Welcome home, my daughter.
She screamed just as Landon ran up behind her and pulled her to her feet.
“Whatever this is,” he said, his voice terrified and eyes wide, “we have to run.”
XIII
Leila stared into the ring of stone, her eyes wide and watering, her breath short, all while Landon tugged on her arm.
“Leila,” he said quietly. “Leila, please.” His tugging stopped for a moment, and after a quick rustling sound, returned. She turned to look at him. Milford was perched back on his shoulder. The owl’s eyes made contact with what stood in the ring, and he started flapping his one wing wildly again, the feathers around his neck gone ruffled and fierce.
Leila turned back to the ring, the soft blasts of wind from the owl’s angry wing rustling her hair and tickling her neck.
“Is it you?” Leila asked, taking a step forward.
“What are you doing?” Landon shouted. Leila turned back to him, and lifted a hand up.
“Getting answers. You can leave if you want.”
“I’m not leaving you here with that, that thing.” He shook his head and backed down, taking a step away.
“Is. It. You?” Leila pressed again, turning away from Landon and taking a step towards the ring of stone.
There, in the middle of it, stood a woman.
But she was unlike any woman Leila had ever seen.
She stood there, naked and exposed, but where one would normally have skin, she was coated in a thick, brown bark, covering her from her feet up to her face. Instead of hair, she had brilliant curls of dark-and light-green leaves blended together with streams of purple vines, almost like highlights, which danced around her face. Her eyes glimmered, bright, fiercely green irises swirling in the unusually human whites of her eyes, casting a contrast against the rest of her.
She took a step forward, and Leila gasped as flowers and moss bloomed where the tree woman’s foot pressed down, wildflowers of multiple colors and hues and shapes. She extended a hand, and as she moved, bits of bark crumbled off her arm, her body creaking like an old tree in a light breeze.
“Come into the circle,” she said, her voice honeyed and soft, not at all like the whispering that had echoed in the recesses of Leila’s mind all these many years. It was still familiar in a strange way, as though she’d been speaking through a muffled receiver on a bad cell phone connection and now the tone was finally clear. Her voice carried on the wind, like a breeze, rustling the leaves in the trees around them.
Leila took a step, and Landon put his hand on her shoulder. She shrugged it away quickly and turned to glare at him.
“What are you doing?” he asked, his voice full of concern. “We should go.”
“I can’t do that. You know I can’t,” she said, taking a step back towards him. She surprised herself by grabbing his hand, finding it rough and calloused. She squeezed it, the hard skin pressing against her soft hands. “Wait here.”
Leila turned back and walked into the circle, where the woman of ivy, branches, and leaves stood with flowers and greenery blooming around her bare, brown feet. The woman walked slowly towards her, and when she was just an arm’s length away, lifted a hand up and placed her palm on Leila’s cheek. Leila stiffened at the touch, which was hard and rough. The bark-like skin scratched her face, but gently, like a cat’s tongue.
It was hard not to stare.
Up close, Leila took notice of the woman’s features. The pointed nose, the bright-green eyes that looked far more human than the rest of her. A handful of butterflies and a hefty bumblebee flitted about in her hair of ivy and leaves, and small flowers were tucked away in the green.
“At last, you’ve come home to me,” the woman said, and as she exhaled, soft plumes of what looked like pollen gently floated from between her lips. She pressed her hand against Leila’s cheek a little more firmly, rubbing a hard thumb over her cheekbones. Leila could feel it scratching the surface of her skin, and winced. The woman let go and looked down, reaching out to grasp Leila’s hands, which had been firmly at her sides.
Then the woman’s hands held hers, the skin dark and brown like a tree, rough as bark.
“I’m sorry,” she said, looking back up at Leila. “It has been a long time since I touched a human.” She looked off to the side, wistfully, and Leila followed her gaze, seeing nothing. “Not since I last saw your father.”
Leila breathed in sharply.
Her father?
The tree woman turned sharply back to Leila, and Leila could feel her heart racing, the rush of blood thundering in her head, pounding in her ears.
“I’m your mother, Leila,” the woman said, smiling without opening her mouth. Her lips were a softer shade of brown than the rest of her body. “Though I suspect you know that now.”
“How . . . ?” Leila stammered, looking down at the still-blooming flowers under her feet. “How is any of this possible? How . . . how are you possible?” She closed her eyes and shook her head, which still ached. “This can’t be real.” She looked up at the woman, who continued to gaze at her. Her eyes were human, but hard. “You can’t be real.”
Leila looked behind her to Landon, who stood outside the ring of stone, Milford perched on his shoulder. The owl shifted about, looking uncomfortable and panicked. She could try to say how unreal all of this was as much as she wanted, but there he was. A witness.
“You see all of this, yes?” Leila asked.
Landon nodded, his mouth closed tight and his eyes watering.
“Please explain,” Leila said, turning back to the woman. “Please. I’ve heard your voice all my life. From the group homes to the foster homes, outside as a child and inside the walls of my new home. And now, louder than ever. Why? How?”
The woman closed her eyes, small flecks of brown bark and silt fluttering off her eyelids, and let out what seemed to be a sigh. It was more of a soft breeze that rippled through the leaves and vines in her hair, and it washed over Leila. It felt like the winds that came whenever the voices did, the breezes that tickled her neck. The tree woman opened her eyes again and this time her look was forlorn and sad. She turned away, taking a few steps back into the middle of the grove.
“What are you doing?” Leila asked, moving forward, heat rushing through her body. “I have questions. Why did you call me here? Why do you keep calling me?”
The woman raised her hand, her fingers like gnarled, old vines, her arm a branch. She looked back at Leila.
“We are in danger. I . . . we . . . needed someone who could speak for us.”
“Us?” Leila asked. She turned to look towards Landon, who had walked up closer to the circle surrounding the grove. Milford’s neck feathers were still ruffled and mad. Landon took a slow, careful step into the circle of stone and squinted, as if anticipating something.
When his foot touched the ground inside the circle, he looked immediately relieved.
“What did you think was going to happen?” Leila asked, smirking.
“I don’t know,” Landon muttered. “I’m new to this magic thing.” He exhaled. “But I’m here with you.”
Leila looked back up at the woman in the woods, who was waving a branch-like arm in the air. A soft breeze rustled in the trees, and Leila shivered.
“If something goes wrong, we run,” Landon said. “I’m not going to let anything happen to you.”
Leila looked up at Landon. He stared ahead, focused on the strange woman in the center of the grove.
She believed him.