Chris spent most of the day after the raid feeling the damage through the Rootmind the way you'd run your fingers over a bruise, cataloguing what was torn and what was stressed and what had simply given up. The Ents along the northern wall suffered the most; two of them had taken direct hits from mage fire and their bark was split deep enough to see the pale wood underneath that hummed with a low persistent ache that Chris couldn't do much about except send them nutrients and try to encourage them to recover and regenerate a bit faster. The spike bushes would need more time, at least a week if he didn't focus solely on spreading and recovering their numbers, while the scream flowers were mostly hoarse in a way that felt almost sympathetic, a few having burst and died after pushing themselves too far. Lastly came the various other vines, some having taken so many cuts that the Critic had gone quiet, retreating into itself to focus on trying to save what he could and urge their recovery.
Sera found him sitting against the fig tree as the sun was slowly setting, his eyes closed and his fists balled up tightly. She didn't say anything for a while, instead just sitting down next to him with her back against the bark.
"I told you they'd come," she eventually said. Her voice was quiet but not gentle because Sera didn't do gentle; she did honest, and sometimes honest seemed to hurt more. "I told you ages ago that the Empire doesn't send envoys to negotiate. They send envoys to make it look like they tried before they start killing and do all they can to take whatever they want."
"I know."
She just gave him a flat look in response. "You didn't act like you knew. You sat there and gave him a week like it meant something, like they were actually going to wait for your response and pull out at you telling them no. You wanted to ignore them and pretend they weren't there, only for them to come back in four days and attack us."
He opened his eyes and looked at her. She was staring straight ahead at the scarred northern wall with her jaw set in that way she got when she was angry but trying not to show it, making him realize she wasn't really angry at him, not entirely at least. She was angrier at the situation and at herself for not being more forceful about what she'd seen coming.
"We held, though," he said, but even he knew how weak that sounded, how it was a justification that just didn't settle right.
"We held against fifty soldiers and three mages who attacked in the dark without siege equipment and clearly had little real experience," she said, turning to look at him with those sharp tired eyes. "We got lucky, and you know it. They're going to come back with a lot more next time and a lot less negotiation."
Chris didn't answer because he knew she was right. No further words were spoken; instead she simply walked away, letting him consider her words.
The Voice came later that evening, when he was alone and trying, and failing, to fall asleep.
'You see now,' it whispered, its tone gentle and almost reasonable, which made it so much worse than when it was aggressive because it meant the Voice was trying to sound like something he should listen to. 'You see what happens when you try to do this alone? They came with fifty men, and as your female companion pointed out, you barely held them off! Their next wave will be hundreds if not more, and you know you can't grow enough to stop an army. Rather, you need to think and plan for it, to think of counters, but you can't, at least not without me.'
Chris pressed his forehead into his hands and felt the bark ridges on his knuckles press into his skin, the knot mark throbbing the way it did when his stress was bad, a side effect he had noticed the last few days when he tried to be hopeful that nothing would happen yet the stress not relenting. He wanted to tell the Voice to shut up, but he also wanted to hear what it would say next, to hear its offer so he could firmly deny it.
'This is why you need me,' the Voice pressed. It sounded firm yet he noticed how it also had notes of desperation. 'I can help you prepare, to form defensive patterns and growth sequences, giving you access to knowledge about things that would take you months to figure out on your own and even plants that no longer exist, that have never touched this land. And for that, all you have to do is let me in. Just a little would be enough.'
"Just a little?" Chris muttered into his hands. The words came out bitter and hollow, because he'd heard that pitch before in different forms, and every time he knew "just a little" would turn into "a little more" and end with it becoming "everything that made him who he was."
He told it firmly no. The word was hard and harsh, causing the Voice to go quiet, leaving Chris to lie in the dark with the Rootmind humming its slow tired pulse through the village and the world tree's root coiled gently around his wrist. His plants trying to heal and recover, the guilt of knowing his lack of action being the reason behind it, unsure if that thought was from the Voice or his own mind.
Oswin finally came back on the third day.
He arrived from the north with a small group of six people all trailing behind him in a loose cluster, looking nervous and out of place in a way that suggested they'd never been anywhere near the Barrens before. As he got closer, Chris noticed his frown and the way he stared at the northern wall, his expression causing something to twist in Chris's chest.
"What in the—" Oswin began, looking between the damage and Chris. "What happened here? Does it have something to do with the imperial forces camped a short distance away?"
"They came to make some kind of offer and wanted to give me a week to consider, but they attacked early and, well, you saw for yourself what happened because they didn't take no for an answer."
Oswin's mouth opened and closed a few times, and Chris could practically see the merchant's brain recalculating, adjusting risk assessments, repricing goods, rethinking supply lines before letting loose a long, slow breath as he shook his head.
"I told you, before I left," he said, his voice flat and tired. "I told you people were going to start noticing. I told you this place was going to become a target the moment word got out that something was growing out here that shouldn't be—"
"I know! Sera already gave me a dressing down for this. Please, just, just don't, okay?" Chris said tiredly, his voice showing clear frustration.
That shut Oswin up and caused him to blink at Chris, clearly not expecting the admission. Then his shoulders sagged and he looked back at the damaged walls with something that might have been sympathy or might have been fear.
The people he'd brought were still standing at the edge of the village looking uncertain. Chris looked them over, doing the same for the village in turn. Oswin slowly told him about each of them: a couple who looked like farmers, a blacksmith who had his hammer strapped to his side, a woman with a healer's satchel, and two others who Oswin seemed evasive about. He felt something complicated when he looked over all of them. These people had come here because Oswin had apparently told them there was a safe place free from the empire's grip, and now they were standing in the middle of a village that had just been attacked and was still healing, a place that didn't seem safe at all.
"These are the ones I could convince thus far," Oswin said. "More would've come, but word's spreading that the Barrens are getting dangerous. Military activity on the northern approaches — something we saw on approach — and a few caravans hoping to come and possibly trade were told to turn back. The rumors are getting inflated by the time they reach the trading posts, which is both a blessing and a curse." He paused. "I need to go back out soon, though; I just came to get more products."
Chris looked at him. "You just got here and you're already rushing off again? What about rest? And you really sold everything already?"
"I know, and to answer in order: I need to move fast and get back out there, building a war chest of sorts. If the Empire's already sent forces and plans to send more, then every trader on the northern routes is going to know about it within a week. I need to hear what they're saying, what they're planning, while also prepping for those who will come regardless of the warning to stay away." Oswin's voice had shifted into something sharper, more focused. "I can't afford to rest just yet. I need to try to bring back more people, skilled ones and anyone who can actually make things that you can't grow or is good at crafting. I also need to start using our slowly forming war chest to try and hire some mercenaries or adventurers for you to help defend this place because of what is no doubt coming."
He said the last part carefully, and Chris caught the meaning and understood what he meant. The plants couldn't do everything; couldn't build furniture or forge tools or bake bread, and the village needed people who could fill those gaps if it was going to survive and become the haven he wanted.
"How long is this going to take?" Sera asked, and Chris hadn't heard her approach, which was typical.
"Two days, maybe three if I can use one of the horses I saw you… requisition. I'll leave the people I brought here while I get what I can from the trading posts closest to here before coming straight back rather than going to the nearest city again." Oswin hesitated, and then something shifted in his expression. "I've got some coin now after all, our first real profits from selling the goods to some old friends who will create a demand and hunger for them. It's not much yet, but it's a start. And so you know, we will need a proper barter system in place if this village is going to function like something other than a glorified camp. It's why I will be leaving a portion of the coin here for you to pay your new people, who will then, in turn, pass it to me to bring what they need till we can properly set something up here to do so instead."
It was practical and grounded and exactly the kind of thinking the village needed but nobody had been doing. The realization sat heavy because Oswin was right, and it was another thing Chris should have considered but hadn't.
"Go," Chris finally said. "Get whatever it is you need, whatever it is you feel will be useful, but be careful."
Oswin nodded and turned to go but stopped and looked back at the damaged walls.
"This place, Chris, this isn't what I promised these people," he said quietly. "I told them it was safe. That there were opportunities here. I didn't tell them they'd be walking into a war zone."
"It wasn't when you left," he replied weakly.
"No," Oswin reluctantly agreed. "It wasn't. But even so, you're responsible for keeping them safe now."
He left later that evening on a horse, having restocked with various alcohols and goods before spending an hour brushing his new horse to bond with it, talking to it like it was a long-lost friend, telling Chris it was important to make sure a proper bond was formed. All Chris told him when he heard that was how he was supposed to be heading out, not bonding with livestock, which made him huff before he left. Though Chris had him take two small satchels, one with a pair of shoots bamboo growing from it and the other a thorned vine. Oswin hadn't argued about the plants, though he did raised an brow at how the spike bushes seemed to treat the horse like royalty.