Chapter 5
Chapter Five
Marian presses a hand to her temple, letting her breath come shallow and uneven. ‘Please,’ she whispers, voice fraying at the edges. ‘I just need a few moments. This is all rather overwhelming.’
Allen hesitates in the doorway, fingers resting on the frame. His bright expression softens with understanding. ‘Of course,’ he answers. ‘I’ll wait just outside, but don’t take too long.’
The door shuts behind him with a soft click.
Marian holds still until his footsteps fade down the walkway. She exhales hard and moves, before her courage can falter, to the furthest window, where the latch gives easily under her fingers. Without a backward glance, she shoves it open and swings one leg over the sill, but freezes.
The ground is nowhere in sight.
Her cabin is perched in the canopy, like birds in a great woven nest; its window is built into the trunk of a massive ash.
The branches have been sanded down and lashed tight to wider ones that stretch from one colossal tree to another in a makeshift bridge that connects her little cottage to countless others.
All around, the forest is filled with homes of carved timber and glass, moss-thatched rooftops and windows paned with multicoloured river stones.
Marian blinks against the brightness.
Children’s laughter rings out faintly from a platform above, where a pair of young fae race barefoot across a hanging bridge, their copper and blonde curls bright against the morning sky. Their steps are sure. Trusting. As though they’ve never once feared falling.
‘Saints preserve me,’ she mutters, inching herself off the ledge onto the closest branch that could hold her weight. The forest yawns below her in a dizzying drop of green. She lowers herself until her feet catch the bark.
The tree flakes beneath her nails, leaving slivers in her palm as she makes her way down. A curl of her hair snags on a twig, and she bites back a curse, focusing on each careful foothold. Her arms tremble, but she drops onto a pad of soft moss with a muted thud.
For one breathless heartbeat, she wonders what it would be like to stay, to become a part of the very place her parents feared above all else.
She turns and moves deeper into the line of trees, heart thudding. The world is hushed but for the dripping of water from somewhere and the slow exhale of moss underfoot. Her skirt snags on bramble, but she doesn’t stop. She pushes through the tangle, breath shallow, pulse wild.
Then the forest stirs.
A shadow moves to her left. The bole of a nearby ancient oak ripples and parts.
From within, the outline of a man emerges – massive, slow-moving, half-shadow, half-tree.
Bark shifts like muscle, and out steps the one Allen had called Little John.
The air hums faintly around him, alive with the whisper of leaves.
In his hand glints something small and silver.
The fox hairpin, its metal still faintly stained with blood.
Marian freezes. There’s no anger in his face, just a quiet knowing that makes it clear she’s been caught.
‘I . . .’ she starts, voice barely more than a breath. ‘I wasn’t—’
Before she can fumble her way into a lie, a familiar voice drifts down from above, light and teasing.
‘Should’ve known you wouldn’t stay put.’
Marian’s head snaps upward. The minstrel lounges in the canopy like a cat; his grin is infuriatingly boyish, though his eyes carry something sharper.
‘Valiant effort,’ Allen continues, ‘but it’s no use. Half the forest would alert us before you made it ten paces.’ He swings down from the branch with a graceful drop that barely stirs the soil. ‘Sherwood doesn’t take kindly to uninvited wanderers.’
The realization chills her. ‘So I’m a prisoner, then.’
Allen quirks his head. ‘A guest under close watch.’ His grin softens what might have been condescension. ‘That is, until the Council decides what to do with you.’
Marian bristles. ‘How kind.’
Little John shifts with a grunt as he gestures toward the narrow path that winds upward through the trees.
Allen clears his throat. ‘Best come along before you find more trouble.’
Marian hesitates, glancing back toward the faint shimmer of morning mist between trunks at the forest’s edge. But the way Little John’s golden eyes track her makes it clear that even the forest itself would not let her go.
So she follows.
The path winds higher, roots and stairs woven together. The deeper they climb, the more the light shifts from ordinary dawn to something softer, dappled through leaves that seem to breathe.
Allen walks a few paces ahead, every movement loose and unbothered, as if the world bends to make room for him. ‘Keep close,’ he calls over his shoulder. ‘The bridges can be tricky if you don’t know where they end.’
The air grows warmer the higher they climb, carrying the scent of sap and herbs. When they reach the top, she takes in the entirety of her surroundings.
A fae village suspended above all of Sherwood.
Marian swallows. ‘I-I-I had no idea any of this existed.’
Allen glances back at her and smiles, a flicker of pride in his eyes. ‘That’s rather the point.’ His boots thud softly against the timber, and Marian follows him across the footway.
Every structure is different. Some are squat and round like woven baskets, others slender and tall, spiralling up trunks.
Everywhere she looks, the trees are part of the design.
Not obstacles to be trimmed or avoided, but partners.
The trunks grow through walls, split staircases in two, anchor roofs and porches.
Rope pulleys and hanging baskets rise and fall between levels, carrying goods from kitchen to forge, from weaver to apothecary.
Marian slows to take it all in. Her bruised pride, her fear, her questions – everything quiets beneath what swells in her chest.
She’s walked through castles carved of stone and cold silence. But this is something else. Something older. Wilder. Beautiful in a way that feels almost impossible. It’s as if the trees welcomed the inhabitants and grew into their needs.
This isn’t just a home – it’s a haven.
‘Come on,’ Allen calls out, ‘we’re late enough as it is.’
Heat creeps up Marian’s neck as she falls in step beside him.
Allen strums his lute lightly as they walk, his fingers coaxing a jaunty tune that makes heads lift and mouths split wide in smiles as they pass.
Fae glance up from their work; some grin politely, others narrow their eyes at Marian before looking away.
Allen dips his chin to them, his melody smoothing edges her presence cannot.
‘Welcome to Elswyth,’ he hums.
‘Elswyth,’ she echoes softly, the word strange on her tongue.
They walk further along the platform. The rope handrail creaks beneath her touch as she steadies herself.
Marian swallows, the sound loud in her own ears. ‘There are so many of you.’
‘Not normally,’ Allen answers. ‘Each village sends a few members alongside their Elder to ensure they’re protected.’
Marian glances at a cluster of fae gathered near a bridge, their hands moving with quick, emphatic gestures. The tension between them is visible even from this distance. One of them jabs a finger into the other’s chest, who then responds with a swift slap.
‘Vicious even among yourselves,’ she mutters.
Allen’s hand stills its strumming, the cheerful tune faltering into silence.
He looks at her sidelong, one brow arched, though his expression is more wounded than offended.
Following her line of sight to the arguing fae, his laugh is short, but without mirth.
‘What you see there is not malice. It’s passion.
We fight when the stakes are high, because we care enough to sharpen our words on each other’s spines.
’ His gaze lingers a moment on the cluster ahead, then flicks back to Marian, voice softening.
‘Any danger we face comes from the arrogant humans who wander too deep, with blades held high, and think the forest will bow.’
Heat prickles at the back of Marian’s neck, shame rising swift and hot. She keeps her gaze fixed on the walkway boards, her cheeks burning. ‘I didn’t mean anything by it,’ she lies, shaking her head. ‘I’m sorry.’
They pass a cluster of children darting between roots and platforms, their hair threaded with feathers and their laughter clear as bells. One of them pauses to gape openly at Marian, before being pulled away by a taller youth whose ears glimmer with tiny bronze cuffs.
Marian studies them. ‘They’re so . . .’ She trails off, unsure of the word.
‘Don’t be fooled by their wide eyes and quick smiles – mischief and beauty are two sides of the same coin around here,’ Allen offers lightly, watching her out of the corner of his eye.
‘Pixies are fae tricksters at heart, but they mean no harm. Their idea of play is confusing mortals with illusions and riddles, until you don’t know which way is north.
Keep your wits sharp and they’ll respect you for it. ’
A flutter of wings draws her eyes upward.
Above them, two figures with pale skin and hair the colour of river foam float between branches.
Their gossamer wings shimmer faintly in the beaming sun.
One tips forward, dangling upside down with a bubbling giggle, before darting away in a blur of motion.
The other tosses a cascade of flowers that scatter across Marian’s path.
Her step falters. She bends slightly, fingertips brushing one of the petals where it landed. It feels real, but dissolves into mist the instant she lifts it.
Allen’s lute thrums a single amused note. ‘Riverfolk. They weave reed-flutes that can charm fish from the water. Beautiful, if you can stomach the sound of them practising for hours.’
Marian tips her head back toward the branches, but the pair have already vanished.