Chapter 151: Chapter 150: Guardians

Guardians? Who the hell were those? And what was that look from Zeew supposed to mean? She thought I was one? Fuck no! I would know something about that. I would, right?

Curiosity got the better of me, though. Well, curiosity and doubt got to me. I wasn’t entirely sure that what the spirit did to me was just give me longer wing feathers. So I had given up the provocation of two disgusted northern eagles and changed the course of my flight, not hiding my interest in the conversation between Miros and the spirit. A bit rude, for sure. However, given the strength and perception of those two, I didn’t see the point of trying to be discreet.

“How can I name a Guardian when I don’t have a name myself, silly Zeew?” questioned the spirit and giggled, amused that Miros didn’t know something so simple.

In fact, ever since Zeew found out about the seed, I’ve been wondering how the beasts knew so much about the World Trees while humans were so lacking in knowledge, or so it seemed to me. Was it the instincts? Perhaps some kind of inherent knowledge and respect for the trees with which the beasts were born.

Or it could have been the fact that the elves had a hard time keeping beasts and animals from getting on and out of their kingdoms, as Lord Wigram mentioned. If so, then it wasn’t hard to imagine that what the eagles knew may have been knowledge brought by others and passed on through generations.

And that raised the question of why humans didn’t send beasts and animals there as spies. Someone like Lightfeather must have been capable of it.

“Forgive my ignorance,” Zeew chimed in her melodious voice, visibly fighting her pride after being called silly. “Chick, not Guardian then?”

The eyes of both of them fell on me just as I was about to stop my flight by the spirit’s side. While her look full of joy and delight brought a smile to my lips, Zeew’s made the hairs on the back of my neck stand up and threw me off, making my flight stop a little awkward. I actually bumped into the spirit with my wing, but it just made her giggle more.

“Clumsy Korra...I don’t have any Guardians yet, Zeew.”

Oh, so I wasn’t one. Good to know. Honestly, it lifted a weight off my heart, and I wasn’t the only one eased by the fact. Though, I didn’t like the haughty look the mighty Miros was giving me at all. It was like I had become prey again in her eyes. Or someone lesser, a weasel. 

I had to ask anyway, even if it meant showing my ignorance. “Who are those Guardians?”

Expectedly, Zeew snorted at my ignorance. In contrast, the spirit found it amusing and giggled. “Korra, silly too. The ones who guard me, of course.”

It took a lot of effort to stop myself from sighing out loud, allowing myself just a mental one. After all, that part was pretty obvious to me. “Silly me, of course...but what does it mean to be your Guardian?”

“It’s an honor, chick,” Zeew chimed in, showing her merit to the spirit. “Proud to be one.”

Okay, I have to admit there was more to her words, and I was a little confused by the meaning behind them. “You met one? I mean a Guardian.”

Mighty Miros sized me up with her eagle eyes. “When I was no more of chick than you, barely able to fly, Casoow returned to our nests from his Great Flight, named as one. Songs of his name and journey still resound among our kin, singing about how he became Guardian for tree far beyond.”

Honestly, I had no idea what to say, taken aback by realizing how much more complex the beast’s relationships were than I thought.

“Tell me more...” begged the spirit, beaming with curiosity.

Zeew’s chest puffed with pride, and she started to sing. Even though I didn’t like her, I had to admit that her voice and the song she sang were beautiful. There were no words in it, just tones, the essence of which was the valiant journey of Cas across land and sea, where he dared to sit on the branches of a tree he had never seen. This act pitted him against the old Guardian of the Tree. In that fight, his pride was wounded when he tasted humiliating defeat, but the tree saw his valor and gave him the name of Guardian, Casoow.

“Where’s Casoow now? Can I meet him?” the spirit blurted out her questions eagerly as Zeew finished her singing.

“He traveled further, spirit of tree. Wherever his wings took him.”

Upon hearing that, the spirit let out a crestfallen whimper. “I really wanted to meet him.”

“I, too, would like to hear him sing once more. Maybe one day his wings will carry him among us again.”

“You really think so? That would be great,” the spirit beamed, her cheerful mood back. “Right, Korra?”

“Yeah...” I muttered, unable to hide my unease with the idea. If he was anything like Zeew, his pride must have soared to staggering heights with his naming as Guardian. Not the eagle I wanted to meet. So I tried to avoid answering with a question of my own. “How can he fly around the world? Shouldn’t he be...you know, guarding his tree?”

“That would be silly, Korra,” the spirit said, circling me. “How would the tree see the world if he stayed? How would he get stronger?”

Wait... see the world? Through his eyes, maybe? Whichever way it was, there was something to the latter part. However, letting him roam the world to get stronger posed one big issue. “How can he protect the tree if he is not there?” Ha, now answer that.

“Tree calls and Guardian will answer the summons.”

Oh, of course, magic. “No matter where he is in the world?” If so, that was some damn powerful magic the World Trees possessed. Perhaps even strong enough to cross the boundaries of realms.

“Where my roots go,” the spirit replied, crushing my hope that World Trees could be my way home in the bud.

Since the roots of the World Trees were said to encompass the world, therefore their name, boundaries where such a Guardian could go and from where he could be summoned seemed unlimited. That is as far as Eleaden was concerned. Yet If I were to become one, as Zeew believed, it would be like having shackles put on me. It would tie me to this world, and quite possibly for good.

I didn’t want to do that, or rather, I wasn’t ready to give up hope of returning.

“Why so sad all of a sudden, Korra?”

“I thought of my world, my family. I’d like to see them at least one more time.”

“Ah, they far beyond the reach of my roots.” The realization dawned on the spirit, but then she looked off into the distance, lost as her mind wandered the world. Before, I found it confusing. Now, I knew she was communicating with the other World Trees somewhere on the other side of this realm. It was both impressive and terrifying at the same time.

“Sorry Korra, I’m too weak,” sighed the spirit dejectedly. “Others say I must grow stronger to be able to send my Guardians to other worlds.”

“...” I know I must have looked stupid to stay staring at her with my mouth gaping open, but I couldn’t help it. “...I thought they could only go where your roots reach?”

“That would be silly. How would I look at the places my roots don’t reach?”

“There are such places...except for the other realms?” I asked cautiously, not wanting to imply her incompetence. I wasn’t worried about the spirit taking it the wrong way, but about one proud eagle. And as expected, Zeew was the only one who took my insult with a grain of salt. The vibe I got on the back of my neck sent shivers down my spine.

“There are many,” piped the spirit, having no problem owning up to her shortcomings, giving Zeew a pause.

“There are?”

The ethereal apparition of the World Tree below us giggled, flapped her wings, and circled us both. “Sky, Zeew. My roots cannot reach the sky. Only my branches can, but they don’t reach that far. Still small.”

“Small? You are way too big as far as I’m concerned,” I remarked.

The spirit giggled. “I am not a big one. Korra, too small.”

Well, from her perspective, sure. From a human viewpoint, I’d say average. Perhaps only my chest...

“Wings too small and weak,” Zeew quipped about my inability to fly, taking advantage of the moment to point out my shortcomings to the spirit once again.

The remark that was on the tip of my tongue about how it didn’t stop me from flying, I didn’t let it out of my mouth and swallowed it, not wanting to piss Miros off more than she already was at me. Here in the presence of the World Tree, I was safe-ish. Outside of it, not so much.

The world was teeming with people at my throat. I didn’t need to be wary of more.

So instead of provoking a powerful and proud beast, I glanced at the spirit circling joyfully around us. “Are there other places your roots cannot reach?”

She actually stopped and thought about it for a moment. “Deep water is hard to grow roots in, pointless too. Some rocks are difficult for my roots to grow through. The deeper I reach, the harder it gets. There are so many things down there that my roots are forced to avoid,” the spirit complained, pouting.

“What about labyrinths?”

Her curiosity was piqued immediately. “What are those?”

“Old humans’ dens,” Zeew shrieked in disgust.

“I don’t know about that,” I shrugged, aware that Esu called labyrinths by a similar name. “Anyway, labyrinths, as humans call them, are ancient structures buried deep in the ground. For all I know, they should be big and reach really deep.”

“Oh, I know those annoying things. Impossible for my roots to penetrate. Stinging to the touch. There’s one not far from here. Why so close, right Korra? It hurt me when I was little. Esu soothed my pain.”

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Zeew couldn’t bear to listen to her painful recollections of her encounter with Fallens Cry and shrieked: “You, humans!”

This time I didn’t take it lying down, so to speak. “Not my fault. It hasn’t even been...one a full moon that I’ve learned about them. Damn it. I’m not even of this world.”

“You, with humans.”

“Why blame the humans of the current time anyway? It was built by the ancient ones. You said it yourself.”

“Humans, all same.”

“Same, but different,” the spirit piped in, caught up in our argument. “Different names, so many names.”

Good point, but not a distinction I would use. Names didn’t make us who we were and I could tell that Zeew saw it the same way. To give her credit from a broad perspective, humans could be the same in essence. But the same could be said of any species.

“Are you the same as Casoow, Zeew?”

“I would not dare.”

“What about your ancestors? Were they the same as you?”

Zeew let out an angry shriek. “How dare you? Those were great eagles. They earned the name Miros. Heights they have reached are sung in songs. Not like me.”

“And I am not like my ancestors either.”

“Me too, not like the old ones,” said the spirit, enjoying the argument a little too much. “They have strong names. I am nameless.”

And so we established that we were all far from our ancestors. Great, right? Not good enough for Zeew. At least that’s what it looked like for a moment before she finally let it go.

“So those pesky things are dens?”

“Kind of...” I nodded at the spirit’s query.

“And humans live inside? You live there, Korra?”

I almost laughed. If humans live there? A lot of people said Deckard basically did.

Anyway, the issue of labyrinths was not the way I thought this meeting with Miros would go. In my mind, it was riddled with arrogance and insults. Thinking about it, it kind of was. Well, putting that aside, I gave the spirit an amused smile and explained how the labyrinths were supposed to work, the really basic stuff. I was hardly some kind of expert on the subject.

And yet my knowledge of labyrinths was enough to make the spirit look at me with eyes gleaming with curiosity. “Wow, hidden little worlds and so many.”

“Yeah, you could look at it that way.” I nodded, picturing the individual floors as little worlds she suggested they were. In fact, according to Deckard, the seeker never reached the edge of the floor, any floor. There was powerful magic in the play that either turned the seeker in their steps without them noticing or, in the same way, simply displaced them elsewhere within the floor. So basically, the floors could seem endless and even like small worlds in themselves.

“Sounds like fun. Will you take me there, Korra?”

“W-what...” I had a hard time finding the words to answer her. How do you tell someone who is bouncing up and down with excitement that it’s impossible? It will always involve disappointment. “I’m sorry, but I don’t know how,” I said, glancing down at her crown below me.

“She’s not Guardian,” Zeew argued, making sure I knew where my place was, that I was just a chick who couldn’t fly without the help of others.

The spirits passed over her remark with a broad grin. “Yet.”

Once again, she managed to shock me and make me speechless. And not just me. Even Zeew was taken aback by her rather blunt and innocent statement.

Though, Miros was quicker than me to get her wits back around and took a breath to shriek her objection when the spirit froze and gazed off into the distance. Her ethereal form flared up like a little star less than two breaths later, and she vanished.

‘Fuck! What now?’

I was forced to quickly put the question out of my mind and focus on myself as the hairs on the back of my neck stood up and a shiver ran down my spine. It wasn’t just Zeew, but also the two northern eagles that were giving me murderous looks. Or was it jealousy? It didn’t matter, anyway. Even though the World Tree was right below us, I didn’t feel very comfortable in their presence without her spirit around.

“Parley?” I asked, hoping the meaning of the word would come through correctly. Not the best word, I know. The best my brain could come up with at the moment, though. Whether the meaning came through correctly didn’t seem to matter, and the longer the spirit was gone, the more the tension grew.

So I mused.

Would a nosedive right into the branches of the World Tree do me any good? Doubt it. Zeew was a hunter, born ruler of the skies. No doubt she had the skills to hunt me down and to do it even before I reached the first leaf of the treetop. Not to mention the difference in our strength.

As I pondered my not-so-good options, she flew closer to me, making me realize how massive she actually was. Not as big as Esu, for sure, but her wingspan rivaled the breadth of his antlers.

‘Come on, where are you, spirit?’ I whimpered in my inner voice.

“You, chick, very weak,” Zeew shrieked after sizing me up. “Can’t even fly. Unworthy to be Guardian of Tree.”

That was something we could agree on, so I nodded warily, not quite sure where she was going with that.

“Pathetic. Like weasel,” she sang, not hiding her view of me. “More to you than meets eye, though.”

Fuck me! Did I hear that right? Did she just admit I wasn’t that pathetic?

“I may not see, but not stupid. Esu sees more in you, and so does tree. What, I cannot understand...yet.”

Honestly, I didn’t understand what they saw in me either.

“Even if you Guardian, still flightless chick to me. No respect, unless you prove otherwise.”

Me being the Guardian of the World Tree? Sorry, but it still sounded ridiculous to me. I couldn’t defend myself very well, let alone anyone else. However, if for some crazy reason I were to become one, to be disrespected by such a powerful beast as the proud Miros before me was something I could live with. It wasn’t hard to imagine that if I demanded respect from her, my guardianship wouldn’t last very long.

“I understand,” I said, bowing my head and showing her my gratitude for her goodwill. After all, she decided to wait and see what I was capable of instead of getting rid of me.

“Zeew, Korra,” the spirit squealed in delight as she appeared in our midst all of a sudden. “What are you still doing up here? Come down. I have to tell everyone my name.”

“Y-you got a name?”

She laughed at my question and puffed out her chest. “I’m no longer nameless.” Then she turned to look at Zeew, grinning like a madwoman. “I think I feel pride.”

“Very good, one should,” Miros sang her praise.

That made the spirit giggle with smug satisfaction. “Come on, come on down. You can sit in my branches. I won’t mind.”

“We can?” Zeew stammered, surprised but flattered by the offer.

“You all may,” nodded the spirit, gesturing to the two northern eagles.

“Then, it will be an honor, spirit of tree.”

She giggled and, without another word, dived into her branches, making a path for us, and what a path it was given the size of the eagles. Rather than a path, it was a wide tunnel through the branches, allowing for a smooth dive down. Still, I couldn’t match the speed of the eagles, and so, on the expanse beneath a sky decorated with the dangling, streaming clusters of glowing flowers, I got the last.

By the time my feet touched the ground, the eagles were already sitting in the branches, their eyes like the eyes of all, beasts and men alike, glued to the spirit standing by her trunk, puffing out their chests with pride.

Seeing me there, she smiled broadly and made her big announcement. “Hi, I’m Idleaf, and Idleaf is who I am.”

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