They buried what remained of the guardian beneath the silver tree.
There were no rites, no fire, only silence and a grave carved from an earth too tired to protest. Gwyn drove the pommel of her blade into the soil, marking the site. It was not forgiveness or peace. It was memory.
Bedwyr sat with his back against a stone, knuckles scraped and voice hoarse from the unbinding song. He plucked a low, slow note from his lyre, not a tune, just a vibration, a presence. It hummed faintly through the glade like breath through broken reeds.
Galahad crouched near the Spirit Tree’s roots, examining the scorched vines and cracked earth. “This tree won’t recover. Whatever it was bound to is gone. But the damage is spreading. The corruption didn’t start here.”
Skif floated closer, her wings still flickering with residual light. She landed on Bedwyr’s shoulder without ceremony, her voice barely above a whisper. “That creature wasn’t just guarding the glade. It was tethered to something... else. When we cut the chains, it screamed through the roots. I felt it. Like a cry through a buried web.”
Gwyn exhaled slowly. “So it wasn’t the last.”
“No,” Bedwyr said. “Only the first we’ve seen.”
A distant rumble echoed beneath them. Not thunder. Not wind. Something deeper. Subterranean.
Galahad looked up sharply. "There are caverns beneath this forest. Old ones. Abandoned after the Accord broke. I thought they were sealed."
"They’re open now," Skif said. "Or something’s clawing upward."
Bedwyr stood, brushing dirt from his coat. "We need to return to the Wall. This is bigger than corrupted trees and dying Dryads. If it spreads beyond Talonia..."
Gwyn shook her head. "No. Oberon’s Wall won’t hold it. Not if the roots reach beneath it. We need to go beyond."
Skif turned, eyes wide. “You mean the Gloaming lands? The Drenched Valleys? We haven’t crossed the southern range in a generation.”
Gwyn nodded. “The corruption isn’t just killing Fae. It’s erasing history, names, memory itself. If it crosses into mortal soil, they’ll never know it existed. We need to find its source, or nothing we’ve done here will matter.”
Galahad rose, his expression unreadable. “There’s an old trail. Buried under talon and time. It leads south, through the singing stone pass.”
Bedwyr looked toward the trees beyond the glade, where the forest darkened into blue mist. “Then we follow it.”
Gwyn retrieved her blade from the earth. Her voice was quiet. "We bury one guardian, and now we walk toward what guards the void."
And so they turned from the Spirit Tree, leaving its fading silver light behind. The path ahead was old, forgotten, and waiting.
