Prologue
The voyage beganwith a whispered secret and a most peculiar piece of wood.
Upon first impression, it was nothing extraordinary. Just a simple cut of log, brought back from an explorer’s journey to the new world. The whole continent was nothing but vast forests, untamed, unclaimed. Lumber was hardly a surprising resource.
But this cut, this tree, was different.
It was not oak or pine.
It was not walnut or cherry or maple or birch.
It wasn’t like anything the man had ever seen.
Impressively strong. Surprisingly flexible. Impossibly light.
Lumber from this tree could be fashioned into the finest fleet of ships ever known. It could create bridges that would span for miles. Houses and buildings and palaces. All would spring up like weeds and last for centuries.
This was a tree that could build an empire.
The man paid the explorer three times.
Once, for the cut itself.
A second time, for the explorer to show the man the exact place he’d found the trees. Together they crossed the sea, then a bay, then a cove. The explorer canoed them deep into the new wilderness, tracingthe routes he’d marked on his maps, charting where he’d gone, where the trees grew.
The man had stared with wonder at the vast forest, thousands of trees strong, thousands of gold coins in the making, and a strange hunger kindled within him.
So he paid the explorer again. This time, for his silence.
The explorer, gladdened by his heavy pockets, set sail once more, now heading south. He wanted to be somewhere warm enough to burn away the memories of those trees, of the dark and wild world in which they grew. Even as he basked half a world away, sun-kissed and surrounded by swaying palms, those trees made him shiver.
Back at his home in the north, the man drew up a plan, put together a ship and supplies, gathered a crew and equipment. He thought through everything. He left nothing to chance. Day after day he toiled, driven more by that strange hunger, that gnawing ambition and greed. He wanted to be the first to conquer this new world, to bring it under his heel, one fallen tree at a time.
The man was clever. Very, very clever.
He knew that the most important piece in this endeavor was not the machinery or the blades, not the rations or the transport. The thing, the one thing that would make his schemes work, was the morale of his men.
So, when he told them of this new expedition, he instructed them to pack it all. Pack their homes, bring their wives and children, their maiden aunts, their elderly parents, their sweethearts and livestock. They were meant to bring anything holding them to the old world. They would not be returning. They were on a noble mission, a greater destiny. They were bound for glories unimaginable.
He spun the men stories and, starry-eyed, they followed after.
Their voyage was long and hard, crossing the cold northern sea, one punishing wave at a time. Sickness claimed some of the older ones. Tears flooded the nights, the children certain they’d never see land again. Doubts crept in, stalking through the crew, taking hold of the men and their women. These doubts clouded their thoughts, corroded their hope.
The man would not listen to doubts. He pressed ahead, pointing theship west, his gaze fixed on the watery horizon. He reminded them of the wealth that awaited. He restored their dreams.
For a time.
When they did finally reach land, finally spotted the thick black slabs of rock rising high from the water like slumbering leviathans, any cheer the company felt withered away.
They stood in an awestruck line along the ship’s starboard side, watching the ancient cliffs draw nearer, silent and grim. There was a strangeness to this land, an uncanny watchfulness that set their neck hairs at attention. This was not a land to be conquered, as the man had promised. This was a land to be feared.
But the man did not heed those who wanted to turn back, who wanted to flee for the comforts of home. Instead, he pointed them up the coast, following the lines of the explorer’s maps until they reached the mouth of a vast waterway, bordered by primeval forests.
They gave one last look to the sea behind them, then entered a vast bay.
Rocky cliffs grew steeper, forming forbidding granite mountains. Blackflies and mosquitoes festered, swarming and hungry for flesh to feast upon. Bloodcurdling cries were carried upon fierce and howling winds. At night, the sky burst into shimmering flames that danced silently across the dark void.
Women clutched their children close.
