After getting married, just not to the woman I thought I would, it was time to meet up with Maelwys. The warm feeling I gained from the stuffy aired, domed cavern beneath the crypt began to be overshadowed by the joy and excitement of being able to escape from these torturous dual cities and head back to some kind of nature, even if it was somewhat sanitised.

The excitement, along with the overwhelm after exiting the calm quiet of the interior of the chapel and into the busy crowds swirling around the stalls in the courtyard of Saint Evaine ’s Chapel, dulled my normally sharp senses. Tan-bei was the one who noticed her first and brought my attention to Sara.

She was standing there, an island in the midst of the swirling crowds, staring at the two of us. Her eyes were puffy and her warm pale white face looked deathly pallid. Down by her sides her hands were shaking. She was opening and closing her mouth like a sort of fish feeding for flies on the surface of a river.

Beyond a few curious looks, the crowds ignored her. Back I couldn ’t do much but leave my love behind, hoping that one day we would meet again. Now I could do something about it. With a couple of quick steps, parting the crowd between us, I made it to her side. Carefully, I picked her up and held her close.

She tried to push away from me, but I wouldn ’t allow it.

Tan-bei, put her small delicate copper-fawn hand on my arm, ‘let’s go back inside. I’m sure they’ll be happy to see her.’

Her hand felt comforting on my arm. I found myself smiling.

After failing to escape my enwrapping arms, Sara gave up. Instead, she snuggled into my chest mumbling about being too late. I turned around and headed back into the chapel. The longing of wanting to be out in nature fading in importance compared to the pain in seeing Sara so broken.

Once I entered the calm sanctuary of the chapel with its brightly painted walls full of promises, hopes, and warnings, I saw the thuggish looking preacher, Gannis, kneeling on the floor with another set of stones and a deep green casting mat.

The slightly skew-whiff deep green material, with its crude gold stitching, looked remarkably familiar. And what was more were the stones. These were true stones. Rounded stones that I had spent days picking out of a stream deep in the hills. Sirona had then used her spirit gifts to carefully carve the signs onto them.

I had purposefully not searched Sirona when I left her. Hoping the stones would guide her towards a pleasant next life, and in time, guide her back to my reincarnated self.

If he had them, he had been there during that night.

Releasing the baggage in my arms, I rushed towards him.

His ruddy face frozen as he watched me come closer. A familiar expression. A pleasant one.

My foot lashed out and hit his surprisingly firm stomach.

His body tumbled away on the floor. Rolling until it smashed into the wall beneath a picture of a vengeful goddess hunting. I felt the goddess in the image call to me. Not to stop me, but for me to accept her.

A wildness washed over and through me, similar to the one which engulfed me when I became Treeman. While it held a primitive and wild edge, this wildness had a lack to its depth. The depths of the wildness were more civilised and restrained than the wild depths which brought Treeman out of me.

I grabbed the groaning figure by his slate grey robes and lifted him up. His purple skull cap had come off somewhere. Right now, he had none of the grace of being a preacher. Instead, he looked like many of the holy fools who had tried to get in my way during those final days.

My forehead proved stronger than his nose.

Blood dripped out of his ruined nose.

‘Tell me,’ I said. ‘Did you laugh as you took your turn with her?’

Before he could respond, I launched him down the length of the chapel.

I followed him, ignoring the annoyances that got in the way. One particularly annoying annoyance did not stop. It got back slapped out of my way.

The wretched preacher was on its knees, begging.

How many of my people begged under the laughing eyes of those who believed they were superior? It was funny when they begged in return. The few who didn ’t got my respect.

I kicked the begging preacher under the chin, snapping his head back. I fell upon him, straddling him.

‘Did you laugh when she cried?’ I slapped his face with the ends of my fingers. ‘Did you laugh when they shoved her sword into her most private of parts?‘ My voice faltered. ’Killing her and our child?’

I slapped him again. Without any force, it felt more like a caress than a slap.

The eyes looking up at me were not those of a victim.

They were those of a martyr. I had seen those eyes plenty of times when I had forced myself to perform more and more cruel perversions upon Orla. Yet her kind, loving, martyr eyes never once held condemnation.

His eyes were the same.

‘Fuck you bastard,’ I sobbed quietly and rolled off him.

My Sirona.

All the pain and fear which I had thought I had overcome fell upon me. It slammed into my chest with a weight that made it hard to breathe. I couldn ’t breathe. The world was blurry. My whole body refused to work.

A primal scream roared out of my body.

Something was going on. I just couldn ’t care. My world was gone. Sirona, my world. She had told me the previous morning, just before I collapsed, that we were to be blessed with a child.

That day, we decided we would finally retire. Flee the ruins of our home and start a new life with the aid of the druids. But I came down with a fever and we were discovered. Sirona led them away to protect me.

She should ’ve fled.

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Taken our child and started a fresh life.

But she sacrificed herself and our child for me.

I was too weak to do anything to protect her when she needed protecting the most.

Why?

Why did I deserve to live?

Why do I get to live a life full of blessings and joy?

Why do I deserve to receive love again?

Why could I not just die?

Why did Orla show me such tenderness and love?

Why did I flee from her?

Why did the preacher, just now, accept his sacrifice with grace and love?

My body felt feverish. I was coming down with another fever. Why now?

I could feel people surrounding me.

Maybe weakened as I am, one of them would slip a knife through my ribs, killing me. Or smash my skull in. Or crush my ribs, leaving me in pain as I try to take my final few breaths as I drowned in my own blood.

There was a gentle hand on my brow.

No.

I want to see Sirona again. To chase after her. Climb into our new life together. A life where we could live and grow up together in peace and love. A calm life of peace. Interrupted by raging arguments, chilled by the depths of our love. With children bringing us blessings, joys, and the occasional pain.

Sirona.

She had gone on ahead of me in the worse possible way.

Yet I wasn ’t allowed to follow her.

Where was the pain I deserved?

Instead, I felt softness beneath me, and hands clutching both of my hands. There were sobs and angry mutterings. But no pain. The preacher ’s rough voice spoke gently. Words not aimed at me, but at the angry voice and those which held my large hands so tight.

The voice droned on and on.

Tears not of my own fell upon my hands.

Mutterings of disbelief.

Then another voice, deep and rich. It spoke a melodic tale, one which I couldn ’t hear, but one which sank deep into my turbulent core. In time, my core calmed and I could hear more and more of what was going on around me.

Finally, my fever broke. I became aware.

An elderly man with warm white skin and ancient eyes in a craggy face dominated my awareness. Distinguished in his poise and looks, with a full head of grey hair, he orated the epic tale of the isle which I had once called home. His powerful voice brought the images of those giant trees which reached high into the sky, casting the world below into a constant state of green twilight.

Of how we lived and hunted, and took of the bounty of the forest. How some were blessed with gifts to help protect and guide the forested isle for future generations. Then one night, everything changed.

A wave of power washed over the isle, causing mass destruction, killing many of us.

Those who had been blessed were either killed, had their powers ripped from them, or became mindless fools who could but babble.

Then the disaster truly began.

It started with a single ship who limped its way to the shores after being caught in the tidal wave caused by the wave of power. A single ship who sailed away full of a cargo of our precious crafted goods; not just the material ones we traded, but those of our heritage, and worse was the live flesh and blood crafted goods of our future generations.

Secrets our people had long kept, were plundered. The mineral bounty which had allowed the vast forests to grow on our isle, and which had protected and fed us for countless generations, unearthed and ripped from the isle ’s virgin soil.

Our people were used to rip out the stones from the ground. Those were the blessed ones. They forced some to service those who invaded our lands in less savoury ways.

A few hidden villages remained. In time, they were discovered.

The folk were forced to listen to those who would be our superiors as they ranted and raved about how great their religion was. And how great living packed together with many others in a space which was truly too small. And how great it was to force nature to follow our will, not for us to follow its will.

The youngest were forced to live apart from us; ripped away from their parents, grandparents, or those who cared for them. They shipped most away never to see their homeland again.

A few souls did what they could to bring salvation to the few they could save. Druid ships pulled into distant and small bays, coves, and rivers. The protectors led the broken and damaged to them. In time, more and more protectors joined with the broken.

Until only the greatest of the protectors remained.

Of the greatest, two stood out beyond the rest. Barely adults, the couple forced those invaders on the isle to live huddled behind defensive walls made of the same wood which belonged to the trees which once stood tall and proud and allowed the Folk their freedom.

They rescued many.

They slaughtered many.

Troops of mercenaries and private armies scoured the island for the two of them.

Still, the flow of broken souls leaving the island remained.

Then, on one fateful night, one of the two was captured and killed. Her body left broken as a warning to the husband. But they misunderstood their target.

Driven mad by rage, he went on a grief driven rampage.

The walls which were meant to keep them safe turned against them. Hastily constructed stone walls were not the answer, either. The dormant roots grew from the ground and ripped them down.

In time the island was all but abandoned, lorded over by the indomitable and unbowed Broken Branch.

But like the isle he loved, he too faded away, lost to the mists.

It is said that the indomitable Broken Branch will one day become whole.

When that day comes, he will lead his people, scattered as though seeds in a storm, back to the isle. Then in the fertile valleys, the people will regrow stronger than before.

‘And where is this Broken Branch?’ Tan-bei asked. ‘Maybe he can help my—our Berwyn.’

I felt her small hands squeeze my giant hand as hard as they could. Sara, on the other side, buried my other hand into her bosom.

‘He lays before you broken,’ Maelwys said, his voice quiet in the stillness of the chapel, ‘yet still indomitable and unbowed.’