Glancing out over the fields of gold strewn before him, Noah recalled that goddesses' words. She was right to say there were monsters on his doorstep, the kanyon wolf in the forest and Serris being evidence enough of that. 'Though to argue semantics, technically its Liora's doorstep. Not mine, I'm just a freeloader.' he snorted glancing out over the billowing tree of greys and brilliant pink blossoms that was Serris' canopy.
It seemed larger, not by much but he could feel there was something different. Though the many miniature red orbs glittering about the branches of plump cherries filled with juices and flavour was likely another culprit of that.
Stepping into the circle of green grass separating Serris from the hay fields, Noah knelt down and plucked a fallen garnet from the grass. Just before lifting it, pausing as he pondered why the grass was so short, almost like someone had recently trimmed it and yet none of the stems showed any signs of being cut. Almost like they had grown to a point and then simply halted, not wishing to threaten the illustrious grey, near silver bark of the serrul tree they surrounded.
Rolling over the glistening orb in his fingers, Noah inspected its every facet, the dimple from which a green stem rose only to end in a nub that separated into another from which another cherry was likely to have been growing, yet nothing was there. And its near perfect, waxy sphere that glistened like polished gemstones.
And all he could think about as he stared down at it was, "bloody hell this is a big cherry." indeed it wa were he to measure it properly it would threaten the bounds of three centimeters in diameter almost as thick as his thumb in every direction.
Turning his gaze upwards, Noah was greeted with the sight of hundreds, if not thousands more of these dangling gems. a dozen to a branch and everyone as big as the last, all uniform in size and lustre. Perfection in drupe form.
Then came the thought. The unholy thought. "These… are my children… oh god that's a weird thought." Especially considering they were all edible. Twitching at the cheek, he glanced down the drupe fruit in hand, unsure of how to react knowing his 'children' could be used to make a pie.
"I really need to stop over thinking things. I will not last long here if I keep this up," tossing the fruit to the side, Noah approached the trunk, ready to call out to Serris but first thought back to what brought him here before her, a day before the week timeline she'd given him.
***
"Hey Caina…" Noah broke the silence between the two. His book, the Almanac, laid to the side, pages down and hiding the short excerpt about a harvest goddess, one known throughout the world. Demetria. And glanced out the windows overlooking the farmstead.
"Yes?" she questioned not looking up from her own book as she flipped it onto the next page. The quick scan she always did with new pages before reading them in full setting a twinge of anticipation for the raunchy scenes soon to come. Not that she'd ever exclaim that or settle the feeling they welled within her unmentionables.
"How much do you think cherries would sell for?" it was a simple question, filled with the memories of Demetria's passing words to him.
"Depends on the type. But I'd say for a bundle I'd say about… fifty, maybe a hundred buckles. Though have fun finding anyone around here who'd have the money to pay for those types of noble fruits. Plus, not like there's many cherries growing around here. Only noble houses grow them. Why?" she asked.
"Just curious." his fingers rapped across the counter. A thought filling him as he pushed off the counter and spun to her, quickly picking his book from the counter to toss it into the basket he'd freshly emptied and sorted into all the places he thought the ingredients should go. His bottle of holstaur milk entering the small onnaire to keep it fresher for longer. "I'm going to check something out for a bit. When Liora comes down just tell her I'm out in the fields for a bit."
"Uhuh," her reaction dull and uninterested, "don't get screwed by a wolf again. I don't want to go back to Redle again."
'Do the wolves go into the fields?' a shiver coursed him as he threw open the door into the outside world and slipped on his boots, 'wait… what is in the fields.' scanning the tips f waving golden stems, Noah swore he could see what looked like small rounded ears and long, red pheasant like plumes peaking from the top.
"I have been risking my safety every time I stepped into the fields… that's not a comfortable thought at all."
Luckily, monsters that called fields their homes oft were skittish and preferred to stray away from humans. That was the males of course, the ones that actually looked like animals and not like woman with animalistic features. Those apparently were more… active in their seeking of meals.
In otherwords, they enjoyed pushing down their meal when they least expected.
"Well, hopefully these are all normal… yeah, no. Fat chance."
***
Pressing his hand against the rough bark of Serris' tree he spoke, "Serris, are you there?" his tone soft but hopeful. When he could feel a twisting sense on his palm, Noah pulled away and watched as the bark twisted and grew with the soft, feminine face of Serris appearing to grow from the side.
The mask of bark she'd had now more natural and less static. though still she didn't blink her bright pink shining eyes but her lips, they parted slowly, something she was incapable of just days earlier.
"I am here Noah," she said, her body still extruding from the trunk.
She'd grown larger, became more mature in form and feature resembling a woman rounding the end of her twenties, perhaps early thirties with a modest bust soft bosom. Her rump just barely escaping the confines of the tree but her crotch fully doing so, showing off the familiar shimmer of pink that was her labium. Her skin itself still resembled the bark of the tree bust as it rose from the points she connected to the tree, it smoothed and slowly lost its grainy texture. Finally coming to resemble something of a real woman though with the odd crack revealing pinkish light around her arms and legs. Atop her head, peaking through the pink hair were several raising spikes that crafted a sort of crown atop her head. A signifier to her being a tree mother. Something further accentuated by the many dozens of small cherries lining her hair.
"I was not expecting you quite yet."
"I know, it's just…" he scratched his head, "this is going to sound pretty cruel, but would… you be okay with me selling your cherries?"
"Selling?" she murmured head tilting as Noah attempted avoid glancing directly at her hanging breasts, their softness having grown even more apparent though still lacking in the definition that would make up her nipples apart from a light pinkish circle at the precipice of the mounds. "As in offering my fruits for trade?" she questioned.
"Yeah." the feeling of asking a girl to let him sell what amounted to her unborn children was not lost to him. "I won't blame you if you say no."
"I do not see why not."
"But aren't they like, you're children?"
Her brow animatedly rose, a fact Noah was still coming to realize was strange considering just days earlier she looked like a carving. Now though she had lips full and rich with a pinkish shine and a sharp, modelesque pointed chin. She was really quite pretty.
"No. I do not see why they are my children. My people and I do not bare children. Our fruits are nothing, but seeds meant to be planted, they do not harbour the essence required to become the life of a tree nor the life of a dryad. They are simply fruits that nurture the land I am nestled atop. As I remember having spoken last, we spoke, if you so may, I will refrain from giving my fruits the life needed to raise my sisters and have done so awaiting your response."
His lips parted if they weren't really 'fertile' did they meant they weren't his? 'I'm overthinking again, aren't I?' that he was.
"Have you decided whether you will become my fruiter or not?" she asked, voice soft and as melodical as it usually was.
He'd been fearing that question. "I don't know Serris. Things with the farm are complicated and I don't know how long I'll be here, and I don't want to become your fruiter only to abandon you when the farms gone. That's not fair on you."
"I see…" her voice and form sunk saddeningly, and her eyes lost a glimmer that struck a cord deep within his heart, "that is a pity."
Guilt, guilt is what he felt watching her shrink like that, "no don't get me wrong Serris. I would love to become your fruiter," he flushed, construing the term as the dryad form of husband. "But before I can really say, I need to figure out how to save the farm."
"And you believe selling my fruits may deem to do so?"
He nodded, "in the beginning maybe. It depends really, I've gotten an idea on how I could do something to save it and it needs monsters like you. Monsters who have some type of resource I could possibly sell. But I don't have the money to afford them and as far as I know you are the only one here, I can speak with and I know has something of worth. God, I feel like I'm treating you like an object with how I'm speaking."
"My fruits, do you believe people will take them?" she questioned.
"I don't know. It's more complicated than just people buying them. I have to think about price, storage, and all of that, and then where do I sell them? I know there's some type of market going on in another village but how do I get them there before they go off? How far even is the village? I have to consider so many things and after what happened in the village yesterday, we've basically been cast away."
Serris went still, looking to be pondering a thought until she eventually nodded, "you need not worry about my fruits being affected by rot, though the ones scattered about do not, I have the means of nurturing my fruits to be resistant to the plague of time." Guiding her gaze upwards, a branch slowly snaked its way down, curling around before finally coming to halt between the two, dangling from its tip two of the same large cherries he'd taken from the ground just earlier.
Reaching out, she plucked the stem from the branch and the two marbles dangled like conkers laying against one another. She held them in both hands and small worm like threads rose from her palms, they pierced through the wax skin and slowly they began to undulate with vein like structures.
Noah was only capable of watching the unusual scene until the squirming halted and the threads severed from her palms. Snapping one of the cherries from the stem, she held them apart, "these fruits are what we dryads call the pistané, we fill them with our promises and we only gift them to those we deem our fruiters. I will be more than glad to offer you any of my fruits for you to trade with others, but I can only grow so many with the nutrients my roots can find in the soil of this farm. So, I ask of you to accept my request of being my fruiter, to provide me the seed I require to produce my fruits. All I ask of you is to one day allow me to lay my fruits and bear my sisters new life. For that, I will forever offer you my fruits."
As she held out the white veined cherry, Noah felt a tug within him that lead his arm to heasitantly raising, "Serris, I don't know if I'll be here past a few months. Are you sure?"
"I am." she spoke with determination leaving little room for him to argue, "when you leave, I will simply return to dormancy."
He grit his teeth, he couldn't imagine how long she'd been dormant, simply watching the world run by around her while she sat here, solemly, lonely. He wanted to help her. Lowering his hand if fell atop the out held cherry and he sighed taking it in hand, feeling the unusual wrinkles she had grown in its glossy covering.
The brightest smile he had ever seen quickly rose and stole Serris' face, her wholly pink eyes shimmering like stars as she clenched her own cherry to her chest.
"Serris," Noah said rolling the orb around in his palm, already having an idea as to what she wished of him to do with it, "I don't mind if you want to plant a few sisters. But… before you do, can I speak with Liora about it. This is her land after all."
"I do not mind, Noah. I am in no rush, so long as I have seed within me I can plant now or in one hundred years."
"Thank you," a soft, if not weak smile took his lips and he glanced to the drupe fruit. "So… I just eat this?"
She nodded languidly and as her head rose to straight and so too did she bring her hands up, her own cherry to her lips and bit into it, swallowing the chunk without thought to devour the rest of it moments later.
As he watched it, Noah stealed himself. 'if I'm making a promise, I better well keep it.'
Bringing his own to his lips, Noah bit into it. There was some resistance but his teeth quickly severed it away, allowing an explosion of juice and cherry sweet flavour to assault him. His eyes bolted open as his senses fired on end until he was left wanting more. When all was gone, Noah was left licking his lips, an incomprehensible fullness within his stomach.
Yet there was something else, something strange. As his stomach slowly began to digest the fruit he could feel something meld with his body, an energy not his own.
Before he could think more over it, Serris spoke. "Noah, I must now rest. I ask of you to return tomorrow, it is then we shall complete consummate our pact. Until then," two more branches snaked from the ceiling of blossoms and cherries, each filled with tens of cherries, though as they grew nearer to him, the branches twisted and conjoined with one another, forming a bowl, then walls, then a handle.
"A basket?" he murmured as the rough, organic weave was hung before him, stuffed to the brim with her waxy burgundy cherries.
"These are the best of my first fruiting. They are yours, my fruiter."