“Will we be allowed to visit?” the woman asked once Eletha had led her and her son away to the edge of the sacred forest. “My old family used to have a custom … We’d like to bring flowers to the grave, or, well, to the place where the body will rest. Would you allow it?”

Eletha glanced at the woman and concealed her disgust with a smile. No doubt she meant to murder the flowers while moving them. She wouldn’t know how to touch something as fragile as a dandelion or a rose without killing it, let alone be willing to try to.

So Eletha shook her head. “No,” she said. “You may visit on the next day of the accord, but no sooner. The law of trespass stands without exception.”

“Not even once? Please?”

Just once would be fine, actually, Eletha thought. The visit would be ‘to die for’.

“No,” she said aloud.

The woman looked sheepishly towards the ground, tightly holding her son’s hand. “What if … I was to bring flowers here, to the border?” she asked. “I could say some prayers, at least, and then ... would you bring them to her? To my daughter?”

Hearing such blasphemous words, Eletha became so furious that her mask of pleasantry slipped, as did her trembling right hand, towards the shaft of an arrow strapped to her thigh. “I will not cover my heart tree in death!” she hissed. “The flowers are innocent; they want nothing to do with you and your dead little runt!”

Both the woman and her son took frightened steps back, staring at her in horror.

Eletha glared at them, beside herself with anger. Eventually, many moments later, she forced herself to tear her eyes away from them before the violent thoughts could truly take hold of her.

They don’t know any other way, an annoying thread of thought in her mind echoed, even while she seethed with rage. Meat-men, beasts, even most animals … killing is just what they do.

It was the reason the goddess Phosyphia created dryads in the first place.

Concealing her fury as much as she was able, Eletha forced herself to speak to the woman again.

“If you want flowers so badly,” she growled, “I’ll plant them myself. You will see them when next you are welcome into our forest – but you will not insult me or my sisters by bringing any yourself.”

Both the woman and her son continued to stare at her, shaking. The son took a few more steps back, hiding behind his mother’s dress.

“Do you understand?” Eletha asked.

Still trembling wildly, the woman hastily nodded.

“And do you accept?”

“Yes! Yes! Thank you.”

Eletha relaxed and released the arrow she had begun clutching in her right hand. Pulling her gaze away from the two meat-men, she knelt to the ground and gently caressed a small birch sapling growing in the shade in front of her. “Good,” she said. “Then, as this young one witnesses, we have an accord.”

She looked towards the two humans again and slowly rose to her feet. “Is that all?” she asked.

“O-only one more thing – if you would be so kind, noble dryad,” the woman said.

Eletha clicked her tongue, realizing she was being far more patient with the humans than was customary or necessary.

“I’d like to ask if my boy is sick, too,” the woman said. “Luvelye. I’ve heard dryads can tell these things at a glance. If you would be so kind—”

“No,” Eletha cut in. “He’s not sick. He’ll be prowling the earth for decades to come, a horror to all of nature’s guardians.”

“He’s … not? Oh, thank you, Vifafey … and thank you, dryad. I am in your debt—”

“Leave now, then, and I’ll consider it repaid. Trample on fewer lives on your way home.”

The woman hastily nodded, holding her son close to her again and profusely speaking praise to Eletha and the lesser god Vifafey. Slowly, she made to leave. Eletha had already grown bored by her presence rather than disgusted by it by the time she and her boy finally did go.

Stolen from its rightful place, this narrative is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

The reddening sun slowly hid itself under the treetops as she began to make her way to the Oakmother’s sacred grove.

“Not sick at all, that little boy,” she murmured to herself, passing a group of birch trees, pines, and larches. “But then, neither was the girl, before the nightshade.”

The journey back to the Oakmother’s grove was much quicker than the one away from it, since Eletha was no longer stuck caring for meat-men.

She made it to the Great Oaks before twilight, skipping on pebbles and tree roots along the way. It was refreshing, once again moving through the forest without watching plants get trampled right in front of her, forbidden from intervening as sylvan law and basic morality decreed.

“The accord was a mistake,” she murmured. “No matter how few of us dryads there are left … those murderers and fire-starters…”

Of course, her thoughts on the matter were unimportant, as were those of the majority of her sisters. The Oakmother’s word was final, and she had personally arranged a ‘peaceful coexistence’. With the occasional days of accord as exceptions, the humans would stay out of the forest, and the dryads stay in it. The agreement didn’t make anyone happy, but it left everyone alive.

Eletha smiled, lifting her hand and caressing the bow hung on her shoulder. Almost everyone, in any case. Trespassers can be shown no mercy.

Soon enough, she passed through the entrance of the Oakmother’s grove. About twenty of her sisters were gathered there, tending to saplings and undergrowth that were bent and injured when the humans passed them.

The Oakmother was there too, with a human. The old, bald one, the leader – Berrick. The sun was already down, and he was still in the heart of the woods … it made Eletha’s skin crawl.

A gentle breeze began to pick up, causing the myriad of leaves above everyone to sway and rustle. The Oakmother held a hand to one of her oaks, silently communing with them, to the chagrin of her human acquaintance. After a few moments, she opened her eyes and signaled Eletha to join her.

Eletha did so without delay. As she skipped along the pebbles, she saw May kneeling on the ground and tending to a little sapling with a bent leaf stroke.

“Who is she sending for?” her seed-sister asked. “Ah, yes. Her favorite.”

Eletha rolled her eyes and continued hopping towards the Oakmother.

“Are we truly asking for that much?” the human was saying as she arrived. “Vephena, this will be bad for all of us. I keep telling you not all of us humans are the same, but you won’t listen!”

The Oakmother sighed, removing her hand from the oak. “And I keep telling you, dear friend, that we do not interfere in human affairs. Is our accord with you truly not favorable enough already? Why do you keep asking for more?”

“It is, Vephena! I’m not asking for more, we are all already happy with the accord – but we won't be able to follow it any longer if you don’t help us!”

Eletha stood patiently in silence, eyeing the distressed meat-man with a measure of distaste.

“We do not pick sides,” the Oakmother said. “We cannot.”

“Vephena, I’m begging you. Just this once. Half your girls are starving, aren’t they? You’ll even get a meal out of it!”

“Eletha,” the Oakmother said, turning away from him. “My child. It is good that you have made your way back here so quickly. I have a task for you.”

“What is it, Oakmother?” Eletha asked.

“I’d like to ask that you see this man safely home,” the Oakmother said, shaking her head. “He is dear to me, and I would fear for his fate if he were to wander our forest alone in the dark.” She turned to gaze at the human again. “These woods can be dangerous for our human friends.”

Eletha frowned, trying to see if she was being serious.

Berrick rolled his eyes at the Oakmother in a display of utter repugnance. “So that’s your answer, Vephena?” he asked. “No? Just like that?”

“I’m sorry, Berrick,” the Oakmother said.

“Fine. But things won't bode well for you either. Without us and our accord, how will you eat? Will you start leaving the forest to scavenge and murder? How long until someone sets fire to it?”

The Oakmother remained calm in the face of the threat, but Eletha unconsciously grasped one of the arrows on her thigh.

“It’s been a pleasant day of accord, Berrick,” the Oakmother said after a few moments. “I’d rather not end it with a fight. Look … I’m sorry, but I have to look out for my own. I will pray that you resolve your issues.”

“Not bloody likely!” the human retorted. “Hell, this might be our last goodbye, Vephena! But … I guess I shouldn’t complain. It clearly doesn’t matter to you.”

“Goodbye, Berrick. Please be wary of that screecher I mentioned earlier.”

Screecher? There’s one here? Eletha thought. She hadn’t heard. Perhaps the god-blessed monster would kill one of the meat-men on their way home.

“Goodbye, Oakmother,” the human spat.

At that, the Oakmother appeared taken aback, but after a moment, she composed herself again and nodded at Eletha, and she, in turn, placed her hand on the human’s shoulder.

“Come,” Eletha said to Berrick. “I’ll show you the way.”

“No,” the Oakmother said, looking towards the ground. “See him all the way home, my daughter. The law of trespass will be lifted a little longer.”

Eletha turned toward the Oakmother, confused. Had she really just asked her to leave the forest…? It appeared so…

The human snorted. “Spare me. Let’s just get going,” he said, before turning away from Eletha and the Oakmother. He plodded off without a care for any of the young plants in his way.

Eletha gazed at the Oakmother for a moment longer.

“All the way home, my daughter,” the Oakmother said. “Please keep him safe.”

“Why give this task to me?” Eletha asked.

“Because you’re good with the bow, and because you might benefit most from completing it. You have potential, Eletha, but you need to be able to behave yourself more appropriately around the humans. I want you to take this as a learning opportunity. As your seed-sister Maylissena told you earlier today, try to play nice.”

Eletha shuddered at the embarrassment. Confused as she was, she nodded and skipped up ahead of the human.