They did not move at first.
No order was given, and no decision was made. The City of Columns stood around them like a pre-delivered verdict, and the Odyr Tree loomed in its heart—static, silent, yet possessed of a presence that was nearly unbearable.
The silence was suffocating. It wasn’t the silence of emptiness, but the silence of anticipation. It was as if the valley itself was holding its breath.
Amazal was the first to feel it. It wasn’t fear he had known fear since the day of his exile but a pressure behind his eyes, a slight tightening in his chest, like a thought trying to surface… and failing.
“Do you feel this?” he asked quietly.
Jadig shifted his weight from one foot to the other.
“If you mean the urge to run until my legs snap—then yes.”
Vaelor did not answer. His eyes were anchored to the roots.
They were closer now.
The ground beneath the tree wasn't just stone; it was layers of rock, petrified soil, and the remains of ancient growth compressed under an impossible weight. The roots weren’t merely resting upon it… they were reclaiming it. Thick as towers, they twisted and split, then fused back together each one scarred with grooves that didn’t look like erosion, but like… writing.
Cillian knelt near one of the roots, tracing a shallow groove with her fingers. Suddenly, she jerked her hand back as if touched by a cold fire. Her pulse faltered for a second as she stared at the space beneath her fingertips. Those grooves… they weren't just cracks in the wood.
Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.
“It flickered,” Cillian whispered, her eyes wide with bewilderment.
“I saw a light a faint, pale glow, a vein of dim radiance running deep within the wood. Then it vanished the moment I focused my gaze on it.”
Ikida furrowed his brow as he stepped closer.
“A language?”
“Life,” Vaelor muttered, watching the tremor in Cillian’s hand.
“Or what remains of it.”
He exhaled slowly.
“Some texts described the Odyr Tree as a witness. Others as a judge. No one ever agreed on which was worse.”
“Reassuring,” Jadig scoffed.
A wind swept through the valley.
It wasn’t strong.
Nor was it cold.
It was… intentional.
The leaves—if they were leaves—did not rustle. They moved. A collective, precise movement, like a massive creature adjusting its posture.
Amazal stiffened.
For a moment—just a single moment—he could have sworn the pulse beneath his feet had grown stronger.
Then
a sound.
Not from above… but from deep within the city. A grinding sound followed, slow and deliberate, as if stone itself were shifting under a will it could not resist.
They all turned.
One of the petrified Giants at the edge of the city had cracked.
It didn’t shatter.
It simply fractured.
A thin fissure carved its way from shoulder to chest, spreading like a vein beneath the surface.
No movement followed.
No collapse.
But the message was clear.
“They are… not dead,” Jadig whispered, his voice barely audible.
Vaelor’s face darkened.
“No,” he said. “They are… suspended.”
Ikida took a step back without realizing it.
“Suspended… until what?”
No one answered.
Because the question was being asked elsewhere.
Amazal felt it then clearer than before.
A pull.
Not toward the tree…
but away from it.
He turned sharply, scanning the outer columns, the shadows stretched between the towering pillars.
“There,” he said, his breath quickening.
“Something… is not right over there.”
Nothing moved.
But the silence had changed.
Vaelor closed his eyes for a brief moment.
“We should not stay.”
Jadig glanced at him in disbelief.
“You’re saying this?”
“Yes,” Vaelor replied.
“And that alone should worry you.”
Another sound.
Closer this time.
Not stone.
A breath.
Slow.
Massive.
Controlled.
It did not echo.
It swallowed sound.
Ikida raised his hand, signaling absolute stillness.
“The thing that ended the Giants…” he whispered.
“It never left.”
The Odyr Tree stood motionless.
But its roots
for a single heartbeat
seemed to… tighten.
