Well, it turned out Mr. Himichi was wrong. The krummholz were not harmless enough. That "hep-ho hoop-ho" thing they did? It was cute, for the first thirty seconds or so. After the fifth continuous minute of it, I wanted to strangle them. Mercifully, I managed to get them to stop doing it, though that entailed having to first explain the difference between "stopping" as in, "stop saying 'Hep-ho hoop-ho' over and over again" and "stopping as in", "Stop everything that you're doing and stand like statues".

Thankfully, it didn't take too long for our party to arrive at the krummholz' destination—Night's Glade—and the krummholz didn't need to inform us when we got there. Anyone with eyes could have noticed that.

The foliage abruptly changed at the opening of the glade. The bushes dwindled away, ceding ground to moss carpets and low-lying grass. The fuzzy earth rose and fell in irregular bumps, smoothing over the many tree roots' serpentine contours. Stones littered the scene like in a Munine meditation garden, intermixed with sprigs of brightly colored flowers. Massive trees rose up all around the glade, forming living walls and ceilings. Yet, as big as they were, they were little more than upstarts compared to the three behemoths in the heart of the glade.

These had to be the treefathers. The krummholz certainly thought as much.

"Treefathers! Treefathers! Treefathers!"

From a distance, the Treefathers looked like a record of sorcery. You would have thought they'd been animals that had been bewitched to fall asleep, and then grow as they dreamed. The three trees stood in a triangular formation, leaning against each other, boldly spreading their wide arms. Their bark was wrinkled and dark. It poured down their trunks in gnarled streams, like lava long since hardened into stone.

Looking at these trees, I felt like I was staring at a person.

The krummholz marched toward the center of the glade, chanting "Treefather!"

We followed them.

Suddenly, a voice yelled. "Stop! Stop!"

The krummholz froze in place.

Even though there was no sign of anything that even suggested the three trees could talk, somehow, I just knew the voice had come from one of them. Most of the talking trees I'd encountered in fiction tended to have human faces or features approximating them, but the Treefathers did not. Despite that handicap, they exuded a sage's aura, commanding and authoritative.

I had to fight the urge to sit on the soft grass and look up and listen.

Perhaps it was just me, but the tree's voice sounded masculine to my non-existent krummholz ears: reserved, yet strong.

"Peel my bark!" another tree said. "Can it be?" He sounded elderly.

"Company?" a third tree said. This one was passionate and young—like Jonan, only with better manners. "What a wonderful day! We have company!" The tree brimmed with zeal. "How long has it been?"

"Silence," the middle-age-sounding tree said, "you ask that every time the krummholz come back from Day's Glade."

"Yes, Night," the youngest Treefather replied, "because it's exciting!"

Apparently, the young-sounding tree was named Silence.

Irony much?

"But now we have company, actual company," Silence said, "and that's even more exciting! Don't you agree, Stone?"

Ileene whispered into where Mr. Himichi's ears should have been. "Whoever named that tree Silence must have had a twisted sense of humor."

"Yes, I do," the oldest-sounding Treefather said, responding to the name Stone.

"Our apologies for the sudden greeting," the middle-aged-sounding tree said. It—he?—made a sound like he was clearing his throat. "Welcome, visitors." A wisp of light briefly swirled in front of him. "We are the Treefathers; you may have heard of us," he said. "I am Night."

"I am Stone," said the elder tree. A wisp of light swirled in front of his trunk as well.

"I am Silence." The youngest Treefather brought forth his wisp.

"It has been far too long since strangers last graced our glade," Night said.

"How did you know we were strangers?" I asked.

"When you have seen and known the krummholz for as long as we have," Night replied, "you can tell at once when something is amiss,"

"What brings you here?" Stone asked.

"Is there news from the Vyxit?" Silence said.

"The what?" Ileene said.

Suddenly, the three Treefathers fell silent; their wisps vanished. For a moment, I was afraid something had gone (horribly) wrong, but then their wisps reappeared right next to us and swam around our group of four. They darted past the sprout on Suisei's head, and swerved between Ileene's flower-queues, ravishing us with effusive attention.

"Did I hear them right, Stone?" Silence said.

"How can this be?" Stone asked.

"It's so curious," Night said.

Night's wisp hovered in front of me. I could sense his voice coming from it as it scrutinized me down to the last detail. "You are not one of the Aegises, nor are you one of the Archived."

"Let them speak, Night!" Stone said. The elder Treefather sounded unusually agitated.

The three wisps pulled back and dissolved away.

"Please explain yourselves," Silence said.

"What do you mean?" I asked.

"How did you get here, to this space?"

"Oh," I said.

Suisei's leaf-robe rustled as he stepped in front of me. "What's it to you?" he said. "If we have information you want, it's only fair you provide us with something in exchange."

Clever.

Night's wisp appeared up in his branches, pulsing in tune with his hearty laughter. "I'd say yes for that question alone! Ah… my friends, you are something new. I'd give almost anything for that. Very well, you have my word. We shall trade questions and answers."

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"How can we be sure we can trust you?" Ileene asked.

Silence scoffed, his wisp quivering in front of his trunk. "What do you take us for, a bunch of eucalyptuses?"

"A treefather's word is his very soul," Stone said. "It was so before the Blight, and only grew truer after it."

"Genneth," Suisei said, "would you do the honors?"

"What should I tell them?"

"Whatever you think is worth sharing," Mr. Himichi said.

But that made me pause. I looked up at Night. "First, just tell me one thing."

"Certainly."

"If I tell you stuff, who else will hear it, either through you, or through someone else?"

"So," Stone said, "you have secrets to keep, do you?"

"You don't need to concern yourself with us blabbing," Silence said.

"Silence," Stone said, "if they pose a threat to the Vyxit, it's our duty to send out a warning."

"When was the last time anyone cared about what we had to say/" Silence asked.

"You're overcomplicating things," Mr. Himichi said. He looked over the three of us and the three of them. "Night had it right the first time: an answer for an answer, that's the simplest way to do it."

Night's light flared bright. "And seeing as we have answered your first question, it's now your turn to answer one of ours."

I nodded. "Agreed."

I guess we were about to have a good old-fashioned riddle battle—or, well, the diet version of one, anyhow.

"Who are you?" Night asked.

If I could have moved my mouth, I would have grinned. "I'm Dr. Genneth Howle, and these are Mr. Kosuke Himichi, Dr. Suisei Horosha, and Ms. Ileene Plotsky."

"Just your names?" Silence quipped. "That's hardly fair!"

"But it is an answer," Stone said, "and a Treefather's word is his vow."

"Very well," Silence said. "Ask your next question."

I figured I might as well start with establishing the terminology. "What are the Vyx and the Vyxit?"

Night's wisp flew up to one of his branches and came to roost there.

"I count two questions in your words," the tree replied, "but… the two terms are so interwoven, they might as well be one, so, I shall allow it."

"Night is all heartwood," Stone said. "Always has been."

"He wants to answer the question, Stone," Silence said, "so let him. Or do you want me to do it? You know I'd be more than happy to do it."

The elder tree sighed. His branches sagged ever so slightly, making his leaves shiver.

"To answer your question," Night said, "the Vyx are living machines, both sorcerous and mundane, many in number, yet one in mind—so long as they remain together. Their abilities are diverse and varied. They are vehicles and dwellings; wanderers and sky-ships. The Vyxit, meanwhile, are the peoples who dwell among the Vyx; this includes ourselves, and the krummholz."

"The twEfE were the first to join," Stone said. "In the beginning, there were few of us, but more would come with time. To survive, we embraced unity, banding together into a people—the Vyxit—forging a new culture and identity for ourselves, one that would serve us all in our long Synespera."

"This is not a question but a clarification," I said. "So… you're saying the spaceships are the Vyx?"

"Yes, the spaceships are the Vyx," Silence said. "What else would they be? Wait, no," a branch quivered, "don't answer that, it was just a rhetorical question."

Stone's light floated down from the branch where it was resting. "I will ask the next question."

"Very well," I said.

"Where are you from?"

"We call it the Earth." I glanced at Suisei. "Though, I'm told it's actually called a planet, which—"

"—You know what spaceships are," Silence said, "but you don't know your world is a planet? How odd."

"The skies of Genneth's world are devoid of anything other than his planet's sun and moon," Suisei said.

"His planet?" Night asked. "Is it not also yours?" A moment later, the tree added, "You can count that as one of our questions."

"No," I said, "it isn't. Well… it is, but it isn't." I pointed at myself, and then Ileene and Mr. Himichi. "Ileene, Mr. Himichi, and I are from one world. Suisei is from another. However, his world is a different copy of ours, more or less."

"A parallel universe," Suisei added.

"Fascinating…" Night said.

"Since you asked us two questions in a row," I said, "it's only fair that we get to do the same."

"That it is," Stone said. "Proceed."

I gestured at our surroundings, and at the krummholz and the treefathers themselves. "What is all this? By which, I mean, who are you, and the krummholz?—that's the first question; I imagine the three are all quite interconnected. As for the second… how did you come to be here?—wherever here is."

"Those are excellent questions," Stone said. "For Vyxit such as ourselves, time is split in two. There is what came before the Blight, and the Synespera that came after it. We are defined by that distinction."

"Synespera?" Ileene asked, eyes widening in dismay as she realized she'd asked another question.

Thankfully, Silence gave the answer free of charge.

"Our existence as Vyxit," he said. "We are scattered together, rather than apart."

"Before we joined the Synespera," Stone continued, "we were as you see us now: guardians of the forest, as we had been since time before memory. We rebuffed strangers who came to despoil this sacred place. The krummholz are partly our creations, and partly theirs. The plains-dwellers brought them to us as offerings, mere dolls of dead wood. We carved the breath of life into them, that they might serve us, to tend to our roots and prune our branches, guard our glades, and interact with other beings in our stead, and—if need be—wage war to defend the forest. And so it was, and so it remained, for time after time."

"But then the Blight came," Night said.

Night's wisp rose over our heads and grew, everything turning bright, and when the light cleared, the land had changed. The sun was sunken behind the horizon, skies darkening to greet a forlorn moon. Mist crept into the grove, luring the shadows out of hiding.

Wyrmsong broke through the air. The forest rumbled, helpless prey fleeing &alon's hordes, stampedes chasing stampedes. Night's Glade was alive with panicking voices and frightened growls.

A one-horned, chicken-legged rabbit raced into the glade, scampering over stones and the trees' shadows, shining soft light from its horn. A wall of energy suddenly appeared in its path, and the poor animal smacked into it like it was a wall of bricks, breaking its neck in the process. The impact's ripples revealed the full extent of the barrier as they crossed its surface.

The whole glade was encased in a luminous shell.

"We sheltered as many as we could," Night said, speaking over the scene.

Light came from the barrier, and from the moon, and from the many, gleaming things that lived in the enchanted wood. The light quivered, like its owners, cowering in the barrier's shelter. I saw gray-skinned humanoids with pointed ears and alabaster hair, wearing simple, slender garments; small, fuzzy brown crabs hidden in fallen logs; a pair of deer-like creatures paid off to the side—glowing-horned, with a wolf's build and sections of striped hide, their lips pulled back in a sharp-toothed growl at the one-horned rabbit's corpse.

The corpse wasn't as dead as it looked. Within seconds of being knocked back, the rabbit staggered to its feet and charged at the barrier like it wasn't even there. The wet, crunchy impact speckled the barrier in black ooze. Again, the barrier flared bright, knocking the rabbit back, and, again, the rabbit rose. Lights continued to burn on the barrier, slowly turning the black ooze hanging there to ash. In the light, I saw the rabbit's head droop at an impossible angle, revealing the fungal filaments emerging from the ulcers in its neck.

"What's the barrier?" I asked.

"A ward," Night replied, "to keep the evil at bay. Be careful," the Treefather added, "you owe us an extra answer for that."

Darn it.

Off to the side, outside the barrier, I heard a familiar chant:

"Hep-ho! Hoop-ho! Hep-ho! Hoop-ho!"

A squad of a dozen krummholz tramped into the glade, armed to the teeth with primitive spears, wooden shields, spiked clubs. They swarmed the infected rabbit, smacking it again and again, beating it to a pulp.

The rabbit's battered body sprouted tendrils and skittered away.

The krummholz raised their weapons and cheered.

"The krummholz aren't infected," Suisei said. I noticed he hadn't posed it as a question.

"The krummholz are merely puppets," Stone explained. "The Blight only infects living things; everything else, it consumes."

"They were just obstacles to be destroyed," Night added.

There were two unearthly roars at the edge of the glade. Everyone in the glade clamored to attention: the krummholz raised their weapons, the gray-skinned people shouted in fear; the antlered wolves whimpered and growled.

Two predators burst into the glade, galloping toward the barrier with their ulcerated paws. &alon consumed almost all of their bodies; fungal stalks sprouted from their backs, capped in bioluminescent bulbs that lanterned in the mist.

The krummholz yelled: "Attack!"

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