The Trials of Ildarwood: Spectres of the Fall Page 5

  “I’m pretty sure that’s not even a word.”

  “I’ve told you, like, a million times that I don’t want to be friends with them anymore! And not only did you invite them over anyways, you did it on a night when Mom’s still home! Don’t you have any idea how uncomfortable she makes people?”

  “Actually, this is the first I’m hearing of it,” Alder said. “If only there had been some clue before I married her.”

  “Then why would you do it?”

  “Marry your mother? I suppose because I fell in love with her softer side, but—”

  “Oh, come on, Dad! You know what I mean! Why did you invite them over without asking me first?”

  “Would you have said no?”

  “Yes!”

  “Well, then, there’s your answer.”

  “Dad, I’m serious!” Telara huffed, stomping her feet in rapid succession while clenching her fists. “Why are you making me do this?”

  “Because it’s tradition, Lara. And I’m well aware that you and your little friends haven’t exactly been getting along lately—”

  “Cora called me a know-it-all again the other day, and Zizi wanted to know why I was letting myself get fat.”

  “—but it’s important for you girls to spend some time together before the Trials start. There’s a very good chance you’ll need each other’s help once you’re out there. Besides, your mother needs to leave tomorrow so she can start getting everything ready for First Day, and I need to start spending more time at the Astercourt so hordes of unreasonable parents can storm into my office and tell me all the horrible ways I’m managing to ruin their children’s lives. That means tonight is our last chance to do something together as a family, so I’m gonna need you to just indulge us one last time, and then maybe I’ll think of a good way to make it up to you, all right?”

  Huffing and throwing up her hands in protest, Telara turned away before responding. “Okay, fine, but only if you let me come with you tomorrow when you go to work.”

  “I said I’ll think of a good way to make it up to you.”

  “Oh, come on, please! I thought I was your favorite.”

  “For the last time, Lara, I don’t have a favorite; I love all three of you girls exactly the same.”

  “I know, but if you did have a favorite, it’d be me, right?”

  “Of course.”

  “So why can’t I go with you to work tomorrow?”

  “I’ll tell you what,” Alder offered, standing and walking around his desk to escort his daughter out. “If you agree to be a good sport about this sleepover, then I promise I’ll talk to your mother and see if she has any objections to you coming with me, okay?”

  “Okay, fine, but when she says no and winds up embarrassing me in front of everyone, you’ll take me with you anyway, right?”

  “I’ll certainly consider it,” Alder replied before nudging her out into the hall and leaning forward just enough to fix her glasses. “Now, go find your mother so she can do something with that hair of yours before your friends get here.”

  “But, Dad!” Telara whimpered, ready to begin yet another battle of wills. Yet once the door had closed firmly in front of her, all she could manage to add was “I don’t want to.”

  Misery was the only word to describe the hours Telara had spent over the years perched upon a rickety wooden stool in the kitchen while her mother tended to her hair. Delaniya Brent was hardly the most endearing of mothers, after all, with her no-nonsense demeanor and perpetually stern expression. She was a woman of strict standards, with a tall, rigid posture, pursed lips, and chestnut eyes. Her dark brown hair was always meticulously woven into a hundred thin braids secured together into a tight bundle behind her head–a far cry from the thick, unevenly knotted dreads of her husband.

  What must have been a time for bonding and conversation in the households of other Ondalan families felt more like an interrogation for the three sisters Brent. Each would take a turn upon the stool while her mother pulled and combed and tortured her hair into tight, perfect braids designed to last weeks with minimal care. All the while, Delaniya would probe into the details of her daughters’ lives. That was how each Brent sister had learned at a young age how quickly even the most closely guarded secrets and lies could be rooted out whenever even a few strands of their hair were held hostage between their mother’s calloused fingers. Needless to say, all three girls had in time found it easier to say nothing at all than to volunteer any information.

  It had become a family tradition for Merielle to go first, as the oldest and most compliant of Delaniya’s daughters. After her would always be Telara, who preferred her braids to be much thicker than her mother’s. Once Telara’s turn was done, Avianna would then hop up onto the stool, and not long after, seemingly endless strings of shouting and profanity from both would echo all throughout the house.

  “Why can’t you just leave it the way it is?” Avianna would always complain.

  “If you can’t even control your own hair, how is anyone ever supposed to believe you can control your own life?” Delaniya would always reply.

  After finishing with her youngest daughter, Delaniya’s mood would always sour. Neither triumphant in victory nor gracious in defeat, she would retire to the office by herself and not emerge again for hours. Such was Telara’s hope on that one night in particular.

  At sundown, Briyal Legarde arrived with Cora Zimari, inseparable friends despite all their many differences. Where Briyal was always sweet and cheerful, Cora was cold and sarcastic. Where Briyal was often admired for her young and innocent beauty, Cora was pale and perfectly plain. And where Briyal loved everything about nature, Cora considered the outdoors highly overrated, preferring instead the many comforts of inside.

  Then, of course, there was Zavanna Tisarro, the utmost bane of Telara’s existence. Though timid and sweet in her own unique way, there was something about Zavanna that grated on the nerves of everyone around her. With strawberry-blond hair and a pencil-thin frame, she was the smartest of the girls yet eternally aloof. As a result, Telara could never quite tell if Zavanna ever truly meant to be insensitive, making it hard to hold so much of what came out of her mouth against her.

  “Your house smells funny,” she noted that particular evening as she stepped inside the door. Though Telara often cringed in her presence, there was not much more she could say or do to end their friendship. After all, their parents had all gone through their Trials together, which meant Telara and her friends were all expected to do the same.

  Yet in spite of all of Telara’s fears regarding what might happen that evening, the next few hours were entirely uneventful–much to Telara’s delight. Her mother did not emerge once from her office, and her father left them alone so they could spend plenty of time by themselves. Then, only once it was time for them all to go to bed did Alder finally knock upon his daughter’s bedroom door and ask if he could enter.

  “You girls want to see a story before you head off to sleep?” he asked with the tiniest glint of nostalgia in his eyes.

  “Come on, Dad. Don’t you think we’re a little old for bedtime stories?”

  “Well, maybe in a few more days, but I’ve got a really good one for you tonight–one that’s a bit more appropriate for four young ladies about to start their Trials. You remember all those stories I used to show you about all the different Maidens of the Ildarwood and all the different ways they protected generations of Ildarbound during their Trials? Well, this is the story of the very last Maiden in Ranewood–the one that saved the whole town from a dark and terrible Blight.”

  Taking a seat beside the bed, he carefully removed a small, ornate music box from his pocket and placed it on the nightstand nearby. Carved from antique Ildarwood, it had amethyst flecks all throughout, and its soothing melody filled the room while setting a somber tone for the story ahead. With each note it played, t
he room grew darker, and soon the girls found themselves immersed entirely in the world Alder described:

  It was a long time ago when the Maiden first arrived in Ranewood, though she had a different name back then. A sweet and gentle orphan from a faraway land, Jun Wei had no friends or family to speak of, and no possessions of any kind. She lived for years inside an orphanage on the Ildarwood’s outer edge, cared for by the Anderen–always nurturing and kind.

  “Jun Wei,” they said one morning, “we cannot tell you where the paths ahead may lead, but know that we are with you on your journey. We cannot tell you what challenges you will face, but we promise, we will help you overcome them. And though it pains us greatly, we cannot tell you what awaits at Trials’ end. All we can say with utmost certainty is that we know you will endure, because you must, for the world has far too great a need for souls and hearts as kind as yours.”

  And so she began her journey with a single gift–a silver ring crowned with an iridescent pearl they had plucked from the bark of her favorite Ildarwood tree. Rising from the center of the orphanage’s grand hall, the tree had sparkling silver bark and Ildarglass leaves of every color–a towering sign that all who entered would always be welcome beneath its boughs.

  That first year was not easy for Jun Wei, for she saw firsthand how cruel the other kids could be. Alone but unafraid, she found friends in the trees themselves, and in all the animals who lived among them, and in all the flowers that grew beneath. She learned everything she could from the oldest she could find, for they told the greatest stories and knew great secrets from the past.

  With each passing year, she moved deeper into the forest, where the trees were far less friendly, and all the animals, far less tame. Stained by untold years of suffering, they warned of dark days on the horizon, like far too many they’d seen before. In the Deepwood far beyond our borders, Jun Wei saw firsthand what foul effects the Trials could have on the souls of the innocent, and as she struggled to endure the ravages of the wilds herself, she searched more desperately for a way to save the Ildarwood from its plight.

  In the end, one final Trial did await Jun Wei, though it was not far off in the distance, as she had always been told. When at last she arrived within the Direwood of old, deep within the center of the forest, a whisper in the wind brought desperate warnings from back home. A foul and terrible Blight had finally taken hold in Ranewood, turning children against their parents and neighbors against neighbors. So desperate was the town to stop the fell toxin’s spread that they had resigned themselves all to the most terrible of solutions. That night, they had agreed to cleanse the Ildarwood with sacred light and golden fires, to purge every last drop of corruption from their lands, and every tainted soul within along with it.

  Haunted by visions of all the needless suffering that would no doubt result from such a plan, Jun Wei returned to Ranewood without delay and stood before two councils with but one simple request. She would risk her life inside the Ildarwood to try and find a cure for the Blight. In exchange, all she wanted was time–a single year to show them all that hope was not yet lost.

  After much debate, her wish was granted, though none expected her success. And so, while families and friends alike resigned themselves to mourning those who were not yet lost, Jun Wei set to work doing everything she could think of to save the Ildarwood. That winter, she created a map of the entire forest within our borders, from Ranewood Hall, in the center of town, all the way east to the Great Silver Lake, which rests on the Deepwood’s edge. In the spring, she made friends with every Ildarbound she could find and spent weeks hearing their tales. Then, in the summer, she made peace with all who had become corrupted, and she dared to learn their tales as well. By fall, the Blight had at last begun to subside within our borders, and then by winter, she was ready to emerge from the forest, victorious at last.

  “Impossible!” some shouted.

  “How did you do it?” demanded others with great surprise.

  “I just did what I always do,” Jun Wei answered. “First, I watched. Then I listened. Then I consoled and I advised. Then, once I had gained the trust of the untrusting, they let me tend to scars left weeping by careless hearts and damaged souls.”

  “But what about the source?” one councilman asked desperately. “Everyone knows that whenever there is a Blight, there is always a Source. So what was it?”

  And so Jun Wei stared out at all the desperate eyes staring back at her and said—

  “Alder!” Delaniya shouted, causing the story to swiftly end. In an instant, Telara found herself sitting on her bed once more, with her friends and father all around. Beside the bed, the music box stopped playing, and its lid shut swiftly on its own. “Of all the stories you could have told them, why, beneath the Heavens, would you go and pick that one?”

  “It’s just a story, Anya,” Alder insisted, “and they’re all old enough to hear it now.” Yet Telara could tell from her mother’s hardened expression that Alder’s answer did little to assuage Delaniya’s immense irritation.

  “It’s past their bedtime,” she announced, “and we need to be up early.”

  “You’re right,” Alder conceded. “It is getting late.” Then, with a quick glance back at his daughter, he wished the girls a good night’s sleep and shut the door behind him.

  Lamenting the abrupt end to what had been a gripping tale, Telara tried to find amusement in her father’s brief facial expression–it was precisely the same look everyone else in the family had whenever it was their turn to face the inevitable wrath of the inscrutable Delaniya Brent.

  Breakfast the next morning was every bit as uncomfortable as Telara had expected. Sitting with her friends near her father’s end of the table, she dared not glance toward the other end of the room, where Avianna and Merielle sat on opposite sides of the table with their mother at the head. For several long, awkward moments, no one spoke at all while their meals were consumed, though Telara found the silence far less uncomfortable than she did her family’s usual squabbles.

  “So, Ella, have you decided when you’ll be returning?” Delaniya eventually asked her eldest daughter. Taking a hasty sip of auryn juice, Merielle knew better than to respond with a full mouth. It was one of many lessons the girls had been forced to learn at that table, including the importance of answering with precision. No wavering, no sarcasm, and nothing disrespectful–those were unbreakable rules.

  “I packed last night,” Merielle said finally. “Daddy agreed to give me a ride into town on his way to work.”

  “Your father told me you volunteered to speak during the Right of Passage ceremony. What exactly were you planning on saying?”

  That was when all the other Brents at the table exchanged another look to which they had all grown quite accustomed. Delaniya’s question was a trap, and they all knew it.

  Still, Merielle maintained eye contact with her mother as she confidently replied, “I’m just going to start by singing the Warden’s Song. Then I’m going to say what the Ildarguards always say to start the Trials.”

  A collective sigh of relief filled the room after that, and for one brief moment, forks and knives eagerly returned to their morning duties.

  Then came the fateful words that would ruin the day for all who heard them spoken: “But first I want to give the new Ildarbound some quick words of advice to help them get through First Day.”

  Silence filled the room as nearly every set of eyes turned nervously in Delaniya’s direction.

  “Oh, really?” Delaniya asked, more offended than surprised. “You know, sometimes I don’t know why we even bother. The years we’ve spent at this table warning you girls about the dangers your father and I face every time we have to go out there and stand in front of all those troublesome little people, and the first chance you get to prove you’ve actually been paying attention, you decide to risk everything we’ve spent years fighting for just to indulge in some shor
t-sighted attempt at compassion.”

  “It’s not short-sighted!” Merielle insisted. “I’ve thought long and hard about this, and I think it’s the right thing to do.”

  “Who are you to define what’s right?” Delaniya countered. “You’re fourteen years old. You’ve been out in those woods for all of two years, and now, just because you’ve earned the right to walk around wearing the emblem of the Ildarguards wherever you go, you suddenly think that makes you an expert in what is right?”

  “Well, no, but—”

  “‘No but’ is right, Merielle. Your father and I have each spent over twenty years in those woods, and we have seen firsthand the consequences of more than a few good intentions gone awry. You have not. Things are the way they are for a reason, and while that does not in any way mean that our methods are ideal, sometimes the way things are is a great deal better than the alternatives. You have no way of knowing what kind of damage a well-intentioned sliver of knowledge can do out there, so for the very last time, I am advising you in the strongest possible terms to reconsider what you have planned, or there is a very real chance that you will not be the only one who ends up paying the price.”

  Hesitating to respond, Merielle looked toward Telara and her friends before returning her gaze to the matriarch of the family. “You know what, Mom? You’re right. I have spent years sitting at this table and listening to you and Daddy talk. And you know what the most annoying part of all those years was? It wasn’t how quiet we had to stay while you two were reading the morning paper, or even the fact that you two barely ever talked to us when you were done. It was the fact that every time Daddy tried talking to you about some terrible thing he’d read about in the news, you’d always just huff and say, ‘Why even bother to complain about all the world’s problems if you’ll never actually be willing to do whatever it takes to try and solve them?’ Well, that’s exactly what I’m trying to do, Mom. I’m finally ready to try fixing something that is completely and horribly broken, and the one thing I just can’t understand is why you, of all people, won’t support me now that I am.”