The Beast Within
Chapter Thirty-Four – The Great Tree Spirit
The sky became clear. A sudden wind, fresh and crisp and filled with the mixture of pine and daisy, blew through the trees in the forest and gently rattled their branches, like the first breath of the reawakening god. The telthor spirits began to stir. They inclined their head and bowed before the Wood Man, each of them showing certain reverent on their face. The mouth of the tree spirit opened soundlessly, but a silence was suddenly lifted. Leela could hear the birds tweaking once again. She half closed her eyes and stretched her hands a little, enjoyed the sensation of the tender breeze brushing past her fingertips as it wrapped around her body.
"Arh…you…it's you…again." A low, calm and gentle rumble echoed through the Tree Spirit's branches, as if it was stretching and trying to speak at the same time.
"You are…" The air genasi opened her eyes and looked at the Wood Mand curiously: "You are the Wood Man."
"Yes, I am ALL that creeps or walks, lives or grows, sickens or rots or dies" The tree spirit paused for a moment. His eyes grew wide, and he seemed to falter… to betray a sudden weakness of pain.
"You are not well, Wood Man." The druid frowned in concern.
"Why, thank you for your concern." The Wood Man smirked mildly: "Now, as for you, will you always be here when I wake, devourer of souls? Gorge on my life a hundred times. And you will never be sated, nor will I ever die, while the forest persists. "
"Huh?" Leela was bewildered: "I don't believe we had ever met?"
"The face changes… the hunger remains the same." The tree spirit rattled his branches: " Why are you here, devourer of souls? Why did you slew the parasite and call me forth, if now to feast once again?"
"I am not hungry." The air genasi smiled grimly: "Not anymore."
"Arh…so you choose to devour the parasite instead" The Wood Man tilted it's head: How curious…"
"I did not choose to eat them." The druid replied, a little frustrated. She blinked her eyes, trying to hold back the welling tears that were threatening to overflow and trickle down her cheek: "the hunger within me choose to strike at the moment when my strength was too weak to refrain it."
"Wood Man, if I may speak." Kaelyn bowed her head toward the spirit tree: "What was this…Genius Loci, this … 'parasite you referred to?"
"A doomsguide? On the mortal plane?" The Wood Man's eyes was glittering in surprise: "Humph…here I thought I've seen it all. To return to your question, doomsguide, it's anger, hatred, the forest's fury…made flesh and wood and will…your hunger dispersed my soul, Spirit Eater, and that fury arose in my place …It seeped into the souls of the small ones, the gentle ones, and slew them… called to the fouler ones and drew them hence."
"Why Nadaj, milord.?" Asked Dalanka: "Why a young hathran?"
"She happened to be there when they needed a vessel. Yes, it was that simple." The tree spirit sighed: "Through her mind and her voice, the parasite schemed and avenged."
"The parasite..." Leela chew her lips: "was it preventing your return?"
"Yes. While I was dispersed, the anger grew too strong." The Wood Man's branches rattled, the twirling winds once again circled around the glade: " The hatred… the parasite… had to be torn from the forest's heart before I could emerge again."
The air genasi folded her arms: "What are you saying, you were too weak to fight the Genius Loci on your own?"
Several surprised gasps rose behind her, indicating her query was valiant and offensive. The druid squared her shoulder and tilted her chin a little, prepared to receive some aggressive roars from the tree spirit. But the Wood Man simply remained silent, its lustrous brown eyes flat and unmoving.
It had dawn to her that perhaps…perhaps the great spirit was confused… that somehow, she was not what he expected.
"Yes," The Wood Man finally opened its mouth and admitted: " I was…and am…too weak."
"The Witches," The druid swallowed and prepared her next question: "They sent me to find you…to seek cure for my hunger."
The Great Spirit shook its head, his leaves and branches stirred and rattled: "…you still do not understand, child. Neither did those other faces, which hid the same hunger that you bear. They called it a gift; you think it's a curse. As the matter of fact, it's neither."
"Not a gift nor a curse…" Leela was bewildered: "How can that be? What is it then?"
"It's your nature. Hunger is what you are." The tree spirit replied: "You are not always thus… But how your nature changed is not known to me."
"Nature?" The crease on the air genasi's forehead deepened even further, and her eyebrows nearly arched to the sky above them. Her voice rose and she sounded slightly frustrated: "Now you lost me. Must everyone in Rasheman talk in riddles? I swear I did not have this thing in me when I was in the Sword Coast. It cannot be my Nature."
The Wood Man seemed oblivious to the druid's ranting. His eyes continued to study her thoughtfully for a while before continuing on: "Yet…I sense a wrathful touch upon your soul…"
"Huh?" Leela's eyes widened and stared at the tree spirit: "What?"
"A touch…" Said the great spirit slowly: "A touch of a god. A god who's dead."
"You believe that a dead god somehow changed my nature..." The air genasi slowly shook her head disbelievingly: " and cursed me with this hunger? That seems unlikely."
"And a dead god nearly killed you when you tried to escape his barrow, I am just saying." Okku chuckled beside her: "Not all that is dead lays still, little one."
"Very charming." The druid grunted: "Forgive me, Okku. But waking up in a eerie cavern with no living being but a skeleton next to you, greeted by a group of teething spirits, hungry…not physically but spiritually, almost all the time, and traveling nearly half of a world to here, believed someone, or something finally can do something about this… whatever that is inside me, and only to be told it is my bloody nature. Believe me, this is not exactly music to my ears."
"A dead boar may fall into a stream, putrefy, and corrupt the waters." The tree spirit's voice remained tranquil and undeterred as he watched Leela glare at Gannayev, who was now in stitches, trying his hardest not to laugh out loud: "A dead tree may topple and rot, providing life for a million swarming ants. Who says dead means stop? Who says dead means they no longer effective to the mortals?"
"Oh, alright then." The air genasi finally sighed: "So a dead god somehow changed my nature. But which god, and why?"
"Humph…" The Wood Man meditated: "An unfamiliar god, I must say… A stranger to the forest. Chauntea, Mielikki, Lurue…these are the gods I know in their youth, and their wrath is different in kind."
"So you don't know." Disappointment was written all over the druid's cerulean face: "… I… We were told you fought other spirit-eater before. You… you must have known…known something…"
The remained energy Leela had held since waking up in the Barrow seemed completely drained away from her body. She swayed and her knees nearly buckled. Tears brimmed at the edge of her long lashes. Suddenly, bearing the constant cravings, tramping through the field of thick snow, parleying with hag, spirits, giants, and slashing her swords through creature she had not imagined she would encounter a mere few months ago, no longer seemed to mean anything to her. The life she once had… the Sword Coast… felt like drifting further away from her.
Was she stuck here forever? Alone? Thought the air genasi.
She felt someone move closer quietly and stop behind her. The druid turned her head around, and saw Gannayev's glittering blue eyes over her shoulder. The corner of his mouth curled up as usual. Before she had a chance to say anything, she felt her shoulder sunk and being squeezed slightly. She turned her gaze and saw Safiya's small ebony hand on her shoulder. The Red Wizard of Thay's smile deepened as her eyes meet Leela's. Over the Thayan's shoulders, the air genasi noticed Kaelyn's clear-as-mirror eyes looking at her. They were filled with empathy and comfort.
A surge of warmth rippled through her body. Suddenly she no longer felt as exhausted and frustrated as she thought she was.
"Your hunger…has but one face at a time." The Wood Man closed its eyes and thought for a moment: "The face…they may change, but there is only one."
"That's how I remembered it as well." Okku grunted as he pawed the soil beneath him absent mindedly: "But I only met two Spirit Eater in throughout my life—as a mortal and as a telthor bear god. Cannot pass any comment with just two, you see."
"The hunger never changes, no matter how many you've seen." The tree spirit nodded: "Their faces always perish. The more they eat, they more they must eat. Then the hunger devours them… burns them from the inside, and pass to a new face. The face stands before me now…" It paused for a second: "I am afraid, will also be consumed."
"How…" Leela finally found her voice again: "So how can I defeat this hunger?"
"You cannot defeat your nature." The great spirit sighed: "You must be what you are…and in being, you must finally succumb. To change your nature… to return to what you once were…such changes are…almost impossible. Burn a forest to ash, and you can only plant anew."
"We…we traveled all the way there." The air genais looked at the tree spirit, struggling to conjure her thoughts: "Surely you have to offer us some word of advice other than this."
The tree spirit fell silent again, its stag eyes gleaming, lustrous and brown, into the druid's. For a while, that was all it did. Leela stood patiently in the golden sunlight. Birds and other animals made noise around them. Gentle cool breeze whooshed past their body.
Finally, after what felt like a lifetime, the low, almost whisper-like sound of the Wood Man, echoed through the branches again: "To control the beast, you must defy its nature, force it to act against its will. Since you cannot change its nature, it is almost impossible to achieve such a thing. However, you can teach it to obey."
The air genasi tilted her head and looked at the old tree for some time, before opening her mouth: "…Show me how it works."
"Channel your spirit into the forest—into me" The tree spirit waved its twigs: "By doing so, perhaps…you might discover a way to restore, as well as devour."
"Arh, the reverse effect." Safiya's hand flew to her mouth: "Yes, it could work. The hunger could drain one's spirit, it might be able to restore them…"
The druid sat down cross-legged on the soft grass, allowing the scene of buttercups and daisy fill her nostrils. She closed her eyes, gathered her spirit energy and directed it into the Wood Man.
She cleared her thought, and almost immediately, the dark presence within her began to stir.
Arh…
Hungry…
"You can't be." Murmured Leela inwardly: "You just was fed, a Genius Loci. Don't tell me that's gone already."
Must feed…
Must feed on this one…
The air genasi realized almost straight away the hunger desired the Wood Man's vast and defenseless soul. The hunger stretched out slowly. The black shadow crawled on the ground inch by inch. Nearby, Dalenka yelped, struggled not to leap forward and stop the presence from moving forward. Her body trembled. If was only Derek holding her from behind, or the old witch's body would probably be collapsed.
Now…
Must feed now…
The shadow reached the tree spirit's roots, readied to climb up the week spirit's body. Okku gritted his teeth, his huge body was rigid and his eyes darted between the Wood Man and Leela nervously. Safiya's hand tightened into fist, her hands crackled with sparks, and her body was shaking uncontrollably. Kaelyn's snowy white eyebrows were in knots. The Dove's back was as stiff as those trees around them, and her wing fluttered restlessly. Gannayev folded his arms and shifted his bodyweight from one leg to another. Other than an arching eyebrow, the blue hagspawn did not show any sign of anxiousness.
"Oh, no, you don't!" Leela murmured. Her eyes snapped open, her hands outstretched, her fingers clawed in, her blue body was shimmering with silvery light and her white hair was flying around wildly. The air genasi gathered her inner strength, using all her might to pull the darkness inside her back. Winds around the glade blew wildly, reflecting certain struggle within her body. The hunger writhed hard and fought to escape from her grasp.
The dark presence roared. Its shadow leashed back to the druid angrily, trying to feast on her spirit energy instead. The blinding light glittering around her body grew even brighter and suddenly burst outward. It soon surrounded the hunger and trapped it inside. The hunger seethed and hissed at the air genasi.
"I am the Knight Captain here and I am the rightful owner of my body." Leela growled: "You will be doing as I command from now on!"
The silvery lights around the hunger tightened. The dark presence screeched. The light reached out, now slowly moving toward the Wood Man, who observed the movement passively and remained emotionless. Behind her, the corner of Gannayev's lips curled up. He cast to Safiya nearby, who was now relaxing a bit, a side-glance and gave her a slight nod.
"You knew she wouldn't succumb this time?" Kaelyn looked at the dreamwalker curiously.
"I trusted she wouldn't succumb this time." Was the blue hagspawn's answer.
The glowing light quickly covered the tree spirit. The great tree sighed in totally relief, as if its pains and aches were erased completely for the first time in years.
"Arh…what was lost…is restored." The Wood Man grinned toward the druid, now slowly opening her eyes and looked at the great spirit with concern: "The forest breathes , and its anger fades to silence, thank you, devourer of souls."
Leela stumbled back to her feet and bowed her head toward the great spirit: "My predecessor's debt is paid, Wood Man. May your forest have peace."
"You know, you are different from those faces before you." The Wood Man smiled and inclined its head: "Goodbye to you all" Its huge trunk figure began to fade. Soon, only golden sparks remained. The Ashe Tree glade was a sun trenched opening once again.