"What happens if we don't answer?" Vespera asked immediately.
The dryad looked at her with bored eyes. "You die, and that is that."
"Like Buck died?" I asked.
The dryad looked briefly away, and I noticed a stack of pale, crumbling bones on the ground. "His name was Buck? He was stillborn, like all other children of this time. Ruin, regression and, eventually, darkness. There is no use stalling, Sol Nightguard."
I took a deep breath. "Ask, then."
The dryad smirked, and then his eyes changed. From pale red, like the sun through a curtain of smog on Delta Pavonis III, they became emeralds. A million facets studied us with great intelligence, and when he spoke, his voice was captivating.
"I am a ship on a shoreless sea. The harder I run, the heavier my hull becomes. When I reach my top speed, a single breath in my cabin watches a hundred autumns pass outside my window. I grant you the stars, but I steal everyone you ever loved. What am I?"
Then he returned to normal. His eyes, once again red, regarded me with contempt. "Wipe that stupid grin off your face, challenger, and do not make the same mistake many others made. Do not ask questions. You have all the time in the universe to think, but the next words you utter will be taken as the answer to the riddle."
I did not wipe the grin off my face. Instead, I broke down laughing. I laughed, feeling it bubble from deep inside me. I felt the girls worry through the bond, but I couldn't help it. I laughed and laughed. Still, I said no words and broke no rules.
After a minute, I managed to calm down and stared at the dryad, meeting his red, hazy eyes. There must have been something in my gaze, because he took a step back. He was the one being intimidated, if only for a moment.
"You are a relativistic spaceship," I said coldly. "Did you rummage through my mind without my permission to come up with it?"
The dryad cocked his head. "I am not familiar with the term you used. Are you perhaps attempting to deceive me?"
"No, fucker. A relativistic spaceship is a ship, in space, and traveling at close to the speed of light in a vacuum. Is that the answer to the riddle?"
The dryad nodded, a hint of a smile tugging at his lips. The glow in his eyes faded a little, and there were specks of green in the red haze. "That is correct," he said. "Now—"
I didn't let his softer tone deceive me. I was a mess of emotions, and I could feel the girls' worry through the bond. Upon hearing the riddle, they really had thought I was cooked, and I very much didn't like that. What I liked even less, however, was the riddle.
"Now answer my question, plant guy," I said with more venom than I thought I was capable of. "How the fuck does a sentient tree know of relativistic spaceships without knowing what relativity is? Again, did you look in my mind without permission?"
"I promise you I did no such thing. The riddle has been the same since long before my time."
I blinked. Was this all just a strange coincidence, then? Then again… "Am I the first one to answer correctly?"
The dryad nodded. I sighed. Of course I was.
"Sol," Elyra's soft voice reached my mind and pulled me back to the present. "Is he… crying?"
Vespera was as surprised as I was. "He is!" she shouted.
I looked at him, and at his eyes. The red was gone, the haze replaced by pale green. It wasn't the same green as when he had told the riddle; it was gentler and softer. It wasn't the only change either. In fact, his whole body language had changed.
I opened my mouth to speak, but a System window killed whatever I was about to say.
General level up!
General Level 4 → 5
+1 to all stats.
+1 General skill point.
Insufficient energy.
The girls' eyes widened. "Level up?" Vespera said out loud.
"The backpack!" Elyra shouted. "We left it outside."
This shook the dryad out of his contemplative state. Tears still dripped down his face, but with a deep breath, he gathered what strength he could and told us: "You have solved the riddle, challengers. You have earned the right to challenge the tree."
I looked at the tree behind him. "That tree?"
What had previously just been a very big tree, perhaps an oak—I was no tree expert—was now something else entirely. It was bigger and taller, with a twisting trunk filled with darkness. So tall it pierced the shield dome and reached for the sky like an impossible needle.
"An illusion," I said through the bond. "A hologram, I think."
I could recognize the telltale signs of it.
"It might be as you say," Vespera replied. "But the magical pressure I feel from it is no illusion."
"Sol," Elyra said. "I do not think we are strong enough to defeat the tree. And I do not think I want to, either."
"She's right, spacer boy. The first part at least. What do we do?"
I felt their eyes on the back of my head, expecting me to do something. I could feel that they had not even considered the easiest way out, and I was reminded of the fact that even though we were so similar, we had our differences.
"We talk to him," I said. Then, out loud: "We don't want to fight the tree."
"You must," the dryad argued. "It is the rules, no matter how much I despise them."
He was sniffling, trembling like a leaf. Without the red haze of hostility and sadistic pleasure at delivering the riddle, which might not even have been really his but the tree's, he looked frail, defenseless, and so, so sad.
I got an idea, and felt Vespera's smirk even though I couldn't see it.
"Sure, it is the rules. But even though we earned the right to fight the tree, the tree hasn't earned the right to fight us."
The dryad looked at me. "What do you mean?"
"I have a riddle for you. Well, not as flowery as yours, but a riddle nonetheless. Answer it and we shall fight. If not…"
"Death?" he asked, concerned.
I laughed. "Nothing so extreme. How about if you don't answer correctly, then you must agree to become allies?"
"I accept," the dryad said quickly. I saw relief in his face. Then, his eyes turned to emeralds. "The tree accepts. Spell it, human."
I took a deep breath. Truly, I had no idea how to speak riddles. Still, I had to. "There is a small traveler. You don't know where he is, but you know where he wants to go. So you ask him—how can I behold your image?—and the traveler tells you—you must touch me—. You do, and now you know where the traveler is, but you do not know where he is going. Who is he, and why does he hide so?"
The dryad blinked a few times, but his eyes never faltered. Finally, he opened his mouth and said: "He is light."
I smiled. "That is only part of the answer."
"A riddle cannot have two answers. That is the rules."
"Is it?" I challenged. "Just like light is two things, so my riddle requires two answers. Tell me, tree, how does a photon know it's being observed?"
The dryad opened his mouth to speak, but no words came out. He touched his cheeks, almost surprised to see that his slender fingers came back wet with tears again. The droplets left little trails that sparkled in the non-daylight of the grey sky, out of the normal flow of time.
The tree retreated from his mind, and his eyes returned to the pale green of his individuality. I smiled.
"Welcome back," I said.
"The tree does not know the second answer. We are allies now, as per the rules."
I walked forward, offering my hand. He took it gingerly. "It is a strange custom," he said. "To shake hands."
I shrugged. Vespera laughed. "Looks like spacer boy does it again! Little angel," she said as she tapped the girl on the shoulder, "looks like we will have to defend what's ours with our teeth and claws."
"What do you mean?" she asked.
"Look at his eyes," the demon said. "He's all smitten."
"I don't like where this is going," I told her.
She walked over, her hips swaying. "Then stop being all charming all the time, Don Giovanni."
"What's a Don Giovanni?" I asked. I felt like I should know, somehow, but I didn't.
She did not answer. Instead, she approached the dryad, who was still standing still, with drying tear trails on his cheeks, and asked: "What's your name, plant boy?"
"Calyx," he said in a soft voice.
"Well, Calyx." The demon licked her lips. "Now that we are allies, I'm pretty sure Sol has a few questions for you."
She stared him down with cold, calculating eyes. There was no mistaking the warning in her gaze either, and I could feel a hint of amused sadism through the bond. She was enjoying seeing him squirm now that the balance of power had been reversed. The tree had withdrawn after my riddle, and now Calyx was all alone with us, and didn't know what to do.
"Start by telling us what you know," I said. "And why do you speak of spaceships and relativistic effects instead of plants and magic."