Page 14 of Eternal Thorns (The Feybound Chronicles #1)

13

THE WATCHER'S DILEMMA

T horne's consciousness spread through his network of forest sentinels like water finding its level, each connection bringing new reports that made his spectral form flicker with agitation. The magical awakening within Thornhaven Manor exceeded anything he'd expected or prepared for.

Through a crow's eyes, he watched Silas discover the hidden study's entrance. Through ancient roots that had breached the manor's foundations centuries ago, he felt the key's power unlocking protections he'd personally woven into the walls. Every sentinel reported the same unsettling observation - this wasn't just an Ashworth wielding inherited power. This was something entirely new.

“You feel it too, don't you?” Briar materialized beside him, her freckles glowing with excitement. “The way he works with the magic instead of trying to force it?”

Thorne wanted to dismiss her observation, but the evidence kept mounting. Where Marcus had approached each magical discovery with barely concealed hunger, Silas moved through the ancient protections with something closer to reverence. Each unlocking felt less like invasion and more like restoration, as if he were reminding the manor of its true nature rather than imposing his will upon it.

The forest itself betrayed Thorne's carefully maintained distance. Branches shifted to catch glimpses through the manor's windows. Flowers turned their faces toward Silas's movement like sunflowers tracking light. Even the dour stone spirits, traditionally suspicious of any human presence, reported an inexplicable draw toward his magical signature.

“The border guardians are getting restless,” Rowan reported, emerging from his oak. “They say it feels like the old days, when the boundaries were gates rather than barriers.”

“The old days led to betrayal,” Thorne reminded him sharply, but his own words felt hollow.

“And before the betrayal?” Rowan pressed. “Have you forgotten what those gates enabled? How many lives were saved because humans and fey could work together? The healers who could cross freely during plagues, the knowledge shared that protected both realms?”

“I haven't forgotten anything.” Frost crept across nearby leaves as Thorne's control slipped. “I remember exactly how beautiful the partnership was. That's what made the betrayal cut so deep.”

“Then you should also remember it wasn't just Marcus who believed in that partnership.” Rowan's voice gentled. “You believed too. And watching you now, old friend, I see that same belief trying to wake up.”

“Don't.”

“You're scared,” Rowan observed. “Not of Silas's power, but of how naturally he embodies everything you and Marcus once tried to build. He doesn't just carry the blood and the key - he carries the original vision, untainted by ambition.”

Thorne's form flickered violently. “Hope is a more potent poison than fear.”

“Is it?” Rowan gestured toward the manor. “Look how he touches the old magic. Not seeking to possess or control, but to understand and restore. Even you must see the difference.”

“What I see,” Thorne said bitterly, “is another chance for everything to go wrong. Another Ashworth whose good intentions might very well destroy us all.”

“Or save us.” Rowan met his friend's stormy gaze steadily. “You're so focused on preventing another betrayal that you might miss the chance for actual healing. The forest sees it - that's why the boundaries respond to him differently. Maybe it's time you did too.”

The ancient oak they stood beneath creaked in apparent agreement, making Thorne glare upward. “Traitors, all of you.”

But he couldn't quite keep the uncertainty from his voice, and Rowan's knowing look suggested he heard it clearly.

A particularly troubling report came from the grove's heart. The twilight flowers, which had closed their petals to all but Thorne for centuries, were beginning to stir and open whenever Silas's magic resonated through the grounds.

“Guardian,” Briar ventured carefully, “what if he really is different?”

“It doesn't matter.” But even as Thorne spoke, he felt his own carefully buried hopes beginning to stir, like seeds long dormant feeling the first touch of spring.

This wasn't how it was supposed to go. The dream-sharing was meant to test Silas's intentions, not awaken such profound responses in both manor and forest. Not stir such dangerous possibilities in Thorne's own ancient heart.

Through his sentinels' collective sight, he watched Silas handle each magical artifact with instinctive understanding. His magic carried echoes of Marcus's power, yes, but tempered by something his ancestor had lacked - genuine humility before powers greater than himself.

“Well,” Rowan said quietly, “this complicates things.”

Thorne couldn't argue. Every report, every observation, every resonance between Silas's magic and the forest's own power threatened the bitter certainty he'd maintained for centuries.

“You're brooding again,” Briar pointed out, her freckles pulsing with nervous light. “The twilight flowers are starting to wilt.”

She wasn't wrong. The delicate blooms around his feet had begun curling inward, responding to the turmoil in his magic. Thorne forced his power back under control, though the effort felt like trying to contain a storm in a glass jar.

“I don't brood,” he muttered. “I contemplate.”

Rowan's laugh rumbled like distant thunder. “You've been 'contemplating' so hard the younger spirits are hiding in their trees.”

Through his network of forest eyes, Thorne watched Agnes approach Thornhaven's gates. The witch moved with deliberate purpose, scattering what looked like simple dried leaves in her wake. But his enhanced sight revealed the truth - each leaf carried subtle enchantments, tiny tests woven into seemingly random patterns.

“Interfering old woman,” he growled, but there was less heat in it than he'd intended.

“You know what she's doing, don't you?” Rowan moved closer, his moss-covered armor catching the filtered sunlight. “She's proving what you refuse to see.”

Inside the manor, Silas had already noticed the witch's magical breadcrumbs. Through a particularly attentive crow's eyes, Thorne watched the young noble pause mid-step, head tilting like someone hearing distant music.

He watched Silas navigate a particularly complex glamour Agnes had woven across the manor's threshold. Silas’ magic reached out instinctively, not trying to dispel the illusion but working with it, guiding it into more harmonious patterns.

Agnes turned then, looking directly at Thorne's crow messenger.

“She's showing off,” Thorne grumbled. “Making a point.”

“And what point would that be?” Rowan's tone suggested he already knew the answer.

Before Thorne could respond, something dark slid through his awareness like oil through water. The shadow entity had returned, stronger than before, its whispers carrying the weight of centuries.

Remember how it felt? To trust so completely? To believe in something larger than ancient divisions?

The voice was Marcus's, young and earnest as it had been in the beginning.

Thorne's form flickered violently, frost spreading from his feet. “Get out.”

Why fight what you already know? Now the voice was his own, thick with betrayal and grief. History repeats. The pain will be exquisite.

But something unexpected happened as the shadow tried to twist his observations of Silas.

“Guardian?” Briar's voice shook slightly. “The shadows are moving wrong.”

Darkness gathered at the grove's edges, testing Thorne's defenses. But where it tried to touch memories of Silas, it found no purchase. The young Ashworth’s actions carried none of his ancestor's hidden ambition, none of the pride that had made Marcus vulnerable to corruption.

The shadow's whispers took on a frustrated edge.

If we cannot poison your sight, perhaps we shall poison his. Show him the monster you became. The vengeance you dreamed of. The price of loving a guardian who chose bitterness over healing.

“The hell you will.” Thorne's power flared, driving the presence back.

“Well,” Rowan said into the ringing silence after the shadow retreated, “that was interesting.”

“Interesting?” Thorne rounded on his old friend. “That thing is getting stronger, bolder, and you call it interesting?”

“What I find interesting is how it failed.” Rowan's expression turned thoughtful. “It couldn't twist your perception of Silas the way it once poisoned your memories of Marcus. Why do you think that is?”

“Don't.”

“The flowers are doing the thing again,” Briar interrupted, pointing to where the twilight blooms had begun opening, turning toward Thornhaven like flowers tracking the sun.

Thorne felt Silas complete the last of Agnes's magical tests. Silas’ power moved through the ancient protections with such natural grace that even the manor's stones seemed to hum in recognition.

“He's nothing like Marcus,” Thorne said quietly, and was surprised to realize he meant it. “And that terrifies me more than if he were.”

“Because it's harder to hate what you recognize as genuine?” Rowan asked. “Or because hope is more frightening than suspicion?”

“Both. Neither.” Thorne paced the grove's perimeter, his form shifting between shadow and substance as he wrestled with unwelcome realizations. “Marcus knew the right words, made the right gestures, but there was always something underneath. A hunger that colored everything he learned. But Silas...”

“Approaches magic like coming home,” Briar finished when he trailed off. “Like remembering something his blood always knew, even if his mind forgot.”

The shadow's presence lingered at the edges of Thorne's awareness, rage and frustration rolling off it in waves. It had expected to find another Marcus - another noble whose ambition could be twisted, whose pride could be weaponized. Instead, it faced something it didn't know how to corrupt.

“You have to make a choice,” Rowan said quietly. “That entity won't stay frustrated for long. It will find new tactics, new ways to prevent what it fears most.”

“And what's that?”

“The same thing you fear.” Rowan's moss armor clinked as he moved closer.

Thorne watched through his crow's eyes as Agnes concluded her magical demonstrations. She'd proven her point thoroughly - Silas possessed not just the potential for working with forest magic, but an innate understanding that transcended simple inheritance.

“So what will you do about it?” Briar asked, echoing his earlier question. Her freckles had settled into a steady glow, suggesting she already knew his answer.

He materialized in the heart grove to find the Elder Willow already waiting, her bark-skin form radiating tension.

“Look,” she commanded, gesturing toward the prophecy stones.

The ancient rocks pulsed with silver light, their glowing symbols rearranging themselves even as Thorne watched. Two paths emerged from the complex patterns - one spiraling upward in harmonious curves, the other fracturing downward into chaos. But what caught his attention was a new figure that appeared in both paths: a shadow form that shifted between light and darkness, its nature fluid and undefined.

“Well, shit,” he breathed, recognizing elements of his own power in its ever-changing shape.

“Indeed.” The Elder Willow's roots shifted beneath her. “The entity we face isn't simply born of past betrayal. It's become something far more dangerous - a manifestation of pure potential.”

“That's not possible.” But even as Thorne spoke, he felt the truth of it.

The shadow's presence had grown stronger with each step Silas took toward understanding forest magic. Every awakened memory, every restored connection, seemed to feed its power.

“All things are possible in times of great change.” The Elder Willow traced one of the glowing paths with a root-tendril. “This force feeds on possibility itself - the potential for reconciliation and the potential for final breaking. Each choice, each moment of trust or suspicion, gives it new strength.”

Thorne's form flickered as implications crashed through him. “Every test I set for Silas, every challenge I create...”

“Increases its power, yes.” Her expression held ancient sympathy. “The very act of testing him creates more potential outcomes for the entity to feed upon.”

“Fucking perfect.” Frost spread from Thorne's feet as his control slipped. “So I'm supposed to just let him wander into the forest unopposed? Give him free access to our secrets?”

The prophecy stones pulsed brighter, their paths shifting to show new possibilities. In one, light and shadow merged into something entirely new. In the other, they shattered each other into oblivion.

“The choice was always going to come,” the Elder Willow said softly. “Though perhaps not quite as we expected.”

Before Thorne could respond, magic surged through his forest network. The sensation yanked his awareness toward Thornhaven, where something ancient had just awakened. The map. Silas had found the hidden map.

“No,” Thorne whispered, but it was already happening.

He felt old magic stirring in the enchanted parchment. Every path marked on it blazed to life in his magical sight. Places where trust had allowed both peoples to work together, sharing knowledge and power freely.

“Guardian?” The Elder Willow's voice held careful warning. “Your magic grows unstable.”

Memories flooded him as each path on the map awakened. Teaching Marcus the secret ways through the forest. Watching human and fey healers work together during a particularly harsh winter. Finding joy in sharing knowledge that had been kept separate for too long.

“He'll use it to find the second journal.” Thorne's voice came out rougher than intended. “Those paths, they're not just routes. They're trust made manifest. Every one of them was created through cooperation between realms.”

“Yes.” The Elder Willow watched him struggle with the implications. “And now you must decide - will you honor what those paths represent, or reject their very purpose?”

The shadow entity's presence slid closer, drawn by the surge of magical possibility. Its whispers carried both promise and threat.

Such potential. Such perfect symmetry. Trust offered and trust betrayed, all over again.

“Get out of my head,” Thorne snarled, but the entity's laughter only grew.

We are what you made us, Guardian. Every bitter thought, every moment of pain, given form and purpose. And now The shadow seemed to coil with anticipation. Now we have new possibilities to shape.

The prophecy stones' light shifted again, showing Silas walking the ancient paths. In one version, his presence restored them to their original purpose. In another, darkness consumed both walker and way. The shadow figure appeared in both scenarios, its form changing depending on choices not yet made.

“If I try to stop him from coming,” Thorne said slowly, “I prove I can't be trusted. If I let him come-”

“You risk everything,” the Elder Willow finished. “Including your own heart.”

Memories of creating those paths with Marcus threatened to overwhelm him. The joy of working together, of building something meant to last centuries. The bitter knowledge of how it had all ended.

But Silas wasn't Marcus. Every observation, every test, every moment of unexpected grace proved that. The way he approached forest magic with reverence rather than ambition. How naturally he understood concepts that should have been lost to his bloodline.

The shadow entity pulsed with frustration as Thorne's thoughts turned toward hope.

You dare consider trust again? After what it cost you?

“Interesting,” the Elder Willow murmured. “It fears your hope more than your bitterness.”

Thorne realized. The entity fed on possibility, yes, but it seemed to prefer darker potentials. His pain and suspicion gave it strength, while genuine hope made it recoil.

Through his forest network, he felt Silas studying the map with that same careful reverence he brought to all magical discoveries. The young noble's fingers traced paths that had once connected realms, and Thorne felt ancient magic respond to his touch. Not awakening this time, but remembering.

“I can't stop him from coming,” Thorne said finally. “Not without becoming exactly what that thing wants me to be.”

The shadow's presence twisted with barely contained rage.

Then we will show him what you truly are. The monster grief made you. The bitter spirit who chose vengeance over healing.

“Will you?” The Elder Willow's question held genuine curiosity.

The prophecy stones pulsed one final time, their paths merging briefly to show a single possibility - neither pure light nor pure shadow, but something between. Something new that could only exist through genuine trust.

Thorne touched the burns on his spectral flesh where Silas's key had marked him. They resonated with the map's awakening magic, reminding him of what those paths had originally meant. Not just routes through the forest, but proof that two realms could work together in harmony.

“So what will you do?” the Elder Willow asked, though her tone suggested she already knew his answer.

Silas stood at his bedroom window in Thornhaven, one hand pressed against the glass while the other gripped the awakened key. His magical signature pulsed with quiet resolve, lacking the desperate ambition that had colored Marcus's every action.

“The dream-walking isn't enough anymore,” Thorne admitted. “Not with that thing twisting every memory it touches.”

“Guardian.” Rowan's voice cut through his thoughts as the ancient spirit materialized from his oak. Moss armor clung to his form in disarray, suggesting urgent travel through the forest network. “We have trouble.”

“When don't we?”

“This is different.” Rowan's usual humor had vanished. “The shadow entity, it's manifesting throughout the forest. Not just whispers or impressions. Actual forms.”

Thorne's power flared with alarm. “Where?”

“Everywhere. It pulls shapes from both human and spirit memories. The border guardians report seeing lost travelers who never existed. The dryads swear they've glimpsed versions of you from before the betrayal, teaching magic to phantom students.”

“Fuck.” Frost spread from Thorne's feet as implications crashed through him. “How long?”

“That's the concerning part.” Rowan exchanged glances with the Elder Willow. “Each manifestation corresponds to moments when Silas makes progress understanding his heritage. When he found the map just now? Three new shadowforms appeared in the twilight grove.”

The Elder Willow's roots shifted beneath her. “It feeds on revelation. On potential made manifest.”

“Which makes any indirect communication dangerous,” Thorne finished. “Every dream-memory I share gives it more material to corrupt.”

“He means to enter the forest.” It wasn't a question. Thorne could read the intention in every line of Silas's posture.

“Yes.” The Elder Willow's voice held ancient certainty. “The only question is whether you'll meet him as guardian or adversary.”

“It's not just about the forest's secrets anymore, is it?” Rowan asked quietly. “You're afraid of having to interact with him directly. Of having to face how different he is from Marcus without the buffer of dreams between you.”

“Stay out of my head.”

“I don't need to be in your head to see the obvious.” Rowan's expression softened. “Every test you've set, every challenge you've created, has been about maintaining distance. But that's exactly what feeds the shadow's power - the space between trust and suspicion, between what could be and what we fear will be.”

The entity's presence swirled closer, as if summoned by Rowan's words.

Such delicious irony, it whispered. The great Guardian, paralyzed by the very thing he once championed. Shall we show young Silas exactly what became of the last spirit who dared trust an Ashworth?

“Get out,” Thorne snarled, but the shadow only laughed.

We are what you made us, it reminded him. Every bitter memory, every moment of betrayal, given form and purpose. The more you hide from genuine connection, the stronger we become.

The Elder Willow stepped forward, her power pushing back the encroaching darkness. “Which is precisely why someone must take the first risk. Must choose trust over suspicion, possibility over fear.”

“And you think that someone should be me?” Frost crackled through Thorne's voice. “After everything that happened?”

“Because of everything that happened,” she corrected. “Who better to break the cycle than the one who helped create it?”

In that moment, Thorne recognized the truth he'd been avoiding: there was no safe path forward. Every choice carried risk. The only question was whether he'd let fear of repeating the past prevent any chance of a different future.

“Well,” he said finally, his form stabilizing as resolve crystallized within him, “I suppose it's time to see if an old guardian can learn new tricks.”