Vath set a brisk pace as they began their trek into the forest, following a well-worn game path that the two often took. Lily scampered around, roaming ahead and off the trail to collect plants, insects, and interesting rocks. Her uncle had taught her to see the land around her as a perpetually replenishing source of bounty, and her deft hands constantly plucked and snatched things to be quickly stuffed into her many pouches. Vath had introduced her to roots and mushrooms that were good to eat, herbs for flavoring their meals and their teas, vines that could be pulled and then rebraided into sturdy ropes. He’d never taught her much about the insects and the rocks though, she just collected those because she liked them.
Outside of the forest, the plants, bugs, and animals were relatively uninteresting: occasionally Lily would snatch up a beetle with an odd number of antennae or an herb with leaves the wrong color, but it was within the forest that things could get truly weird. Except for the rocks. As far as Lily could tell, rocks were always just rocks no matter how far they went in, and she kind of liked them for that.
Lily once discovered a rose with scaled petals. She had begged Uncle Vath for hours until he taught her how to press and preserve it and she still had it 2 years later.
Unlike the many smaller patches of forest near their compound that surrounded themselves with bushes and smaller trees, this forest, The Forest, had a clean and distinct border separating it from the fields and hills beyond, a strangely regular line of adult trees. The forest grew beyond, immediately thick with undergrowth and shadows as though someone had cut out the deepest part of an old-growth forest and transplanted it here in this meadow. It would have to have been a large cut, however, since the line of trees went on well past Lily’s furthest exploration and she and her uncle spent a lot of time out there.
Vath strode easily through the first line of trees, unbothered by the low branches and recent undergrowth that encroached on the trail. It was one of Lily’s chores to keep their regular paths cleared up to the third waypoint but this path was one they rarely took. Vath was somewhat relieved that Lily didn’t seem to take note, caught up as she was in her cheerful packrat routine.
Years ago, the first rumors of people becoming acclimated with the essence of this world started trickling into Vath’s former clan. At the time they were dismissed as myth and wishful thinking, right alongside the rumors of lost open worldgates and beasts that could transform into humans. If anything, due to the poisonous nature of essence it was humans turning into beasts.
Lily tore right through those assumptions in the same way that she would treat a spider web between her and a particularly interesting albino twelve-legged beetle.
Despite the apparent randomness to Lily’s gathering route, Vath was always careful to follow her whenever she veered off of the path. Her unique attenuation to the natural essence around her allowed her to easily guide them around lingering clouds of the… gas? Radiation? With the loss of so many tools and technology in the flight to this world, Vath had never heard of anyone conducting a proper study, at least not one that yielded concrete results.
It shamed Vath that the clan had thrown Lily out due to her condition. What they would call a deformity. Lily obviously had a lot to offer the clan: she was smart, brave, and honestly significantly stronger and more durable than any child her age had any right to be. Too many in the Yun Clan held to the old beliefs, clung to a world they had left behind too long ago for this kind of backward thinking, which Vath regarded as a real sickness in the clan. This world was their home now. Had been for over 500 years. In almost a decade of making their own way on the frontier, Vath had never once regretted leaving alongside his niece.
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Lily and Vath had a week to spend in the forest, but they would reach his intended destination in two days. Vath resolved that he would spend the rest of their time preparing Lily for both the trials and what might come after. He doubted that she’d be able to remain ignorant of her heritage forever.
“So where are we headed, Uncle?”
Vath swore Lily could read his thoughts sometimes.
They had walked all morning while Vath was lost in thought. The trail had started off wild and overgrown right at the forest’s edge, and by now had completely faded as they entered the old growth part of the wood. The trees here were larger across than Vath was tall and their branches joined into an unbroken canopy, casting the forest floor into perpetual shadow. The going was actually easier than it had been with the trail: the trees grew with a great deal of space in between and the only smaller plants that could be seen growing between them were ground-hugging ferns. Some of the oldest trees had ladders of mushrooms and carpets of moss scaling their heights but no tree had fallen here in a very long time.
The forest floor was deceptively peaceful. Lily and her uncle had ventured into this part of the forest many times and both were quite aware that underneath the blanket of ferns, giant ant colonies, snakes, and even the occasional wild cat made their homes just out of sight.
“Northwest, all the way to the mountains.”
Lily stopped and squinted up at the canopy. Almost no sunlight broke through the dense upper branches but what did slanted down across their path from left to right. Lost in thought, she canted her head and chewed on the inside of her mouth and then marched off, correcting their course away from the early afternoon sun and her uncle followed behind without comment.
As was her custom, every few minutes Lily repeated her routine of dashing off-course and returning with new prizes. She flashed in and out of the sunbeams seemingly at random but Vath noticed after an hour or two that she exclusively returned with the long thin leaves of young blanket ferns. She was not strong enough to pull the tough fibers from the adult plants so she was clearly being selective. She wove them together as the pair pressed ever deeper into the forest and as her new broad-brimmed hat took shape. Vath caught on: it was going to rain.
Lily didn’t react at all as a heavy cloak simply appeared in her uncle’s hands. She ducked casually as he flourished the cloth through where her head had been, tossing it over his shoulders. Her attention was focused firmly forward, while her hands never stopped weaving the branches she had collected except to dart into one of the small pouches on her chest for berries that she grazed on as they walked.
The hat went on her head and the hood covered her uncle long before the rain actually reached them. The first sign of what was to come was the sound. The thick leaves overhead held onto what water they could collect until they couldn’t and the clockwork-timed splashes all around them set the meter for their walk.
The sunbeams Lily had set her course by had long since faded and as the rain picked up they were soon replaced by streaming columns of water finding the same drainage in the canopy that the sun had. Small drops making their way through more esoteric paths dripped all around them but because of the shelter of the branches in this area, Lily and Vath were still relatively dry in spite of the torrent above.
Darkness set in as the light finally gave up trying to reach this waterfall world, blinding Vath and Lily though they pressed on. Lily followed the gaps in the ancient trees and felt a bit like the droplets striking the top of her fern hat, flowing through the easiest path, and her uncle followed her. Unlike the drops, however, Lily’s path flowed ever uphill. There were no more waypoints this far out to guide by, and with no sunlight, a less experienced navigator would quickly be lost. Even Lily could only give them a general direction.
There were three possible directions they could go once they got into the forest. Well, four really. Back out, of course. Uphill led towards the few lonely peaks to the northwest, and if they skirted the hills and stayed level they would eventually be heading west towards the ocean. The last way was to pass over the mountains to the north but that way only led deeper into the forest, further than even Lily and her uncle could go. At some point, the natural essence out there would become too thick even for the pair and they could proceed no further.
Going uphill made things relatively simple. There were only four major peaks in the forest as far as Lily knew, and none of them were reachable in a single day’s travel. They would have to adjust their heading later. Hopefully, the morning would be clear. Thunder rumbled overhead as the pair waded through drenched ferns.