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A Shift of the Wind
Characters: Cypress, Boyce
When: The winter after the Everwood Comic, Chapter 1
Wordcount: 1259
Summary: Cypress meets Boyce for the first time, after Boyce has vowed to reunited Daphne with her copse.
Notes: Crossposted to![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png)
fic_promptly and rainbowfic. This will eventually be folded into comic-form in chapter 2 or 3... but for now, have a written version.
Cypress woke with a start, snow avalanching from his horns and spines and gnarly shoulders. He'd been sleeping again, that long, slow, winter sleep that occurred when a dryad went into torpor for the season and rejoined their tree... but he was the last of his copse who could withstand the bitter cold, so he had not climbed in to the comforting bole of his namesake.
His side twinged, where an axe once had bitten him, and he stiffly moved a wooden hand to cover the weal that had grown up over the old mark. If he'd been made of flesh and blood, he'd have certainly died... if he'd been a proper tree, he might not have recovered, either, come to think of it. He'd lived, and so had eight last members of his copse survived to escape the encroachment of some particularly aggressive humans, so though he hurt, it had been worth it, hadn't it?
The wind howled over the glade from between neighbouring granite shoulders, and Cypress shook off the rest of his snowy cape to carve a path from the edge of the cliff he'd been keeping watch on. Drawing up to the cluster of trees hunkered together for shelter, he sighed relief to see nothing had changed from the last time he'd done a circuit of the high pass. Seven trees, all very different from one another. The eighth was gone, now, and that was a more recent loss than the others... He touched the trunks of each of his friends as he passed them, warming them with loving thoughts. He extended a hand to his own tree last, felt the yearning in the still-green needles that brushed up against his hand.
Even as he thought it, Cypress' branches parted for him, arms opening for a hug that would haul him into the quiet, dark sleep of a proper hibernation. They were so high up the side of the mountain that the wind battered him tauntingly, and for a moment, his resolve wavered... Alone like this, he felt old, and tired, and though he always believed his kind were meant to bend with the breeze, he did not feel particularly amicable to the way the breeze had whipped up. It made his weal flare with cold, hard sap. He'd begun to hate the sound of wind across the exposed cliff face.
Then it changed, died down. Cypress paused on the edge of his trunk, leery of the sudden silence. In it, he could hear the crunch and susurrus of someone making the ascent into the glade. He came around the edge of the copse and confronted a little man, all covered in layers of fur and walking on bits of sinew and wood. His side throbbed, and Cypress balled his fists until his knuckles creaked. He'd grown to dislike humans, and this one, alone as he was, would not be difficult to till under... but he had stopped a short distance away, watching Cypress warily.
The dryad waited, wondering if the creature would draw a biting blade, or build a fire, or cause some other form of mischief with which he wasn't yet familiar. He would not allow that to get very far, of course... but he also would not land the first blow. His kind did not fight, as a rule.
The human dropped his oversized pack, which sunk into the snow before him almost three feet. Never taking his eyes off of Cypress, he dug something from a pocket in all the layers at his chest, and withdrew something small and round. Cypress growled when the man made a gesture to toss it underhand, all the needles across his shoulders, chest and head flaring up. The man thought better of it, and offered it between his mitts, taking one step closer, then another.
About half-way between them, Cypress recognized what the man was carrying. An acorn... no, not exactly an acorn. He plowed through the snow, the remaining distance, grabbed the man by both arms, and hefted him bodily from the ground while he plucked the seed from his grip.
He growled again, and found his vocal chords were distressingly ill-used. "Where?" he grated.
The man hung from his grip pitifully, exhausted. Cypress was reminded of the strangeness of hot-blooded animals by the ice riming the man's beard, the condensation coming from it, the way he shivered. "D-down... in the Evermarches. Split off from... from you by accident, she figures."
"Why did you bring this," Cypress demanded, dropping the human, clutching the little acorn safely within his fist. "How did you find us?"
The man didn't stand, only leaned back to get his bearings, to look all the way up at the much larger dryad. He looked as exhausted as Cypress felt, and frailer, too... it did not engender sympathy in him, but then he also did not lift up his large, gnarled foot to snuff out the creature's life. Where there was one, there would soon be many... he would have to rouse his copse at this insane time of year and force them to move on, if they could... "She wants you back," the man was saying, himself hoarse from strain. "She's been waiting. Please," and he sounded genuinely mournful, "I'm not trying nothing, but that Oak of yours misses her people more than anything I can do to make her happy."
Cypress didn't think he detected anything waggish in that tone, but he was distracted by the steady warmth and life he could feel gently pulsing from his palm. A dryad didn't give something like this to just anyone, let alone a human... He looked at this one again, carefully, and settled into a deep squat, balancing his arms on his knees. His side protested, but Cypress pulled the man up by the scruff of his furs so that they could confront one another. "You know where my Oak is," he said, careful, thoughtful. "And you knew how to track us. What name do you wear?"
"Ah... call me Boyce."
"I will keep you," Cypress decided, but slowly. "But... your timing is poor." He ignored the shivering snort that answered him, as the human drew his furs more tightly around him. "You may prove yourself over the winter, until the spring arrives. When it does, you will tell us where she is."
"I will take you to her," the human responded. His little shoulders squared up, and Cypress caught the determined glint in the man's dark eyes. "She's safe, but it's not all that safe between there and here."
Cypress didn't much know if he would allow the human such authority... but he was not quick to dismiss the idea. He noted that the air had become soft with the gentle whisk of a new snowfall, and he stood watch as the human regained his possessions and followed him back to the dormant copse. He couldn't quite bring himself to believe that he was now harbouring such a dangerous little creature, but the hope of finding the eighth member of his copse--maybe the last copse left in the Evermarches--made his gnarl of a heart blossom. Had humans grown larger than the greed he'd come to know them for? Maybe the unexpected arrival of this one was a sign of safer times ahead... He covered the overgrown weal on his side and willed it not to ache. If they had grown better as a whole, there were still old wounds to bear. He would have to be careful, with this one.
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When: The winter after the Everwood Comic, Chapter 1
Wordcount: 1259
Summary: Cypress meets Boyce for the first time, after Boyce has vowed to reunited Daphne with her copse.
Notes: Crossposted to
fic_promptly and rainbowfic. This will eventually be folded into comic-form in chapter 2 or 3... but for now, have a written version.Cypress woke with a start, snow avalanching from his horns and spines and gnarly shoulders. He'd been sleeping again, that long, slow, winter sleep that occurred when a dryad went into torpor for the season and rejoined their tree... but he was the last of his copse who could withstand the bitter cold, so he had not climbed in to the comforting bole of his namesake.
His side twinged, where an axe once had bitten him, and he stiffly moved a wooden hand to cover the weal that had grown up over the old mark. If he'd been made of flesh and blood, he'd have certainly died... if he'd been a proper tree, he might not have recovered, either, come to think of it. He'd lived, and so had eight last members of his copse survived to escape the encroachment of some particularly aggressive humans, so though he hurt, it had been worth it, hadn't it?
The wind howled over the glade from between neighbouring granite shoulders, and Cypress shook off the rest of his snowy cape to carve a path from the edge of the cliff he'd been keeping watch on. Drawing up to the cluster of trees hunkered together for shelter, he sighed relief to see nothing had changed from the last time he'd done a circuit of the high pass. Seven trees, all very different from one another. The eighth was gone, now, and that was a more recent loss than the others... He touched the trunks of each of his friends as he passed them, warming them with loving thoughts. He extended a hand to his own tree last, felt the yearning in the still-green needles that brushed up against his hand.
Even as he thought it, Cypress' branches parted for him, arms opening for a hug that would haul him into the quiet, dark sleep of a proper hibernation. They were so high up the side of the mountain that the wind battered him tauntingly, and for a moment, his resolve wavered... Alone like this, he felt old, and tired, and though he always believed his kind were meant to bend with the breeze, he did not feel particularly amicable to the way the breeze had whipped up. It made his weal flare with cold, hard sap. He'd begun to hate the sound of wind across the exposed cliff face.
Then it changed, died down. Cypress paused on the edge of his trunk, leery of the sudden silence. In it, he could hear the crunch and susurrus of someone making the ascent into the glade. He came around the edge of the copse and confronted a little man, all covered in layers of fur and walking on bits of sinew and wood. His side throbbed, and Cypress balled his fists until his knuckles creaked. He'd grown to dislike humans, and this one, alone as he was, would not be difficult to till under... but he had stopped a short distance away, watching Cypress warily.
The dryad waited, wondering if the creature would draw a biting blade, or build a fire, or cause some other form of mischief with which he wasn't yet familiar. He would not allow that to get very far, of course... but he also would not land the first blow. His kind did not fight, as a rule.
The human dropped his oversized pack, which sunk into the snow before him almost three feet. Never taking his eyes off of Cypress, he dug something from a pocket in all the layers at his chest, and withdrew something small and round. Cypress growled when the man made a gesture to toss it underhand, all the needles across his shoulders, chest and head flaring up. The man thought better of it, and offered it between his mitts, taking one step closer, then another.
About half-way between them, Cypress recognized what the man was carrying. An acorn... no, not exactly an acorn. He plowed through the snow, the remaining distance, grabbed the man by both arms, and hefted him bodily from the ground while he plucked the seed from his grip.
He growled again, and found his vocal chords were distressingly ill-used. "Where?" he grated.
The man hung from his grip pitifully, exhausted. Cypress was reminded of the strangeness of hot-blooded animals by the ice riming the man's beard, the condensation coming from it, the way he shivered. "D-down... in the Evermarches. Split off from... from you by accident, she figures."
"Why did you bring this," Cypress demanded, dropping the human, clutching the little acorn safely within his fist. "How did you find us?"
The man didn't stand, only leaned back to get his bearings, to look all the way up at the much larger dryad. He looked as exhausted as Cypress felt, and frailer, too... it did not engender sympathy in him, but then he also did not lift up his large, gnarled foot to snuff out the creature's life. Where there was one, there would soon be many... he would have to rouse his copse at this insane time of year and force them to move on, if they could... "She wants you back," the man was saying, himself hoarse from strain. "She's been waiting. Please," and he sounded genuinely mournful, "I'm not trying nothing, but that Oak of yours misses her people more than anything I can do to make her happy."
Cypress didn't think he detected anything waggish in that tone, but he was distracted by the steady warmth and life he could feel gently pulsing from his palm. A dryad didn't give something like this to just anyone, let alone a human... He looked at this one again, carefully, and settled into a deep squat, balancing his arms on his knees. His side protested, but Cypress pulled the man up by the scruff of his furs so that they could confront one another. "You know where my Oak is," he said, careful, thoughtful. "And you knew how to track us. What name do you wear?"
"Ah... call me Boyce."
"I will keep you," Cypress decided, but slowly. "But... your timing is poor." He ignored the shivering snort that answered him, as the human drew his furs more tightly around him. "You may prove yourself over the winter, until the spring arrives. When it does, you will tell us where she is."
"I will take you to her," the human responded. His little shoulders squared up, and Cypress caught the determined glint in the man's dark eyes. "She's safe, but it's not all that safe between there and here."
Cypress didn't much know if he would allow the human such authority... but he was not quick to dismiss the idea. He noted that the air had become soft with the gentle whisk of a new snowfall, and he stood watch as the human regained his possessions and followed him back to the dormant copse. He couldn't quite bring himself to believe that he was now harbouring such a dangerous little creature, but the hope of finding the eighth member of his copse--maybe the last copse left in the Evermarches--made his gnarl of a heart blossom. Had humans grown larger than the greed he'd come to know them for? Maybe the unexpected arrival of this one was a sign of safer times ahead... He covered the overgrown weal on his side and willed it not to ache. If they had grown better as a whole, there were still old wounds to bear. He would have to be careful, with this one.