Life Giver

3. A Tree Falls-1

3

A TREE FALLS

Three months later he wanted to reconsider. Oh, at first, he had been fine with his decision and had walked the woods, sleeping under the stars and having little interaction with humans in the forest. It only took him a few days to recognize that many of the horror tales about Fallon were fiction. No demons stalked him. No dragons hunted here. Instead, he faced far more real issues than those fairy tales threatened. Yeolani wandered between the trees eating anything he could find before he realized he would soon starve if he didn't find some reliable means of hunting or trading for food. Winter was coming, and he couldn't afford to wait to find that security. He grew tired of struggling to net fish from the rivers or raiding squirrels for their hoards, and despite his desire to find his own way, he knew he wouldn't survive without help from other humans.

As fall descended, he finally made up his mind. He couldn't continue eating hand-to-mouth and washing only when he came across a creek. He dreaded sleeping out in the open when the rains began. And worst of all, the haunting of the fairy lights would drive him insane if he didn't get under some shelter. He had heard stories of the fairies, far less frightening than demons, but at least these were real. The little sprites filled the Fallon Forest like mosquitoes on a pond. Their constant cloud of lights overhead kept him awake, and their fluttering wings invaded his dreams. He yearned for a shelter to help keep them at bay, and Yeolani deeply regretted not asking Honiea for a tent, but it was too late now.

So, one miserably rainy evening, he finally approached one of the logging crews that supplied fuel for Simten and Savone on the forest's edge and asked for work. At first, the leader of the crew, Bowdry, looked at his scrawny frame and mocked him. "You'll not last a week.”

Again, Yeolani's temper drove his tongue. "I'll wager you I can chop as much wood as the best man on your team," he boasted, knowing he was a fool for doing so, but he was desperate, and the smell of the stew on the evening fire captivated him. "Just give me some food, and tomorrow I'll prove I can be an asset to your crew."

Fully half-a-dozen woodsmen in the group laughed, as if it were a joke, and encouraged Captain Bowdry to at least not back down from the challenge. Meanwhile, Yeolani stood by the fire in the center of the makeshift camp, stubbornly looking the leader in the eye, unashamed of his worn clothing or shoddy appearance. Of course, Yeolani looked needy; he was. He hadn't been able to eat or wash much over the last few days, and the constant harassment of the fairies kept him awake half the night.

"And what happens if you don't bring in more wood than me? What am I to get in return for this meal?" Bowdry demanded cheerfully.

"I've got…I've got a …a very good knife. It's small, great for gutting fish. You can have it if I don't perform." In fact, it was the magically crafted one Honiea had put in his newly created pack along with a candle which she also, for some unknown reason, had given him. Yeolani really didn't want to part with the knife, but he figured that would be the only thing he owned that would tempt the crew into taking a risk on him.

"Here, let's see what else you've got," chuckled another crew member who snatched Yeolani's pack off his shoulder. He wanted to protest but resisted, realizing these men, all rough and most probably at least his father's age, would not steal from him. He had nothing they would want. Yeolani watched impassively as the lumberjacks dumped his belongings out on the ground. Once they found the jug filled with water, not ale, they began muttering in discontent.

Then to his surprise, one of the men lifted the candle, and everyone stopped speaking. They all turned to peer at Yeolani, a look on their faces that he couldn't interpret.

"Where did you get the candle?" Bowdry asked in a careful voice.

Yeolani didn't know how to answer. A candle? He had used it a few times to light his way when he had to find a place to sleep and found nothing magical about it, but obviously, these men knew something about it that he didn't. Yeolani dare not reveal his ignorance. So instead he remained silent. Stoically, he stood in the firelight waiting for an explanation, pretending he understood but had nothing to say.

Finally, when he realized Yeolani wouldn't speak, Bowdry capitulated. "Very well, if you want work, there's a place to be had. We only have two requirements: work hard and, when there's a need, let us use the candle."

Yeolani felt his jaw drop open in wonder, but he recovered quickly. "Candle it is. Now, where's my bowl?" He would think about what he didn't know later. Right now, he was more interested in the stew.

And that is how Yeolani managed to survive his first winter in Fallon Forest. Moving with a whole crew of woodsmen taught him much: how to chop and fell trees, but also how to interact with a variety of men and make deals with them as he listened to the crew chief Bowdry selling loads of wood at the hamlets deep in the forest or at towns closer to the edge. Yeolani managed to hold his own and bulked up with the benefit of reliable meals and hefty work. This did nothing to teach him the self-reliance he craved. While his companions weren't great hunters, they could bring down a deer with a well-placed ax throw. Quarry rarely came within range, for cutting timber drove off most of the game, but the men were always ready, nonetheless.

The crew slept in tents which thankfully kept the fairies away at night, much to Yeolani’s relief. However, that did not stop these pesky creatures from buzzing over him when they worked during the day. Their bright lights hovered just beyond reach over his head. He alone seemed to be irritated with them, although they swooped throughout the camp. One evening, early in spring, one of the other men caught him trying to swat at one and chided him.

"If you've got the attention of the fae, you shouldn't try to sweep them away," Arvid, his friend, said frankly. "Most of us can't see them, so you should be grateful that you interest them."

"I’d rather have a lady’s interest,” Yeolani replied in amazement. He had not realized no one else noticed the fairies that flew in flocks around Arvid’s head.

Arvid chuckled at that. "Almost as good as a lady. No, the fairies are a sign of good luck. My sister Rashel, supposedly she's got them hovering about her head all the time. And a good thing. They kept her from falling in the well once, and our ma, she claims they're protecting her from evil."

"But…but if you can't see them, isn't that…well, odd? They’re more of a nuisance than a sliver in your toe. They keep me up at night if I'm outside the tents."

Arvid, the only other younger man in the wood crew, simply shrugged. "Maybe they're the reason why you've not been injured in your time here," and he suggestively pointed at his boot.

Arvid had already told him the tale of how he had accidentally planted his ax blade between his toes after he'd been at the work only a few weeks and then added that it was a minor miracle that Yeolani hadn't hurt himself already in the dangerous work of a lumberjack. "Most of the men don't believe in the fairies, but I've seen my sister with that look…bedazzled by the fairy lights. And the others say you're freakishly lucky so far. You've got some kind of protection for sure."

At that comment, Yeolani remembered, for the first time in ages, his conversation with Honiea. He didn't think the two things, magic and fairies, could be related, but maybe being plagued by fairies was a magical signal like his seasickness had been. He would not ever be completely free of Honiea’s world, he reasoned. And if that meant the fairies were concerned for him, he could deal with that far better than seasickness. Generally, these creatures didn't interfere with his work by day, and now, sleeping in a tent, they didn't keep him awake either. Yeolani didn't pursue more about the fairies. He could ignore them just as easily as he could his curiosity of magic, and he did well at that until the summer. Then everything changed again.

The crew planned that morning to cut down a massive tree. Ten men could not complete a ring about it, and its top was lost in the sun’s glare. Yeolani noted that fairies covered it more than other trees he’d seen. It was thick with them, so Yeolani could not even see the lower branches where he had cast his guideline. He wasn’t on the cutting crew at the moment, so he wasn’t exactly watching the first swing of the ax. The blow simply sounded wrong. That one swing made every fairy’s light go out. Abruptly, the tree began to fall. It shattered, revealing its rotten, unstable core. It twisted as it fell. Yeolani saw it all from his place on the guide rope. It swung as if some invisible giant rolled the falling timber toward them. The massive tree snapped with a bang, bounced off its jagged stump and swept in an arc toward the other side's guide ropes. They didn't stand a chance. Four men were struck and bowled over and one remained pinned under the log when it finally came to a rest.

Everyone dropped their lines or axes and scrambled toward the fallen men. Luckily, two had fallen in the soft loamy earth and had been pressed into the ground rather than crushed, but two were not so well off. One had broken ribs, and his breathing came labored. And then there was Arvid, still pinned under the massive tree. He was still conscious but raving in pain. Someone went running for shovels to start digging out around him, but the camp was half-a-mile away.

"Yeolani, where's your pack?" barked Bowdry, who shoved Yeolani off toward the camp, assuming he'd left it with the tents. Quite often the young man brought it with him since it was amazingly light, and he liked to have access to his jug of water. Yeolani staggered the mere yards to where they had started the morning at the edge of the clearing and snatched up his pack, bringing it back as fast as he could run.

Captain Bowdry looked gratified that Yeolani didn't have to run as far as the camp. "Get out the candle. We need her help," he ordered.

Obediently Yeolani did as he was instructed. He dumped out his pack and lifted the candle from the pile, confused as to what to do next.

"Well, light it, boy," barked the captain.

Still not sure what good a candle would do for his friend or the men who now knelt around Arvid's body, using their hands to scoop the ground underneath his pinned legs, Yeolani did as he was ordered. His hands shook as he gathered a pile of dry pine needles and then found his flint and steel from his belongings. It seemed to take forever to get a smoke to start, and then he fished around on the ground for a stick that would light. His hands barely held the tiny flame steady as he set the stick to the candle's wick. Once he knew it was lit, he looked over at Bowdry and felt a well of fear. Everyone in the crew knew that this candle was magic and so was he.

Without quite knowing why, Yeolani lifted the light high and began wishing that Honiea and her magical healing hands would come to this signal. No wonder these men were willing to let him join them; he had been given a magic candle that could call for help. Honiea hadn't given him the explanation, but somehow this must have been known among many others that worked amidst the dangers of the forest.

It didn't take long. One moment she wasn't there, and the next, she was. Yeolani saw the honey hair and a bright flash of lavender before his eyes normalized and Honiea, appearing exactly like she had come from a surgery, with bloody smudges on her apron and carrying her pack.

"You didn't give me a chance to explain," she said in a low murmur and then took the candle from him, blew it out, and then handed it back without another comment. Then she purposefully walked around Yeolani like he was a tree in the forest and stepped up to Arvid's side. Bowdry simply nodded a greeting but didn't question Honiea's magical arrival.