Winter Flint's Arc

Chapter 3 of 18

Winter's fingers tightened around the vial. The dark substance inside pulsed like a heartbeat, spreading tendrils against the glass. He'd seen rot before, documented it, argued about it. This was different. This was alive in a way that made his skin crawl. The bark-reader watched him without expression. "You came here because you want witnesses," Winter said. "You want them to see what I've been saying is real." She nodded once. "Words don't work anymore. Show them this, or watch them argue while the wood dies around them." Winter looked past her to the stone marker at the bridge's western edge, its carved lines barely visible under decades of lichen. That marker had stood since the first council. It had outlasted wars and droughts and every petty dispute the clans could invent. Now it might not see another season. The bark-reader set her leather pouch on the ground between them. "There are three more vials inside," she said. "One for each elder who thinks they're too important to listen." Winter crouched and opened the pouch. Four vials total, each holding the same writhing darkness. He'd wanted proof that would force the clans together. She'd brought him proof that would terrify them into scattering. "If I show them this, they'll panic," Winter said. "They'll say the western grove is lost and we should abandon it." The bark-reader's jaw tightened. "Then you'll know which ones deserve to lead and which ones deserve what's coming." She turned to leave, then stopped. "The heartwood was eight hundred years old. The rot took it in three days. Your council has less time than you think." Winter stood and called after her. "Will you come tomorrow? To the marker?" The bark-reader didn't turn around. "I'm done asking permission to be heard," she said. "If your council wants answers, they know where to find me." She walked off the bridge and disappeared into the western path. Winter was left holding a vial of proof he wasn't sure he wanted. Showing it would validate everything he'd been saying for months. It would also confirm that the threat was worse than even he had believed. He looked at the displaced sprite families watching him from their makeshift shelters. They'd lost everything overnight. The other clans would see that as a warning to stay away, not a reason to gather. Unless he made the cost of staying away higher than the cost of coming. Winter pulled the horn from his belt and climbed onto the stone marker. The lichen was slick under his boots, but the height gave him what he needed. He blew the horn three times, the old signal for emergency council. Sprites looked up. A few gnomes from the hill path stopped walking. When the sound faded, Winter held up the vial where everyone could see it. "This is what killed the eastern grove," he said. "The bark-reader found where it started. Three days until it reaches the center paths. Anyone who wants to survive this meets at dawn by the old marker stone. Anyone who doesn't can explain to their children why they chose pride over breathing." He climbed down and tucked the vial back into the pouch. The bark-reader had given him a weapon. Now he'd used it. By morning, he'd know if fear was enough to break through centuries of stubbornness, or if the clans would rather die divided than live united.