Witch's Forest (1)
The first thing that caught his eye was a woman woven from branches.
The woman wore a laurel wreath, and even her hair was made of twigs and boughs.
With her body converted in places to wood, she looked almost like a spirit of the forest.
She resembled the fairy queen he had seen in the Fairy Meadow.
If there was a difference, it was that the fairy queen had seemed more like a human shape clinging to a tree, whereas this woman felt as if plants had bloomed from a human body.
What mattered most was the thing at the center.
He could sense, even without saying it aloud, that the fairy queen—who had clearly been nature itself—was the greater presence by far.
Perhaps because her eyesight was poor, she wore a pair of luxurious spectacles.
Across from her, Lawrence could make out a familiar broom.
A cloak adrift in the air.
A mask floating despite having no visible owner.
It was the image of the witch he had seen in Dragon Valley.
“Oh my. Now what in the world is this? Honestly. Sister, look who’s here. It’s the sister who locked herself away and never showed her face.”
The one chirping away with exaggerated delight was the witch wearing the laurel wreath.
Lifting both hands—now transformed into vines—to her face, she smiled broadly.
“Arwen. It’s rare indeed that you’d attend a gathering. And to come so soon, before night has even fallen…”
The witch addressed as sister reacted much the same way.
“Laurzara. Auriela, Sister. Are you the only ones here?”
“Look at you. We haven’t seen each other in so long, and that’s the first thing you say? You even brought a guest without a word of warning. I truly can’t tell whether you have any sense at all.”
“I had every right to come. Auriela Sister invited me.”
“The sister invited you? What nonsense is that supposed to be?”
Laurzara, the witch with the laurel wreath, asked it back.
But Auriela only stared silently at Lawrence.
“You’re the cherished child I saw in Dragon Valley. The Witch’s Night is still a long way off. What brings you all the way here?”
Had he been moving too urgently?
It seemed Arwen hadn’t even had time to contact them.
“I apologize for coming without advance notice. My name is Lawrence.”
Once he understood the situation, Lawrence bowed his head.
There was no rudeness greater than this.
Being invited was a separate matter entirely.
He could not afford to confuse the two.
Just because he had the right to be here did not mean he had been given permission to act as he pleased.
No one would welcome a guest who barged into the master bedroom with dirt still caked on his feet.
And from what he was hearing, it sounded as though the Witch’s Night itself was still some distance away.
“You’ll speak with me in a little while.”
“All right, Sister.”
Arwen didn’t even bother to make an excuse.
Watching her calm, matter-of-fact manner, Lawrence had no choice but to realize what had happened.
She had clearly bent the rules in many ways out of pity for his circumstances.
“I accept your apology, Lawrence. I was the one who invited you from Dragon Valley. If you wish it, then as a fellow seeker of the world’s truths, I can at least provide a place to shelter from wind and rain.”
“Thank you for your kindness, Lady Auriela.”
It was too soon to relax.
He still couldn’t tell whether those words were sincere or merely polite.
If she had taken on a human form like Laurzara, perhaps he might have known. But with only a cloak and mask suspended in the air, there were far too few clues by which to read her feelings.
“Yes. How is the last guardian faring?”
“He was in good health when I left Dragon Valley.”
“Then you do not know how he is now.”
“I’m certain he is well.”
Lawrence remembered the last conversation he had shared with Acheron.
So long as he continued to seek the world’s truths, there would one day be another chance to meet.
“Words soon become the power of an utterance. If you are that certain of it, then I may look forward to good news before long.”
Auriela called Arwen over.
With a gesture that suggested she’d be back shortly, Arwen glanced toward Lawrence.
Soon, then, he replied with a small nod.
Once the two of them stepped away, Laurzara approached.
“So you’re the cherished child whom the master of winds treasured.”
“I suppose this isn’t the first time we’ve met…? I’m truly sorry for my rudeness today.”
“Mm? It’s fine. Don’t be so stiff. To be honest, I just wanted to tease Arwen a little. I don’t bear you any ill will.”
She laughed softly, as if trying to ease his tension.
“I couldn’t attend that day because I had my reasons. So you really were the one, then. I’ve heard a lot about you. You’re seeking the world’s truths too, aren’t you? I’m Laurzara. My sisters call me the Witch of the Forest.”
“The Witch of the Forest?”
“Yes. As you can see, I use witchcraft that works with the forest.”
See this, Laurzara said, raising her hand; at Lawrence’s feet, blue-green sprouts pushed up through the ground.
The sprout quickly blossomed into a flower, and when her vine-like fingers touched it, the bloom withered and a fruit took its place.
“Want one?”
“I’m fine, thank you.”
“Mm. It’s tasty.”
Crunch, crunch.
She brought the bite-sized fruit to her mouth and ate it.
“You didn’t come here because you happened to run into Arwen, so what brought you all this way?”
“I asked her to guide me because I wanted to seek instruction.”
“Oh? The cherished child asked to be guided to Yggdrasil… That’s not something I ever would have imagined.”
Laurzara curved her lips as though she already knew everything.
“You want instruction, then? Very well. It’s rare that a cherished child comes to visit. I suppose I can manage that much.”
“Will that be all right?”
“Don’t get too excited. Just because I show you a fragment of mystery doesn’t mean whether you can understand it is up to me.”
“If you teach me, I’ll do my best to learn.”
He had thought he’d made a disastrous first move.
Instead, the conversation was going surprisingly smoothly.
“But you won’t get something for nothing. That’s the witch’s contract. Transactions between magicians are based on equal exchange.”
“A transaction… I don’t have many things on me right now.”
“Don’t worry about that. What you gave Arwen will be enough.”
“She didn’t ask for anything in return.”
“Oh my. You’re so innocent. You simply don’t know it, but that child has already been paid.”
He had no idea what she meant.
No matter how he thought it over, nothing came to mind.
At the very least, he had no memory of giving her anything directly.
“Then what would you like me to give you?”
He shifted his thinking.
What mattered now was not Arwen.
Lawrence focused on the witch in front of him.
“Hmm… Blood? No. That would be improper when we’ve only just met. How about hair? Ah, not much, of course. Five or six strands? If that’s difficult, one would be enough.”
Seeing the atmosphere grow strange, she hurriedly corrected herself.
Hair?
Unless he had misheard, she had definitely asked for hair.
“If you really don’t like that, something else would be fine too. Nails or toenails would do. Even an eyebrow is worth studying.”
Stumped by her rambling, Lawrence plucked out a few hairs.
He grabbed at his own head more or less at random, and ended up with five or six strands in his hand.
“Would this do?”
“Are you really sure?”
Laurzara’s eyes widened.
“Yes. I mean, hair is just hair…”
Was this really something to make such a fuss over?
To be honest, he had been worried she might demand Lemegeton.
But then she had gone and asked for nails, toenails, or even eyebrows.
That had taken all the tension out of him.
“You understand me, cherished child!”
“My name is Lawrence.”
“Yes, yes. Lawrence. You really are a good boy. The master of winds has an eye for things, after all.”
She smiled with obvious pleasure.
“But if you just pull it out and hand it over, it doesn’t mean anything. Let me check once more. You really are giving me your hair, right?”
She wasn’t taking them by force.
It was only a hair or two.
Nothing that significant.
“I’m taking it. I’m really taking it, all right? No changing your mind afterward.”
Her shining, sparkling eyes were uncomfortably intense.
She smelled of grass.
Laurzara placed her hand on the boy’s head and plucked the hair free.
With a thin ringing sensation, the world seemed to spin.
Overcome by a wave of severe dizziness, Lawrence dropped to both hands and braced himself against the floor.
It wasn’t pain. It was closer to the drained weakness that came after overusing magic.
His mind felt blank.
It was like having cast Shadow Spear dozens of times in a row.
The moment Laurzara pulled the hair free, it felt as though his mana had been sucked out with it.
“Ahh, look at this color. This is the mana of the cherished child who handles the void. What will grow if I plant you, I wonder? Don’t worry, dear little one. I’ll raise you with love.”
Laurzara wore a rapturous expression.
Covering her face with both hands, she shivered with delight.
The silver hair caught on her vine-like fingers was, for some reason, shining with a black light.
She sounded breathless with joy, as if she had received something wonderful indeed.
While Lawrence was still catching his breath, Arwen returned.
She looked from one of them to the other, immediately understood the situation, and sighed. Then she flew at Laurzara and mercilessly pecked at her head with her beak.
◇◇◇◆◇◇◇
Lawrence sat in the place Laurzara had prepared for him.
A table and chairs made of living plants had formed a delightful little garden.
“Tea time, tea time.”
Humming to herself, Laurzara set a teacup on the table, filled with something impossible to identify.
“Sorry. I should have told you in advance. I didn’t know what you liked, so I prepared tree sap.”
“That’s all right. I’m feeling much better now.”
“Really? So you’re all right now.”
She did not ask twice.
Her way of drinking was odd as well. She slipped one of her vine-like fingers into the teacup.
Like tree roots drawing up water, the vine absorbed the contents of the cup.
Was something similar what had happened when she had pulled out his hair?
If his mana had been sucked out in the same way, then it made sense that his body had gone weak so suddenly.
“Before I start, there’s something I want you to understand. In the past it might have been different, but now there isn’t a single sister who can handle the void.”
“I heard that the void, along with brilliance, is an extremely rare attribute.”
“That’s right. Especially since our sisters are each specialized in one attribute. For example, Arwen has very little talent beyond witchcraft that works with fragrance, and I, too, can scarcely handle anything besides witchcraft of the forest.”
Lawrence looked over at Arwen, who had sat down with them.
As if in agreement, she nodded.
“So the mystery I can teach you isn’t the void. I’ll teach you how to listen to the whispers of the forest.”
Forest witchcraft.
He couldn’t say for certain whether it would be any good. At least in terms of working with living things, it didn’t seem like it would have much offensive power.
Still, he was in no position to be choosy now.
He had to learn every bit of mystery he could.
“First, I’d like to ask how much of mystery you understand. Could you tell me how far the last guardian taught you?”
Lawrence slowly explained everything he had learned from Acheron.
After listening to the entire account, she repeated his words back to him.
“General knowledge of mystery. Cognitive concepts and the world’s truths. Strange. Is that really all? It seems you never once spoke of the most important magic.”
“I didn’t learn a single spell.”
“Not even the basics?”
“No. I asked Acheron to teach me that way. I wanted to make sure I had the cognitive concepts firmly in place first.”
“So what you learned was the ear that listens. I see…”
The cherished child was nothing more than a pleasant-sounding label.
It made him feel strangely embarrassed, as though he were exposing how empty he really was.
“You really don’t mind if I teach you? To be the first for a cherished child like you… what should I do? I’m afraid a flower might bloom from my head.”
“Pardon?”
For some reason, Laurzara’s breathing had grown rough.
Her eyes, wild behind her spectacles, were the same as when she had held his hair and looked ecstatically pleased.
“Don’t mind me.”
“……”
For a little while, Laurzara was lost in her own world.
Then, after gathering herself, she began.
“Shall we start with the basics? All magic is easier and stronger when you create something from what’s already prepared, rather than from nothing. It’s the same with my forest witchcraft. In a forest teeming with life, my power grows endlessly stronger.”
In the direction Laurzara pointed, vegetation swelled upward.
Grass and branches intertwined to form a small flower bed.
Flowers of many colors bloomed there, quickly filling the air with their beauty.
“Then what about Arwen’s fragrance witchcraft?”
“If she doesn’t prepare her scents in advance, it must be inconvenient.”
“Exactly. Any magic that depends on a medium you can’t easily obtain nearby is always carrying a weakness with it.”
Lawrence had already considered that much himself.
Arwen had gone so far as to guide him to a specific place whenever she showed him magic.
If she couldn’t prepare the required fragrance for each spell, there was no way she could cast properly.
The scents available in any given environment were limited, and from the moment a magic system depended on such conditions, it was already far removed from practical combat use. It might still have great value as a magic for research, but that was another matter.
Even though he had thought fragrance witchcraft was impressive,
that was why he had never taken a particularly aggressive stance toward it.
“By contrast, forest witchcraft doesn’t have that weakness. It’s rare to find a place in this world that has no plants at all. You’re probably feeling it too. The reason void is truly frightening isn’t merely because it stands above all other attributes.”
“It’s because you can obtain its medium anywhere.”
“Correct. Light and shadow are two sides of the same coin. And among them, there is nowhere a shadow does not fall.”
Thinking about it, the first Shadow Lawrence had ever handled had also been created from the shade cast by moonlight.