“In Arborium, everyone rushes. They talk about going straight to work. Or they say, ‘I’ll be there straightaway.’ When Arborium began, it was not meant to be thus and it is not so here, the one place Dendrans have not reached with their influence. My dream, and I hope it is yours, is that our whole wood can be made clean once again, if you play your part. Be careful and follow me close.”

Corwenna turned away from him and plunged into the path. Ark tried to follow, even though the branchway supported its own living forest — a tangle of gigantic rhododendron, laurel, and clumps of hawthorn that sprung up from the path and scratched away the smartness of his new apparel. The scents and colors assailed him from all sides, disorienting and dazing him, flower petals the size of ravens’ wings fluttering past his vision. As he tried to push through the bushes, he was aware of other movements and scurrying sounds. The worst that Arborium had to offer were bad-tempered wasps drunk on fermented apples. He didn’t want to know what lay hidden in the shadows off these pathways. “Wait for me!” he shouted, turning a corner and almost bumping into his new teacher.

“Hush!” Corwenna put a finger to her lips. “Can you not hear them?”

Ark was itchy and hot. The only sound he could now hear was the occasional squawk of ravens high overhead.

“You remember when you were trapped in the sewers and the guard came to stare in at the porthole?” she whispered.

“Yes.” He was no longer surprised that she seemed to know everything.

“The feather-gift was part of it. A raven does not shed his cloak lightly. It was a sacrifice for my Hedd to give up one of his breast feathers. He knew it would be used well…. But the other comes from what made you. You were born on wood. You come from the wood. Therefore you have inherited the skills of every tree. You simply have to discover them.”

Corwenna fell silent, and then he heard it. A drumming in the distance, reverberating through the branch and into the soles of his feet.

“Quick now.” She grabbed Ark tight around the shoulders, her sharp fingernails digging through his shift and into his skin. “This is a deadly test. You must be all ears. These trees, at their core, hold stillness dear. It is the reason why we always come back to the wood for our dark hearts’ ease. Remember the guards!” With that, she let him go.

What the holly was she on about? The path was empty. Corwenna vanished as easily as the world he’d left behind.

The drumming sound grew louder. A few hawthorn leaves fell, as if some far-off giant had shaken its tiny, twisted branches. Whatever lay ahead of him on the path approached at speed.