“Now, you are a queer fish, aren’t you?”

The elf slowly woke up. As the blur vision of a wavy hazy world slowly cleared up, he saw a young girl about ten years old in front of him, looking at him like some weird creature that had suddenly popped out from the belly of the earth. But the peculiarity of this perception was this: she was upside down. And this puzzled him. As the vision got clearer, he saw that they were in a rather dim surrounding and behind her a few small plants were growing upside down. The roots were growing upwards while the leaves were growing downwards. I must be in a cave or ravine or something, he thought. And she must be a batgirl. He tried to turn around but felt restrained. Where am I? Hmm, there’s the smell of dry leaves and wet soil. And it’s quite dark. Then he heard the sound of river flowing and birds were chirping. And so he realized as he became more awaken, it was him that was hanging upside down. His whole world suddenly made a complete turn.

His internal alarm went off. He was bound and tied and hanging upside down. And this little girl with green short hairs was looking at him intently. He struggled to get free but it was hopeless. His whole body was wrapped around by roots and vines and that tied him up effectively. The more he struggled, the more it tightened. He gave up and looked back at the girl. She was quite beautiful for a child, not cute or anything but beautiful, squatting in front of him with her hands on her chin, watching him with that big round intriguing eyes, her green pupils focused right at him. Their heads were levelled and so, they were looking at each other, eye to eye. Only that, he was upside down.

“You should stop struggling. They would only get tighter,” the girl said as a-matter-of-fact-ly.

“Who are you? Let me go!”

“I’m not the one who tied you up. So, I can’t let you go,” replied the girl truthfully.

“Then, help me. Help me get loose. Cut the vines.”

“I can’t cut the vines because I don’t have a knife. Even if I have one, it won’t work. It won’t cut. And, I really can’t help you. Oldbark won’t permit it. He said that you are a detriment.”

“A detriment?”

“Yes, a detriment to the peaceful existence of the Forest,” the girl said without ever taking her eyes of him. “Are you a fish? A fishman? I’ve never met a fishman?”

“I’m not a fishman. There’s no fishman. I’m an elf. We’re the greatest race that has ever existed in the Great Plains.” the elf said, still struggling. “What is he talking about? Detriment! We are the last defender of the forest, the purveyor of justice. And where is he? Show yourself. Come out, come out!” the elf shouted. After another round of struggling, he gave up again. Exhausted. Exasperated.

“An elf. What is an elf? But you can be a fishman, can’t you.”

“I cannot be a fishman. I cannot be something that I’m not. I’m an elf. Shouldn’t you know something about elves. Haven’t anyone tell you something about them?” The elf could not believe that there was actually someone who did not know anything about elves. Maybe, she is too young and no one told her, the elf thought. And she’s living in the forest, and alone.

“Nope. Why do I want to know anything about them? Do you know anything about me? I don’t think so. And since you don’t know anything about me, I shouldn’t know anything about you and certainly not some elf race.” She said it all as plainly and as carelessly as it could be.

The elf was wordless. And she continued,

“And Oldbark said not to trust you. He said that elves had not been in the region for hundreds of years. He said that the elf has extinct. So you can’t be an elf. Therefore, you must be a fishman.”

“What does he mean by extinct? Who is this Oldbark? He doesn’t know anything. We are all alive and well and flourishing. We have just stopped coming here.” The elf turned around trying to find this Oldbark. “Where is he? I don’t see him.”

“But, he’s right here.”

The elf took another look around. He was sure that there was no one here except himself and the girl. She must be imagining things, he thought. “Who is Oldbark? Is he your imaginary friend? Can you untie me?” asked the elf again. His voice was more agitated. Something was not right. The other possibility, the elf thought, is that Oldbark is a ghost or some invisible being standing just beside him. The elf suddenly felt a chill running through his whole body.

“Nope, nope and nope.” The girl replied all three of his questions and she counted her fingers while answering them to prove it. “Well, whatever you are, I don’t care.” And the girl declared, “I’ve decided that you are a fish, so you will be a fish. And I like to keep you as a pet.”

The elf was astounded. “You want to keep me as a pet. I’m not a pet and I’m not going to be your pet. And I’m not a fish. Fish swims in the river.”

You might be reading a pirated copy. Look for the official release to support the author.

“You did swim in the river. Oldbark saw you swimming along. He fished you out because he thought that you are one exceptionally ugly looking fish. Then he hung you up like all fish, so that the water would drip down and you would be dry. Look at the puddle. The water came from you.”

The elf strained his neck to a looking-up position as to look at the puddle of water, which from his point of view was above his head. What he saw horrified him. He could not believe that this reflection was him. His face was dirty. His fair white hair was dirty, messy and in disarray. There were pieces of algae and decaying weeds intertwined within. His body was all bound up in vines and roots that extended from a very high place. His clothes were probably in rags, torn and dirty. He grimaced at the image. He was never this scruffy looking. Ever since birth, he was clothed with the finest cloth and fed with the finest food. He slept in soft warm bed and his bedroom was sparkling clean. This was abomination. Only now, he could appreciate fully the situation he was in and it was not looking good.

He was in some sort of a cavern with holes here and there so that light speared through. But the illumination was dim. Apart from that, there seemed to be no way out. The ceiling was very high and looked conical. He was entombed by walls of rocks with a few scraggly little vines growing from the walls drooping down several feet. His head started to throb because of all the blood rushing to his head and his chest hurt like hell, that punch by that old goat still reverberated within him. Being bound up like this did not help at all. So, he decided not to argue with her about the fish business anymore. He thought that getting out of here would be paramount to him. He would become a fish if he must.

“Well, at least, he could have hung me the other way around. With my head up, maybe.” His throbbing head was beginning to hurt.

“Nope. That way, I can’t see your eyes.”

“Yeah, yeah. He hung me upside down so that you can see my eyes. Funny. Very funny,” the elf said while looking everywhere, trying to find something that might help him to escape.

Then certain things felt strange. How did the little girl get in here? A little girl doesn’t live in a forest alone. Who’s taking care of her? Is she a prisoner like me? There’s something peculiar about this girl. The elf could sense it but he could not put his finger on it. Is she another evil monster, like that goat, disguised as a beautiful little girl? Or, how else can a child be here? So, he decided to ask again, this time more politely, “Who is Oldbark? And, who are you? Where are we?”

“Oldbark? Oldbark is a tree. And we are among his roots. And I’m not a monster. Neither is that goat.” The girl answered freely and without any hesitation.

Only now, did the elf notice how sweet and melodious her voice was. And that made him overlook one very important thing in their conversation.

On hearing that, the elf looked around again. Indeed, all the walls were actually roots. How could I miss it?, he thought. They were inside this pocket of space between two giant buttress roots covered all around by a network of aerial roots and prop roots interwoven among each other. The elves knew a thing or two about trees. They had been living in the forest for generations, and more so ever since they had retreated from the Great Plains. From the extent of the roots, he knew that this was one massive fig tree. Perhaps, one of the venerated Banyan. He had never seen tree roots like these. It must have grown for thousands of years. And he could imagine how the canopy would be like, as wide as a town, a green plateau up in the sky propped up by numerous trunks.

No wonder it is so dim. This is one big tree, he thought.

“Yes. He has been growing for a long time. He is very old. Older than me,” the girl said.

“You are just a girl. Of course, it’s older than you. But really, who is Oldbark? You cannot seriously expect me to believe that he is a tree. It’s preposterous.”

“But he is,” said the girl with all seriousness of intent. Her big round eyes shone the light of utter innocence.

“But if Oldbark is a tree, how can he fished me out of the river and tied me up? A tree cannot move. It doesn’t have hands. It doesn’t have eyes. And a tree cannot think.”

“Oldbark can do everthing that you’ve just said and he doesn’t need eyes or hands or a brain to do them. Oldbark knows more things than any of us. He had attained consciousness, thousands of years ago.”

“A tree, attaining consciousness. Please. And, how do you know that? Did he tell you that? He could be lying, you know.”

“Oldbark didn’t tell me because Oldbark can’t talk.”

“But you just said, ‘Oldbark said’.”

“It’s just a figure of speech. Oldbark didn’t say it to me like you did. And I don’t need him to tell me. I just know. We are connected. If I want to know something, I just know. Maybe, it’s not possible for you to understand. You are just a low level being.”

“What low level being? I’m an elf. We are the lord of the lands. We are the most admired race of the Great Plains. And you still have not told me who you are.” The elf was becoming irritated again for being called a low level being. He started to struggle violently.

After a while, the elf stopped. He was tired. It did not work. Now, the elf was lost. There was nothing he could do. The only way of escape seemed to be this little girl. But she’s nuts, connected to a tree, she doesn’t know what she’s saying. How can someone be connected to a tree, he thought. Is there an umbilical cord or something? He did not know how to proceed? This was out of his mind. But the worst thing was she seemed to be telling the truth, totally committed, but yet her truth could not be further away from the truth. It went against everything his experience had told him. How could he believe in this story about a thinking moving tree? A tree is a tree. Nothing more. But how to deal with her? How to bring her around? How to make her see? She is hallucinating. A tree just grows at a fixed spot. She must be crazy. But he decided to do the most urgent thing first. He pleaded with a smiling, most amiable face, “Can you untie me now? It’s not that comfortable to talk like this.”

“Oldbark said that you cannot be trusted. And Oldbark said that you can stop trying to wriggle your hands free so you can fire that little gadgets in your sleeve. He has grown tiny roots into them so everything is stuck.”

What? How? How does he know that? Can he see through my clothes? The elf thought to himself.

“Of course he can see them. He sees everything.”