The Meadow Dwellers welcomed the Ibexes as honored guests after Minty’s magnificent healer work. Enyanna’s bleeding had slowed after drinking the tea concoction. And after a few hours of rest her bleeding had stopped entirely. And the baby boy had cried and cried until eventually falling asleep himself. When they both awoke Enyanna was able to breastfeed her son, who suckled her healthily, and it appeared both of them would be alright.

King Leandrus insisted the mo’huran stay until the burning ceremony, in which the effigy of the antlered wicker man, the Wild Watcher, would be set ablaze. The burning would take place in three nights, to commemorate the bounties the meadow had bestowed upon them over the season, and to bring luck to the coming season’s gatherings. The king insisted that the ceremony would bring the Ibexes good luck on their Great Journey.

In the three days they stayed at the camp in the gorge, Yuliko would often stand beneath the towering wicker man, remembering how the antlered green man had seemed so man kin-like to her when it appeared from out of the trees. She had read something in the green man’s dark eyes. What was it? Sorrow? Regret? Something sad. But the Wild Watcher’s white painted eyeballs were unreadable, lifeless..

Much of Yuliko’s time was also spent out of the gorge in the meadow, where the sunflower people taught their guests to flower walk. Jogen explained that the Meadow Dwellers had two ways of traversing the meadow. They could travel stealthily beneath the giant sunflower stalks, which was slow and required good navigation abilities. The other way was to flower walk over the heads of the bouncy tree-like sunflowers.

Flower walking involved taking advantage of the springiness of the sunflower stalks as one ran across the disc heads. Once mastered a flower walker could sprint across the meadow at rapid speed. Some of the sunflower warriors that had taken the mo’huran captive, no longer wearing their wooden masks, volunteered to teach their guests the skill.

It took many attempts and many tumbles down to the meadow floor, but eventually Yuliko was able to sprint and bounce along the tops of the flower heads with confidence. Once she knew what she was doing, Yuliko actually found it exhilarating to fly over the fiery field of red and yellow petals.

Faydayo became especially adept at flower walking, and even rechallenged King Leandrus to another duel, though this time all in good fun, and not over a cliff edge. It was another exciting duel with the stalk clubs, and it even looked like Faydayo was going to knock down the king a couple times, but ultimately the king protected his title as the sunflower champion, and threw Faydayo over the disc with a rolling toss as they grappled. King Leandrus was so pleased with Faydayo’s fighting that he gifted him an elegantly carved stalk club.

Kardan, on the other hand, had a hard time getting the hang of flower walking. More than anyone else, he repeatedly plummeted to the meadow ground, getting decently banged up in the process. But he was tenacious and wouldn’t give it up. Yuliko actually found it endearing how clumsily he tried to get his jumping right.

Minty continued making the healing tea for Enyanna until she was able to walk on her own. Their second night with the Meadow Dwellers, Enyanna found Minty and Yuliko at a fire and gifted them each with a pot of sunflower oil as a thank you. The oil was a precious gift; it could be used for medicines and skincare, as fuel for lamps, for cooking, for treating wood, and many other uses. Enyanna also let each of them hold the baby for a while.

The boy was even more precious. Yuliko was awed by the new life she had helped to bring into the world, if only in small part. It was crazy to think that this fragile little newborn would grow to be a man of his tribe someday, maybe even be one of the masked sunflower warriors.

Krissa didn’t spend much time with their hosts, rather, most of her time was spent alone somewhere in the meadow conferring with the spirits. Yuliko wondered how much Krissa could learn from these foreign spirits so far away from Maw’Goro. Did communing with the meadow spirits work the same as the rainforest spirits? Krissa hardly spoke of her insights, so Yuliko didn’t know if she was learning much or learning little.

On their third and final night with sunflower people, they held the burning ceremony. As the sun was setting the entire Meadow Dweller clan gathered beneath the giant wicker man at the bottom of the gorge. Logs and tinder were heaped at the base of the Wild Watcher, and the fuel was doused with sunflower oil. Drummers banged their instruments frenetically as the crowd circled around the wicker man. Closest to the effigy the Meadow Dwellers whipped around dancing with much energy as the drums. The crowd chanted together in their sunflower tongue. Jogen told them it meant something to the effect of ‘By fire, the next earthly watch comes. By fire, the otherworldly watch continues.’

Yuliko wasn’t exactly sure what that meant, but she had gathered that the Wild Watcher effigy signified the turning of a cycle for the sunflower people. She wore her elegant conure feather headdress her mother had made her, walking the circle side-by-side with Kardan, who she noticed was wearing the red jasper bracelet Gidiya had gifted him. She told herself that it didn’t mean anything, Kardan simply wanted to look his best for the ceremony.

And, he did look very nice, Yuliko thought. He normally wore his hair in a bun, but a Meadow Dweller had offered hair groomings to the Ibexes, and now Kardan let his freshly trimmed hair hang down to his shoulders. And he wore flowers over his ears.They had all been gifted flowers to wear.

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Jogen had told them the tradition was to circle the effigy nine times before the burning. This had something to do with moving between the earthly realm and the Other World, but he couldn’t explain much more in Black Glass speech.

As they walked their circles, Yuliko’s and Kardan’s hands brushed together. They both quickly looked at each other, and smiled. Kardan took her hand in his, purposefully now. Yuliko blushed.

“Hey, what do you say we get out of this crowd,” Kardan said.

“We’ve still got four more circles,” Yuliko said.

“Oh, well I guess we should walk faster,” he said.

“We should find a quiet place,” Yuliko said, squeezing his hand briefly. “But after the ceremony.”

“Yeah. After the ceremony,” Kardan said.

They let their hands slide apart and continued their walk, both with giddy smiles on their faces.

King Leandrus sat on a wicker throne on an elevated area of the gorge floor, watching his people swirl around the effigy. On one side of the king sat the sunflower shaman, wearing an oversized oblong mask with super exaggerated features. Yellow and red petals ringed around the mask's edge. On the king’s other side on a stool sat Faydayo, with King Leandrus’s arm wrapped around his shoulder. The king was animatedly waving his free arm around as he told Faydayo a story, of which Faydayo surely understood very little.

Minty had been rather shy around most of the Meadow Dwellers, as she was with most people. So she had spent most of her time with Hado, learning what she could from him about the local plantlife and their uses. But now that there was dancing to be had, all of Minty’s shyness evaporated and she hit the dance ground. Hado seemed shocked by the mousy girl’s transformation into a wild raver.

Zana and Pykor were sitting with their one-armed interpreter, Jogen, but their conversation was interrupted by a group of boys who wanted to see Zana’s leopard tattoos. She obliged by stripping off her wrap to show them, which visibly made Pykor uncomfortable.

When the sun had fully set and the gorge was lit by torches and campfires, the Wild Watcher half shrouded in the flickering darkness, the sunflower shaman rose from their seat and shouted, “Aryo nok na!” The drumming and the chanting came to a crescendo. The circlers stopped walking. The dancers halted mid-whirl. The crowd stood stiffly, facing the masked shaman.

Yuliko and Kardan made their way back to Jogen as the shaman spoke in sunflower tongue.

“Shaman say Wild Man’s watch end. New Watcher take over,” Jogen translated.

Then the shaman was handed a torch, which they raised high in the air, and continued speaking.

“Fire burn away old. Fire clean. Meadow Dwellers new power after fire,” Jogen told them.

After that the shaman lowered the torch to eye level of their mask. They threw a powder from their pocket into the torch and the flames flashed bright white, then flickered blue. The effect only lasted a few seconds, but all the Ibexes were astonished. They had never seen magic like that before, and they all realized they were in the presence of strong spirit powers.

Then King Leandrus rose from his wicker throne, giving Faydayo one last pat on the back as he did so. He stood beside the shaman who bowed and handed the king the torch. Leandrus stepped down from the elevated area down into the crowd, carrying the torch high, his ivy cape dragging behind. The crowd stepped aside to create a path as he walked. All the dancers that had been closeby the effigy all stepped back with the rest of the people.

Upon reaching the wicker man, King Leandrus stood still for a long moment, then he hollered out, “Noka Jabee!” And he hurled the torch onto the pile of fuel beneath the Wild Watcher’s legs. The flames spread quickly across the tender and timber. Steadily, the fire consumed the fuel pile and rose, starting to catch the wicker man’s legs and groin.

The king removed the dried flower crown from his head, then he tossed it into the flames, which quickly shriveled into black ember. Next Leandrus removed his withered sunflower cape, and swung into the roaring fire as well. He unsheathed his stalk club from his belt, and that went in the fire too. Following that, the king took off his leather gloves, untied his leggings, and stripped off his wrap. All of which were tossed into the fire, which was hungrily eating up the wicker man’s legs and up to his waist.

The Ibexes all watched with grim anticipation wondering how far this act was supposed to go. Faydayo had risen from his stool and moved to the edge of the throne area. Yuliko’s hand slipped back into Kardan’s, and she held tight watching the scene play out.

The now naked king removed his moccasins, pitching those into the fire as well. All that remained was his bodily self. Leandrus was handed a knife. He flipped the long ponytail of his hair over his shoulder and he slashed off the braid. He yelled out to the crowd, “Noka Jabee!” and he burned his ponytail as an offering too.

“Na pak Jabee!” the crowd shouted and cheered.

Flames crept up the wicker man’s torso, crawling over him like a swarm, blackening and crackling his body.

“People say king reborn,” Jogen translated.

The naked king strode back through the passageway of people to his wicker throne. He climbed up the platform and a new beautifully braided flower cape was draped over his shoulders, and a new sunflower crown made from fresh cut flowers was placed upon his head by the shaman. The king gave Faydayo a hug, then sat back down on his throne.

It appeared that the ceremony was over. The drummers started up the music again, and the Meadow Dwellers found nice spots to watch the pyre burn.

“Hey,” Kardan said to Yuliko. “Let’s get out of here.”

“Hold on,” Yuliko said. “I want to watch.”

“Sure,” Kardan said.

Yuliko scooted closer to him as they gazed upon the blazing antlered effigy. The flames were eating up the wicker man’s arms and neck. Yuliko laid her head on Kardan’s shoulder. They sat and watched until the flames had spread all the way to the Wild Watcher’s antlers, and burnt them to ash.