Day 4 - Deep Botankeu Forest
The season of Crimson Moons, when the boundary between worlds grows thin
The forest had changed around them as they traveled deeper into its heart. Here, beneath canopies so thick that noon felt like twilight, ancient trees grew to impossible sizes—their trunks wide enough to house entire families, their roots creating natural bridges across hidden streams.
Teleu moved through this green maze like he'd been born to it, reading signs that remained invisible to Reloua's eyes. A broken branch here meant someone had passed recently. Disturbed moss there indicated water nearby. Bird calls in certain patterns warned of predators—or worse things that stalked these depths.
"How do you know this forest so well?" Reloua asked as they paused beside a stream whose water ran silver-clear over smooth stones. "You said you're not from Gold Land, but you navigate these woods like..."
"Like someone who's spent time running through them," Teleu finished, kneeling to refill their water skins. "Let's just say this isn't my first time needing to disappear between kingdoms."
He handed her a water skin, their fingers brushing briefly in the exchange. Despite everything—the danger, the exhaustion, the uncertainty—Reloua found herself studying his profile as he drank.
There was something almost ethereal about him in this setting. The filtered green light played across features that seemed carved from some noble metal, and when he moved, it was with a fluid grace that spoke of years of training in arts she could only guess at.
He's beautiful, she realized with a start. But more than that—he's dangerous in a way that has nothing to do with sword skill.
"Tell me about your kingdom," Teleu said suddenly, breaking into her thoughts. "Gold Land. I've heard stories, but stories and truth are often different things."
Reloua settled beside the stream, grateful for the rest. "What have you heard?"
"That your people have so much gold they pave their streets with it. That your king bathes in wine and your nobles eat nothing but honey and peacock meat." His mouth quirked in what might have been amusement. "That sort of nonsense."
Despite everything, Reloua found herself laughing—a sound like silver bells in the forest quiet. "Not quite. Though I suppose we do live better than most." She grew more serious. "Gold Land is... complicated. We are wealthy, yes. The earth gives us gold, copper, iron, precious stones. But wealth brings its own problems."
"Such as?"
"Corruption. Complacency. The assumption that gold can solve any problem." She picked up a smooth pebble and turned it over in her hands. "My father used to say—" She caught herself, adjusting quickly. "I've heard it said that gold is like water—essential for life, but in the wrong quantities, it can drown you just as easily as thirst can kill you."
Teleu glanced at her sharply, but said nothing about the slip. Instead, he stood and stretched, his movements controlled despite what must have been considerable fatigue.
"Wise words. Your kingdom sounds more thoughtful than the stories suggest."
"Most places are," Reloua replied, rising as well. "What about Ankh? What's it really like?"
For a moment, something vulnerable flickered across Teleu's carefully controlled features. Then it was gone, replaced by that familiar mask of detachment.
"Different from Gold Land," he said finally. "We're not rich in gold or jewels. Our wealth comes from..." He paused, seeming to choose his words carefully. "From knowledge. From understanding things that other kingdoms ignore."
"What kind of things?"
"The old ways. The connections between seen and unseen worlds." Teleu gestured toward a grove ahead whose trees seemed to shimmer with inner light. "Your people see the forest as a source of timber and game. My people see it as... more than that."
They resumed walking, and as they approached the shimmering grove, the air itself seemed to change—growing thicker, more charged with some unseen energy. Reloua felt the hairs on her arms rise.
"Teleu, what is this place?"
"A thin place," he said quietly. "Where the veil between worlds grows gossamer. The forest has many such spots, especially during the season of Crimson Moons."
As if responding to his words, the grove began to emit a low, harmonic humming—so subtle it was felt more than heard, resonating in the chest and bones rather than the ears. Reloua stopped walking, her eyes wide with wonder and a touch of fear.
"What is that?"
"The trees are singing," Teleu said simply, though his hand had moved instinctively to his blade. "They do that sometimes, when the boundary grows thin enough. Some say if you listen closely, you can hear the voices of those who've passed beyond the veil."
Reloua strained her ears, and for a moment—just a moment—she thought she could almost make out words in the ethereal sound. Words in a language she'd never learned but somehow understood.
Be strong, daughter. The shadow beside you walks in darkness, but his heart knows light. Trust him, though he trusts not himself. Dark times come, but gold burns brightest in the forge of adversity.
The voice—maternal, warm, achingly familiar—sent tears streaming down Reloua's face before she could stop them.
"Mother?" she whispered.
Teleu's head snapped toward her, his eyes sharp. "What did you hear?"
"I... I thought..." Reloua wiped at her tears hastily, embarrassed. "Nothing. Just the wind through the trees."
But Teleu was staring at her with an expression she couldn't read—not quite suspicious, but intensely focused, as if she'd just revealed something significant.
"You heard a voice," he said flatly. "Whose?"
"I said it was nothing."
"Don't lie. Not about this." His voice was harder now. "The thin places don't speak to everyone. If you heard something, if someone reached through the veil to contact you..." He trailed off, then added more quietly, "You're more than you're pretending to be."
Reloua met his gaze, her own eyes blazing with sudden defiance. "And you're not? You who carry royal alchemical weapons? You who fight like a war master? You who speak of Ankh's 'old ways' like someone raised in their mysteries?"
They stood facing each other, the humming of the trees creating an otherworldly backdrop to their confrontation. For a moment, the air between them crackled with tension—challenge and recognition and something else, something neither was quite ready to name.
Then Teleu looked away first, his jaw tight.
"Fair enough," he said quietly. "We both have secrets. We both have reasons for them." He started walking again. "The question is whether we can trust each other despite those secrets, or whether we're just... traveling in the same direction until it's convenient to part ways."
Reloua hurried to catch up, her heart pounding. "Which do you want it to be?"
"What I want doesn't matter. What matters is surviving until we reach Gold Land's borders."
"That's not an answer."
"It's the only answer I can give right now."
They walked in tense silence for perhaps half an hour before Reloua spoke again, her voice softer now.
"My mother died."
Teleu's step faltered almost imperceptibly, but he didn't stop walking. He said nothing, but his silence felt like permission to continue.
"The palace physicians said it was a fever. A sudden illness that came on quickly and took her within days." Reloua's voice was barely above a whisper. "But my mother was never sick. She was strong, vital. And in her last moments, when I was alone with her, she whispered something to me."
"What did she say?"
"'Trust no one. Not even family. Especially not family.'" Reloua's hands clenched into fists. "Then she was gone, and suddenly everything changed. People I thought I knew showed different faces. Alliances shifted. And I started wondering if maybe that fever wasn't so sudden after all."
Teleu was quiet for a long moment. When he finally spoke, his voice carried a weight of understanding that went beyond mere sympathy.
"My Mother also died."
Reloua looked up sharply, but Teleu kept his eyes fixed ahead.
"Also suddenly. Also unexpectedly. The physicians said her heart simply... stopped." A bitter smile twisted Teleu's lips. "My mother who could ride for days without tiring. Whose heart was supposedly so strong the court physicians used to joke she'd outlive us all."
"You think she was murdered."
"I know she was murdered." Teleu's voice was flat, emotionless—but Reloua could hear the rage beneath it, cold and controlled. "And I know who did it. I just can't prove it. Not without getting myself killed in the process."
"Is that why you're running?"
"I'm not running." Teleu said sharply. Then, more quietly: "I'm surviving. There's a difference. No it is not the reason I am surviving."
"Is there?"
He stopped walking and turned to face her fully. In the strange green light of the deep forest, his eyes seemed to hold shadows of their own—deep, painful shadows that spoke of loss and betrayal and a loneliness so profound it made Reloua's breath catch.
"Yes," he said simply. "Running is cowardice. Surviving is strategy. I will avenge my Mother. I will reclaim what was stolen from me. But not by throwing my life away in a futile gesture of rage." His eyes bored into hers. "And if your mother was murdered as you suspect, you'll need to be smart about it too. Rushing back to Gold Land without a plan will just get you killed."
"So what do I do?"
"You survive. You learn. You gather allies and information. And when the time is right—when you're strong enough and prepared enough—you strike." His hand rested on the hilt of his blade. "Revenge is a dish best served with certainty of success."
They resumed walking, but something had shifted between them. The walls hadn't come down entirely—Teleu was still too guarded, too controlled for that—but cracks had appeared. Through those cracks, Reloua could see the wounded person beneath the warrior's mask.
"The voice I heard," she said after a while. "In the singing trees. It told me to trust you."
"Convenient," Teleu replied, but there was no mockery in his tone.
"It also said you walk in darkness but your heart knows light." She glanced at him sidelong. "Do you think that's true?"
"I think the dead say what the living need to hear. Whether it's truth or just our own hopes given voice..." He shrugged. "Does it matter?"
"It matters to me."
Teleu looked at her then—really looked at her, as if seeing past the muddy clothes and exhausted features to something deeper beneath.
"You're stronger than you pretend to be," he said finally. "Stubborn, reckless, far too trusting for your own good. But strong." He turned away. "Your mother raised you well, whoever she was."
"She did," Reloua whispered. "And yours raised a son who survived when survival seemed impossible. That takes strength too."
"Strength," Teleu repeated, tasting the word. "Sometimes I think strength is just another word for refusal to break. But refusal isn't the same as not being broken."
"Are you? Broken?"
"Aren't we all?" He didn't wait for an answer. "Come on. We need to cover more ground before nightfall."