Trees

Background
Trees are the proof of Graham's father's adage "Nothing is as it appears!" In Daventry, trees double as homes, hideouts, treasure repositories, places to hide weapons, and monsters. Rosella met the latter after her escape from the ogre in Tamir. While she was in the ogre's house, she took a sharp ax and was carrying it as she fled into the scary forest. The trees there are endowed with a rudimentary kind of life, and they like to snatch up anyone who comes within the grasp of their limbs. Death comes crushingly to the trees' victims.

Rosella was able to escape their clutches by swinging the ax at them. She gained their dim respect, and they left her alone afterwards. It is the way with those trees; if one stands up to them, they get scared and back down. Indeed, one might say that their bark is worse than their bite.

The trees in the scary forest are not at all like the trees in the Land of Oz. There, in Gilliken country, is a grove of willows that bother people by laughing at them as they pass by. They are cousins, of course, to the weeping willows. There are also stories of trees that throw their apples at a person if they try to pick them.