Longeye Read Online Free Page A

the air, and the flares and flashes of the Newmen's auras, terrible and seductive in grief.
    At last, he removed to some small distance from the nest, sank to the ground, and put his back companionably against a dozing culdoon tree. Night had come on, and the early stars were preening. Meri pulled out his knife and began to tend it, less for necessity and more for the comfort involved in performing so commonplace and usual a task.
    "If sleep is denied me, I might as well begin my task in the wood this night," he murmured, his voice hardly louder than the purr of whetstone down blade.
    It may be that your task here is not yet done , the deep voice of the elitch answered, and Meri sighed, without needing to ask what was meant.
    "Tell me of this Palin Nicklauf," he said then. "He wanders, so I'm told, and serves the needs of trees and Engenium alike. Has he no wood of his own to tend?"
    Lightning flashed—but no. It was merely the Newmen's grief, blaring for a moment, then falling. Surely, Meri thought, the Elder had sublimated by now.
    Palin Nicklauf is his own wood. The elitch spoke slowly, its thought forming with a degree of uncertainty marked in a tree—and said no more.
    His own wood? Meri wondered. And how did that come about?
    There was no immediate answer from the tree, which was not, on reflection, entirely surprising.
    Ranger , the elitch spoke again. Shallow roots bear the fruit of fear.
    "So I have heard, and so was I taught," Meri said politely, his attention more than half on the knife.
    My roots are deep and I shelter many. Allow me to give a gift.
    The whetstone stopped its steady stroke. Meri closed his eyes, hearing Faldana's broken whisper, pleading with him as he held her shattered body. "Beloved, allow me to give the gift. You may live. I . . . cannot."
    "I . . ." He cleared his throat. "Elder, I am honored by your regard, but—I am so weak, and you are so mighty . . . I fear that your fires would overwhelm mine. Let me . . . grow in the usual way. A slow settling is surest," he added, which the trees in Vanglewood had been particularly fond of quoting at a sprout.
    Silence, as if the tree pondered, then—
    You are the best judge of your own health, Ranger. The gift is yours, should you need it. Only ask.
    "Thank you," Meri whispered, his throat tight with emotion.
    It is the trees who thank you, Meripen Vanglelauf .
    Bemused, Meri tested the edge of his blade with his thumb. Satisfied, he slid it away, stowed the whetstone, and considered what other comfortable, needful task he might be about to while the night—
    There was a sound, to his left and ahead, as if a foot had been set unwarily among the leaves and grasses.
    Meri tipped his head, listening as the steps, soft, but perfectly audible, moved toward his nest. Whoever approached must assume him asleep, so carefully did they move, saving that one misstep only. Their breathing, however—that was noisy, and irregular, as if they labored under strong emotion.
    "Jamie Moore," Meri said, pitching his voice no louder than the whisper of the breeze through the trees.
    The footsteps hesitated, then sounded again, moving toward Meri's position at the base of the culdoon.
    The boy was disheveled, his brown face pale, and sticky with recent tears, his quiet aura stitched with crimson. His task, Meri thought with a private sigh, as the trees had foretold.
    "Sit," Meri invited, patting the grass beside him. "And say what is in your heart."
    It was more collapse, but however it was done, the lad was facing him, properly cross-legged, his hands flat on his thighs.
    "Why did the trees let Gran die?"
    The boy's voice was unsteady, as well it might be, bearing the burden of such a heart-question—indeed, the question. Wood Wise, even Rangers, tended to believe that the trees were all-powerful. It seemed inconceivable that beings so old and so wise could be limited in any way, and yet—
    "Even trees die," Meri said softly.
    Jamie sniffled. "But