Melissa

The next few days of travel passed without incident. Lonna was a bit extra paranoid, perhaps - she had Joanie listening for hoofbeats, and would get us off the road whenever other travelers came near - but that wasn’t really out of character for her. More concerning was the amount of paper she was going through, casting those shielding spells Clatara had given me. She still insisted that Sorissa couldn’t possibly be scrying on us, but that didn’t stop her from doing multiple castings every morning and night.

If there was one thing of note, I suppose it would be our camping arrangements. Liliath had provided us with a proper tent and bedrolls, the better to weather the nights. The only problem was, there was only one tent - one large enough for three. Talith didn’t sleep, so the lack of a tent for him was fine - or so he said, despite Lonna’s objections - but the lack of an extra tent for me… well, it felt a little awkward.

Lonna just glared when I brought it up, and asked if I was that against sharing a tent with her. She didn’t seem to get what I was so nervous about. It was like the fact that I’d been a guy - or at least identified as one - up until a couple days ago didn’t even faze her…

Still, my bedtime discomforts aside, things proceeded pretty smoothly during the initial part of our journey. Which made it all the more jarring when our traveling was interrupted by a large tree that had been laid across the road.

“Wow… I didn’t think stuff like this actually happened outside of the movies,” I admitted, staring at the tree. “I mean, I guess it makes sense but… I kinda thought it was something Hollywood came up with, or something?”

“Do you know something I don’t?” Lonna asked, frowning at the tree. “Because if there’s a reason I shouldn’t just blast this damn tree to pieces, I’d love to hear it.”

“I mean… it’s pretty obvious, isn’t it? A tree in the middle of the road? That’s like… a classic bandit trap, isn’t it? You know, since it forces everyone to come to a stop, and stuff?”

“I don’t think bandits did this,” Talith warned us. “Look at the roots.”

“Nope nope,” Joanie said. “Bandits might cut down a tree, but they wouldn’t take the time to uproot one.”

“Maybe they figured a cut down tree would look too suspicious?” I suggested, not quite willing to let go of my theory. “I mean, I guess it could just have just fallen over from a storm or something, but… I think there’d be more than one tree laying around in that case, right?”

“Probably,” Talith confirmed.

“Does it even matter?” Lonna asked, rolling her eyes as she dismounted her horse. “I don’t care if it’s bandits or nature, so long as they stay out of our way - which they will, if they know what’s good for them. Especially after they see what I’m about to do to this damn tree.”

“Maybe I should handle this one,” Talith said, his voice pitched low. “I’m getting a bad feeling about this…”

“Oh please,” Lonna said, twisting her head around to glare at the Lapsi. “You’d have a bad feeling about drinking water if I was the one doing it. You’re just paranoid.”

Talith scowled, opening his mouth to reply - only to stop, as his eye sockets widened in surprise. “Shit! Lonna!”

“Wha-” was all she managed to get out, before a tree branch twisted to strike Lonna across the temple, sending her sprawling to the ground.

Joanie cursed, even as Talith roared and charged toward his sister, his massive fists pulling back to strike towards the tree trunk. Where they hit the wood cratered, and a scream tore forth as the upper trunk split apart to form a massive maw. The roots twisted and turned, diving into the ground as the tree righted itself before my eyes. As it did so, one of the branches moved, wrapping around Lonna’s form and pulling her towards the tree’s massive mouth.

“Lonna!” I screamed, practically falling off my horse in my hurry to dismount. I stumbled a few steps before lurching forward, desperate to reach her.

“Nope nope!” Joanie called out, tackling me before I could make it more than a few steps.

“What are you doing!?” I demanded. “That… that thing is going to eat her!”

“Not sure what you think you can do about that,” she replied. “If Talith can’t bring it down, your fists aren’t going to do much.”

“But-” I started, only to stop as the tree threw Lonna into the air, lunging forward at the same time to try and catch her in its wooden jaws. Talith roared, tackling the wooden enemy in an attempt to push it back, but its trunk bent forward with surprising elasticity to try and grab her even as it was pushed.

“Lonna!” I cried out, even as the wooden teeth began to close around her, and for a moment the whole world seemed to slow to a crawl. I watched, able to see in excruciating detail, as the maw closed around her, wooden teeth pushing into her flesh. I saw the burst of red as it penetrated, saw Lonna’s eyes jerk open, and heard her scream.

Then, suddenly, the world turned white in a flash of light so powerful that it washed the world out. Then came heat, and a sound of cracking, and popping, and a terrible wail so loud I thought my eardrums would surely burst - and then there was silence, and I was left to try and blink the spots out of my vision.

“What… what was that?” I asked, rubbing at my eyes in a futile attempt to try and clear my vision faster. “Lonna? Are you okay?”

“No, I am not fucking okay,” she replied, anger and pain both evident in her voice. “I nearly got bisected by a stupid fucking tree.”

I blinked. “Uh… Don’t you guys sorta… worship trees, or something, though? Are you sure you should be cursing them out? Or… Well…” I gestured to the smoldering remains of the monster tree, which now had a huge smoldering hole where its mouth had once been. It twitched on the ground, even as I watched, its roots writhing. The movements were slowing down, though, and something told me that it wouldn’t be moving for much longer.

“We worship the Majesty Trees,” Lonna replied. “Not… whatever the fuck this monstrosity is.”

“Majesty trees?” I asked, forcing my eyes away from the tree’s death throes to focus on Lonna. “Are those, like… a special sort of tree or something?” I’d been meaning to ask about them for a while, honestly, but it had never seemed like a good time up until now.

Not that this was a particularly great time for a conversation on religion, either, but… Well, honestly, I just wanted to distract myself from the horror of nearly seeing Lonna die right in front of my eyes.

“…Of course you don’t know what a Majesty Tree is,” Lonna muttered, shaking her head. “Let me guess. They don’t exist wherever you’re from?”

“I mean… maybe they exist under a different name?” I suggested. “Are they just… like… really old trees, or something?”

“Or something,” Talith said, interjecting himself into the conversation as he drew Lonna into a hug.

“Ack! You’re crushing me!” she complained. I noticed she didn’t move away from it, though. “Guh. Couldn’t you at least wait until I had a chance to heal myself, first?”

“Then heal yourself,” Talith said. “Now.”

“…Don’t wanna,” Lonna grumbled, crossing her arms. “It’s barely a scratch, anyhow - I’ll be good as new with a little rest.”

“Lonna…” Talith said, his voice a low growl.

“I said I don’t wanna!” she repeated. “It’ll make it a pain to hide my identity.”

“Am I missing something?” I asked, glancing between the two of them. “Why wouldn’t you heal yourself if you can?”

“Because I can’t,” she replied.

“She can, too,” Talith said. “She’s just being stubborn about it.”

“Look, it’s not even that bad!” Lonna said. “I can function fine without any healing whatsoever, so… Can we just go?”

“Nope nope,” Joanie interjected, finally letting me go and moving onto her feet. “Countess thought something like this might happen, so she set me up prepared, yup yup.”

“What do you mean the Countess knew something like this might happen?” Lonna asked, clearly suspicious. “Did she know there’s stupid tree monsters in her domain?”

“Nope nope,” Joanie replied, shaking her head. “But she thought you might not want to heal yourself. Said I should offer my services, in that case.”

“Your services?” Talith asked, narrowing his eye sockets. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Can heal,” Joanie replied, with pride in her voice. “Needle, thread, and alcohol. Not as good as a spell, but it’ll patch you up well enough.”

“Perfect!” Lonna replied, before glaring at Talith. “Assuming you’re willing to let me down so I can get treated?”

“It would be easier if you just healed yourself…” Talith complained, but nevertheless lowered Lonna back to the ground.

“That’s not an option,” she replied, bluntly. “Not without a lot more alcohol than we’ve got on us, anyway.”

“I still feel like I’m missing something,” I muttered, mostly to myself.

Joanie nodded, one of her long ears flicking in my direction. “Yup yup. But don’t pry. The Princess will tell you if she wants you to know.”

“Don’t call me ‘Princess,’” Lonna said, with a scowl.

“As the Princess commands,” Joanie replied, with what… might have been a smile? It was really hard to tell with her rabbit head and all.

Lonna groaned, before turning to Talith. “Get the stupid corpse off the road, would you? I get the feeling this is going to take a bit…”

“I can help!” I volunteered. I might not have been as strong as Talith, but I was pretty muscular, and… Well, to be honest, I was sort of looking forward to giving those muscles their first workout, and seeing just what I could do with them.

Lonna shook her head, though. “Nope. You’re with me.”

“What’s she supposed to do with you?” Talith asked, suspicion clear in his voice. “Unless she’s got some healing skills I don’t know about?”

“I’m going to tell her about the Majesty Trees,” Lonna replied. “If she’s going to save our world - and stick around in it - then she should know a thing or two about it, shouldn’t she?”

“That’s…” Talith hesitated. “Why now?”

“Because I’m going to need a distraction from the pain, alright?” Lonna snapped. “Now get to work cleaning the damn debris while us girls get to work on treating me. Unless you have any other complaints?”

“Not off the top of my head,” Talith admitted. “But you can’t seriously expect me to clean all this mess up by myself, can you? There’s wood everywhere!”

“Just haul the big pieces off the road, so that we can ride,” Lonna replied, waving off his concerns before turning to me. “Now come on, you two. Let’s sew up this damn wound before I bleed out and drop dead or something.”

“Is that… actually a risk?” I asked, a little worried.

“Probably not?” Lonna said, shrugging her shoulders. “But let’s pretend it is and hurry up anyway.”

I hesitated a moment, glancing between Talith, who was scowling, and Joanie, who was currently busying herself removing supplies from her pack. When neither said anything, I shrugged.

“Why not? It might be sorta nice to hear about this world’s religion, anyway.”

“Not just our religion,” Lonna replied. “Our history. You wanna know why dragons are hated, and trees are worshipped? Then listen up, because you’re about to get a lesson from a girl who’s descended from both of them.”