Published online by Cambridge University Press: 29 April 2021
For an indifference graph G, we define a symmetric function of increasing spanning forests of G. We prove that this symmetric function satisfies certain linear relations, which are also satisfied by the chromatic quasisymmetric function and unicellular $\textrm {LLT}$ polynomials. As a consequence, we give a combinatorial interpretation of the coefficients of the $\textrm {LLT}$ polynomial in the elementary basis (up to a factor of a power of $(q-1)$), strengthening the description given in [4].