The temperature dropped fifteen degrees as Logan stepped into the redwoods onto springy ground formed by thousands of years of decomposed branchlets. His whole body relaxed as the scent of soil and greenery enveloped and cooled him. Tiny muscles around his eyes and scalp he hadn’t realized were clenched let go. He could almost hear Uuma call him, the bass hum he’d picked up so early in life when he was alone in the platform he and his father had built. It formed the texture of his childhood. He’d learned to relax into that sound like lying in a hammock. He could twist and turn inside the strings of sound wherever he was, pluck them with his body or swim among them. The giants were like relatives, great aunts, great uncles, and great-great-grandparents.
His mother had been furious when his
