When Lirran stepped out of the council chamber, he could finally see the town he had been too heavily laden to see before.

He stood at the very top of a vast cathedral with living trees for pillars and leaves for a stained glass ceiling held by arching branches, two hundred to three hundred feet above the forest floor. Houses of wood and thatch sat in the trees like fruit growing there naturally, interconnected by boardwalks held by branches willingly. Many of the treefolk were on these boardwalks, going about their business, carrying wares or children in baskets on their back while they navigated the forest climbing with their long arms as much as they walked with their short legs. Children hurried up and down trunks of trees like running through a street, men with huge loads on their backs walked on their knuckles like apes with however such a dignity as one would not guess from such a likeness.

Lirran was transfixed so much that Drupada turned around again and called to him. “Hurry up, honoured guest. My family awaits.” The carriers had already disappeared with the barrel as Lirran had dawdled and gawked in the splendour of what was a forest only at first look, a great town at second. The guards of the old warrior followed him closely and pushed him on gently with weapons made entirely of wood.

Lirran walked without taking his eyes off his surroundings. He was equally gawked on by others. The layout of the town was obvious: smaller trees and lower branches carried most of the boardwalks, which were like main roads. Where two of those came close together, thick ropes or trees growing in between connected them like alleys, which the natives used readily and quickly by swinging on their long arms in an elegant and swift manner. Further up in the trees, where branches fanned out, sat buildings consisting of single rooms interconnected by hallways, smaller walkways, ropes or even just the branches of the tree they sat in. Some rooms were like open huts and people went about their daily activities in plain sight like washing clothes, carrying water, cooking on small iron stoves or engaging in a craft. Some constructs seemed to poke above the forest canopy, maybe lookout towers or places to collect rainwater, Lirran guessed. At the very bottom, on the forest floor, were pens for chickens, rabbits and small deer-like creatures, pools and ponds of water as well as proper roads on which people transported large goods with handcarts.

They soon came upon something like a plaza with a set of two elevators heaving wares from the forest floor. On the plaza were store stalls as one would expect in any town and Lirran saw more barrels of water being carried around as well, just without any Tzappatt in them. They were placed where the people could lower buckets from their very houses to draw from them.

At some point, Drupada commented Lirran’s constant staring. “I see you are impressed with our town of Vakarshik. You have never seen these lands, have you?”

“No. Where I come from, forests are harvested for wood and game, nothing more. We could never build something like this.”

“Thank you, but it is less built and more grown, lovingly, like one would grow a flock of sheep. We do not till and sow fields, the endless planes of your kin look barren to most of us. We believe in planting trees that serve not just as source of food but also shade, shelter, foundation for buildings and eventually: wood, be it as building material or just fuel to fire.”

Lirran remembered the endless fields of swaying gold of his homeland and missed them. He enjoyed watching the crops grow over the year and the winds gently stroke them in waves like the ocean. Maybe it was a similar kind of splendour. “I wish I had seen it sooner.”

“Well.” The wide man smacked his belly. “If we hurry, you can enjoy the hospitality of my abode sooner.” Then he gave a chuckle and hurried his step, to which Lirran still needed to adapt by shortening his stride. They came to a group of trees separated by a wider gap than most, yet without a break in the canopy. The group of trees carried many rooms, some large, and did so in a seemingly communal effort together.

The armed guards of the old warrior stopped outside the door, then the wide man opened the gate to the house and revealed inside a richly decorated anteroom with wood-panelled walls bearing mosaics made of colourful woods from black to white, red to yellow, brown to even fresh green. They depicted men and women working in orchards and forests, climbing to shape branches and pick fruit with a variety of tools.

Behind the doors of the anteroom laid a hall of mostly empty floor and a stage at the far end. The ceiling was held up by arching stems naturally grown, branches interlocking to form a solid roof with no spot open or leaf inside. Through the windows framed by vines came only dim light, but the room was illuminated by blueish lanterns curiously hidden inside spherical bushes growing in pots along the walls.

An elderly lady with long and simple wrappings and lacking any paint on her body greeted them. She gestured to a table where various colourful morsels were prepared.

“Welcome home, First Phalapatr. The Mahila Arundhati will be here momentarily.”

“Excellent” the wide man said and corrected the fit of his loincloth and headdress. “Let me welcome you dear guests into my humble abode. Feel free to taste from the morsels prepared for you. We shall wait for my sister and my daughters so that we may appropriately welcome you.”

Lirran looked around. He inspected the finely worked wood, naturally fitting together like stone and mortar, the decorations, finery, tapestries and fragrance of flowers all around him, who was dirty, small and without purpose. He did not deserve to be here, but he also did not deserve to be locked up. He wanted to be back on the ocean waves, but a gust of wind and rain reminded him that the storm outside was still very much raging. The building swayed as the trees did but retained its form.

He now noticed that the man was looking at him with a friendly smile, seemingly awaiting something. “I am sorry, Lord, I am in awe of your palace, I know not how to thank you.”

The wide man laughed. “Do not call me Lord, I am the First Phalapatr, not of nobility but elected into my role by my peers, call me Drupada, I insist. This is not my palace. Although I am allowed to live in the further branch of the building by grace of my office, it is still the hall of the Phalapatrah.”

Lirran raised an eyebrow. “I must look like a fool, I am not familiar with any of your titles.”

The man chuckled and walked to the table, then took place on a cushion, beckoning Lirran to follow him. “I am sorry, you must be famished and confused by this land’s customs. Come, eat, and you will understand what it means, for I and the other Phalapatrah have grown these. We are the heads of families and estates that grow and care for the trees bearing fruit and have agreed to sell them only through the market open to all and for a fair price. If I am rightly versed in the customs of Insisa, you could think of me like the master of a guild. The man who has taken you prisoner was the Raksaka, so to say a protector and general. His scouts mistook you for an invading enemy, they are always expecting war. But I assure you, the peaceful reputation of this town shall be repaired by the hospitality I offer you. This honourable and skilled woman here” he gesticulated to the elderly woman that had greeted them. “Is the Kitva of this gathering hall. Although some may call her a servant, she is far more honoured, as she keeps this building in the great splendour that it is.” The sound of people hurridly approaching from a doorway interrupted him. “And here come more members of this household.”

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He stood up and so did Lirran, but Drupada bid him to sit down again. “Oh no, we must present ourselves to you!”

Four women entered through the door, the front most was of Drupada’s age and wore a wrapped dress of that reached her elbows and knees and covered yet displayed a full womanly figure. The paint on her body was of red lines and green rounded shapes, like vines and leaves.

The woman bowed and Drupada introduced her. “This is the Mahila, the Lady of the household, my sister Arundhita. Even I have to bow to her commands of this household.” He chuckled, then went to the next woman.

She was older than Lirran but not by much. She wore a similarly wrapped dress and body paint in straight red and yellow lines. “This is my eldest daughter Kisha, since recently an Araksita, a promised woman. We will soon join our house with that of a wealthy merchant in familial love.” She bowed too.

The next woman, or girl, was of Lirran’s age possibly and wore a length of rosy cloth that went around neck, breast, hips and between her legs, before coming back forward and hanging down like a loincloth. It used as an anchor a metal ring that kept her bellybutton free, which was encircled in thin white lines that flowed from there like water all over her body. “This is my daughter Pritha, a Malati of this household, an eligible and untouched woman.”

The third girl was no older than eight years old, she wore a tight wrapping that covered only her torso. Her body was painted with simple orange lines, which she had apparently smeared over parts of her face already when wiping her nose. Drupada lifted the girl up and onto his shoulder, where she giggled and held on with her legs and finger-like toes. “This is the Anuja of the house Dyanti, a precious little bud that needs not bother herself with boys.” He gave her a kiss on the cheek and left her on his shoulder.

He then turned to the four women and introduced Lirran. “This is Novice Lirran, of the Gurvi Kaza, who were both washed ashore while traveling past our lands. They were given into our care by the Prabhu Dushya himself.”

The four women again bowed, even Dyanti on her perch and greeted him in their language.

Lirran’s heart stopped for a moment when he heard Kaza’s name. He had completely forgotten about her, carefree and impressionable as he was. “Where is my Navigator? Has she arrived yet?”

The Lady Arundhita bowed and spoke up. “My daughter the Malati Saraswati is taking care of her in one of the guest rooms.”

“I need to see her, please!”

Lirran’s begging was not unheard and the Kitva led him out through a different doorway. They arrived in what seemed to be a lounging and eating area for guests with several rooms leading off. The Kitva spoke to him. “This is the guest section where the First Phalapatr houses high functionaries and partners for his business. You are allowed to be here as you wish, but leaving the hall requires permission of the Raksaka.” She then opened a door to a room larger than the hut Lirran had grown up in with a bed large enough for seven people and even its own balcony. In the centre of the room stood Kaza’s vessel and before it was a wet blanket where Kaza laid belly down. Another girl or woman in the same dress as the Malati Pritha knelt next to Kaza and was cleaning her shell plates. The Kitva introduced Lirran as “Malati Saraswati, this is Novice Lirran.”, then left the room.

Lirran stepped closer. “My Navigator, are you alright?” He knelt down to her, she did not speak.

“She is well, for now.” The girl said. Her speech of Insisa was perfect and without any accent unlike everyone else Lirran had heard in this place yet. “She has requested your presence, wise Novice, several times. She has also requested a number of materials required to mend her shell plates.” Lirran now noticed that this girl’s proportions were different from the other treefolk. While her arms and toes were still long and her legs short, they were much different so than the others'. Her limbs were also thicker and her skin taut, containing underneath strands of muscles that spoke of health and strength. Her face was flatter than the others’, her nose wide, flat and upturned, her nostrils for some reason closed unless when she breathed. She was carefully scraping the mucus off Kaza’s plates, along with the blue blood and yellow puss that had mixed with it and formed a hard crust. “She was worried about you, I think. I have not yet taken care of any of her kin, but she was good at instructing me.”

A knock came at the door and in stepped a young man with a swollen cheek. Lirran recognized him as the first attacker that had injured Kaza. “I am Agnijit, the Zaktim ordered by the Prabhu to serve your bodily health and protection as penance for my transgression.” He made a deep bow. Lirran recognized the demeanour of a beaten dog in him.

The girl responded without getting up or even looking at him for long. “Then you can begin by giving the wise Novice a bath and a shave, the Kitva will assist you.”

Both Lirran and the man named Agnijit were surprised by this demand, but it came as it had to. The Kitva brought them to a different room where a bathtub was filled for him. Together, she and Agnijit scrubbed Lirran with a paste that smelled of peaches and had coarse grains in it. It felt like it was stripping off Lirran’s skin, which was left soft and pink afterwards. Then they washed every nook and cranny of his body with a soap that smelled of walnut and honey. Finally, the Kitva shaved his face and head. Lirran did not know why it was necessary, but he did not protest to the woman holding a sharp razor at his neck. Her movements were accurate and well-rehearsed, at times so fast Lirran was fearing for his life, but not a drop of his blood was drawn.

The Kitva then dressed him in a loincloth and another wrapping of yellow cloth that was left loose but held remarkably well. It left his arms and legs free like so much of the fashion these people wore and he figured it made sense for a people so dependent on climbing rather than walking.

When he returned to the guest room to Kaza and Saraswati, he saw himself in a standing mirror, the largest mirror he had ever seen. While his face was burned tan by the months under the sun at sea, his scalp was mostly still a doughy pale. His beard had barely ever been more than an upper-lip fuzz, but he was still sad to see it gone.

Saraswati stood up and approached him. From up close, she inspected his clothing. “You are wearing the wrappings of a private student of a Guru.” She corrected and smoothed a few folds of his wrappings and when her fingers grazed Lirran’s skin, a feeling ran across his entire body in a wave of goosebumps. She bore the fragrance of sweet fruits and flowers Lirran had never witnessed before. “I was told you were given clemency and a delay of your judgement. We can use that to give you a standing that will benefit you.” Up close, Lirran saw that she was different from the others in another manner: she had hair. It had been shaven off, not as recently as his, but he saw on her scalp and running down the back of her neck a very dense, dark stubble, denser than any hair he had ever seen on a person. When their eyes met, he saw how deep they were, an almost black brown with streaks of bright like burl wood. “If you can prove you are worthy of that standing, that is. The council does not take well to charlatans.” She tightened a last loop of his wrappings with a sudden pull. “Come now, your Mistress has demanded you perform this so that you may learn.”

Under the instruction of Kaza and Saraswati, Lirran performed what was necessary to set a Tzappatt’s broken shell plate. The slime and blood has already been scraped off and the broken plate been set back together. He mixed powder from shells of clams and snails, burned until white and brittle, with water until it was a thin paste, then he applied it a first layer to the broken plate. He was then given strips of a material thin like paper but with a grain like wood.

“What is that?”

“It is wood.” Saraswati said. “Your Mistress asked for kelp, but this will have to do in its absence.”

“Wood? This is wood?” Lirran looked at the paper-thin strip and held it against the light. Tiny pores like in wood were indeed visible.

“Yes. Cut very, very fine. We know how to make many things of wood.”

He layered it across the shell plate together with the grey paste and a thick glue. After several layers, he dusted the wet mass with powdered chalk to absorb the remaining moisture.

At the end of it all, Kaza finally raised her head and spoke, albeit slowly and weakly. “You did well. I will now rest. Please do this: enjoy hospitality.” A smile was in her face, with pain but relief mixed in.

Lirran stood up. “I wish you good rest, my Navigator.”

Saraswati led Lirran back towards the hall, Agnijit followed them closely behind. “My mother and uncle will have prepared some entertainment. He likes to see his people happy.”

As he followed Saraswati, Lirran saw her hips and shoulders move like boats upon the smooth wave that was her spine, swaying ina serpentine motion left and right that made her musculature display a strength in her that was enticing, drawing him in.

He closed his eyes and exhaled, he tried to steer his thoughts away, subdue his will, be in the situation only as far as he needed to. He felt as if he was walking into a web already spun for him, as if there were intents around him that went far beyond mere hospitality. He had no choice but to get caught and hope for the best.