currently does." The older woman near the gate finally stepped forward then, her gaze lingering on the forming canopy overhead. Unlike the others, she did not look surprised by the grove itself, only thoughtful.

"The roots spread quickly," she observed. Her voice sounded calm and weathered like riverstone worn smooth through time. I studied her more carefully.

"You can feel them."

"A little." The woman's eyes drifted toward the exposed roots beneath the heart tree.

"Water listens to old things. So does soil." Interesting. Garrick rubbed one hand across his beard before gesturing toward her.

"Kaelen, this is Lysara. She serves the river shrines near the southern district." Aibell blinked once.

"You brought a priestess?" Lysara smiled faintly.

"Something closer to caretaker."

"That sounds suspiciously vague," Aibell muttered.

"It usually does," I replied. The older woman's attention shifted toward me then, and I noticed the brief change in her expression the moment she sensed Nemain resting beside the roots in recognition. That interested me significantly more than it should have.

"The sword is hungry," she said quietly. Garrick sighed immediately.

"Wonderful. We've reached the point where strangers identify cursed weapons on sight."

"It speaks loudly," Lysara replied. Garrick stared at the wrapped blade for a moment before sighing heavily.

"That somehow worsens the situation." I rested one hand against Nemain's wrapped hilt before the sword could react further.

"Most people avoid noticing it."

"Most people stop listening to the world once they grow old enough to fear it," Lysara said calmly. The grove rustled softly overhead, agreeing. Merrow looked between all of us with growing irritation.

"I dislike this entire conversation."

"That's understandable," Aibell assured her. Lysara slowly walked farther into the grove while studying the seven young heartwoods surrounding the central tree. Her fingers brushed lightly across one of the younger saplings, and the leaves above us shifted immediately in response. Aibell noticed it too.

"The grove likes her." Lysara chuckled softly beneath her breath.

"No, it recognizes me." The statement settled quietly through the garden. I frowned slightly.

"You've seen heartwoods before."

"Long ago," she replied. That answer immediately caught my attention because very few people still living should have recognized heartwoods at all. Most surviving groves had vanished generations ago, and the First Circles even earlier than that. Garrick noticed the shift in my expression and sighed tiredly.

"That," he muttered, "is exactly the look people make before ancient secrets appear." Lysara smiled faintly at Garrick's complaint before resting both hands atop her carved staff.

"My grandmother served a riverside sanctuary farther south," she explained.

"Travelers passed through often in those days. Traders, ferrymen, wandering circles." Her eyes drifted upward toward the forming canopy.

"I only saw heartwoods once when I was young, but I remembered the leaves." Support the creativity of authors by visiting Royal Road for this novel and more. Aibell glanced around the grove again, taking in the silver-green branches overhead and the seven young saplings surrounding the central tree.

"I'm beginning to understand how rare this place actually is."

"Very," I replied. Merrow crossed her arms while studying the roots spreading beneath the garden.

"That somehow makes me more nervous."

"That's becoming your default response to most things lately," Garrick observed.

"It's been an exhausting week." Lysara eventually moved toward the exposed stone marker near the center of the grove. The moment she saw the ancient carving beneath the roots; her expression shifted with quiet recognition.

"This was buried beneath the garden?" she asked.

"Yes."

"And the seeds?"

"Hidden inside it." She crouched carefully beside the stone and traced one finger lightly across the worn grooves of the symbol.

"Then someone preserved this place intentionally." Aibell frowned slightly.

"You think they hid the grove here?"

"A beginning of one," Lysara corrected gently.

"People protect what they believe the world may need again someday." The words settled quietly over the garden. I looked toward the seven young heartwoods surrounding us and found myself wondering again who had buried the seeds beneath Fallowspire and how long they had waited beneath the city unnoticed. Garrick folded his arms near the gate.

"You're all discussing ancient hidden groves far too calmly for my comfort."

"That sounds like a personal limitation," Merrow informed him.

"You threatened to throw medicinal herbs at me earlier."

"And I stand by that decision." Aibell snorted softly while Garrick muttered something deeply uncomplimentary beneath his breath. I looked back toward Lysara.

"Why did Garrick bring you here?" The older woman's expression grew more serious.

"Because the river has started changing," she said quietly. The grove reacted almost immediately beneath my feet. The roots shifted deeper through the soil while the leaves overhead stirred softly despite the still air. Lysara continued carefully.

"Fish have started dying near the southern channels. Water currents behave strangely around old stone foundations. Birds abandoned several stretches of the riverbank days before the last storm." She paused briefly before adding, "And three nights ago, the river shrines heard singing beneath the water." Aibell frowned immediately.

"Singing?" Lysara nodded once.

"Voices deep enough that the sound carried through the stone beneath the shrines." I felt the grove tighten around the district through the spreading roots beneath the soil. The reaction carried the same instinctive alertness I had sensed earlier when the corruption brushed near the city. Garrick watched me carefully.

"You've heard something like this before."

"Yes," I replied quietly. Not in usually in rivers, but the pattern felt familiar enough. Corruption rarely announced itself openly in the beginning. The first signs usually appeared in smaller changes. Water turning foul, animals fleeing, growth twisting slowly out of balance. By the time people noticed something was truly wrong, the corruption had usually settled deep enough to defend itself. Lysara studied my expression for a moment.

"You understand what's happening."

"I understand what it can become if nobody acts early." That answer silenced the garden for a few moments. Merrow eventually sighed and rubbed one hand against her forehead.

"I came here to make sure you were eating properly," she muttered toward me.

"Instead, I apparently walked into the beginning of an ancient catastrophe."

"That also sounds familiar," Aibell replied dryly. After a brief pause, Merrow resumed her healing duties and eventually forced me to eat something resembling a proper meal while she inspected the healing cuts across my shoulders with the same expression Garrick usually reserved for structural collapse.

"You're still overexerting yourself," she muttered while tightening a fresh bandage.

"The grove may be helping, but you are very obviously not made of bark."

"That feels speculative," I replied. Merrow gave me a flat look.

"It feels medically accurate." Aibell leaned comfortably against one of the exposed roots nearby.

"You should hear him explain rest."

"Merrow frowned immediately.

"I already dislike where this conversation is going."

"He claimed closing his eyes several times counted as sleep." Merrow stopped tightening the bandage long enough to stare at me in visible disbelief.

"You survived this long entirely through spite."

"That's unfair." Garrick folded his arms near the gate.

"That's generous," he muttered. Lysara's quiet laughter drifted softly through the grove while she continued studying the young heartwoods surrounding us. Unlike the others, she seemed completely at ease beneath the canopy, as though the grove's presence settled naturally around her. Interesting, the roots beneath the garden had calmed somewhat since she arrived.

The tension I felt earlier near the edges of the district still lingered faintly through the soil, but the grove no longer reacted with the same sharp alertness. Lysara eventually rested one hand against the bark of the central heart tree.

"It's young," she said quietly.

"But the foundation beneath it is old enough that the grove already understands what it was meant to protect." Garrick frowned faintly.

"You keep talking about this place like it's alive."

"It is alive," I replied.

"That answer stopped being reassuring hours ago." Aibell glanced upward through the canopy overhead.

"Protect what exactly?" Lysara looked toward the walls surrounding the eastern district beyond the grove.

"Balance," she answered simply.

"Places like this were never meant to stand apart from cities. Older kingdoms built around rivers, forests, and old shrines because they understood survival depended on keeping those things healthy." Merrow tied off the final bandage around my shoulder with significantly more force than necessary.

"Modern cities usually prefer walls and taxes."

"That too," Garrick admitted.

"The problem," Lysara continued, "is that when land is ignored long enough, something eventually fills the emptiness left behind." Silence followed naturally after that. Nobody in the grove needed her to explain what that "something" might be. The corruption had already made itself known in smaller ways, dead fish, wrong currents, sick forests, voices beneath water. The signs connected too cleanly now to dismiss as coincidence. Garrick finally exhaled heavily through his nose and looked toward me.

"The task I mentioned earlier," he said, "the one I needed help with?" I nodded once.

"It's the water." I had already guessed as much, but hearing him say it aloud still tightened something quietly in my chest.

"The river?" Aibell asked.

"Partly," Garrick replied.

"But the bigger concern runs beneath the city, older channels, aqueducts, reservoir tunnels." His expression darkened slightly.

"Workers started disappearing near the eastern runoff tunnels three days ago." The grove stirred faintly beneath the roots around us, listening. Lysara looked toward me carefully.

"Captain Garrick believes you may recognize what's spreading before it reaches the inner districts."

"That's an optimistic way to describe the situation," I muttered.

"It's the polite version," Garrick replied. Merrow crossed her arms immediately.

"I dislike the sound of all of this."

"You dislike most things involving underground tunnels," Garrick observed.

"Because underground tunnels are where civilizations hide terrible decisions."

"That is historically accurate," I admitted. Aibell sighed softly.

"Why does every conversation around you eventually become deeply concerning?" I considered that briefly.

"I suspect coincidence." Aibell gave me a tired look.

"Nobody believes that anymore." The afternoon light shifted gradually through the canopy overhead while the grove rustled softly around us. Beyond the walls surrounding the eastern district, Fallowspire carried on with its usual rhythm distant wagons, merchants shouting across crowded streets, guards changing watch atop the outer walls, but beneath them now, I could feel the roots spreading steadily farther through the city soil.

The grove was listening to Fallowspire and the city, whether it realized it or not, had already begun changing in return. Garrick eventually straightened away from the gate.

"Havlar wants to speak with you before we move further," he said.

"Preferably before rumors about mysterious singing rivers and living forests spread through the entire city."

"That feels reasonable to me," I replied. Garrick stared at the grove surrounding us for a long moment before sighing heavily.

"That makes one of us."