Lucy

26-07-872, Somewhere in Baseros

Clouds were drifting overhead as soft bubbly shapes that intermittently blocked the stars. Victoria was lying on her back in the grass looking up, feeling exhausted and invigorated at the same time. She hadn’t stopped walking — running really — since she left her dorm and the campus grounds behind. She had barely heard groundskeeper Warren call after her as she stormed away with tears in her eyes but enthusiastic determination in her heart, the words of that letter still fresh in her mind.

Part of her wondered if she should have stayed just a while longer; she would have gotten her archaeology degree within the next month — would that be an important thing to have out in the real world? No matter, she would’ve been called back to the Sylvandrian court way before that. She thought back then, on that moment, on those icy fingers restraining her, and shivered.

"Lady Thornewood, I must implore you to..." She had paid the man no mind and tried to hurry onward until something suddenly stopped her in her tracks. A bony yet incredulously firm grip clutched her wrist and when she looked back the groundskeeper stared back at her. Those once friendly eyes of a harmless old man now seemed dark and threatening. It was at that moment, that she noticed something she had never before: a dark obsidian insignia pinned to his overcoat, inlaid with golden pickaxes framing ebony branches gnarling around a central diamond. Blackwood.

She barely remembered how she got free, faintly recalling a flash of light. It hadn’t been until hours after her departure that she finally felt safe enough to let herself rest, here in the open meadows south of the elven kingdoms. She turned her gaze eastward, towards the moon. It had been her source of calm and certainty ever since she was a child, but now it seemed as big and unknowable as the life ahead of her. But she was free. Finally.

The wave of relief from that realisation combined with the exhaustion from running pulled her, uncharacteristically, into a deep sleep.

She awoke to a faint rumbling noise coming in from the east. Dew had seeped into her clothing, and the cold into her bones. Groaning against the stiff ache of her muscles as she got up, she tried to identify the source of her rude awakening. Her eyes squinted against the morning sun low on the horizon. Just how long had she been out?

She could barely make out the shapes among the kicked up dust and the orange light. A battalion of Stormwatch soldiers were approaching on horseback, undoubtedly coming to take back what belonged to the homeland: Victoria Verrona Ulesse Thornewood, The Moonlit, Lady of the Pallid Grove, Daughter of the Pearlescent, Heir to the Rosewood Mountain, Princess of Sylvandria.

Well, she wasn’t having it, and bolted westward, running — quite literally — for her life. For her freedom, her autonomy. But soon, a problem arose. She was running straight into what was — in essence — a dead end. Darkness crept into her periphery and fear shot into her chest.

A forest of gnarled, twisting branches emerged before her — stalks like cancerous growths choking out their earthen host. Not the idyllic views of nature and greenery, of serenity and life, but large jagged thorns in all directions. It was clear little lived there but endless shadows and she knew at once what she was heading into.

Ilantrath Eraffaen. An old Sylvan name for the cursed forest. It can be roughly translated as “Wrath of the Silent”. Not even the most experienced rangers bothered crossing through those lands. Now it was her only hope.

She looked back — horses closed in, carrying shouting armoured figures. But no horses would fit through the cracks between the growths, and no soldier would brave what was known to be an inescapable end awaiting in that forest. Desperate, Victoria slipped inside.

The ground was dry and dusty; even water struggled to seep through the thick canopy above. How do these plants survive? she thought, her fear suddenly overshadowed by scholarly curiosity. The roots must run deep, perhaps to some hidden underground reservoir. That would mean most of the plant was underground—but just how deep could that go?

Too deep, and it would be improbable for a seed to sprout through the soil; it would have to grow too far without light. But then again, the water couldn’t be close to the surface either, otherwise there would be moss and fungi abound. It seemed impossible for these growths to exist. Unless... If groundwater levels had receded gradually over time, slowly enough for the plants to adapt by extending their roots deeper… How fascinating!