The Sacred Grove
The pilgrim trail was packed. Groups of travelers shared excited greetings as they leapfrogged each other along the path after stopping to enjoy a repast in the shade of a tree or under a canopy provided by the vendors whose stalls were scattered along the way. The sun hovered brilliant in the sky, and the warm spring breeze coaxed gentle ripples from the surrounding meadows. The multitude was destined for the Grove, to an event a century in the making.
On the road, the tinkling of cymbals danced through the air, and the pilgrims stepped aside to make way. A procession of Readers was approaching. The clerics walked in solemn silence, their white linen robes swishing rhythmically with every step. They alone had been gifted the ability to read the trees—the bioengineered repositories for mankind’s purest knowledge, created on the eve of the Blackout—and they would be the ones to scrutinize and interpret the miracle.
In recent days, as the snows had melted and the new year returned life to the land, a single sprout had emerged from among the young blades of grass blanketing the Grove. It was the first scion of the sacred trees that all had thought incapable of bearing fruit. Word of the miracle had spread quickly. Every man, woman, and child able to walk the distance made hasty preparations and set out to witness it with their own eyes. All hoped to be in attendance as the new tree’s first leaves spread open to feast on the light and reveal their knowledge.
As the people arrived at the Grove, they set up camp around the low stone wall that set it apart from the rest of the world. Four days had passed since the discovery of the new shoot, and every day the camp swelled with new arrivals. As the sun set on each day of anxious anticipation, the people unwound with an evening of song, dance, and drink. But on the fourth evening, those who had just completed the long journey were greeted by a reverent atmosphere. Fires burned deep into the night as old friends speculated about what the new tree might tell them. The pessimists among the pilgrims were prepared for an incoherent, jumbled text: a randomized product of thoughtless transcription. Those blessed with a little more optimism imagined the reproduction of a known text, perhaps something of special significance. The visionaries anticipated the finger of God, writing for them a new revelation: an exalted synthesis of humanity’s greatest ideas, reaching higher than anyone could fathom.
Daylight broke over the horizon on the dawn of the fifth day. Tiny leaves slowly uncurled. All would be revealed.