Sitka

Sitka takes the Pacific's worst weather personally — and wins. The tallest spruce on Earth grows where the ocean throws everything it has at the coast: hundred-mile winds, drowning rain, salt that kills lesser trees in a season. She stands in it the way a lighthouse stands in it, which is to say without comment. Her needles comb the fog for water; her roots grip the thin coastal soil like a promise. Storm nights are her element — Rain is her faction gift and her temperament — and the Skyreach tells of the great gale that snapped three challengers and left Sitka merely tidier. "The sea tests," she says. "I answer." Inland trees call her harsh. She calls it honest. There is no shelter on her coast, only the truth of standing, and Sitka has never once sat down.