Romans & histoires Under The Oak Tree Season 1

Ayla and Rhobart ate in silence while they listened to the women talking or watched couples dancing. Minutes before midnight Rhobart stood and looked at Ayla, “We should go see the winter oak tree. You will love it.” Ayla looked at her mother, and Queen Lavia nodded. Rhobart grabbed Ayla by her hand, and together with Kerra, they made their way to where the old winter oak tree was. “Rho,” Ayla said when they stopped close to the tree. “Why are we looking at an old tree?” Rhobart chuckled. “You will see when it is midnight. I am sure you are going to love it.”

The forest deepened as they moved, the air thick with age and memory. Kael could feel it even before he saw it — that hum, that pulse beneath the soil, like something old and sentient breathing in slow rhythm. The witches followed close behind him, their steps quiet, cautious, reverent. Then, at the heart of the grove, it appeared. The Ancient Oak Tree.

The morning air should have been sweet. It should have tasted like the promise of a new life. But as the sun rose over the First Den, the sky took on a dull, metallic sheen. The golden wheat fields were no longer dancing. They stood still, as if they were afraid to move. In the center of the valley, the Great Oak Tree stood tall. Its leaves were a deep, vibrant violet, pulsing with the soft rhythm of Kaima’s heartbeat. She was the wind. She was the soil. Every breath the wolves took was a gift from her.

“Glee . . . shit.” Another tremor jolted them, and the centuries-old cottonwood tree—the only thing left out there—twisted and leaned, losing its foothold on the remainder of the crumbling bank. Slipping away. Richard felt something at his elbow. This time it was Owen tugging at him, a clogged warning in his throat. Pulling him back from the decimated park area. Toward the waiting vehicle. “Daddeee . . . ” Katie fretted. Richard took heed and went.

The oak tree loomed over us all, an ancient monarch shivering on its last morning. Talon fired up the chainsaw again and pushed it into the wound. The blade screamed. Chips and dust flew at him, clinging to the sweat on his arms and face. Jake crouched at a careful distance, reading the fractures where the trunk was splitting. His voice was urgent — “Angle it! You’re veering right!” — and Talon corrected, sweat running in sheets down the back of his neck. The saw chewed deeper, and a shudder ran through the trunk. The leaves above began to rattle. In the hush between engine bursts, I noticed Mike seemed to be breathing hard — short, sharp, rapid. Was he crying? Or was his chest just hitching

Sebastian's POV I sat under the oak tree in the garden, the screen of my phone lighting up with a voice message from Mason. Sliding my finger across the display, I held the phone to my ear. The Omega girl's voice was awash with hesitation. Every pause whispered of something left unsaid. Once the recording ended, I tapped out a quick note on my keyboard: [She's hiding something. Keep an eye on her.] Mason shot back a thumbs-up emoji instantly.

After he ate and had some coffee, he headed to Walmart to look for a small tree and some other decorations. ************************* Quinn had never thought of himself as a dragon person, but when he was on the internet, he ran across Treasured OOAKS and found a dragon that called to him. It was silver gray with green eyes and a green tail. The bark-like skin made him think of the willow tree. The tail branched out like the willow tree’s branches. Quinn had to have one for his tree, so he ordered two, one for his place and one for Willow to put in her house.

The accumulation of fifteen years of being together had made the arrangement more fully itself, not less. They stood under the oak. The June light came through the full canopy in the specific quality of the filtered summer light — green and warm and particular. The oak's trunk was wide — wider than Ernest could reach around, wider than two people could reach around together. The bark was rough, the texture of the old oak, the specific pattern of ridges and crevices that had formed over decades. The roots spread out from the base, some of them visible above the ground, the evidence of the tree's underground life.

The bracket was redirected — she could see that even in the dark, even in the storm, the downspout angled away from the foundation the way he had described — so he had finished, he had done what he came to do, which meant he should have been inside already, which meant — Where is he. She turned. And then she heard it. Not over the storm. Under it. The kind of sound that bypassed the ears and went straight to the spine — a deep structural crack that she felt in the soles of her feet and the base of her skull simultaneously, the sound of something enormous making an irreversible decision. She turned toward the forest edge. She saw the oak move. Eighty feet of tree and the root ball had let go

But every year, at the same time, one of her comrades delivered a pack of shortbread cookies. At 60, I taught my final class. Before the bell rang, I looked out toward the hillside. A flourishing willow tree stood there. My son lay beneath it. "Cyrus, Dad misses you." —The End