"Ayla, it's morning! Today is the day, remember? Hurry up and come downstairs!"

Ayla opened her eyes wearily. Sunlight fell through a crack in the shutters of her window on the floor, while birds were already chirping outside.

"Coming, mom!"

The young girl rubbed her eyes and put one foot out of bed. She almost fell as she tripped over something round. After steadying herself again, Ayla picked up the object from the floor and recognized it as one of her treasures: a chestnut she had found when she was five. It must have fallen of her nightstand and rolled across the room during the night.

She placed the chestnut back with her other treasures. Her nightstand was full of them: ribbons, little stones, leaves, coins, name it. As she looked at them, a smile spread on her lips. She was proud of the many things she had collected over the years. Every treasure was like a memory to her, and she cherished them with care.

She sat down on her bed and thought back to the day that she found the chestnut: she had been walking with her dad over the market, when she saw it fall. At first she thought that the God's Tree itself had dropped it, but afterwards, this couldn't be the case. It had only made flowers, because the elves liked them, but everyone knew that the tree was the only one of its kind. It still puzzled Ayla where it came from, making it one of her more interesting and mysterious possessions.

Once she got dressed, Ayla walked into the living room. Looking around, she noticed that she had never seen it so empty before. All of the shelves and the chairs were gone, and so was the table. Most of the furniture had been sold, apart from a few things. In the meantime, Ayla's parents were making some final preparations for the upcoming journey.

"Good morning, sweetheart. Are you almost ready?" her father asked.

"I just have to grab a few things", Ayla replied. "do you have a box for me?"

"Of course, but make it quick. We need to be on our way before the merchants enter the market district."

Ayla's parents were tailors. They owned a shop in the market district that was quite popular, but it had only a few customers left lately. The reason for that was that seven years ago, the God's Tree had died. Since then, the city's population decreased drastically. The once so green city had become a ghosttown on a dead lump of wood with just a quarter of its former population left.

And now, Ayla and her parents were forced to leave the city as well. They planned to travel to Eyden, a dwarven city in the north, and open their new tailor shop. It would take about three months to travel there, possibly longer if the weather was bad, but it was better than staying here.

They only took what was really needed: clothes, cookware, tools, personal belongings and weapons for hunting. Ayla's father also managed to buy a small wooden cart, pulled by a deer. Elves used strong bucks rather than horses to pull carts, since they could traverse the forest much easier.

An hour later, everything was set and Ayla and her parents were ready to leave. The little girl looked back at her old house. She missed it already.

"Come on, let's go." her mother said gently.

They walked over the thick branches of the dead tree, towards the centre. The tree had been so kind to grow a wide spiralling branch around its trunk, so that people could easily travel up and down its branches, even with carts or wagons. The first time that Ayla went down to the ground, the wide branch had been a busy road, packed with people trying to get into the city. Now she only saw a few people, all walking downwards.

After an hour or so they finally reached the foot of the tree. Ayla had only come to the ground a few times, and every time she did, she was always amazed how the surface didn't move. The wind would always rock the tree a little, even after it had died, but this was obviously not the case for the ground.

Ayla turned around to look at the God's Tree one more time, as her mother placed an arm around her.

"Goodbye, mother tree. Thank you for your generosity for all these years." Ayla said earnestly.

Her parents smiled and gently nudged her towards the road.

"Let's go sweetheart", her father said. "We have a long journey ahead."

Leaving her former home behind, Ayla turned around, following her parents to the new destination.