Cigtree
Tall, bare, and solemn, the Cigtree is marked along its trunk by spiralling eye-shaped scars where old fronds fell away, forking only far above the ground into great reaching arms that end in clusters of stiff spear-leaves around thick, conical spore-crowns. It favours damp lowlands and mist-veiled woods where air hangs heavy with hidden water, undisturbed by storm or drought. In the gloom of the Land of Green Shadows and the foothills of the Bridge Mountains Place The Bridge Mountains A mountain range in the far north of Tarkdaara, one of the named western and northern sub-ranges of the Spine of the World, the continent-long range of stone and ice., a Cigtree rising from the fog is said to mark places where the boundary between waking and dreaming runs thin.
Key traits
- Thick, scarred bark layers protect the trunk against rot, insects, and the slow grinding breath of the mists.
- Instead of seeds the Cigtree produces towering spore-crowns, rough cones filled with dust-fine spores that ride the mist to far banks and hidden glades.
- Deep, fingered roots anchor the tree against flood-swells and shifting soils, allowing it to endure centuries of river-change.
- Young spore-crowns and fresh spear-leaves are bitter but edible after long boiling; ground and leached of alkaloids, the ripened cones yield a heavy, sustaining meal baked into what Baramma Place Baramma The great jungle island east of Tarkdaara, separated from the mainland by the Bram Sea and home to the Bar. tradition calls dreamer's loaf.
- The tree roots itself wherever fog clings long after sunrise, preferring damp river-flushed plains over open or elevated terrain.