The Dryad - Chapter 112

Spying me through the trees Cocoa rushed towards me and wrapped me in a hug. “I am glad to see you. I was hoping to be here in the spring. But Tide’s help was much more effective than I thought it would be.”

“But why are you in my woods in the first place?” I asked hugging her back. It was good to see an ‘old’ friend. I still remember when she was a young spirit. It was odd thinking about how much time had passed.

“For several months now I kept getting this feeling that something was wrong here and that you needed my help. With all these humans around, walking here would be much harder so I asked Tide to take me.” She then whispered in my ear. “Please thank Tide for this, it would mean a lot to her.” She stepped back from the hug and looked at me.

I did not really want to thank Tide. It would just invite her to get involved more and start trying to take control of everything. But Cocoa was not one to ask for things with no reason, and Mother Sea did help. So in the end I gave in. Looking at Mother Sea I said, “Thank you for bringing Cocoa here. It is great to get to see her again.” A smile spread over Tide’s face bigger than any I had seen. I guess Cocoa did have a point in asking for that.

Having fulfilled Cocoa’s wish I acted on an amazing idea that flashed through my mind. “I know you must be busy. I would haaaa” Cocoa then slammed on my foot. I turned to look back at her. I had never seen her look this stern before. It made me not want to cross her so I let it drop. But I did start rubbing my foot. Did she really have to harden her heel as she tread on me?

Cocoa kindly picked up the silence that was left by my cut off words after she stepped on me, “I am glad I made it here when I did. I never expected to find a fire spirit running through your woods. You must have had a really hard time.”

“A fire spirit on its own is not much of a big issue,” I said, looking at Fume. “She was just the final frustration in what has been the worst year I have ever known.”

“What could be worse to a dryad than having your woods burnt?” Fume said. She seemed oddly put out that I called her a small issue.

“The spirits of my woods have been under attack by a human,” I said letting my frustration ooze out of me.

“How is that a bigger issue than a fire spirit?” Cocoa asked.

Tide nodded to this. “Humans are weak.”

“I have yet to face him myself. He has always evaded me.” I spat out. “But from talking to a young dryad who was also attacked by this man, he has this goo that paralyzes spirits. He is a magician that seems to kill anything he touches. He was spreading death around her woods. When she tried to stop him she was nearly overpowered. She had to run away to seek shelter in my woods.”

“A magician strong enough to face a spirit?” Cocoa seemed shocked.

“But you said she was just a young dryad. It can’t be an issue for us that have seen millions of years.” Tide looked at me skeptically.

I heard Cocoa mutter, “It’s only one million for me.” But I ignored her.

I also ignored Fume who stammered, “M-m-millions of years.”

I flopped on the remains of a slightly charred log. This year really had been too much to bear. “I wish that was the case. This spring Faun went missing.” I could feel tears starting to roll down my face. “It seems she was caught by surprise. I never found signs of a struggle. I have been searching for months to find her but with no luck.”

“Faun was taken?” Cocoa said. I could only nod my head.

Tide was noticeably more shocked. I knew Tide and Faun would talk from time to time. Faun never told me about it but even from my resting place Mother Sea was a bit hard to miss when she walked into your home. “Haven’t you tried calling out to her?”

“As I said, I have been searching for months. Of course I have called out to her.” I took a breath to rein in my frustration at being patronized by Tide. Did she still think I was a little sprite new to the world? “I was out searching the human lands when I got a message that there was an emergency back here.”

“The fire spirit?” Cocoa asked.

“No, it was the other dryad being attacked,” I replied. “But that means that the magician was near. I have been searching to try and find him. I know he is after Ivy but I can’t find him.”

“Ivy?” Mother Sea asked.

“That is the dryad’s name,” I offhandedly replied.

“But then where does Fume come in?” Cocoa asked.

“I have only been back in my woods for about a week, but at that time Fume was not there. A couple days before you arrived I had to meet with some elves and humans. Once I finally escaped their spiritual cacophony, Fume was terrorizing my woods. It was the next day that you showed up.”

“You mean all that fire happened in one day?” Cocoa asked in horror, looking out over my woods with her spiritual sense.

“A day and a half,” Fume said sheepishly. “I was really hungry.”

“One thing I have been wondering is that if you were so hungry, why have you not come to these woods sooner?” Tide asked a really good question. I did not want to give her credit for it but I had been wondering that for some time.

“There was no food to carry with me from the vent.” Fume stated full of frustration. “I only had the gasses from the vent to eat. I can’t take those with me and I couldn’t store enough spiritual energy to make the trip. I would have gone out before I made it.”

“But then how did you get here?” Cocoa asked.

“Several days ago, this man came to my vent carrying a large stick. I asked him to give it to me. It had been thousands of years since I had food that nice. He said he would be happy to give it to me, but he wanted me to drink some nasty black tar. It was gross and gave me this weird tingly feeling. He seemed disappointed for some reason but gave me the stick anyway and said if I ate it slowly I could use it to reach a forest where wildfires are welcome.” Her face fell at these last words then she mumbled to herself, “I guess that was not true. And that stick was barely enough, I almost collapsed before I reached the edge of the woods. I had never been so scared and hungry.”

I could not help but want to retort that there was a big difference between what she had done and a small wildfire. Remembering the scorched earth I had passed on my way here, I wondered how she ever thought that someone would be fine with that. But that was not important.

It had to be Maximus. He was at her vent. He had tried to take Fume too. He was a monster. Did he want to rid the world of spirits? But for some reason his spirit paralysis did not work on a fire spirit. Why on earth was that goo useless on Fume when it worked on Faun who was much stronger? Was it not stable in heat? Regardless of why, it seemed Maximus’s power had little to no effect on Fume. Maybe with that ability, I could find a way to get Faun back. I glanced back over my charred woods. If only I could trust her.

But if Maximus could not take her, why did he help Fume escape? Judging by the little I learned from Maximus’s teacher, he would never do something to help others. None of this made any sense to me. I really wanted to figure out what was going on. But puzzling over this by myself did not work so I grudgingly asked, “Why did that man help you?”

“I wondered that myself. When I asked, he said I looked lonely. But once we started to head to these woods, I thought I heard him through the flames saying something about a distraction.”