Miko:
I breached a grand limb, dragging myself up the bark and laying against the limb with my back supported by the trunk. My efforts had brought me this far, and before my eyes was the complex crown of the tree. The bushy part of the tree that can be seen from afar with regular trees — the part you climb up to with two or more steps and a muscle up. It took me a month to climb. Yet, I wasn’t exhausted or ready to give up. Nothing in my body hurt; I felt rejuvenated both in body and spirit. I had come this far and was proud to see my efforts realized, but this place, The Garden, gave me undying stamina. Of course, I did sleep during the climb, not because I had to; I actually wanted to. The rhythm of sleep keeps me focused, a small goal to look forward to. I kept finding myself desiring that next darkness so that the place that collects me in my sleep would arrive again. Today, I looked out onto the branches and twigs that webbed out in front of me, and a deep breath gave me a surreal feeling. A memory pulsed forward in my brain of where we were when I started this journey, and I couldn’t help but laugh at the state of my prior self; a joyful laugh. The laugh that comes when you reflect on how far you have come compared to your previous self. I did not regret who I was, but it did make me laugh for a moment. Then my goal sunk back into my mind, and where I was gained shape again. I fell forward onto my palm and then stood tall. Stillness took over my face as I prepared myself for the next part.
Ray’s of light found pathways through the branches and bushy treetops guiding my footsteps in this realm high above the ground. I might be as high up now as I was on the mountain, and there won’t be any rolling down, just a swift drop to my certain death. These branches were big enough to fit three carriages comfortably, so I stayed in the middle, away from the edges. I didn’t mix well with heights, so looking down was avoided at all costs. I walked around the branch I was standing on. A huge burl swelled around the trunk, which allowed me to further around the cylindrical shape of the tree. Against the bark of the trunk, juts of malformed material stemmed out a short way, forming a sort of unconventional stairway. Every muscle in my body had been worked tirelessly through the climb, so I didn’t mind a more relaxing way to raise the elevation. A constant full-body workout did provide some much-needed strength and conditioning. A rigorous version that provided with unlimited stamina allowed my body to engage itself to the limit and then build up my muscles when I slept. For the first time in my life, my body was improving rather than regressing. Maleki was leagues ahead of me still. I mean, he’s been doing this forever, but it felt good for once to rely on my own physical strength. The makeshift stairs wound around the tree as I walked around it endlessly, hours of my life staring at the intricacies of shades of brown. I can’t tell if this was made or cut, but the colossal tree’s bark grew around it. Even if you could see into the thick crown from the ground, the distance and texture masked this starlike shape from being seen like camouflage until you were right on top of it. The other branches all split off from the trunk, so occasionally, a divot in the stairs conformed into the thick branch pathways extending far into the edges of the tree’s range. However, I wanted to see where these took me, and my curiosity about what lay at the top kept me moving swiftly. The steps were misshapen, each different from the others, so my steps had no rhythm. Height and depth changed quickly, so I placed my foot carefully each time, resulting in slower progress up the stairwell.
Finally, the end of the steps arrived in my eye-line, and the scent in the air turned sweet. Not the fruit kind of sweet, more like the nectar of a flower that comes from a flesh bloom. The crown of the colossal tree opened up more here at the top, causing winds to travel through, carrying the scent all around in the breeze. Soft sounds could be heard above, footsteps and a hum combined with a whistle. I stepped lightly, careful not to make a sound so that I didn’t alarm who or whatever awaited me. My back pressed flat against the trunk as I listened for a change on the wood platform above. Crawling up the steps using my available arm to soften the impact of my movements, I got to the last two steps and prepared to peer over. This was the tree’s crest, the last of the trunk before it turned into tall, vertically angled branches to cover the top of the tree with leaves and more sub-branches. Four limbs in total curved off and twisted in different directions, the base of each branch connected to the sides of the tree, leaving this middle area untouched. Although, the circular disc we were standing on was not perfectly round, nor was the area entirely open to the air. The trunk curved up above, forming small walls randomly in certain sections of the platform. In the middle of the disc was a house-shaped out of wood and decorated with leaves and spare materials the colossal tree produced. It’s more of a big hut, actually; I’m not sure what the difference is; you can just tell.
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In front of the building were a table and two chairs. One of the chairs was occupied by a person with long brown hair twisted together and twirled into two knobs at feminine shoulders. She must have been twenty feet away, but I heard her so clearly, even from here.
“It is impolite to leave a lady waiting, Miko.” She spoke smoothly.
My body was pressed hard against the top step, shocked she was able to know I was coming, and how did she know my name? I took a deep breath and stood tall, climbing the last step and then standing tall to accept whatever came next. “Forgive me, though, isn’t it rude to lay ambush on guests?”
“I have not moved. Weren’t you the one sneaking up on me?” She retorted.
I approached her right side, circling the outside of the circular wooden platform to get closer to the other seat available. “Fair point. I just expected someone to stop me from achieving my goal by force or convince me with more words.” She turned her head as I made it parallel with her body. Wanting to approach her and the chair head-on, I continued my unconventional walk to the other side of her hut.
“Stop you? I never quite had the touch for violence my siblings possessed.”
“More words to share, then? I’ve grown weary of stories.”
“We have much in common, then. I, too, have grown so tired of the monotony; I much prefer reality to fairytales. They never live up to the expectations we give them.”
When I caught her straight on, she brought her teacup in for a drink, and her face was blocked by her bangs. I grabbed the top of the chair with my right arm and took a seat. Unable to pull my chair up properly with only one good arm, I sat across from her with my chair angled awkwardly. I could have straightened it out, but proper has never been my thing. A tea set elegantly on the table. An odd thing to see in such a natural environment. She looked straight at me, her hair sliding back to the side of her head. She was young; she looked maybe fourteen. This would have surprised me, but after Khronos revealed himself, I somewhat predicted this since he said he had siblings. “You said ‘siblings.’ Khronos is your brother?”
She sat elegantly, her hands clasped around one of her knees that was crossed over her other leg. “It has been a long time since I called him that. Now, I call him my husband.”
Had I yet taken a sip of the tea laid out for me, I probably would have spat it out. “Husband? Isn’t that frowned upon?”
Whatever I said must have made her laugh because she broke out in loud laughter immediately, having to set her teacup down to protect it from her fit.
She finally stopped after nearly struggling to get air. “I — I apologize. You must forgive me. I have only been privileged to meet a few mortals, so I tend to forget how foreign this must all seem.” She paused, taking a breath to continue speaking, “There was just us at first. In all the whole world, we knew only each other. However, if it comforts you, primordial genes operate differently than yours.”
“Still weird...We look the same. How are we so different?”
“The same.” She laughed audaciously. “I have lived thousands of years, yet to you, I must look but a child. We are the same species, but you are a far descendant. The properties of godhood were lost after three generations of children, our children’s children’s children’s children; the last gods.”
This was the closest I had gotten to real answers since I started this journey. “Is that why I’m sick because godhood wasn’t passed down to us mortal peasants?”
She rolled her eyes at me. “Not exactly, Miko, and do spare from the toils of your reductive speech. Godhood isn’t all it is perceived to be. Immortality leads to inevitable failure and eventual collapse of the values we hold ourselves to. Your disease is linked to two factors.” She raised the appropriate amount of fingers in case I was unable to equate words to numbers. “We primordial were created to possess majik; our bodies are more durable and more capable of withstanding the effects. When my siblings ate the forbidden elemental fruits, they were corrupted by the purity, cursed from this place, and sworn to death. The Garden itself is conscious and was aware of the theft, and my siblings knew the price. ‘Whomever shall eat the fruit from the Tree of Majik shall surely die.’ They were banished from this place and the gifts it possesses, and eventually, they had children whom they passed their blessings and their curses to. After eating the fruit, the pure form of majik bonded to their blood and passed to their children. With each generation, the intended form of our species withered while still possessing majik.”
I raised my wrists above the table, showing my forearms. “That doesn’t explain why I’m sick. I don’t have majik.”
She smiled at me, gesturing in the air, like when grandmother would tap me on the nose. “You catch on so quickly. Perhaps the difficult subjects will be easier for you to understand. Your illness is indeed rare. In fact, it is only supposed to affect those born with majik in their blood, none of which you possess. This is a defect placed by The Garden, which acts twofold: to call and to cull. When a child is born with this defect, they pass it on to their children. Khronos tells me there is an order that lies still, passed through the bloodlines. Any with your condition is to be slaughtered immediately to prevent the spreading of the trait to future generations.”