In the dream, the wall rises far above her head. The ivy covers everything, a barrier of poison green, shifting, whispering to itself. Each tri-lobed leaf is edged with scarlet, the serrations sharp as teeth. There is a formless dread as she stands, looking up. The leaves move without a wind to drive them. She feels small, insignificant. She is nothing compared to this.

Far above the color is entirely blood and she thinks it will drip soon to stain her white clothes. Yet for all that she knows this is a place of fear, she is not entirely afraid. She has never been here before, still she knows that she has. This wall exists. This life exists. Something deep in the green speaks to itself of things she cannot understand. There is excitement. There is a building sense of purpose.

When the shadow rises in the center she only watches. A form, a face she knows. His eyes are closed. The three-fold leaves twine in his gold dusted hair, caress his shoulders. There is a vine wrapped around his throat.

But when he speaks, cradled in the green, it is the Lady's voice.

"Remember your roots."

She wakes and the words are in her mind, a point of acid sweetness on the tip of her tongue.

Unsettled, she slides out of the warm bed. It was only a dream. She has those sometimes and they are often of apples or of dancing or sometimes even of running. She has never dreamt of a green wall before.

She wants then to go to Glory, to ask what it means. He will not know but she will ask anyways for she knows the sound of his voice alone is often enough to ease confusion. She tries the door without hope though. It is always locked now and it remains so under her touch, unflinching. She pushes back her sleep-tangled hair and scowls at it but she would have been surprised had it opened. She is unsure and does not like it. Being uncertain is for everyone else. She bites her lip and wonders if perhaps this time she can be permitted to be less than polite. She does not want to stay here alone, not with the whispering she can almost hear.

Today is the day she is supposed to set the bushes on fire outside the Arbiter's window, to make him angry enough to start making yet more mistakes. She is, after all, very good at making people angry. Why is she dreaming of leaves that are speaking in words she cannot understand? Plants have no voices. They just are.

Yet as she stands there in her bare feet, she remembers out of sleep that she cannot go. Not even if the door was as wide open as sunlight without guards to watch where she moves, where they all move. It is only... habit that has her thinking of him, without a compulsion to drive it. She is no longer welcome. They are no longer friends. He will not care that she is upset over a dream.

She made him very, very angry and he forgot as she intended. He forgot more than she intended.

Back to the beginning. Back to the start, back to the first and only rule that she cannot ignore, circumvent, slide around.

She stares at the closed door.

Remember your roots.