49.4 No Act Is Wasted
General Summary
Day 1059
After saying goodnight to Jian Ming, we regather on the ship to bid farewell to everyone who is ready to depart. The serpents are settling in to guard the tree and the other young fae, and are simply leaving me be. Angla’shak has done a good job preserving my privacy, telling the others that they are welcome to seek me out…in four months’ time.
After dinner, Magdalena pulls me aside to ask if I would like company when talking to Asphodeloideae. But I resolve to deal with her alone, as Magdalena tells me that she will respect me even if she doesn’t understand me. Understanding, from Treeborn, is more than I would dare to hope for at this point in my journey.
After this, of course, she and Qing Chen will head East and likely not return until I’ve reached the Grotto and am ready to finalize the magic for Thalien. It’s a sobering thought, being without her and my junior brother for so long, and while I’m sure Magdalena will keep him safe, I still worry about the emotional journey he is about to go on.
What would the you who picked flowers from the snow think of you now?
It’s a sweet thought. I think she would be amazed but not surprised. Some choices I’ve made would have been unthinkable at the time. So many things would be just beyond the real of possibility to who I used to be. And it is both a blessing and a curse that things like “bring him back to life” are well within the doable realm now. It is certainly an increase in the level of responsibility I might theoretically be able to take.
While in demon territory, I ask her to collect Eclipse’s bones, and any others that she finds, if it won’t cause any trouble. She laughs - if the demons cause trouble then she can thump them just as easily as she did the Zephyr. And perhaps even bring the demons up to get lectured in front of their so-called Exalted Ones.
As we watch the sun set over the Tree, it’s hard not to reminisce about how much simpler life used to be, and wonder if it will ever be simple again. Magdalena, with much more experience in life growing ever more complex, points out that one day I’ll have raised up enough capable students that the incessant small problems will be theirs to deal with. The rest of us will be free to wander and learn new things as new things are created.
This reminds me to tell her about Ailanthus’ Grove. She sighs and says he must have just taken it somewhere else, but no one knows where. It’s a shame I wasn’t present to see it happen and take a guess at where it had gone. But more to the point, I can finally ask her whatever gave him the title ‘of Heaven’ as well as ‘of Hell’. All I’ve heard of him is surely about his worst side. Magdalena tells me that he killed off most of his own cycle (tyranny, anarchy, unity, disharmony), leaving only endless tyranny. And his title was earned from creating a heaven for his chosen children by casting down the others ‘to hell’ - many suffer so that few may enjoy paradise. Magdalena cautions that no piece of his cycle is inherently good or bad, because they embody the extremes of what they are.
And I see how the cycle might progress, reflected in civilizations that come and go: Anarchy leading to tyranny, unity, and then disharmony. Ailanthus, apparently, thought himself a god where other Treeborn considered themselves parents. Neither is good…but I have to admit that being child to a cruel god is surely worse than a neglectful parent.
But Ailanthus is not fully a problem yet; the next Treeborn I’ll encounter after Asphodeloideae is Temira. And Magdalena says she has nothing to say to Temira anymore, being so focused on the future and not the past. Aside from making Ailanthus pay for what he did to Evismore, she is not interested in the family squabbles anymore. Even Ailanthus - she might not have the heart to kill him, just lock him away like the Undying fae of Seasons.
And so finally, it is time for me to face Asphodeloideae.
When I march up to the tree, she drifts down from the branches to greet me, looking for all the world like a late riser who has not had her tea yet. She gives off very familiar ‘I’m not awake yet’ energy to me, as a dusk fae, despite it being quite late in the evening. At her request, we ascend into the tree, out of sight of ‘the young ones’ who evidently would not understand whatever she has to say to me.
Inside, the room is hung with fae silks made of pure light magic that give off the energy of all parts of her cycle. If I weren’t so annoyed with her, I might be impressed. But still - it feels like a vacation home filled with trinkets and knick knacks, not a home well-lived in. I suppose she is often…drifting.
I apologize
I nearly laugh. These Treeborn don’t seem to know how to apologize. I wait expectantly for her to give some indication of what, exactly, she is apologizing for.
I’m sorry for being cruel to you. And I’m sorry for intruding. I had not considered how you would feel. This is unfair, or at the least, inconsiderate.
I remain silent and waiting, unwilling to give any acknowledgement of the vague apology. She goes on to thank me for preventing untold tragedies in this world by my sheer existence - she saw me chasing away the crocodiles who were barring the way to her Tree, and for encouraging the droves of people to walk through the gates. I accept this, with the same bemused “It has nothing to do with you, so I don’t see why you need to thank me for it” I have offered most of the powerful, elder beings who have thanked me.
She asks why I didn’t stay longer, and I tell her honestly that it was very difficult to be there. Of course it was difficult for everyone in their journey (my family most of all, she admits) and I don’t say it, but I’m a little defensive at this. Of course it was difficult - she has created a difficult thing for her cycle of fae. And I am not one to point out that I have had it harder than others, but there is something truly brutal about having grown to know and love people who are long dead in my own time, leaving behind their daughter and a legacy for me to inherit. And a little brother so drastically changed by trauma and loss that I hardly recognized his younger self.
Despite not saying anything, perhaps this malevolence comes across in my gaze as she observes that I don’t like her very much.
It is not entirely personal. After all, I do not think very highly of any of the early generations - arrogant and thinking themselves wise while being unwilling to learn. Of the Treeborn I have met, they have seemed unable to make choices for the wellbeing of their children or themselves. But it is a double-edged blade of judgement; I can’t see myself having fared any better in their circumstances. They were as much a product of a lack of community as their earliest children. I imagine only those who refused to plant seeds ever had the chance to walk amongst the Children of Chaos and find their people by chance instead of creating them.
To her credit, Asphodeloideae admits that sometimes she thinks she made the wrong choice, planting a Tree. Chaos was a better creator, it seems. I can only hope that she gives her new fae some space, remembering how Cereus’ progenitor energy affected Liliales. It would be hard growing up around that omnipresent effect. She says she’ll stay for a few years to protect her Tree from any of her siblings who might come calling. And then she’ll drift again.
As I prepare to make my departure from the Tree, she offers me one last thing: The spiritual treasure that so many had come looking for. It was not created by the spiritual phenomenon around her Tree after all; the Heart of Song had given it to her in the distant past, before she transplanted her Tree through time. It was not meant for me specifically, but as something that might be useful to the right person one day. The Heart told Asphoedeloideae that it should go to a person who is able to string it.
Within the large case that Asphodeloideae proffers is an instrument made of a black wood with purple grain. It is warm and lively to the touch and feels much like a Grove wood instrument, though it is magically deeper than any Grove object I have seen before. It is unstrung, and accompanied by 26 loose strings of a rosy, braided hair that feels much like the Heart herself. The instrument itself can hold 13 strings at a time.
Gently, Asphodeloideae tells me that I could probably string the cycles of Hope, Compassion, Dusk, and Growth very easily, but she thinks I will also be clever enough to string others as well.
Indeed, the first string I place as Dusk takes on a beautiful twilight tone. And the instrument becomes mine.
To my relief, the sense I get is that I definitely can’t change someone into Dusk with this string alone. Plucking it, I can feel all the power of dusk at my fingertips, asking to be given shape. Of the other cycles I might be able to string, none of them feel quite right for me right now…hope, compassion, growth, maybe even midnight or stars. Instead, I try to string Agony but can’t - almost to my relief. I don’t know what it would mean for me to know how to string Agony, or what it would cost.
When I return to the ship, Ausha is waiting. After spending months away from her, I expected to feel the reconnection quite sharply. Instead, it flows back into place like it was never gone - it’s almost easy to miss. And for her, there was a gaping hole while I was gone. She says she might have resented that when our bond was new and fragile, but now she just missed me. Ausha tells me that she is on a journey of letting go and then being open to new things. After all, she has the life she never thought would be possible for her, with Teacher.
I’m glad she is the first one to greet me, and I can show her the instrument - a zither. As we examine the strings and I explain that stringing Dusk was easy but I couldn’t reach Agony, I wonder aloud at what it would mean to have a Compassion string under my fingers. I can feel the immense power of Dusk in its string…I think strumming upon it would be the most powerful expression of dusk magic I can fathom. What could I do with Compassion? Imagine standing between armies and instead of empowering one side and suppressing the other, imbuing them both with the knowledge that they are not so different after all.
Ausha, senior sister that she is, looks concerned. At her urging, I agree to talk to Magdalena about it, even though I am certain it will open up conversations about the Heart that I would rather not have right now. The two of us carry the dark wood zither into the ship’s hold to find Magdalena.
She falls to her knees when she sees it, and I have never seen her so visibly shaken. It takes a few minutes for me to stow it in my pouch and bring out some calming tea instead, and I tell her exactly what I was told about it: The Heart of Song left it with Asphodeloideae to give to ‘someone who could string it’, and I was able to string Dusk, so it has become mine. The Heart says she left it ‘just in case’.
The wood, evidently, is from the Tree that birthed all of the Treeborn. The Tree itself is long dead, but Magdalena tells me that it is like seeing a flute made from your own mother’s femur…even if she knows there is no sacrilege or desecration because the Tree must have gifted that would, it is still shocking. And the strings…she asks to see them, but when I tell her that I think they are made of the Heart’s hair, she shakes her head.
The Heart said our Tree had given all it had to give, and one day they all might be in the same position. For now, we had lives to lead, songs to write, and eventually ends to meet.
Last Magdalena saw of the Tree was three thousand years ago - just a few leaves that they all considered a treasure beyond words. But this instrument…she’s worried about what ’just in case’ the Heart was preparing for with wood from their Tree and cords made of her own hair. Personally, I imagine that it might be an alternative to Harmony, made so long before the idea really took shape in the Heart’s mind. I am not particularly worried about the responsibility implied by carrying such an instrument, confident as I am in my freedom and the way that Harmony will (may) address so many problems for the fae.
But Magdalena is so shaken, and I am worried for her. So Ausha keeps Teacher company while I go out to my dusk tree and step into Harmony, much sooner than I expected to return to it. It is more alive than when I left it, and I can see Asphodeloideae’s Tree tall and resplendent where her stump used to be. Before I can really examine what other origin trees are present, the Heart finds me.
It is an uncomfortable greeting, as I am not really interested in talking to her so much as laying Magdalena’s concerns to rest.
What is the answer you’re looking for?
I want the answer to be that I don’t have to worry about anything in the short term, that the zither doesn’t represent some terrible new responsibility. She nods - I can have that answer.
I want to know that it won’t hurt anyone. She shakes her head - of course not.
She asks how many fae have been like me, and I answer honestly that all the Vanguard are, and Jaedien. But they could only bring eight strings, or maybe twelve.
The instrument is called ‘Melody of Dreams’, and no one should be able to string it but her…and me…and those few others whose paths are not the same as mine. I’ve been many cycles - Day and Night, Leaf and Vine, Drifting Seeds. She tells me I could strengthen my connection to Seasons, and to the Celestials, if I tried. I could probably string any of those cycles in their entirety, given time.
Melody of Dreams was aspirational of cycles working together, and requires something difficult of anyone who wishes to string it. They need to have a deep enough connection to the cycle they wish to string, and deeper connection is required for hearty, flexible strings. If the physical string snaps, it will break the player’s connection to the cycle, so I should be very careful about creating strings that are weak. My Dusk string feels strong, resonant, just like the deepest string on my own Eldritch instrument; it would take an incredible amount of energy to snap such a string. If I had succeeded with Agony, it would probably have been brittle and delicate…and I have no idea what it would mean to break my connection to Agony - that I don’t know probably means I am not ready to string it anyway.
It is a tool. It can be a weapon. It isn’t a replacement for Harmony. I made it in the hopes that someone could use it to protect my children from each other and resolve their disputes - to be one of them but have the strength to actually govern. But now so few of are left, and their squabbles might still need resolution… but there is less need for ruling. I made a dream into an instrument, and I accepts that the dreamer who takes it up might have truly different visions or needs than what I imagined.
The Tree, she tells me, had 18 branches and one great trunk, and the various pieces of it have gone towards other crafted items - more instruments like Melody, for example. But not everything it made has survived, of course. The important thing, she tells me, is that now I am able to recognize its wood. If I ever find a box made of the same wood, I must not open it.
Part of me wants to laugh and part wants to cry - every culture seems to have its myth about the end of the world contained within a forbidden box. Of course it is true.
And so the Heart tells me about The End, an invader from the world where spirits get their energy. She conjures a flute made of the same wood and plays an endlessly complex song, showing me the battle that took her, Kaie, the Storm, and the Master to imprison it within the box for Kaie to carry with her at all times. It is madness made manifest, both energy and matter that is spiritual and magical at the same time. It destroys whatever it touches, just by being incompatible with the world. The battle took days before the Storm physically restrained it and Kaie and the Heart sang and created the prison from the husk of the Great Tree - several branches were already missing but this took its trunk. The Master managed to integrate it into our world before they could bind it - he made it into part of our world so it would be bound by our rules.
It is an incredible thing to witness, and hard to take the Heart at her word when she tells me simply not to worry about it. But seeing her and the Master working together makes me very curious about whether I need to worry about *him* at all. For the first time, I can ask that question of someone in a reasonably good position to answer.
The Heart tells me that the Master uses himself up by leaving behind a piece of himself to maintain each rule he creates. He created the rules and laws of our world, and so there is not much left. He still has enough to make new rules, but it would cost him dearly. He could take parts of himself back by releasing rules, if he so chose.
This is not particularly reassuring to me, so I press for a clearer answer. Drakken’s skirmish against me was concerning and also doesn’t align with what she has told me about the Master, so if there is some other party on the board then I want to know.
What is there left to do, for him?
I point out that particularly self-centred mortals might imagine there is plenty to do, as they wouldn’t consider natural laws to be the business of a God of order. She says he likes playing games because they’re so easy to enforce. But his plaything are not always willing, and by today’s standards, he would probably be considered quite wicked. One day maybe you will play games with him too, and you can count him both a powerful friend and complicated enemy.
I have to sigh. It’s about as helpful an answer as I could have hoped for. At least it is reassuring in that there is no particular malice at play.
With the rest of the time I’m willing to spend in Harmony, she shows me the other Origin Trees that are still alive and well. Among them is a Tree made of metal - lead, mercury, iron, gold. She says they’re east of my Frontier birthplace, South of the great sea.
Of the others, I recognize several and get a little more information about their cycles and whereabouts.
- A stump for the fae of light and dark. I tell her that I do not have time to visit their tree while I am this far South, but I know roughly where it is and I think the Soul Rending Crocodiles will need some attention eventually.
- The Celestial Tree, full of new buds. It lives only in the Dreaming and acts as the anchor for their continued existence in the Dreaming. Pistil did a good job with his fae, I think. Probably the best of anyone I’ve seen.
- The Tree of Seasons - choked out by vines. She hopes that the Celestial, Day and Night, and Drifting Seeds might be able to share their strength with it in Harmony. And she’ll ask for my help. She asks me to be kind of them because they are tenacious and much diminished.
- Ailanthus’ Tree - harrowingly symmetrical in its branches but chaotic in its leaves.
- Galfen’s Tree - sickly and unwell, presumably diminished by following Ailanthus. She warns me that Galfen’s children are few now, and thus even more powerful.
- Ericoideae’s Tree - still alive and tended to by Zephyr, which does not surprise me.
Finally, the Heart thanks me for coming to visit her. I feel guilty, because of course I would not have come if not to set Magdalena at ease. The Heart knows this, but her gratitude is still genuine. And then, from thin air she conjures a leaf - sharp-edged but delicate and pulsing as though it has a heartbeat.
It is a leaf from the Great Tree - one that grew on Magdalena’s branch and gave her shade. Please give it to her - tell her that she was an important part of my song and is very important to me. I wish I had given these leaves to my children earlier…but it is hard to let them go.
I slip the leaf carefully into my heart space and cock my head at her, pointing out that I have been travelling with Myrtaceae for quite some time, and am likely to see Temira quite soon.
She nods and conjures three additional leaves, each looking exactly as I would expect for the Treeborn it is meant for.
If you ever meet Ailanthus, you will see that he is very strange. I want to be proud of his accomplishments, but he would consider imprisoning me to be one of his greatest. It’s complicated.
She observes that I have touched tyranny, and I confirm and note that Void had interesting thoughts about it. She sighs.
I had left Void and Oblivion alone to see if they would decide for themselves to be dragons or fae. But now I feel that it was a mistake. You would probably be able to bring them here, if you see them.
