Bran's awe blossomed into warmth. He felt, with a sudden certainty, that this place had known him always, its luminous hush a cradle, its people a story he'd almost remembered. Yet a tremor of worry threaded through the wonder, and he turned to Teo. "My brother... Tavik. He'll be worried, he must be searching for me. Would you include my brother in your invitation too?"

  Teo smiled and nodded, raising his hand in a slow, circling gesture. The light bent and rippled, summoning a trembling pathway of radiance. With a soft, silvery surge, Tavik emerged, breathless and wild-eyed, scrambling to Bran's side. He grabbed Bran into a fierce hug, heedless of the otherworldly company, relief shuddering through his limbs. Then, pulling back, Tavik's gaze darted to the Talanooks; his stance stiffened, broad shoulders squaring in protection.

  "Bran, what happened? Who are these...?" His voice faltered, caught between awe and alarm.

  Bran, still aglow with the city's welcome, gestured to Teo and the gathered beings. "Tavik, this is Teo, and these are the Talanooks. We were invited here. It's all right, truly."

  Tavik's jaw tightened. "We need to get back, Bran. When Oren and Nix return to the forest and find us gone..."

  Teo's voice flowed over him, patient as dusk. "Be at ease, Tavik. Here beneath the Eldertree roots, time slips by in its own gentle rhythm. When you return, you will find only moments have passed."

  Bran pressed his hand to Tavik's arm, eyes bright with wonder and hope. "Let's stay, just for a while. We're safe, and there's so much to see." Tavik hesitated, but the shimmering peace of the city pooled around him, softening his resolve. At last, he nodded, uncertain but trusting Bran's certainty.

  Teo beckoned, and together they followed him along winding paths of crystal and root, beneath arches woven from living light. The city unfolded in waves of marvel, a river of silver light coursed through the centre, flowers crackled with iridescent glow, and shapes flitted between the boughs, singing wordless songs.

  They moved deeper beneath the boughs, the city unfolding like a dream around them. Tavik's hand hovered protectively at Bran's shoulder, fingers tense, knuckles white against the lambent air. Bran, eyes wide as clouds, drank in every facet, each petal of living flame, each ripple of colour trembling across crystal bridges. "How did all this come to be?" Bran asked, his voice hushed with wonder, skipping from marvel to marvel. "How do you live here? Why invite us?"

  Teo's laughter chimed like wind in glass leaves. "So many questions! The Talanooks are a people of song and memory, shaping nothing but what the Mother Eldertree offers. See, for us, the city is grown, not built; every arch, every lantern, is a gift of root and light. We invite only those who carry magic in their hearts. The writing you found upon the tree was our greeting, spun from lichen and hope, for we sensed the spark within you, Bran."

  Tavik's brow furrowed, suspicion flickering beneath awe. "You must not meet many who wander this deep. Few elves find their way to you, I'd wager."

  Teo's smile faded into something gentler, touched by centuries. "Not many at all. A handful in as many hundreds of years. Each encounter is precious, marked in our roots, remembered in song."

  Tavik's gaze dropped, his thoughts drifting to shadows of memory. He wondered, silent and inward, if their mother had stood in this city, heart alight with secrets too deep for words. Yet he held the question close, letting it rest unspoken between the thrum of roots.

  Bran's heart sang with kinship at Teo's words, a quiet longing echoing through his veins. He dared not speak it, this thread of belonging, but it shimmered, gentle, beneath his skin.

  Teo guided them down winding root-paths, where light and shadow waltzed in peculiar, shifting patterns, curling round their ankles. Tavik, ever wary, glanced back at each turn, eyes tracing the way, storing it stone by stone in case return was needed. "The city listens as it grows," Teo explained, gesturing to a living arch that bent as they approached. "Not a stone is cut nor a vine forced. All is the Eldertree's will."

  Tavik's boots pressed into the glowing earth, and a hum, soft and warm, rose beneath his feet. "Why does the ground sing?"

  Teo's eyes glinted. "It hums when pleased. The Eldertree welcomes you."

  They came to a bridge spun of purest radiance, arcing over a cavern where roots twisted down into dark, cool depths. Silver waterfalls poured from above, and winged Talanooks wheeled through the mist, their songs bright and wordless. Bran faltered at the threshold, heart thudding, below, the space unfurled, vast and unfathomable. Tavik's grip steadied him. "Breathe, Bran. Slow and steady."

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  Teo smiled, pausing on the glowing span. "The bridge listens too, it trembles when hearts flutter. It settles when trust steadies it."

  Tavik managed a nervous laugh, the first in some time. "Best mind your nerves, Bran. If you panic, we'll all be learning to fly sooner than these folk expect."

  They crossed together, breath held, feet light on the living light, Bran avoiding looking down and glad for Tavik’s hand on his shoulder. On the far side, the bridge faded into roots, and a vaulted chamber opened, a hall of gentle twilight, its walls a tapestry of leaf and shimmer. Inside, Talanooks moved in a swirling dance, their wings unfurling in a hundred shifting hues, each movement weaving light and melody in the hush. The air was alive with the resonance of wing-harmonics, stories spun not in words but in song and colour.

  Teo stepped into the centre and spread his wings wide, silver and green and gold. He traced a pattern through the air, the light bending to his will, melody unfurling like a banner. "This is how we remember," he said, as strands of song wrapped around Bran, revealing something bright and wild and deep. For a heartbeat, Bran's hopes and griefs and dreams lit the chamber, painting his soul in radiance for all to see.

  Bran stood dazzled, breath caught, heart thundering in his chest. Tavik found no words, his doubts stilled by the beauty of it, left silent before a magic too vast for explanation, too gentle for fear.

  They stood a moment longer in the fading harmonics, neither brother quite ready to move. Bran's hand found Tavik's sleeve, gripping it as if to anchor himself. Tavik, still speechless, squeezed his brother's shoulder in return.

  Teo, patient as stone, waited until their breathing steadied before beckoning them on, down a corridor of twining roots that widened, then spilled open into a market alive with movement and light. The Root Market breathed with its own pulse, lanterns, spun from luminous seed pods, bobbed overhead like patient moons. Stalls coiled from living branches, their surfaces shaped by Talanooks with nimble hands and wingtips; one sang to a cluster of hollowed roots and coaxed them into flutes that chirped and sighed, while another wove strands of light into cloaks that shimmered like the dawn. All around, the air thrummed with barter, song for story, leaf for laughter, promise for petal.

  Tavik paused, eyes wide and wary amid the wonder, and let out a startled yelp. A small creature, no more than a glowing tuft with six delicate limbs, had leapt, unbidden, onto his boot. Its light wavered between gold and blue, as if uncertain, and it clung tight as lichen. Tavik hopped in alarm, shaking his foot. "What in the... get this thing off me! Teo, is it dangerous?"

  Teo smiled, the silver of his wings flickering. "Harmless, I promise. It's a Glimkin, they're drawn to anxious minds. It finds your nerves rather... inviting."

  Tavik spluttered. "Not anxious. Alert. Different thing entirely." But the Glimkin only held tighter, its glow warming in sympathy.

  Bran muffled a laugh, kneeling to stroke the curious creature. Its quivering stilled, light softening to a tranquil blue. "It rather likes you, Tavik. Perhaps it thinks you're in need of comfort."

  Teo stood beside Tavik, his voice gentle. "Here, watch me. Breathe in through your nose, slow as the breeze, then out again just as patiently. The Glimkin will sense your calm and drift away."

  Tavik matched Teo's rhythm, breath shaky at first, then steadier. At last, the Glimkin released its hold, bounding away on a ribbon of light, and vanished into the bustle.

  Bran stood and grinned at Tavik. "Look at that, a proper forest sage now. All it took was out-breathing a ball of fluff."

  Tavik snorted, but the corners of his mouth curled despite himself. "Keep moving, Bran, before another one takes a liking to you instead." With a nudge, he steered Bran after Teo deeper into the heart of the Market.

  The bustle and brightness of the Root Market fell away behind them as the path narrowed. The air grew cooler, quieter. Tavik's shoulders gradually loosened, the constant watchfulness easing as the chaos gave way to hush. Bran glanced back once at the glowing stalls, then forward again, curious what lay ahead.

  They arrived at a tranquil glade, hushed beneath canopies of woven root. Here lay a series of pools, their surfaces aglow with shifting rainbows, each ripple casting patterns on faces and wings alike. Teo knelt on the bank, his reflection fractured by gentle waves. "These are the Pools of Possibility. They show not what shall be, but what might, echoes, shadows of choices. When a Talanook faces a path, we come here to listen for the silent answer within."

  Bran peered in, watching his own shape blur and multiply, uncertain yet oddly hopeful. "So, no certainties. Only questions, and glimpses of where they'll lead."

  "Just so," Teo murmured. "The future is not a script, but a song, and each moment changes its tune."

  Bran rose slowly from where he'd knelt beside the pool, his reflection still rippling across the surface. He said nothing. But his hands, as he brushed them against his coat, were not quite steady, and the warmth that had sat so easily in his face throughout the day had gone somewhere it couldn't be retrieved. The pools' shifting light found the hollows beneath his eyes and settled there.

  He straightened his shoulders with the deliberate care of someone putting themselves back together, and turned away from the water.

  Tavik watched him. He said nothing either. He had learned, somewhere along the years of being Bran's brother, that there were moments when asking was the wrong thing, when silence was the only gift worth giving. He filed what he'd seen away instead, quietly, behind his eyes, and fell into step beside him.

  The pools shimmered on at their backs as they followed Teo deeper into the city, their light offering no answers.