Cursed with immortality, Mars goes on a journey with his lifelong more-than-friends partner Astral, a painfully average future-seeing mage, to find the root of magic, in an effort to ease the side effects of Astral's visions - and to finish their th...
Oops! This image does not follow our content guidelines. To continue publishing, please remove it or upload a different image.
Keefe had convinced us exploring the forest was about more than just hanging out with his family on the platforms far above the ground. It was also about walking through the forest, being close to the roots, and actually appreciating the sheer size of the trees. I understood it the minute we were back on the ground. I hadn't seen it from the ground level yet. There was no clear path and we had to climb over some of the larger exposed roots. They were well taller than me.
Keefe and I had taken the lead, while Zeke and Astral struggled a little harder. I felt more alive here than I ever had before. Keefe were telling me about the different trees, the sorts, the plants. And I had brought my new rucksack so I could take samples and experiment. I kept stopping to quickly sketch something, and then Zeke and Astral could catch up to us.
I loved it here. I wanted to stay here. The elves had welcomed us as if this was our home. They were so lovely, and I was slowly learning their language, so I could converse with them more comfortably. They were patient with me when I butchered their grammar or the pronunciation. They softly corrected me and showed me how to properly form my mouth around the words. It was a hard language as it has a bunch of sounds, I had never even heard. Both soft and harsh and guttural. Whereas mine was flatter and we had much harder Rs. Astral would have a much easier time with it as his dialect was softer and actually resembled the elfish language.
"Look here," Keefe said, squatting in front of a massive plant. It kind of looked like a flower but the leaves were too thick. They were red with small black dots on them, and it definitely looked poisonous.
I squatted down beside him and studied the plant closely without touching it.
"You can extract the poison easily from this one. Just tip one of the leaves," he said and put his bow on the leaf, tipping it down. I handed him a vial as a thick clear substance started dripping from the tip. The vial was soon filled, and he handed it back to me, letting go of the leaf. It went back to its original position, looking entirely unbothered.
"It paralyses. In too high of a dose, it'll even paralyse someone's heart. But just a drop and someone will be out. We use it for our arrows. Or for traps. To keep outsiders out."
"I thought you were pretty open to visitors." I arched a brow at him.
He shook his head. "No. You were with me and that's why you've been let in. Same with my father when he was still alive. He'd only come when my mother was with him. We don't trust outsiders much."
"How come?" I rose back up to my full height and Keefe followed.
"Humans can be quite cruel to anything they deem... Not like them."
I bit down on my lip. "Yeah."
"But none of you are humans." He smiled a bit of a cheeky smile and started walking again. "We're better friends with the mages. Especially the ones who come to learn from us. As you might've guessed, we love sharing our knowledge."
