‘Don’t worry,’ she whispered to him. ‘We’re heroes, remember?’ Saying it made her feel a bit better, and she saw Lug swallow deeply before letting out a high-pitched squeak of agreement.

‘Welcome, little shapewalker and vermispex,’ said Edda, his normally booming voice soft. He leant forward smiling, bringing his head close enough for Liska to see the human face trapped inside the living tree. Whorls and circles of wood grain covered his cheeks, but she could almost picture his features as they had once been. Just replace the moss and leaves with eyebrows and a beard and he might even be a kindly grandad.

Edda’s eyes glowed with powerful magic, flickering and gleaming as he studied the two youngsters. The runes carved into his arms and chest pulsed and seemed to shift, as if they were constantly rewriting themselves. ‘My young friends. Would you please tell us,’ he said, ‘of what you saw the day of the attack?’

Liska glanced over to Lug, whose face was frozen in a mask of pure terror. A faint, whining sound was whistling out of his throat. It looked as though he might never move again, let alone speak, so Liska cleared her throat and began to talk.

She told Edda of their walk through the city, and how they had paused at the swamp’s edge. She described the rockslide in great detail, seeing as she knew so much about them, and how they had seen Noxis emerge and beckon the seepers through. She was just getting to the good bit – flying at top speed up to the Breach – when Edda held up his gnarly hand.

‘So, it was, without a doubt, Noxis the arbomancer you saw?’

Liska nodded. ‘Yes, sir. I mean, lord . . . I mean, your majesty . . .’

‘Edda is fine,’ said the treekeeper with a twitch of his wooden cheeks that might have been a smile. ‘And have you come across Master Noxis before? To be able to recognise him so certainly?’

Liska nodded again and explained her embarrassing incident at the Undren Square. She left out the part about crashing into one of Edda’s friends, although the treekeeper on the right of him was smiling behind his hand.

‘Ah, I remember that evening.’ Edda gave a chuckle that made the floor under Liska’s feet vibrate. ‘That was you, was it? You have certainly been making a name for yourself.’

Liska cringed, imagining the expression that would be scrunching up her mother’s face right now. But Edda didn’t seem to be too bothered about it. He sat back up and nodded his thanks to them, gesturing at them to return to their families.