All the Birds in the Sky

“I don’t know,” Patricia said. “Give me a minute.”

“You’ve had years.” The osprey scowled. “It’s a perfectly simple question.”

“I … I…” Patricia closed her eyes.

She thought of all the trees she’d seen in her life, and then weirdly her mind slipped to the fact that she’d glimpsed a whole other universe when she was rescuing Priya. And that other universe had impossible colors, with wavelengths that humans weren’t even supposed to see — and what color would a tree be there? That thought led her to Ernesto, who was lost in that universe forever and who had said that this planet was a speck and we were all just specks on a speck. But maybe our whole universe was just a speck, too. And it was all part of nature, all of it — every universe and all the spaces in between — as much nature as this Tree in front of her. Patricia thought of Reginald saying nature doesn’t “find a way” to do anything, and Carmen saying they had been right but rash in Siberia, and Laurence saying humans were unique in the cosmos. Patricia still didn’t know anything about nature, or anything else. She knew less than when she was six years old, even. She might just as well be color-blind.

“I don’t know,” Patricia said. “I don’t know. I’m sorry. I really am.” She felt a deep ache, in her joints and behind her eyes, like she hadn’t really gotten healed from being roasted alive after all.

“You don’t know?” A heron wagged its long scissor beak at her.

“I’m sorry. I ought to know one way or the other by now, but…” Patricia struggled for the words, feeling tears fill her eyes again. “I mean, how am I supposed to know? Even if I knew which tree you’re asking about, I would only know my perceptions of it. I mean, you could look at a tree and see what it looks like, but you wouldn’t be perceiving what it actually is. Let alone how it would look to nonhuman eyes. Right? I just don’t see how you could know. I’m really sorry. I just can’t.”

Then she stopped and felt a jolt of realization. “Wait. Actually, that is my answer: I don’t know.”

“Oh,” said the osprey. “Hmm.”

“Is that the right answer?” Patricia said.

“It’s certainly an answer,” the osprey said.

“Works for me,” said the pheasant, fluttering.

“I deem it acceptable,” said the eagle at the top of the Tree. “Despite the appalling lateness.”

“Phew,” Patricia said. She told Laurence what the answer to the question had been, and she noticed that as she spoke the answer the Caddy in Laurence’s hand displayed a menu that she’d never seen before, as though something had been unlocked. She turned back toward the Parliament. “So what do I get? For answering the question?”

“Get? You get to be proud,” the osprey said, with a sweep of wingtips. “You are free to go. With our congratulations.”

“That’s it?” Patricia said.

“What else did you expect?” said an owl, poking its head out of the far left side of the Tree. “A parade? Actually, we haven’t had a parade in quite a while. That could be fun.”

“I thought, maybe, a boon or something? Like, I don’t know, if I answer the question I get a power-up? This was supposed to be a quest, right?” The birds all started debating among themselves about whether there was something in their own bylaws that they’d ignored, until Patricia interrupted: “I want to talk to the Tree. The Tree that you’re all sitting on right now.”

“Oh, sure,” said the pheasant. “Talk to the Tree. Do you want to talk to some rocks while you’re at it?”

“She wants to talk to the Tree,” a turkey chortled.

“I am,” said the Tree beneath them, in a great rustle of breath, “here.”

“Uh, hi,” Patricia said. “Sorry to disturb you.”

“You have,” the Tree said, “done well.”

The Parliament was silent for once, as the birds looked down at their own meeting chamber, starting to converse on its own. Some of the birds flew away, while others stood very still, heads tucking into wings.

“We spoke before,” Patricia said. “You told me a witch serves nature. Do you remember?”

“I,” the Tree said, “remember.”

Its voice came from deep inside its trunk and rose up to its branches, causing them to vibrate and shower leaves down. More members of Parliament were fleeing, although a few of them were trying to organize a motion to hold their own Parliamentary chambers in contempt.

“It remembers me,” Patricia told Laurence and Peregrine.

“The Tree is speaking English,” Peregrine informed her.

Peregrine’s screen still showed that weird screen — which looked like the Caddy’s source code or something. Rows of hexadecimal strings, like machine addresses, plus some complicated instructions with lots of parentheses.

“What are you?” Patricia asked the Tree. “Are you the source of magic?”

“Magic is,” said the Tree, “a human idea.”

“But I wasn’t the first person you ever spoke to, was I?”

“I am many quiet places,” the Tree said. “And many loud places.”

“You talked to others before me,” Patricia said. “And you shared some of your power with them. Right? And that’s how we got witches? Before there were Healers, or Tricksters, or anything.”