A small smile crossed her face. Then again, maybe it would be interesting. Caelin didn’t look like he’d last ten seconds in Tamani’s presence. She would enjoy seeing him put in his place. But not as much as she would enjoy time alone with Tamani. “Trust me, Katya, I don’t need a chaperone.”

“If you say so.” Katya smiled. “Have a good time,” she said, her tone both earnest and doubtful.

“So where are we going?” Laurel asked after she and Tamani completed the charade of walking silently and formally through the Academy grounds and out of the gates.

“Can’t you tell?” Tamani asked with a grin, gesturing to the large wicker basket swinging from his left hand.

“I said where are we going, not what are we doing.” But there was no annoyance in her tone. It felt so good to leave the Academy behind, to feel the fresh wind on her face, the soft soil under her feet, and to see Tamani out of the corner of her eye, following behind her. She wanted to spread her arms and spin and laugh but managed to hold herself in check.

“You’ll see,” he said, his fingers at her back, guiding her down a fork in the path that led away from the houses they’d strolled through last time. “I want to show you something.”

As they walked, the path narrowed and steepened; after a few minutes they crested the tall hill and for a moment Laurel thought something was wrong with her eyes. Shading the hilltop’s considerable expanse was an enormous tree with broad branches that spread wide. It vaguely resembled an oak tree, with lacy, elongated leaves, but rather than having a tall, statuesque trunk, it was enormously stout, knobby, and misshapen. Laurel suspected it would dwarf even the mightiest of the redwoods growing in the national forest that bordered her land outside of Orick.

Aside from its immensity, it didn’t appear too out of the ordinary, but when Laurel stepped under the shade of its branches she gasped as she felt…something…something she couldn’t identify or explain. It was almost as though the air had grown thicker, swirling around her body like water. Living water that crept into the air she breathed and filled her, inside and out.

“What is this?” she gasped as soon as she found her voice. She hadn’t even realized that Tamani had closed the distance between them and placed a steadying hand at her waist.

“It’s called the World Tree. It…it’s made out of faeries.”

“How…” Laurel wasn’t even sure how to finish the question.

Tamani’s brow furrowed. “I guess it’s…well, it’s a long story.” He led her closer to the trunk. “Ages and ages ago—before there were humans, even—faeries sprang from the forests of Avalon. According to legend, we didn’t yet speak. But there was one faerie, the very first Winter faerie, who had greater power than any faerie before or since. And with that power came tremendous wisdom. When he felt that his time was growing close, he sought to pass on the wisdom he had gained. So instead of waiting until he wilted, he came to this hilltop and prayed to Gaia, the mother of all Nature, and told her that he would give up his life if she would preserve his consciousness in the form of a tree.”

“So…he…is this tree?” Laurel asked, stepping close to the knobbly trunk.

Tamani nodded. “He is the original tree. And other faeries could come up here with questions or problems. And if they listened very carefully, when the wind blew, they would hear the rustling of the leaves and he would share his wisdom. Years went by and soon the birds taught the faeries to speak and—”

“Birds?”

“Yes. Birds were the first creatures faeries heard singing and vocalizing and we learned to use our voices from them.”

“What happened then?”

“Unfortunately, when faeries started talking and singing they eventually forgot how to listen to the rustling leaves. The World Tree was just another tree for a very long time. Then Efreisone became King. Efreisone was also a scholar and he found legends about the World Tree scattered through his ancient texts. Once he pieced together the whole story, he wanted nothing more than to revive the World Tree and harness its wisdom. He spent hours and hours in the shade of this tree, caring for it and bringing it back from its dormancy. And in those hours he discovered that he was beginning to hear the words the tree was saying. From it he learned the stories of the ages, and every evening when he returned home he would write them down and share them with his subjects. And when he felt that his time was growing short, he decided to join the tree.”

“What do you mean, join the tree?”

Tamani hesitated. “He…he grafted himself into the tree. Grew into the tree and became part of it.”

Laurel tried to visualize it. It was both grotesque and fascinating. “Why would he do that?”

“Faeries who become part of the World Tree release their consciousness into it. The wisdom of thousands of faeries lives in that tree. Thousands of thousands.” He paused. “They are called the Silent Ones.”

Realization blossomed on Laurel’s face and she gasped quietly. “Your father did that. He’s part of this tree.”

Tamani nodded.

Laurel stepped away from the tree, feeling suddenly intrusive. But after a moment, she reached out and touched the trunk with tentative fingers. Yeardley had taught her to feel the essence of any plant with careful fingertips—one of the few lessons she had picked up both easily and quickly. She closed her eyes and felt for it now, her hands pressed against the bark.