Offerings
by Lori M. Lee
Kirin rowed them out onto the lake one morning. Dawn perched at the lip of the eastern hills, diffused by the mist that plumed in silver curls against the prow. Saereen shivered and rubbed her arms, but she was smiling as well. Her hair was damp against her neck.
“It’s magical,” she breathed as sunlight transformed the water from blue ink to dappled flame.
“I thought you’d like it.” This won him a shy glance and a smile that promised of more dawns to come.
He’d met Saereen only three weeks ago, the day after his family moved into the village of Wingha. A year ago, his mother had passed through Wingha on her way to the capital and fallen in love with the trees. While exploring his new home, he’d heard Saereen humming and found her in a meadow, weaving crowns from hollyhock and coltsfoot, marigolds and fronds. On her own dark brown hair sat a wreath of yarrow and roses and feverfew. Kirin did not believe in the elemental spirits, but he’d been tempted that day, watching sunbeams dance at her brow.
He rowed them farther out. Her delighted exclamations were a sweet companion to the lapping of the water against the boat. Kirin decided he could never tire of that sound.
They were not in love. Affection and longing, however, had snared Kirin by the heart. He could grow to love her, deeply, passionately, given time.
The storm gave no warning. It descended in a shock of stinging wind and spearing rain. The lake transformed into a tempest, flinging their little boat on vicious waves. Kirin tried to direct them toward the shore, but the water tore the oars from his grip and, with a violent heave, flipped the boat.
Kirin and Saereen tumbled into the frothing black.
#
Saereen had grown up in Wingha, as had her parents before her and their parents before them. Their cottage sat at the feet of a forest known as the Giant’s Palace. The forest was older than the kingdom, with trees the girth of houses and so tall, it was said you could touch the sky if anyone had ever dared to climb them.
No one dared. The forest marked a border not found on any map. The Giant’s Palace was home to the spirits of the elements, those of earthen magic. None who’d grown in its shadow would dare to trespass.
Except, that is, for a two-year-old Saereen who’d slipped her mother’s watchful eye and waddled into the trees. There, she giggled as she tapped the caps of mushrooms larger than her fists and tilted her head to peer at miniature elementals crouched beneath saucers of russet lichen. Overhead, lights spun in frantic circles at the human child who’d wandered into forbidden spaces.
She tripped a half dozen times over the uneven ground, but the mossy carpet was always there to cushion her dimpled knees and tender palms. The elementals watched. Curious. Cautious. Until her feet passed from vivid green to dirt damp with rot and paused before the only dead tree in the whole of the Giant’s Palace. It was a ragged thing, the bark gray and flaking.
Saereen ran from it, afraid. At length, she was corralled by tree keepers, six-legged elementals with bark for skin and thistles for hair, and ushered her into the Evening Hall.
There, the trees bore lichen of scarlet and coral, and the aisles were scattered with golden leaves. Fruit trees stood in clusters, branches drooping under their abundance. Servants not much bigger than Saereen carried silver platters laden with peaches, cantaloupe, and apricots down the aisle to the figure who sat at its end.
The queen of the Giant’s Palace sat on a throne hewn from the wood of elm and oak and dragon’s blood. She wore a crown of brambles, ornamented by flowers that were a jewel-bright sapphire. Saereen was too young to understand her importance. She saw only a shining figure in a beautiful gown of agrimony and elderberry lace.
She walked right up to the queen’s throne, lifted her chubby arms, and demanded, “Up.”
Then and there, the queen claimed Saereen as her own.
#
Kirin awoke on the shore. He ached down to his bones. The sun, mercurial as the elements, had returned to caress his cheek.
It took the villagers hours to find Saereen’s body, and then it was more than Kirin’s bones that ached.
The entire village attended her funeral. By its end, a quilt of flowers covered the mound of her grave. Kirin hid in the trees until her parents had gone and then sat at her graveside, twirling the stem of a daisy between two fingers, until night stole away the warmth and his parents came to fetch him.
He had not known her well, but the memory of her haunted him. He saw her in the way the leaves scuttled across the dirt paths and smelled her in the wild herbs that steeped the air. He heard her in the laughter of the village girls who wore flowers in their hair.
#
The seasons turned. Although the sting of her loss had gone, the echo of guilt and regret returned on quiet evenings when storms rushed in and shook the roof of their cottage. As the spring festival approached, he was grateful for the distraction of helping his parents prepare enough bread for the whole village. The spring festival was a Wingha tradition, but it would be his family’s first.
The festival was held in the square where villagers came together on weekends to haggle over various goods. That night, however, they strung lanterns over every corner of the square and hung bouquets tied with purple ribbon. A band played a merry tune at its center, and the villagers danced around them, flush with good food and sweet wine.
Kirin arrived with his parents, who immediately left him to mingle. Although they’d lived in Wingha for half a year now, Saereen had lived here all her life. Every time he went into the village, the eyes of the villagers followed. Some with pity or sympathy, others with accusation. Saereen had been well loved.
After such a tragedy less than a month after their arrival, Kirin had not been keen to make friends and the sentiment had been mutual among his peers. So he stuck to the shadows of the square, refilling his cup when the need called for it. He was glad for the way the wine made his head swim and softened all the harsh edges.
“If your intent is to get drunk, you might need something stronger.”
He paused before his next gulp of wine. The girl standing at his side offered him her own cup, which was filled with an amber-colored liquid. It smelled much stronger than his own watered down wine. Kirin was not accustomed to drinking, so as thin as the wine was, it was doing its job just fine.
Even in his impaired state, he could tell that she was beautiful. Her hair was a glossy black, and though her face was partially obscured by the dim lighting, what he could see made him feel dim and inadequate. Her eyes were large and catlike, the color of honey, and her lips had been painted a dusky rose.
“Or perhaps I’m mistaken,” she said when he didn’t respond. She began to turn away.
Kirin reached out to touch her shoulder. It was bare, her gown wrapping around her upper arms and belted at the waist with a wide red sash. It was not the sort of gown common in small villages. “I don’t know you,” he said. In a village as little as Wingha, new faces were easy to spot.
“You wouldn’t,” she said. “I live in Erhast. I’m only here to visit with my aunt until the end of summer.”
Erhast was two days north by carriage and much larger than Wingha. He’d never been there, but his family used to live in a town of similar size. It had been crowded and stank of manure, its sprawling cobbled streets filled with the clacking of horse hooves and carriage wheels.
“I’m Kirin,” he said, extending his hand for a proper greeting.
“Mae.” She inored his hand, instead tapping her drink to his.
They both sipped at their cups, a bit awkwardly now. But Mae made no move to leave, so he asked about how she was enjoying her stay, and she asked about how long he’d lived there, and they made small talk for the rest of the evening.
Every time she refilled her cup, she first poured a little into the ground. Every time she picked a scone from the table, she tore off a corner and tossed it into the dusty edges of the square. Offerings, she said, to nourish the earthen magic that sustained the elemental spirits.
“You don’t believe?” she asked.
Kirin wiped the skepticism from his face. “I don’t believe in magic or elementals.”
Saereen had though. She’d sung their songs and woven crowns of lilies and lavender to drape at the doorstep of the Giant’s Palace. She’d spun stories as if they were real, her imagination as sharp and alive as she had been. But all her faith in the elementals had not saved her when the storm had come crashing down on them.
#
In the beginning, once Saereen’s parents had put her to bed and then found their own, the tree keepers emerged from the Giant’s Palace to sing lullabies into Saereen’s window. With a delighted laugh, Saereen followed them into the trees where sunlight always shone. The queen greeted her with a kiss on her brow and a brush of fingertips against her round cheek. When she was old enough, Saereen left on her own, humming the lullaby that would wrap her parents in blissful dreams to hold them in sleep until dawn.
Saereen was raised on stories and nectar, ripe dates and whimsy. The queen taught her how to sing a fish into her basket, how to coax flowers into bloom and fruit to grow plump with juice. She learned which herbs to pair for good luck and which were for a bountiful harvest or for protection of a dear love. Those she made for her queen for Saereen loved her and all the elemental spirits as deeply as any person could.
When she was twelve, the queen pressed lips the color of rosebuds to Saereen’s forehead and asked, “My most precious darling, will you love this forest for always? It is your love that must sustain us.”
Saereen pressed her face into the queen’s shoulder, her arms tight around the queen’s waist. The bluebells that adorned the queen’s sleeves tickled her elbows. She said, “Of course I will. For always.”
#
Being that the villagers treated Mae like the temporary guest she was and still quietly ostracized Kirin, the two became fast friends. He liked the way she laughed, loudly and without shame, and the way she voiced her opinion without a care to anyone who might disapprove. Mae was so very much unlike Saereen, and yet they shared a devout faith in their elementals.
He sat with her one afternoon as Mae wove a heap of wild herbs and flowers into wreaths to leave at the border of the Giant’s Palace. It was strange and melancholy, his thoughts unable to free himself from the times he’d done this very thing with Saereen.
“Come,” Mae said as she placed her last wreath into his arms alongside the others. “I want to show you something.”
Kirin followed, wishing now that he’d gone with his father to pick up flour from the mill. They walked the familiar paths of the forest—a normal one with trees of average height and girth. They passed the cottage where Saereen’s parents still lived. He lowered his face, too ashamed even now to face them.
Ahead, a constant presence against the sky, the Giant’s Palace loomed like ladders to the stars. Kirin paused at its border, an invisible line no local would dare cross.
Mae crossed it. Kirin hung back, the wreaths held loose in his arms. No one had ever said what would happen if someone did enter the Giant’s Palace. The restriction was always issued with such dire warning that he had never thought to question it, partly because he didn’t believe and so didn’t care, and partly because he didn’t want to offend the villagers.
With a jerk of her head and a challenge in the lift of her brows, Mae gestured for him to follow. With a frown and a sigh, Kirin did. The earth was carpeted in thick green moss and the trees obscured all view.
“For those who don’t believe,” Mae said, “impressive as it is, you would find nothing more than an old forest.” She cast him an impish smile. “Unless, of course, you’re shown the way.”
One moment, they were surrounded by the majestic quiet of the Giant’s Palace, and in the next, the air shimmered and a veil lifted. It was as if everything before had existed in the drab shapelessness of the dark and now a window had been thrown open, illuminating a world filled with colors and sights unimagined. The trees were suddenly draped in iridescent curtains and vibrant garlands, streaming ribbons and red-capped mushrooms. Eyes large and small peered out from hollows in the ground or beneath canopies of lavender hung with baskets woven from spider’s silk.
Kirin spun in a slow circle, bewildered and terrified. The wreaths he’d been holding fell from his arms. Despite that the trees still blocked out most of the sky, somehow, sunlight shone bright and warm. When the wind blew, it tasted of cinnamon, and somewhere, the clear tinkling of bells rang.
Mae retrieved the fallen wreaths and then led him stumbling and dumbstruck along after her. She placed her wreaths at what seemed to Kirin like arbitrary spots but probably weren’t. Then, her offerings made, they wandered, Kirin’s shoulders tense around his ears. Every movement from the elementals who’d yet to emerge into the open made his stomach lurch.
His steps slowed as something dark caught the corner of his vision. Hidden behind two massive trunks stooped a much smaller tree. Its branches were bare, its bark a sallow gray. Its roots had gone black with rot. Mae walked quickly past it, averting her eyes. When Kirin lingered, puzzled by the dissonance of its presence, Mae gripped his wrist and pulled him away.
#
Saereen had never gone more than a day without visiting. When a week had passed without word, the queen sent a tree keeper to find her. The tree keeper returned not long after with a wilted flower plucked from the mound of Saereen’s grave and a story about a boy and a boat and a storm.
The queen crushed the flower in her fist, fury transforming her beauty into nightmare. Fifteen years Saereen had spent with them. Fifteen years now wasted. The queen’s rage could have split the trees of the Giant’s Palace.
Saereen had nearly been of age. Only one more year.
The queen scattered the crumpled petals at her feet, an offering to the earth. And a promise.
#
It was a strange sort of awakening to realize Saereen’s stories had been true. He’d only known her a handful of weeks, but she’d been so present and so vivid that it had felt much longer. Like this place. It was peculiar and new but also familiar, thanks to Saereen.
Would she have shared this with him in time? Would she have trusted him with this secret? Or would his lack of belief eventually driven her away?
There was no use thinking on it. Mae was as much at home in the Giant’s Palace as he imagined Saereen had been. She’d found her way into the forest almost immediately upon arriving, she explained later. There were such gates into the realm of the elementals all throughout the kingdom, including two near Erhast.
Despite his wonder, he was an ill fit for such a place. He wasn’t from Wingha and he wasn’t like Mae. He hadn’t been raised on superstitions and stories. He believed in things he could see and touch, and what a person could do with their own two hands. Where Saereen and Mae were children of the earth, Kirin was one of practicality. He knew he did not belong there.
Mae, however, would have none of that. After that first afternoon, he only ever saw her in Wingha long enough to guide him into the Giant’s Palace. She preferred the elementals’ glittering world that made their own seem stark in comparison. If he wanted to stay in her company, she said, then he would have to spend it there. She hadn’t invited him inside only for him to spurn the opportunity.
So, reluctant, he did. The days melted into weeks. Summer drifted by on clouds of spun sugar and perfect sunshine, and Kirin felt less and less like an intruder. Along with a few of the elementals, Mae showed him which fruits were meant to be picked and which were for the spirit folk. She taught him which of the elementals to befriend and which to avoid. Which songs to sing into the wind and which to sing to the trees or the rivers. He even became accustomed to offering his food and drink to the earth, which always earned him a warm smile from Mae.
The first time he kissed her, she tasted like a promise.
#
Summer was nearly at its end. Soon, Mae would return to Erhast, but Kirin tried not to think about it. They’d both avoided the topic, the inevitable conclusion to their time together.
They lay on a bed of baby snapdragons, watching the lights of air elementals twirl and bob overhead. It was his eighteenth birthday. Mae had surprised him with a cake soaked in honey, sprinkled with candied flower petals, and dusted in powdered sugar. His fingers were still sticky.
Mae turned on her side, pillowing her arm beneath her head. A snapdragon rested against her cheek. The light haloed her dark hair so that it looked almost as if she wore a crown of sunbeams and gossamer.
“Do you love me?” she asked.
Full with cake and good company, Kirin smiled at the question. He felt almost drunk, the world gone fuzzy at the edges as he trailed his sticky fingers along her jaw and said, “Yes.”
She pushed up onto her hands and knees, head bowed low so that her hair fell in a black curtain to shield their faces from prying eyes. “And do you love this place? Will you love it for always?”
Although the idea of her leaving pained him, he hoped that even after, he would be allowed to return here. “Yes, of course.”
She leaned closer still, her breath warm against his lips. “Will your love sustain us?”
He didn’t understand, but he was too distracted by her impending kiss to care. “Yes,” he whispered.
Her mouth pressed tight to his and the world tilted.
Moments passed. His lids felt heavy and sticky, as if he’d been sleeping a long time. He felt himself being lifted. Around him, voices flitted in and out of his awareness. Fingers caressed the back of his hand, his arm, his cheek. Something rotten and bitter made his nose sting, and at last, he forced his eyes open.
He was being lowered into a hollow in the earth, cradled by the decaying roots of a dead tree. He was confused but not yet afraid because he could still see Mae. She stood close enough to touch. She wore a dress of foxgloves and hemlock. At her brow rested a crown of nettles and ivy.
The queen kissed him again. Gently and with great reverence. “Your love is new and thus fleeting. But it will be enough for now.”
“Mae?” he mumbled. His lips refused to form more words.
“Saereen loved us with unrivaled devotion,” Mae continued. “Her love would have sustained us for decades. Instead, you took our offering from us. You squandered her life, and ours. And so you will take her place until I find another.” She stepped away and touched her fingers to the dead tree. “Thank you for your love, which we offer to the earth to sustain us.”
The tree closed around him, sealing away the light. A scream built in his throat and then faded just as quickly. His fears dissipated into the encroaching darkness and his lids grew hopelessly heavy. So he curled up against the bones of offerings past and slept.
Lori M. Lee is the author of YA fantasy series Gates of Thread and Stone. She has a borderline obsessive fascination with unicorns, is far too excitable, and writes about magic, manipulation, family, and the occasional alien or cyborg. She lives in Wisconsin, but she doesn’t know why.
