For the family she was just starting to feel a part of.
She stumbled to a stop against bright-yellow construction tape that blocked the end of the trail, crossing over it in a giant X shape, hung from two nearby trees. Leila ripped it away and flicked the frayed, yellow plastic from her as the mansion came into view. The ruined building now had the same thick, yellow tape all around it, a number of nearby trees had bright red Xs spray painted on them, and several shrubs were coated in blue spray paint.
Her eyes darted to the path behind the mansion that led out to the gardens, and she rushed down it, ducking under more yellow tape hanging from the archway. In the gardens behind the home almost everything was marked with the same bright-red spray, and she pushed forward until she came to the entrance to the grove, which was also marked with red.
She no longer had to weave her way in and out of branches or step over brush as she walked the path into the grove, so much of it had been cut and cast aside. Here, too, the trees were marked with red Xs.
“No, no, no,” she muttered, moving forward, her feet hitting the hard dirt path. She could hear Sarika and Landon hustling behind her. The light from the grove was just up ahead, bright and beaming, where the canopy opened into the secret, hidden nook. She burst out into the grove and the sun flooded her eyes. And everything came into view.
The rocks that lined the grove were marked with white Xs, and a number of the trees that surrounded it were marked with the bright-red Xs. The three center oaks, the trees where Karayea, Tifolia, and Shorea dwelled, were still standing tall.
But they were marked.
Leila walked into the grove past the spray-painted stones.
“Karayea?” she asked, looking directly at the center tree. “Tifolia? Shorea?” She was surprised at the fact that these strange-sounding names were already permanently seared into her mind. It took her days, sometimes weeks, to remember the names of new kids that came into the old group homes, and sometimes by the time she had them set to memory those kids were on their way out.
She walked up to the center tree and ran her hand over the bright-red X. Bits of red paint came away on her palm. She glanced up at the tree’s leaves, surprised to see they were changing, as though the autumn months were already on them. Her eyes flashed to all the dryads’ trees, the trees that bordered the grove, and those down by the path. Mixed in with the greens now were pops of yellow and red, and some light brown. The leaves were changing color way too soon.
“M-mom?” Leila whispered, the word feeling heavy and foreign, full of unsaid things. Her heart was racing. Were the people who did this still here? Could they hear her?
“Leila!”
She jumped and spun around. Landon and Sarika hurried into the grove, both looking worn and exhausted.
“Sweet Jesus, girl, I had no idea you could run like that,” Sarika said, huffing and trying to catch her breath. “All that bike riding has certainly paid off cardio-wise. I’m dying. I think I’m dying.”
“Oh my God,” Landon said, moving towards the grove. He dropped down on one knee and put his hand against one of the spray-painted rocks, and Leila saw his hand come away with wet paint on it. Leila walked towards him, her heart sinking. The dryads weren’t coming out, and there was Sarika, looking about intensely, clearly taking everything in.
“The assholes were just here,” Landon stood up, balling up his hands into fists. He straightened his shoulders and narrowed his eyes, looking at the trees. He turned to Leila. “Anything?”
“No,” Leila said and shook her head. “But look at the trees. The leaves.”
Landon stared up at the canopy, his head turning this way and that as he walked into the grove, and he put his hand against one of the trees. He wiped off some of the wet spray paint with a finger. He poked around at the ground, and Leila turned and walked over to Sarika.
“This is really weird,” he said, sucking at his teeth. “They shouldn’t be changing this soon.” He paused, thoughtfully. “You don’t think—”
“Don’t say it,” Leila said, surprised to feel a sob threatening to come up.
“So this is it?” Sarika asked, looking up at the canopy. “I mean, it certainly feels like a magical place, you know. How’s all this work? Are you going to like, summon them or something?” She grinned. “Is there a song?”
“Don’t make fun of this,” Leila said, trying to sound less hurt than she was.
“I’m just trying to lighten the mood,” Sarika said, a frown on her face. She walked over and hugged Leila close, and Leila could feel herself starting to choke up. “I believe you. Whatever it is, I will always believe you.”
“Last time they just came out,” Leila said, her shoulders heaving against Sarika. “Landon saw the whole thing, he knows.”
“It’s true,” Landon said.
“Maybe they’re upset or something,” Leila mused, letting go of Sarika and turning to the grove. Roughly cut bushes and spray paint were everywhere.
“Yeah, well, if a bunch of strangers came into my home and painted all over my things, I’d probably stay in all day, too,” Sarika said. She stopped at the path leading into the ring of stones, and knelt down at one of the rocks. “Look at all this. This is, like, centuries old. Who just tears down something like this? And why wouldn’t these dryads just, you know, appear and stop everything that’s happening to them?”
“We only appear in the presence of our own,” spoke a familiar voice.
Leila looked up as Karayea stepped out of the center oak tree. Her movements were slow, precise, not as fluid as the last time she approached her. Sarika backed away, bumping into Leila, and promptly grabbed her hand.
“It’s okay,” Leila said, giving her hand a reassuring squeeze. Landon peeked out from the other trees and made his way over to them, taking a wide stride around Karayea as she walked towards the edge of the circle. He gave her an awkward nod hello, and Leila grinned. It was the sort of awkward, quick greeting one gave someone familiar at a café or in the hallways of school. Not an ancient creature of myth that had existed for centuries, maybe millennia.
It was cute, in its incredibly unusual way.
Landon joined Leila and Sarika outside the circle as Karayea reached the edge of the stones.
“Oh,” Leila said, catching a gasp in her throat. “Your arm.”
Karayea slowly looked down at her arm, her neck creaking like a branch in the wind, and frowned. There was a bright-red mark on her right arm, a bit of spray paint from the X that marked the rest of the tree.
“It’ll fade in time,” she said, her words slow and measured, as she looked back up at the trio. “The poison will wash away with the rain and new growth.”
“Poison?” Leila asked, her heart hammering.
“There are toxins in this color that the humans put on us. I fear it has affected my sisters more than me.” She slowly turned and looked at the other two trees in the grove, which hadn’t moved or opened. “They aren’t as eager to talk to anyone right now, especially to the one with the bird. The one who is supposed to protect us.”
“Me?” Landon asked, surprised. “What did I do?”
“It’s what you failed to do. The men who came with the torches of color,” Karayea continued. “They wore your colors, the ones you bore yesterday, and the ones Leila’s father bore ever so long ago. You and your people, the caretakers, the ones we have trusted for so many years, have turned against us.”
Landon shook his head, and turned to Leila and Sarika.
“There was a maintenance call on the CB yesterday for a project today,” he said. “It must have been this. I’ll have to talk to the crew. They’re just doing their jobs. They don’t know about you. If they did, there’s no way they would have done any of this.”