In the Company of Stones

Chapter 1: The Long Walker, part 1.2

As Ljót carried him, he caught an unfamiliar scent, rich and pungent.  It teased him, called to him.   His crown hyphae surged toward the source of that delicious odor. He all but tasted the minerals, rare minerals he had never eaten before.

::The tailless ones have brought you a special meal:: Ljót said, looking down at him. ::They brought it from the sea:: Purpose and intent flavored her thoughts.

He turned in her arms to peer ahead. Beneath the strong, rich scent, he caught the first thin thread of another odor, a foul taste.

Three creatures stood at the far side of the glade, their bodies wrapped in fibrous sheathing.  Two would reach the height of Ljót’s chin; one with yellow crown-hyphae, and one silver.  A third stood tall as Ljót, but broader of shoulder. Its face was fierce, its strange, golden facial hyphae bristling.

::He:: Ljót corrected him.  ::That one is a male, the other two are queens::

The big male stepped to the fore.  With its skin as smooth and bark-less as their queens, he could not see the creature as truly male.   Its gaze pierced him, its eyes a sharp and icy blue with strange black dots in the middle. It did not smell like the others--none of them did, each scent singular, apart.

::That one reeks of his aloneness:: he said. ::And of fire and smoke::

He remembered what it was to be so separate, so isolate and alone. ::Has sickness driven that one mad?:: he asked. Disturbed, he clung tightly to her. Ljót entwined her hyphae with his, a brief moment of comfort flavored with her satisfaction. She thought of resolution, anticipated changes bearing fruit, and a task well done.  

::No.  Only the mad ones bring the flowers of fire that burn the forest. This one seeks something of us, and brings us gifts:: his queen replied. ::Look::

The fierce male set down the basket of woven reeds. Then pushed it with its foot. The silvery contents poured out.  Slippery entrails spilled onto the ground, spines and fins, heads with sunken eyes gone milky white, all flecked with cast-off scales and thick with delicious scent.

He stirred in Ljót’s arms, hungry, senses inflamed by the rich aroma of the sea.

The male made noises, a long chorus of yips and barks and howls. One hand stretched toward the little bundle the smaller queen carried, the other toward Ljót.

Onequeen gestured the male back to the far side of the glade. She exuded no flavor of command that he could scent--still, the big male’s head drooped, and its shoulders sagged. The sounds it made were mournful, the lonely call of a wolf.

::That male sheds water. Do they all shed water from their eyes?:: He watched the male depart, casting glances over its shoulder.

::I have not tasted this before:: Ljót replied, her thoughts flavored with concern.

The brjálaður queens stepped forward. The shorter one with yellow crown-hyphae held out the small bundle--the source of the foul odor.  

The other queen came closer.  She had crown-rootlets like his own, a soft and translucent silver.

::That one is old:: Ljót said. ::Their young have colored fibers there. But theirs are not for feeding.  Theirs is dead like last year’s grasses::

The old queen put a long bone to her lips. She blew upon it, and sounds came out. Liquid sounds, sounds that flowed together like water.

He heard the peeping of a sand-plover in those sounds, and the shrill of a curlew, the breathy chuckle of a nightjar, blurring and blending together.  The song of pines in wind, and the sweet patter of rain shivered down his limbs.

The bonesong melted the gulf between them, the brjálaður queens becoming as much a part of the forest as songbirds. Ljót began to sway to their sounds, her tail rustling in the leaves.

Seeing this, the younger queen took a hesitant step toward them.  It glanced to the older one, who moved her head up and down, even as she continued to blow on the hollow bone.  The rhythmic motion seemed purposeful.  

New sounds came out of the mouth of the yellow one, a sound like the mewing of fox kits or the calls of otters. Its hands trembled as it held the bundle out to Ljót.

He did not know what the sounds signified.  

Neither did his queen. She stilled.

He pressed his body against Ljót’s, shyly hiding behind the curtain of her hyphae.  He felt his queen’s need to taste the meaning of those sounds, and her frustration that she could not.  

Ljót approached the creature, each step flowing, graceful, gracious.  She took the proffered bundle with the long white fingers of her free hand.  

It stank.

Ljót loosened the fibrous wrappings. They peeled apart like leaves, like an immature queen’s sheathing.  Inside lay a small being, its skin a mottled red, its torso struggling to expand and contract as it took in air.

::What is it?:: he asked. ::Why does it smell so bad? What do these creatures want with us?::

At first, his queen did not answer.  Her hyphae were busy wicking moisture, sampling the mucus that burbled from the small creature’s slack lips.

::It is one of their young.  Taste this:: Ljót replied.  ::There is illness here::

He closed his eyes, his attention drawn to the flavor of his queen’s sending.  An acrid, foreign, flavor filled his senses.

::Invasion?:: he asked. ::These spores are not our kind:: Disgust made his hyphae leak, the discharge pushing away their foul taste.  His moisture spattered onto the forest floor, raising tiny hisses and puffs of vapor.

He remembered another invasion, a portion of the forest sickened and dying. Leaves of ash trees withered, their branches scarred by lesions.  His queen walked into the center of that sickness, round and plump and rich with fluids.  Ljót embraced the dying, ash after ash, her hyphae sliding through crevices in the bark, her body growing thinner as she fed them.  She embraced each dying tree in turn, until she drained herself and had to return to draw moisture from the cool dampness of their home.

Time and time again Ljót returned to the blighted forest, feeding spore’s-bane into withered trees. Slowly, as spring turned into summer and summer into fall, the ash trees had been restored.  But at a terrible cost--there had been no Long-Walkers made that year, no quickening of other Little-Brothers-Under-the-Soil.

Ljót held up the bundle. Despite the rank stench of decay, she placed his hand on the warm creature within, its delicate, yielding flesh so unlike his own.

::For we of the forest, yes, it is like that.  Invader-life must be choked at its root.  Only I can make the poisons that suffocate it. Brjálaður do not wither or split like the ash. With them, invasion makes them grow hot and weak.  They burn it out of their bodies. Or they die::

He looked up to meet the glorious, opalescent blue of his queen’s eyes. Understanding burst in upon him.  

::They seek your spore’s-bane::