The Watchtower (5 page)

I took another step forward. "But then you would know that, Garet James." The voice came more fluidly now, as if it had only needed a little exercise to get it working. "You've already had some experience of our friends the fairies, haven't you?"

I stopped, midway down the nave, frozen to the spot. "How do you know my name?"

The rumbling sound began again, this time louder. It shook the tiny lumignon from their perches in the high roots so that they fell in a colored rain all around me. He--it?--was laughing.

"Ah, the name of Garet James, Watchtower, travels far. It's true I can't exactly go abroad any longer, but I have my ... informants. You could say my roots in this world and yours
run deep
." Again the creature's laughter shook the hall.

"And what do they say about me?" I asked, approaching the throne while stealthily trying to get a look around it to see where the speaker was hiding.

"They say you come to the church of Saint-Julien-le-Pauvre every day, sometimes twice a day. We've seen your kind before, waiting for a sign to set off on your quest for the Summer Country. Indeed, we saw another one--one who could only come after dark--quite recently."

"A man?" I asked, hating the eager hope in my voice. Hadn't I decided earlier today to give up on Will Hughes once and for all?

"Not exactly. A man once ... but now a creature of the night ... a..."

"Vampire, yes, I get it," I said irritably despite my relief at the news. I was beginning to find my interlocutor's speaking style annoying. And his game of hide-and-seek. I made a quick feint to my right and then dashed left around the wooden throne. There was nothing there.

Peals of gruff laughter shook the hall--and they were coming unmistakably from the throne. I came around and stood in front of the huge mass of carved wood--only it wasn't carved, I saw now. The root had grown into the shape of a chair, twisting itself into arms and legs, swelling into rococo curves that suggested some anthropomorphic design. A bulbous area looked like a head, tapering roots suggested fingers at the end of the curved arms and feet at the end of the legs.... I peered closer at one of the feet ... and then recoiled in astonishment. There, at the end of the roots, was a sliver of toenail.

I looked back up at the bulbous area at the head of the chair into two dark knotholes sunk deep into the fibrous wood.

"What are you?" I asked in a whisper.

The wood slenderly twisted into what I realized with mounting amazement was a smile.

"I am Jean Robin," the root answered, "once
arboriste
to kings and now"--he chuckled--"just
arbor. Enchante,
Mademoiselle James."

I recollected my manners enough to reply, "I'm pleased to meet you, too, Monsieur Robin. I've heard of you. You planted the tree in the Square Viviani."

"Yes, little knowing I'd spend eternity below it ... or rather, as part of it." He chuckled again. Now that I was closer, I could make out his features better. He had a high-domed forehead adorned with delicate swirls that I guessed were the remainder of what hair he'd had in life, small, round eyes surrounded by laugh lines, and a dimpled chin that disappeared into rings of rough-skinned root. The face of a small, jolly man whose life as a tree root these last four hundred years had not robbed of his sense of humor.

"If you don't mind me asking, how...?"

"How did I get into my present ligneous state? No, I don't mind at all. It's rare I get any visitors, you know. Please sit down." He slid his eyes toward a low spot before the throne where one of the tree's roots broke the surface, forming a little stool. I lowered myself down on it carefully, surprised to find it rather comfortable.

"Yes, well ... ahem." Jean Robin cleared his throat, which sounded as if it had been coated with sawdust. I noticed that a number of lumignon had come to sit on his shoulders and his knees as he began his story, their little, pointy faces cupped in their diminutive hands as they listened. "As you may know, I devoted my life to trees and rare plants." I didn't have the heart to tell him that all I knew about him came from the plaque in the park above us, so I nodded, which seemed to please him. "I was rewarded for my endeavors by being made
arboriste
to King Henry III in 1585. I created the first botanical garden in Paris in 1597. My nephew, Vespasien, and I traveled far and wide--to Spain and Africa and even to your native Western Hemisphere--for my collection. Indeed, it was from those shores that I brought this specimen that has been named for me:
Robinia pseudoacacia fabacees
." As he pronounced the name of the tree named for him, I thought I detected a change in his sooty brown complexion, a flush of green chlorophyll, which I imagined was a root's version of blushing.

"It was my garden that inspired the Messieurs de la Brosse and Herouard to found the Jardin des Plantes. They moved many of my specimens there, but not this one. My nephew, Vespasien, insisted they leave it here because he knew what had become of me. I hate to think what would have happened had they tried to dig me up!" He shuddered so hard that a few of the lumignon perched on his shoulders and knees flew up in a flurry of multicolored wings and then settled down again. I noticed that when they brushed their wings along Jean Robin's "skin," the wood gleamed more brightly. They were, I saw with wonder, polishing him.

"But how...?" I began.

"Ah, it happened when I was seventy-nine. I knew I had very little time left on earth ... heh, heh, I didn't know yet how much time I'd have under it!... and I'd come to visit my dear pseudoacacia, which I'd planted twenty-seven years earlier. I just wanted to make sure it was doing well ... growing straight, you know, with enough room to spread its roots. The pseudoacacia likes to spread its roots. It was a warm summer day and the tree was in full bloom, its lovely white blossoms scenting the air. When I'd pruned a few branches and cleared away some saplings, which threatened to encroach on its space, I sat down in its shade and leaned my head on its trunk. I could feel the lifeblood in me fading as I listened to the sap flowing strong in her veins. I remember I had the distinct idea that as long as the sap ran in the tree I'd planted, I wouldn't really be dead." Jean Robin's voice, which had grown from gruff to wistful, lapsed into silence. I thought I could hear in that silence the rustle of a summer wind through leafy boughs and the sultry drone of bees in the heavy-hanging blossoms. I waited for him to finish his story.

"When I woke up, I was here in the lair of the lumignon below my beloved pseudoacacia. They had lain me among the roots--to die, I imagine, but then the tree itself wrapped its roots around me and took me into itself. It fed me its own sap as a mother would feed its young, sharing its own lifeblood with me. Over time its cells replaced my own, much as quartz crystals may grow in wood, turning it into petrified wood, and I became as you see me now. A wooden man or, as I prefer to think of myself ... a manly root!" His chuckle was more constrained than before. I had the feeling that reliving his past had made him a bit melancholy.

"That's amazing," I said. "And you've remained so ... alert. How did you learn to speak English so well?"

"Ah, my friends the lumignon, recognizing my hunger for knowledge, have brought me books and information over the years. That's how I learned about you. The fey community has been all abuzz about the arrival of the Watchtower in Paris."

"The fey community? You mean there are more of them?" Although I'd met half a dozen fairies in New York, I hadn't thought of them as a community exactly. They had seemed more like a handful of scattered exiles who had all managed to disappear without a trace once they were done with me. It hadn't occurred to me that there might be a larger population here in Paris.

"Oh my, yes! The Parisian fey community is one of the largest and oldest in the world. It is composed of three main classes..."

The minute he began, I knew I'd made a mistake. He was a botanist, after all, trained to classify and catalog. I could be here all night listening to a disquisition on fairy phyla while what I really wanted to know was when Will had been sighted in Paris and how long ago he had left. I felt bad interrupting him, though. As he had said, he didn't get many visitors, and I figured it wouldn't hurt to know a little more about the local fairy population. They might be able to lead me to Will. So I settled onto my stool to listen.

"The arboreal fey, or
les fees des bois,
are considered by most experts to be the original indigenous species," he was saying. "They are so old that they don't member themselves when they first came into existence, although one I've spoken to remembers saber-tooth tigers..." Jean Robin spent the next ten minutes discussing the difficulty of dating the arboreal fey, their habitats--parks, mostly--and demeanor. "They are very shy and reclusive. They often attach themselves to a particular tree, like this one. My informants tell me that there are still substantial nests in the Jardin des Plantes, the Luxembourg Gardens, the Bois de Boulogne, and the Parc Monceau. The largest population in the Ile-de-France is in Fontainebleau. They are, in general, a merry and simple people, fond of French home cooking--they adore crepes!--singing and dancing--they invented the cancan.

"Then there are the light fairies--or
les fees des lumieres
..." He went on to describe various types of light fairy, including the lumignon, who derived substance from the light and color in the stained-glass windows of the great cathedrals: Notre Dame, Sainte-Chapelle, Saint-Eustache, Sacre-Coeur, Saint-Severin..." I lost track of all the churches where the light fairies roosted. "Most experts agree," Jean Robin concluded, "that the lumignon evolved from a species of flower fairy and that they first appeared in Paris with the advent of the great Gothic cathedrals, but whether they were attracted to the area
because
of the windows or if they originally inspired the creation of the first stained-glass windows, there continues to be dispute--"

Jean Robin was interrupted by a violet-colored fairy loudly chattering in his ear.

"Yes, yes," he said, his gnarled features creasing with merriment, "I'll tell her that. My friend has reminded me that there's a long tradition amongst the lumignon that Abbot Suger was introduced by Eleanor of Aquitaine to a lumignon who inspired him to create the windows of Saint-Denis."

I recalled what Oberon, the King of Fairies, had told me about the relationship between mortals and fey: "The humans we touch bloom in our company. They do their best work while we drink of their dreams." Thinking of the great flowering of Gothic stained-glass windows under the direction of Abbot Suger, it wasn't hard to imagine that he'd been touched by the fey.

"And then there are the
fees de la mer,
" Jean Robin said in a graver tone. The violet lumignon on his shoulder startled at the name and flew into the air. All the light fairies that had been roosting on top of Jean Robin took wing, like a flock of finches at the passing of a hawk's shadow.

"Sea fairies? What would they be doing in Paris?" I asked.

"They aren't native to the region. In fact, the tree and light fairies refer to them, somewhat disparagingly, as 'the boat people.' They came down from the sea on the Seine, exiles from a great cataclysm. Some say it was the drowning of the island of Ys."

The name
Ys
stirred an old memory. My mother had told me a story once of a fabled kingdom off the coast of Brittany ruled by nine priestesses and one king. The king's daughter Dahut gave the keys of the sea gate to a traitor, who opened the gates and drowned the city.

A crimson light fairy dive-bombing into Jean Robin's face put a stop to his speech. He chuckled good-naturedly. "Well, enough of that. I imagine you are more interested in learning the whereabouts of your friend the vampire."

"I'm not entirely sure he
is
my friend," I answered, "but, yes. Of course, I appreciate all you've told me about the different kinds of fairies ... it's fascinating..."

"Tut, tut," he said, blushing green, "no need to flatter an old man, although it
is
nice to have a visitor with a brain larger than a nit." I would have expected another dive-bomb attack from the lumignon at this remark, but instead I felt the brush of wings against my skin, and looking down, I saw that several of the multicolored fairies had settled on my arms and in my lap. "Your voice is so much more soothing than their eternal whine. You must visit again."

"I'd love to, only I do have to find Will Hughes first. Have you ... I mean, have any of your informants seen him at Saint-Julien's?"

"Yes, he showed up in Paris during the winter and began to frequent the church every day. At first we paid no mind to him. Over the centuries he's come many times to Saint-Julien's. In fact, the park outside the church was where I first met him."

"Wait, you met Will? Before you became ... were turned into..." My agitation caused the lumignon on my arm to stir, but then they stroked my arm to calm me down, which, oddly, worked.

"Before I entered my arboreal state? Yes. We both were mortal then, and we both had foolish notions of what might gain us immortality. I had just planted this tree. I remember I bragged to him that I looked to trees for my immortality, and he said to me that he looked to love. Little did we each know what form our ambitions would make of us."

He paused and I thought I saw a sadness come over his wooden features, but then his lips quirked up into a crooked smile. "Funny how we've both ended up in the dark, eh? And yet when I met him I thought to myself, 'Ah, there's a young man who loves the light and is loved by the light.' The sunlight, you see, had turned his hair to gold. Has he grown darker over the years he's spent out of the light?"