Chasing Sparks

Chapter 3.1

"Turn around," Wren muttered under his breath.

But the leaves didn't move. They never moved and they weren't alone in their stubbornness. The flowers, the bushes, the shrubs, the trees and the grass all ignored Wren. If it was green, it wasn't listening.

Wren noticed a small bee land on the flower next to him.

"How about you?" he said, "Will you listen to me?"

The bee flew off.

Wren shrugged his shoulders, picked up his bucket and made his way down to the riverbank. He nodded politely to a Forester woman on the other side, as he started filling the bucket. The Forester responded in kind.

Looking at the woman whispering quietly to the leaves and flowers around her, Wren wondered for the umpteenth time whether his lack of the dryad affinity was simply on account of his being Krill. Six feet tall with long skinny limbs. Pale white skin. Around eleven stones in weight. Hair that nondescript colour somewhere between brown and blond.

The Forester woman, on the other hand, was much smaller in stature, barely five feet tall with a slim sinewy body covered in dark brown skin. She couldn't have weighed more than seven stones and had a mop of thick dark brown hair on her head. A trait common to all Foresters. Not thin wispy strands of non-colour.

This meant Wren was nothing like the rest of the Forester community he lived with and so his lack of the dryad affinity didn't seem all that surprising. But that missed one very important point. His mother.

With the bucket now full, Wren grabbed the handle and started back up the riverbank. He hadn't taken more than a couple of steps however, when he noticed the woman on the other bank waving at him. Waving in the sense of beckoning. Wren put the bucket down and gestured towards the bridge. The woman just kept beckoning.

Wren wasn't about to go wading through the river to get to her, so he made his way along the riverbank to the nearby bridge. As he crossed, he noticed the woman was still waving. Thinking that she may be in trouble or in need of some urgent help, he picked up his pace and ran the rest of the way.

"Hi, I'm Wren," he said as he arrived next to her, "How can I help?" He wasn't even slightly out of breath.

The woman smiled at him. "Can you fetch my jacket from the lodge? I'm feeling a bit cold."

Wren tried to hide his surprise, but the reaction from the Forester showed he hadn't been very successful.

"Is there a problem?"

"No," said Wren hiding his feelings better this time, "Which lodge are you in?"

"The big one."

Of course, thought Wren. The lodges were guest houses for visiting Foresters and the big one was reserved for the highest ranking Foresters.

The lodges were slightly outside the camp but not that far away. Certainly, it wouldn't have been a problem for the woman to have walked back to the lodge and picked up her own jacket.

Wren's home, or the Gardens, were a pilgrimage site for many Foresters and there was always a steady stream of people staying in the guest houses. Wren had yet to figure out why, but for some reason, they all seemed to think he was their personal helper. Wren had even searched the lodges carefully looking for the sign that said 'If you need anything just ask Wren. He's the tall one. No need to be polite.' But he had yet to find it.

Arriving at the big lodge, he knocked on the door. No answer. He pushed the door open and noticed there were five jackets hanging on the hallway hook. Typical, he thought. And they all looked the same, of course. Foresters were not big on fashion and individual style. Browny animal fur seemed to be the preferred look for most of them. As there was nothing to suggest which of the jackets might belong to the woman, he sighed and picked one at random and set off back to the river.

Outside in the cool morning air again, Wren took a long deep breath and smiled. Although he was treated as an errand boy by pretty much every visiting Forester, he didn't really mind. In fact, he actually quite liked helping. To be sure the visitors could be more polite but the chores he was asked to do, gave him the chance to support the community.

And his help was greatly appreciated. With Wren taking care of all the wants and needs of the visitors, the rest of the community were free to focus their attention on the far more important work of maintaining and growing the Gardens. Wren, of course, would have loved to help with this but it required the dryad affinity, so he just did whatever else he could, including fetching jackets.

Arriving back at the river, he said, "Here you go," and handed the jacket to the woman, "Hope it's the right one."

The woman smiled and said, "Actually, I'm feeling a little warmer now, so just leave it on the ground," giving no indication of whether Wren had picked the right one or not.

Wren looked at the woman wondering if she needed anything else but her attention was firmly fixed back on the leaves again. Guess not, Wren mused and started heading back across the bridge towards home.

He was about halfway home when he sat down next to a bush for a drink. After taking a long swig from the bucket, he began out of habit whispering at the leaves around him. He knew nothing would happen but trying had become almost an obsession with him.

After five minutes of nothing, Wren eventually gave up and absentmindedly plucked a mango from the branch just above his head.

"Ahhh, hmmm," came the noise of someone clearing their throat. "Do you know how much time and effort went into getting that mango just so?"

Wren blushed and glanced with embarrassment at the mango in his hand.

"Sorry," he said. "I didn't realise where I was," recognising the soft voice of Master Dirs, the person whose grove he was currently plundering.

"Hmmm. You did seem a little preoccupied. Trying to move the leaves again, unless I miss my guess."

At which point, the motionless leaves from earlier, turned one hundred and eighty degrees and began, what Wren could only describe as smiling.

Wren relaxed and smiled himself. There was something about Master Dirs that put you immediately at ease, even when you were caught doing something you shouldn't.

"Are you going to keep that mango all to yourself or would you care to share it with an old man?" Master Dirs continued.

Wren apologised and handed the mango over.

Master Dirs took a large bite, the juice running down both sides of his chin. The Master of the Gardens might be in his twilight years but he still maintained a certain sense of childlike fun in everything he did. Needless to say, Wren liked him.

"Delicious," Master Dirs said wiping the mango juice from his face and then rubbing his hands down the side of his old brown robe.

He then gestured to the ground, "I've been meaning to speak to you for a while, Wren. Won't you sit and humour an old man for a bit?"

Wren nodded and tucked his long legs underneath him and knelt respectfully on the grass. Master Dirs plopped down next to him with a level of dexterity that belied his old age, adjusted his long brown robe that was becoming increasingly frayed at the edges and pursed his lips as if deciding how to begin.