Rowan Tree Quotes

Faster than lightening, his hand shot out and she gagged, jolting as he grabbed her tongue between his fingers...He released her tongue, and she gasped for breath. She swore at him, a filthy, foul name, and spat at his feet. And that's when he bit her. She cried out as those canines pierced the spot between her neck and shoulder, a primal act of aggression--the bite so strong and claiming that she was too stunned to move. He had her pinned against the tree and clamped down harder, his canines digging deep, her blood spilling onto her shirt. Pinned, like some weakling. But that was what she'd become, wasn't it? Useless, pathetic. She growled, more animal than sentient being. And shoved. Rowan staggered back a step, teeth ripping her skin and she struck his chest. She didn't feel the pain, didn't care about the blood or flash of light. No, she wanted to rip his throat out--rip it out with the elongated canines she bared at him as she finished shifting and roared. Rowan grinned. "There you are.

And beyond the timeless meadows and emerald pastures, the rabbit holes and moss-covered oak and rowan trees and the "slippy sloppy" houses of frogs, the woodland-scented wind rushed between the leaves and blew around the gray veil that dipped below the fells, swirling up in a mist, blurring the edges of the distant forest. (View from Windermere in the Lake District)

Above rowan and yew, the elm tree stands tall. It waits along borders, a sentry at call.

Do not miss me, because I will always be with you. In every drop of rain that touches your tongue, in every breath of air you inhale. In the tips of the leaves that you brush with your fingertips as you pass by. I will be there, in every moment. I am not gone, I am only altered, from this state of matter to another. For a moment, for too brief a moment, I was the man that loved you, but now that I am changed, I am the air, the moon, the stars. For we are all made of stars, my beloved. You and I, and all of life, we were all born out of the death of a star, millions of billions of years ago. A star that lived long and then, before its death, burned at its brightest, its fiercest - an enflaming supernova. But when it died, it did not cease to exist; instead everything it was made of became part of the universe once again, and everything that is part of the universe will once more become part of us. So do not miss me, because I do not die; I transform - into the wind in the tops of the trees, the wave on the ocean, the pebbles under your foot, the dust on your bookshelves, the midnight sky. Wherever you look, I will be there.

The rowan tree's graceful leaves and soft white flowers brush my arm like a whisper.

She heard Rowan awake with a start before he reconciled himself to his surroundings. His back scraped across the trunk of the tree as he slid sideways--trying to see around the branch she was sitting on to get a look at her. "Are you awake?" he asked, his voice still rough from sleep. "Yeah." "Did you sleep at all?" "No." She heard him mumble something to himself and decided to cut him off before he could scold her again. "My butt did, though. Slept like a log all night." "Well, obviously, your butt has more sense than you do." "You're a funny man, Rowan whatever your last name is." "Fall." "I'd rather not." She managed to get a tiny chuckle out of him, which she considered a huge achievement. Rowan stood up on his branch, bringing his head level with Lily's, and started to untie her. His lips were still pursed in a near smile. "My name is Rowan Fall.

When you are in trouble or at your lowest point, and have no one in whom to confide, a hawthorn would be the right choice. There is a reason why hawthorns are home to fairies and known to protect pots of treasure. For wisdom, try a beech; for intelligence, a pine; for bravery, a rowan; for generosity, a hazel; for joy, a juniper; and for when you need to learn to let go of what you cannot control, a birch with its white-silver bark, peeling and shedding layers like old skin. Then again, if it's love you're after, or love you have lost, come to the fig, always the fig.

The sacred rowan is a woman born long, long ago, a woman whose refusal to see love cost first her lover's life, then the lives of her family, her clan, her people. But not her own life. Not quite. In pity and punishment she was turned into an undying tree, a rowan that weeps only in the presence of transcendent love; and the tears of the rowan are blossoms that confer extraordinary grace upon those who can see them. When enough tears are wept, the rowan will be free. She waits inside a sacred ring that can be neither weighed or measured nor touched. She waits for love that is worth her tears. The rowan is waiting still.

She retained the opinions of trees: one of them being that it was best not to have anything to do with human folk. "Firstly, they cut us down," Rowan said. "Secondly they're all insane, though I suppose they can't help that, being rooted in water instead of earth.

And then you weave a forspell that called forth a rowan tree simply to tame a firedrake. Had

Tyrion. “None.” “A pity. Well, the threat may serve to keep the Marcher lords close to their castles, at least. What news of my father?” “If Lord Tywin has won across the Red Fork, no word has reached me yet. If he does not hasten, he may be trapped between his foes. The Oakheart leaf and the Rowan tree have been seen north of the Mander.” “No word from Littlefinger?” “Perhaps he never reached

Ancient oak, ash, and thorn, Out of these was magic born. Rowan, elder, apple too, Hazel, birch, and also yew. Tis the thorn tree folk most fear; You see her when a sprite is near Blossom sweet and berry sour, These will feed a witch's power.

All the trees of the world appeared to be rushing towards Aslan. But as they drew nearer they looked less like trees, and when the whole crowd, bowing and curtsying and waving thin long arms to Aslan, were all around Lucy, she saw that it was a crowd of human shapes. Pale birch-girls were tossing their heads, willow-women pushed back their hair from their brooding faces to gaze on Aslan, the queenly beeches stood still and adored him, shaggy oak-men, lean and melancholy elms, shock-headed hollies (dark themselves, but their wives all bright with berries) and gay rowans, all bowed and rose again, shouting, "Aslan, Aslan!" in their various husky or creaking or wave-like voices.

When she had arranged her household affairs, she came to the library and bade me follow her. Then, with the mirror still swinging against her knees, she led me through the garden and the wilderness down to a misty wood. It being autumn, the trees were tinted gloriously in dusky bars of colouring. The rowan, with his amber leaves and scarlet berries, stood before the brown black-spotted sycamore; the silver beech flaunted his golden coins against my poverty; firs, green and fawn-hued, slumbered in hazy gossamer. No bird carolled, although the sun was hot. Marina noted the absence of sound, and without prelude of any kind began to sing from the ballad of the Witch Mother: about the nine enchanted knots, and the trouble-comb in the lady's knotted hair, and the master-kid that ran beneath her couch. Every drop of my blood froze in dread, for whilst she sang her face took on the majesty of one who traffics with infernal powers. As the shade of the trees fell over her, and we passed intermittently out of the light, I saw that her eyes glittered like rings of sapphires. ("The Basilisk")

Oaks, which represent strength and endurance, have long been linked with the Druids. Rowan trees afford protection. Hardy holly that can survive harsh winters symbolizes courage. Poplars represent death and rebirth. Willows are associated with intuition; divining rods are often fashioned from their flexible branches.

Everything was gone, the garden of wind and light, the Chrysalis, the Mother and her sister-crones, the rowan tree, everything. I was in a grove–no, it was a triad of trees: apple, oak, hazel. And at my feet something that smacked of familiar miens, a stone half buried in a pitch of heather. A stone bearing my name and a date I could hardly remember. A moment passed, another and in those moments I stood numb with gluey feet at the foot of my own grave. For the first time since I’d come to the Faeran Valley, I was alone. And the silence was deafening.

The golden rule of relationships is “Cause no indignity.” A loving relationship is one in which both partners take care to protect each other’s dignity. A wounded soul heals more slowly than a wounded body, so it is as important to avoid indignity as it is to avoid outright harm.

The creature sniffed again—and took another step in her direction. Just like that day at the barrows, the air began to hollow out, pulsing against her ears. Her other nostril began to bleed. Shit. The thought hit her then, and the world stumbled. What if it had gotten to Rowan first? She dared another glance around the tree. The creature was gone.

Here and there among the pines are rowans, with ripe coral berries; now the berries are falling, heavy clusters striking the earth. So they reap themselves and sow themselves again, an inconceivable abundance to be squandered every single year. Over three hundred clusters I can count on a single tree. And here and there about are flowers still in bloom, obstinate things that will not die, though their time is really past.

Rowan was hauling her away, shouting her name, but she couldn’t reach him, couldn’t stop that pull toward the other creature. Teeth pierced the spot between her neck and shoulder, and she jerked, latching on to the pain as if it were a rope yanking her out of that sea of stupor, up, up, until— Rowan crushed her against him with one arm, sword out, her blood dripping down his chin as he backed away from the creature that lingered by the tree.

Scattered trees, never thick enough to be a forest, were everywhere. Shasta, who had lived all his life in an almost tree-less grassland, had never seen so many or so many kinds. If you had been there you would probably have known (he didn't) that he was seeing oaks, beeches, silver birches, rowans, and sweet chestnuts. Rabbits scurried away in every direction as they advanced, and presently they saw a whole herd of fallow deer making off among the trees.

As a child, she was curious about the world beyond the sea, but in a vague, half-sketched way, as she was curious about a lot of things she read in books. London and Treasure Island and horses and dragons were all equally imagined to her. She thought she would probably see them one day, when she was old. In the meantime, the island was hers to explore, and it took up more time than she could ever imagine having. There were books to read, thousands of them in the castle library, and Rowan brought back more all the time. There were trees to climb, caves along the beach to get lost in, traces of the fair folk who had once lived on the island to find and bring home. There was work to be done: Food needed to be grown and harvested; the livable parts of the castle, the parts that weren't a crumbling ruin, needed to be combed for useful things when the tide went out. She was a half-wild thing of ink and grass and sea breezes, raised by books and rabbits and fairy lore, and that was all she cared to be.

What I felt for you in Doranelle and what I feel for you now are the same. I just didn’t think I’d ever get the chance to act on it.” She knew why she needed to hear it—he knew, too. Darrow’s and Rolfe’s words danced around in her head, an endless chorus of bitter threats. But Aelin only smirked at him. “Then act away, Prince.” Rowan let out a low laugh, and said nothing else as he claimed her mouth, nudging her back against the crumbling chimney. She opened for him, and his tongue swept in, thorough, lazy. Oh, gods—this. This was what drove her out of her mind—this fire between them. They could burn the entire world to ashes with it. He was hers and she was his, and they had found each other across centuries of bloodshed and loss, across oceans and kingdoms and war. Rowan pulled back, breathing heavily, and whispered against her lips, “Even when you’re in another kingdom, Aelin, your fire is still in my blood, my mouth.” She let out a soft moan, arching into him as his hand grazed her backside, not caring if anyone spotted them in the streets below. “You said you wouldn’t take me against a tree the first time,” she breathed, sliding her hands up his arms, across the breadth of his sculpted chest. “What about a chimney?” Rowan huffed another laugh and nipped at her bottom lip. “Remind me again why I missed you.” Aelin chuckled, but the sound was quickly silenced as Rowan claimed her mouth again and kissed her deeply in the moonlight.

Oh, but to get through this night. Why won’t sleep come? What’s bothering me here in the dark? It’s not the badgers, it’s not the snakes. What’s bothering me? Something darker is worrying a hole inside me—look how my legs are trembling. Stop moving, Tatiana. That’s how the carnivores find you, by the flash of life on your body, they find you and eat you while you sleep. Like venomous spiders, they’ll bite you first to lull you into sleep—you won’t even feel it—and then they will gnaw your flesh until nothing remains. But even the animals eating her alive was not the thing that worried the sick hole in Tatiana’s stomach as she lay in the leaves with her face hidden from the forest, with her arms over her head, in case anything decided to fall on her. She should’ve made herself a shelter but it got dark so fast, and she was so sure she would find the lake, she hadn’t been thinking of making herself more comfortable in the woods. She kept walking and walking, and then was downed and breathless and unprepared for pitch black night. To quell the terror inside her, to not hear her own voices, Tatiana whimpered. Lay and cried, low and afraid. What was tormenting her from the inside out? Was it worry over Marina? No... not quite. But close. Something about Marina. Something about Saika... Saika. The girl who caused trouble between Dasha and her dentist boyfriend, the girl who pushed her bike into Tatiana’s bike to make her fall under the tires of a downward truck rushing headlong... the girl who saw Tatiana’s grandmother carrying a sack of sugar and told her mother who told her father who told the Luga Soviet that Vasily Metanov harbored sugar he had no intention of giving up? The girl who did something so unspeakable with her own brother she was nearly killed by her own father’s hand—and she herself had said the boy got worse—and this previously unmentioned brother was, after all, dead. The girl who stood unafraid under rowan trees and sat under a gaggle of crows and did not feel black omens, the girl who told Tatiana her wicked stories, tempted Tatiana with her body, turned away from Marina as Marina was drowning...who turned Marina against Tatiana, the girl who didn’t believe in demons, who thought everything was all good in the universe, could she . . . What if...? What if this was not an accident? Moaning loudly, Tatiana turned away to the other side as if she’d just had a nightmare. But she hadn’t been dreaming. Saika took her compass and her knife. But Marina took her watch. And there it was. That was the thing eating up Tatiana from the inside out. Could Marina have been in on something like this? Twisting from side to side did not assuage her torn stomach, did not mollify her sunken heart. Making anguished noises, her eyes closed, she couldn’t think of fields, or Luga, or swimming, or clover or warm milk, anything. All good thoughts were drowned in the impossible sorrow. Could Marina have betrayed her?

Elm. The Nightmare slowed his pace. When he looked back at Elm, his voice drifted in the air, oil and honey and poison. “Neither Rowan nor Yew, but somewhere between. A pale tree in winter, neither red, gold, nor green. Black hides the bloodstain, forever his mark. Alone in the castle, Prince of the dark.

Unlike the Christian myth, Tolkien’s myth contains a deep love for and attachment to the beauty of Middle-earth itself, expressed also by Fangorn’s sad song of Ent and Ent-wife, and Bregalad’s lament for the rowan-trees.

A rowan tree outside the café tossed its bare branches up as if pleading with the menacing sky.

The room was curved, wide, and empty except for one enormous rock in the center. Easily twice Biddy's height, it glowed with faint green-gold shimmers beneath its smooth surface. She had seen that light before. Flashes of it in the old oak, when Rowan drew magic through the skin of the tree. And once, in the scrying glass, as a glow on the wall illuminating Rowan as he lay in enchanted sleep in an underground room. This was it, the room where Rowan had come to steal magic on the night he had nearly never come home. The vault, he had called it. The place where the Council hoarded its wealth like fairy gold.

Biddy knew the trees as soon as Hutchincroft led her to them: three of them in a triangle, each slender and white-limbed, leaves turning golden brown and bristling with red berries. Rowan trees.

Her eyes opened at the touch of light. It was slanting light, golden and shimmering with dust, the kind that filtered through the forests on Hy-Brasil in the late afternoon. And yet when she stepped forward, she found she was no longer amid the trees but inside, at the center of a circular tower that extended up for as far as her eyes could stretch. The walls were the white of polished marble, and the floor beneath her feet was polished wood partially covered by a thick red rug. There was a fireplace with two worn armchairs, and a desk fitted to the curve of the room and strewn with papers. Everything else, every inch of towering wall, was filled with bookshelves. They went all the way up to the high ceiling, at least seven stories, connected by ladders and balconies and ledges. The place had the old-paper smell of Rowan's study at the castle. Biddy stared, barely noticing as Hutchincroft jumped from her arms. "It's a library," she said out loud, in wonder. "It's a library inside a tree.

Except now there is a raven in the rowan tree.

She breathed in, trying to draw her thoughts about her. Rowan would tell her to stop and think. He always did when she was scared. As a little girl, she’d often freeze halfway up the trees he was teaching her to climb, frightened by the stirring of the branches in the wind. You’re all right, he would say, lightly, confidently, as if it was an indisputable fact and not a reassurance. Just think of what to do next. Don’t worry about what might happen to you. What are you going to do next?

Traditionally, the best protection is considered to be a rowan tree planted at the front door and an elder tree at the back door.

What happened to your father?” Tilly did not answer. Ravyn tried again: “How did he die?” She looked away, her fingers dancing a silent rhythm on the yew branch. “I don’t know. They caught me first.” Her voice quieted. “I passed through the veil before my father and brothers.” It wasn’t the Mirror’s chill that was seeping into Ravyn. It was something else. A question that, in the dark corner of his mind, he already knew the answer to. “Who killed you?” Those yellow eyes flared. They landed on Ravyn. “You know his name.” Her voice went low, a deep, scraping whisper. “Rowan.” The King’s insignia flashed in Ravyn’s mind. His uncle’s flag—the unyielding rowan tree. Red Scythe Card, green eyes. Hunters, brutes. Family.

Captain of the Destriers is dark and severe. Perched atop yew trees, his gray eyes are clear. Be wary his magic, be wary his fate. The Yews and the Rowans do not ready friends make.

met your daughter. The one with braids in her hair and eyes like yours. Tilly.” The Nightmare’s shoulders tightened. He kept his eyes on the sword. “You’d be wise not to use the Mirror Card so recklessly, Ravyn Yew. To see beyond the veil is a perilous thing.” “She told me you’re seeking revenge for what the first Rowan King did to you.” A smile crept over his lips. Ravyn hated the sight of it. “Your daughter’s spirit has waited five hundred years in that tree for you. All your children wait.” When the Nightmare turned, his smile was gone. “I, too, have waited.” “To kill the Rowans?” “My aim is vast. There are many truths to unveil in the wood. Circles that began centuries ago will finally loop.” He let out a sigh. “Though I fear, with so many idiots around me, that I must do everything myself.” Ravyn’s tongue tripped over a flood of curses. He took a steadying breath. “What is your plan for when we return with the Twin Alders Card?

As for Elm, you won’t get your hands on him. He won’t be coming with us. What makes you think I’d hurt him? Ravyn scoffed. He’s a Rowan. Descendant of the man who stole your throne and killed your kin. You’ve had five hundred years to imagine your revenge. His stomach turned as he looked at the old blood beneath the Nightmare’s fingernails. Surely you want him dead. I had plenty of time to hurt him. Only I didn’t. The Princeling sensed me—saw my strange eyes—and recoiled. He understands, far better than you, Captain, that there are monsters in this world. He let out a long breath. My claws would find no purchase in a Rowan who is already broken. When Ravyn’s rigid jaw didn’t ease, the Nightmare grinned. Above rowan and yew, the elm tree stands tall. It waits along borders, a sentry at call. Quiet and guarded and windblown and marred, its bark whispers stories of a boy-Prince once scarred. His voice in Ravyn’s mind went eerily soft. And so, Ravyn Yew, your Elm I won’t touch. His life strays beyond my ravenous clutch. For a kicked pup grows teeth, and teeth sink to bone. I will need him, one day, when I harvest the throne.

Besides. My Captain has been distant of late. I would like to know his thoughts.” Have you considered asking Brutus Rowan what draws him away from you? “I am his King. He is not as blunt with me, nor as nettlesome, as you, trees.” The wind stirred their branches. To enter a mind is a treacherous walk. There are doors that are meant to remain behind lock. If you wish for that nightmare, give yourself to her, whole. For an eleventh Providence Card— The Spirit demands your soul.

As I suspected,” the Nightmare said, indifferent. “Decidedly broken.” Ravyn jerked his head back. “You’re hardly a Physician.” “No. But I’ve mended my share of noses—my own in particular.” “I hope whoever broke it enjoyed the feeling.” “I’m sure he did.” His voice caught in the mist. “He had an exacting hand, Brutus Rowan, when it came to pain.” They all went still. Slowly, Jespyr leaned forward. “Did you know him well? The first Rowan King?” “Piss on that,” Petyr said. “Tell us what everyone’s spent five hundred years guessing. Was he the one who killed you?” The Nightmare didn’t answer. His mouth was a tight line, and his eyes were on the trees. He had that faraway look he got when he was talking to Elspeth. Ravyn rolled his jaw. “Well?” Yellow eyes snapped onto him. “Yes. I knew him well.” He leaned over Ravyn. “This is going to hurt. You may wish to distract yourself.” “How do you propose I do that?” “Reach into your pocket.” Ravyn’s brow knit, and the Nightmare blew out a breath. “Not stupid indeed,” he muttered. “The Nightmare Card, Ravyn Yew. That’s as good an invitation to enter my mind as you’ll ever get.

Neither Rowan nor Yew, but somewhere between. A pale tree in winter, neither red, gold, nor green. Black hides the bloodstain, forever his mark. Alone in the castle, Prince of the dark.

… the children’s eyes In momentary wonder stare upon A sixty-year-old smiling public man. — William Butler Yeats,

Fess, lad, ‘tis just a word, like any other word I might use. The filthiness of it is in people’s minds.” Even his Gran said that a word that described something so beautiful and natural couldn’t be so very wrong. You might as well say ‘sky’ and ‘tree’ were wrong. Mind you, she also said that using it too often showed a poor vocabulary and laziness, and she certainly didn’t encourage either of those.

across Jefferson Square to sanctuary in the inn. Good god, he thought, what have I gotten

past.

You might even say there is a tree for every mood and every moment. When you have something precious to give to the universe, a song or a poem, you should first share it with a golden oak before anyone else. If you are feeling discouraged and defenceless, look for a Mediterranean cypress or a flowering horse chestnut. Both are strikingly resilient, and they will tell you about all the fires they have survived. And if you want to emerge stronger and kinder from your trials, find an aspen to learn from–a tree so tenacious it can fend off even the flames that aim to destroy it. If you are hurting and have no one willing to listen to you, it might do you good to spend time beside a sugar maple. If, on the other hand, you are suffering from excessive self-esteem, do pay a visit to a cherry tree and observe its blossoms, which, though undoubtedly pretty, are no less ephemeral than vainglory. By the time you leave, you might feel a bit more humble, more grounded. To reminisce about the past, seek out a holly to sit under; to dream about the future, choose a magnolia instead. And if it is friends and friendships on your mind, the most suitable companion would be a spruce or a ginkgo. When you arrive at a crossroads and don’t know which path to take, contemplating quietly by a sycamore might help. If you are an artist in need of inspiration, a blue jacaranda or a sweetly scented mimosa could stir your imagination. If it is renewal you are after, seek a wych elm, and if you have too many regrets, a weeping willow will offer solace. When you are in trouble or at your lowest point, and have no one in whom to confide, a hawthorn would be the right choice. There is a reason why hawthorns are home to fairies and known to protect pots of treasure. For wisdom, try a beech; for intelligence, a pine; for bravery, a rowan; for generosity, a hazel; for joy, a juniper; and for when you need to learn to let go of what you cannot control, a birch with its white-silver bark, peeling and shedding layers like old skins. Then again, if it’s love you’re after, or love you have lost, come to the fig, always the fig.

Who would have betrayed us?” “I don’t know, and when I find them, I’ll splatter them on the walls. But for now, we have bigger problems to worry about.” The darkness on the horizon had spread, devouring the stars, the trees, the light. “What is that?” Rowan’s mouth tightened into a thin line. “Bigger problems.

You said you wouldn’t take me against a tree the first time,” she breathed, sliding her hands up his arms, across the breadth of his sculpted chest. “What about a chimney?” Rowan huffed another laugh and nipped at her bottom lip. “Remind me again why I missed you.

Tempting as it might be,” Rowan said, nipping her ear in a way that made it hard to think, “I need to be on my way in an hour.” Featherlight kisses brushed over her jaw, her cheek. “And what I said still holds. I’m not taking you against a tree for the first time.” “It wouldn’t be against a tree—it’d be in a pool.” A dark laugh against her now-burning skin. It was an effort to keep from taking one of his hands and guiding it up to her breasts, to beg him to touch, take, taste.

You know that Rowan means redhead in Irish.” I swallowed the sudden lump in my throat. “It’s also a kind of tree.” The tree that had been the inspiration for my name. “It’s a particularly strong and resilient species, if I recall. Fitting.

My claws would find no purchase in a Rowan who is already broken. When Ravyn’s rigid jaw didn’t ease, the Nightmare grinned. Above rowan and yew, the elm tree stands tall. It waits along borders, a sentry at call. Quiet and guarded and windblown and marred, its bark whispers stories of a boy-Prince once scarred. His voice in Ravyn’s mind went eerily soft. And so, Ravyn Yew, your Elm I won’t touch. His life strays beyond my ravenous clutch. For a kicked pup grows teeth, and teeth sink to bone. I will need him, one day, when I harvest the throne.

You might even say there is a tree for every mood and every moment. When you have something precious to give to the universe, a song or a poem, you should first share it with a golden oak before anyone else. If you are feeling discouraged and defenceless, look for a Mediterranean cypress or a flowering horse chestnut. Both are strikingly resilient, and they will tell you about all the fires they have survived. And if you want to emerge stronger and kinder from your trials, find an aspen to learn from – a tree so tenacious it can fend off even the flames that aim to destroy it. If you are hurting and have no one willing to listen to you, it might do you good to spend time beside a sugar maple. If, on the other hand, you are suffering from excessive self-esteem, do pay a visit to a cherry tree and observe its blossoms, which, though undoubtedly pretty, are no less ephemeral than vainglory. By the time you leave, you might feel a bit more humble, more grounded. To reminisce about the past, seek out a holly to sit under; to dream about the future, choose a magnolia instead. And if it is friends and friendships on your mind, the most suitable companion would be a spruce or a ginkgo. When you arrive at a crossroads and don’t know which path to take, contemplating quietly by a sycamore might help. If you are an artist in need of inspiration, a blue jacaranda or a sweetly scented mimosa could stir your imagination. If it is renewal you are after, seek a wych elm, and if you have too many regrets, a weeping willow will offer solace. When you are in trouble or at your lowest point, and have no one in whom to confide, a hawthorn would be the right choice. There is a reason why hawthorns are home to fairies and known to protect pots of treasure. For wisdom, try a beech; for intelligence, a pine; for bravery, a rowan; for generosity, a hazel; for joy, a juniper; and for when you need to learn to let go of what you cannot control, a birch with its white-silver bark, peeling and shedding layers like old skins. Then again, if it’s love you’re after, or love you have lost, come to the fig, always the fig.

When she finished blinking, a large hawk was flapping up through the trees and into the rain-tossed night. Rowan loosed a shriek as he banked right—toward the coast—the sound a farewell and a promise and a battle cry.

I stare at my hands, wondering if they would fit around Rowan’s tree trunk of a neck.

My stick! Alarmed, he skirted the edge of the lake, keeping to the grassy bank until he reached the line of trees edging the shore. Weaving among the trunks, he tried to guess which one held the stick in its roots. Sniffing carefully, he recognized with a burst of relief the rowan where he’d wedged it. He scrambled onto a thick root and leaned over the edge. The water was lapping the bank. He dug his hind claws into the bark, reached a forepaw down into the water, and felt for his stick. It’s not there! He flapped his paw in the space beneath the root. With panic rising in his throat, he leaned farther out, planting his other forepaw on the muddy bank so water lapped his claws as he dangled over the edge. Reaching as far as he could, he splashed his paw in the lake, feeling desperately for the sleek piece of wood. The waves licked his muzzle, making him splutter. Where is it? Had the lake taken it back? He might never see it again! Something hard bumped his muzzle. Something floating on the waves. He sniffed, coughing as water shot up his nose. But he recognized his stick at once.

I like rowan trees," he said softly. "They're slim and small, but they're tough and they'll grow anywhere. They take root in stony soil. They're a mystic tree. Diviners use rowan to find precious metal. And they are beautiful." He looked at her, his blue eyes serious for once, telling her without words that he found her beautiful also. "They make good firewood, too," Ro said, trying to lighten the moment.

mighty rowan trees.

For wisdom, try a beech; for intelligence, a pine; for bravery, a rowan; for generosity, a hazel; for joy, a juniper; and for when you need to learn to let go of what you cannot control, a birch with its white-silver bark, peeling and shedding layers like old skins. Then again, if it’s love you’re after, or love you have lost, come to the fig, always the fig.

your mind, the most suitable companion would be a spruce or a ginkgo. When you arrive at a crossroads and don’t know which path to take, contemplating quietly by a sycamore might help. If you are an artist in need of inspiration, a blue jacaranda or a sweetly scented mimosa could stir your imagination. If it is renewal you are after, seek a wych elm, and if you have too many regrets, a weeping willow will offer solace. When you are in trouble or at your lowest point, and have no one in whom to confide, a hawthorn would be the right choice. There is a reason why hawthorns are home to fairies and known to protect pots of treasure. For wisdom, try a beech; for intelligence, a pine; for bravery, a rowan; for generosity, a hazel; for joy, a juniper; and for when you need to learn to let go of what you cannot control, a birch with its white-silver bark, peeling and shedding layers like old skins. Then again, if it’s love you’re after, or love you have lost, come to the fig, always the fig.

We’re saying you don’t take a two-hundred- to five-hundred-year-old plant—namely a tree—to make a house that lasts fifty years. You take a plant that takes one hundred days to grow to make a house that lasts fifty years. That gives you sustainability.

Anything you can make out of a tree you can make out of hemp.

Our wood is one which the Dark does not love. Rowan, Will, that’s our tree. Mountain ash. There are qualities in rowan, as in no other wood on the earth, that we need.

laughed against her slick skin while her hoarse cries of his name shattered across palm trees and sand and water, Aelin let go of all pretense at reason. She moved, hips undulating, begging him to go, go, go. So Rowan did, sliding a finger into her as his tongue flicked that one spot, and oh, gods, she was going to explode into starfire— “Aelin,” he growled, her name a plea. “Please,” she moaned. “Please.” The word was his undoing. Rowan rose over her again, and she let out a sound that might have been a whimper, might have been his name. Then Rowan had a hand braced in the sand beside her head, fingers twining in her hair, while the other guided himself into her. At the first nudge of him, she forgot her own name. And as he slid in with gentle, rolling thrusts,

I have a feeling you’re going to do your ancestors proud. You know, that’s how the Chinese see it—your accomplishments bring glory not to your descendants, but to your ancestors, in recognition of the fact that it was their sacrifices that put you in a position to do what you do.

The issue is whether we’ll invite those who are currently taken for nobodies into the human family or force them to crash our gates.

If we don’t do likewise, we’ll soon have a sclerotic society that takes care of its elders at the expense of its youth.

Usually, city lights and smog block the stars, but last night a full moon shone overhead. Gazing upward, I had a vision of pockets of poverty shrinking like puddles in the sun.

I like to tease Rowan that he can go ahead and try to reason his way to a new world, but my generation intends to dance our way there.

Permitting businesses and special interests to fund political campaigns encourages demagoguery and invites corruption. That is not government of the people, by the people, and for the people. It’s government of, by, and for money.

to meet her fate beneath the rowan trees in the hills near

Za vasheh zdahrov-yeh,