"Old Father Tree. You know what they think we're up to, down there?"

"I know. Let them think it. Call it protective coloration. That is your Father Tree?" She indicated Himself.

"That's him." I walked on. "How you doing today, old-timer?"

Must be fifty times I have asked that. I mean, the old guy is remarkable, but just a tree. Right? I did not expect a response. But Father Tree's leaves started tinkling the moment I spoke.

"Come back here, Croaker." The Lady's voice was commanding, hard, a little shaken. I turned and marched. "Back to your old self?" From the corner of my eye I caught a shadow in motion, off toward the Hole. I concentrated on a bit of coral and nearby brush. "Keep your voice down. We have an eavesdropper."

"That's no surprise." She spread the ragged blanket she had brought, sat down with her toes right at the edge of the barren. She removed the rag covering the bucket. I settled beside her, positioned so I could watch that shadow. "Do you know what that is?" she asked, nodding at the tree.

"Nobody does. It's just Old Father Tree. The desert clans call him a god. We've seen no evidence of that. One-Eye and Goblin were impressed with the fact that he stands almost exactly on the geographical center of the Plain, though."

"Yes. I suppose… So much was lost in the fall. I should have suspected… My husband was not the first of his kind. Croaker. Nor the White Rose the first of hers. It is a grand cycle, I believe."

"You've lost me."

"A very long time ago, even as I measure time, there was another war like that between the Dominator and the White Rose. The light overcame the shadow. But as always, the shadow left its taint on the victors. In order to end the struggle, they summoned a thing from another world, plane, dimension, what-have-you, the way Goblin might conjure a demon, only this thing was an adolescent god. Of sorts. In a sapling avatar. These events were legendary only in my youth, when much more of the past survived, so details are open to question. But it was a summoning of such scope, and such price, that thousands perished and counties were devastated. But they planted their captive god over the grave of their great enemy, where it would keep him enchained. This tree-god would live a million years."

"You mean?… Old Father is sitting on something like the Great Barrow?"

"I did not connect the legends and the Plain till I saw that tree. Yes. This earth constrains something as virulent as my husband. So much suddenly makes sense. It all fits. The beasts. The impossible talking rocks. Coral reefs a thousand miles from the sea. It all leaked through from that other world. The change storms are the tree's dreams."