Dread Mage

The druids had offered them shelter—a sanctuary woven from branches and leaves, adorned with luminescent fungi that cast a dim glow.

Sonder hesitated, her voice a soft murmur, “Do you think they’ll accept us? After everything?”

Vell shrugged, his gaze fixed on the intricate carvings etched into the bark of the trees that surrounded them. “We have no choice but to try. After... this,” he gestured vaguely to the scorched remnants of the forest. “I've got to find a way to impress them, but in a manner they’d consider green.”

He looked out of a window, the only protection from the outside being a curtain of natural vines and leaves, and saw looming over all the other trees, a giant amongst them, ancient.

“But just as the forest, I’m sure if I nurture our relationship, it’ll grow. I won’t turn away, and I think you also won’t. If they have a teacher at hand, then you could show them your nature, other than being of the ‘raised’ variety, I mean. You like flowers and nature, don’t you?”

“I do,” Sonder said, “though not more or less than any other person. When I was with the simerian, I often had to fell trees as training. I don’t think the druids are going to like that fact.”

Vell knocked gently on the wooden walls of their new home, the sound resonating softly through the room.

“They’ll know,” he said, a hint of amusement in his voice. “Now that you’ve spoken it aloud, the trees will surely tell them.”

Sonder’s expression darkened, her fingers nervously twisting a vine that hung beside the window. Realizing her actions, she let go immediately. It and every other plant could have been like a person for the druids.

“What if they see me as nothing more than a threat or a murderer? The Simerian had their reasons for cutting trees. They needed the warmth that fire provided.”

Vell leaned against the wall, considering her words. “Well, you’re not with them anymore. We’re here now, in the world of nature, and you must prove you belong. You have a way about you, Sonder, a way that draws others in. If you’ll excuse me, I’ll leave you for the day.”

“Already?” Sonder asked, a hint of surprise in her voice.

Vell nodded, his resolve firm. “There's much to do if we’re to make amends. I need to start somewhere, and it’s best I begin now.”

As Vell turned to leave, Sonder watched him go.

He paused at the door, turning back with a thoughtful look. “Oh, and if you can, try not to show any weakness. You know as well as I do that Mellea really seems to detest that.”