Briar Warden's Arc

Chapter 2 of 4

By afternoon Briar had learned to keep her sister's hand in hers even when her arm ached. They waded from trunk to trunk, and Thistle held on without complaint. Three more trees opened before the sun dropped behind the reeds. Green light spilled through the bark and stained the black water at their knees. Each name took longer than the last. Briar had to press her ear to the wood, listen through Thistle's palm, and wait for the syllables to hold still. When the third tree opened its slow eye above them, Briar counted what remained and knew the math was against her. Forty-four trees woken. Hundreds still asleep. The swamp hummed around them in half-voices, trunks stirring in the same key but unable to speak without her hand on them and Thistle's hand in hers. Thistle pulled free to check the northern road. The hum collapsed at once into noise, a wash of syllables that meant nothing. Briar stood in the water with her empty hand open and hated how much she needed her sister back. She had spent her whole life working this swamp alone. Pride was cheap now. Far off, an axe cracked once against wood. Then again. The sound carried clean across the flats. Thistle came wading back fast, mud to the thigh, the sprig of heartwood still tucked at her collar. She did not have to say what she had seen. Briar reached for her hand and took it before Thistle could offer it. "The forest has waited generations," Briar said. "Tonight it can't wait alone." Thistle closed her fingers around Briar's and did not let go. They turned together to the next trunk. Briar pressed her ear to the bark and heard the name inside it settle, clear this time, waiting to be spoken. She had stopped pretending she could do this by herself. That was the thing that had changed. The swamp would rise only as fast as two sisters could walk it, and the axes in the north had already started counting down.