Page 27 of Eternal Thorns (The Feybound Chronicles #1)

26

INTO DARKNESS

F amiliar paths that had guided him to grove and garden now led to spaces that hurt to look at, where natural magic turned sick and strange.

“Last chance to reconsider,” Kai said, methodically checking their supplies for the third time. The protective charms Agnes had given them clinked softly in his pack, each one carefully wrapped in silk to prevent magical interference.

“You don't have to come.” Silas touched the bracelet on his wrist, feeling its weak pulse of Thorne's original magic. The forest guardian's power felt distant, corrupted, but still somehow his.

“Someone has to drag your romantic ass back out when this goes wrong.”

The Elder Willow's gift weighed heavy in Silas's pocket - a crystal vial of pure forest magic, meant to shield his heart from corruption's touch. Its silver light caught on the twisted landscape ahead, making the wrongness even more apparent.

“Remember,” Agnes said, appearing beside them with her usual unnerving silence. “The protection charms will help against general corruption, but they can't shield you from what matters most.” Her clouded eyes studied him with uncomfortable intensity. “The shadow entity will use your love against you. Every genuine feeling between you becomes its weapon.”

“I know.” Silas checked his own preparations one final time. The key hung cold against his chest, stripped of its usual warmth since Thorne's sacrificed himself.

The corrupted forest stretched before them like a nightmare version of the realm he'd come to love. Ancient trees that had once welcomed him now twisted in shapes that defied nature. The very air felt wrong, heavy with power that whispered seductive darkness.

“The path will try to turn you around,” Agnes warned, pressing another charm into his hand. This one hummed with magic that felt older than the forest itself. “Trust your heart over your eyes. The shadow entity excels at creating illusions that prey on hope.”

Silas caught glimpses of familiar places turned wrong. The ancient oak where they'd shared their first kiss, its bark bleeding shadows instead of sap.

“You really love him, don't you?” Kai asked quietly, watching Silas study the twisted landscape. “Like, enough to walk into actual nightmare forest and fight shadow monsters.”

“Yes.” The simple truth of it burned in Silas's chest, stronger than any magic.

Agnes touched his shoulder gently. “Then remember this - true feeling threatens the entity precisely because it cannot corrupt it completely.”

The bracelet pulsed once, weakly, as if responding to this truth. Through their damaged connection came something that felt like Thorne - distant and distorted, but still somehow himself. The sensation carried warning and love both

Don't trust what you see, trust what you feel.

“Right then.” Kai shouldered his pack with determined cheerfulness. “Into corrupted death-forest we go. Try not to get us killed by romantic tragedy, yeah?”

Silas touched the key one last time, remembering how it used to warm with shared power. The metal remained cold, but something deeper than magic burned in his heart.

Some connections ran too deep for even darkness to break.

The first step across corruption's boundary felt like breaking a seal. Power rushed around them, hungry and wrong, seeking any weakness in their protections. But Silas faced it without flinching. Somewhere in this twisted nightmare, Thorne waited - changed and corrupted but still somehow his.

The moment they crossed into corrupted territory, darkness rushed to meet them like a living thing. It recognized Silas instantly, reaching with terrible familiarity born from Thorne's stolen memories.

“Well this is horrific,” Kai muttered, gripping his protective charms tighter.

The corruption responded by sending the first vision. Silas watched his love's crown of branches blacken, his luminous skin turn dark as starless night. But something unexpected happened when the vision tried to touch his heart.

It slid off like water from glass, unable to find purchase against the pure truth of what he felt.

The shadow entity's retaliation was immediate. The ground beneath their feet turned treacherous, paths splitting and reforming with nightmare logic. Roots that should have guided them now reached with hungry purpose, trying to drag them deeper into darkness.

“Left,” Silas commanded, feeling the bracelet's weak pulse guide him. “The corruption's trying to turn us around.”

“You sure about that?” Kai's voice held uncharacteristic strain. “Because I could swear the manor's that way.”

“That's what it wants you to think.” Silas caught his friend's arm before he could step onto a particularly convincing false path.

The deeper they ventured, the more personal the shadow's attacks became. Thorne's voice called from the darkness, mixing truth with lies so subtle they were almost impossible to detect.

“Silas.” The sound carried perfect memory of how Thorne said his name during their lessons. “Why do you fight so hard against what I've become?”

The words hurt precisely because they carried traces of Thorne's actual voice, his genuine fears about love and corruption. But through their weakened bond came pulses of his true essence.

“Your friend will betray you,” the shadow whispered, turning its attention to Kai. “Just as everyone eventually betrays those they claim to love. Look deeper into his heart, see the resentment hidden there.”

Kai's step faltered. “I… something feels wrong.”

“It's lying,” Silas said firmly, but he saw how the corruption worked on his friend's insecurities. Old fears about their different social classes, buried resentment about kept secrets, all being twisted into weapon.

When Kai suddenly lunged toward what looked like a safe path home, Silas had to physically restrain him. “It's not real,” he insisted, wrestling his friend back from the edge of a disguised pit. “None of what you're seeing is real.”

“But it feels real.” Kai's voice cracked. “All those times I watched you move through higher society, knowing I'd never really belong...”

“Stop.” Silas grabbed his friend's shoulders, forcing him to meet his gaze. “You want to know what I remember about all those fancy parties? Looking for you in the crowd. Wishing I could just hang out in the kitchen with my best friend instead of playing perfect heir.”

Kai tried to look away, but Silas wouldn't let him. “You really think titles matter to me? After everything we've been through? That day in the woods when we first met - you didn't see an Ashworth heir. You saw some idiot noble kid holding his bow wrong.”

A ghost of a smile touched Kai's lips. “You were going to shoot your own foot off.”

“Probably. But you didn't care about my family name. You just helped. No judgment, no social climbing, just...” Silas's voice roughened with emotion. “Just my best friend telling me I was being an idiot.”

“Still are, sometimes.” Kai's hands stopped reaching for the false path, his eyes clearing slightly.

“Yeah, well, that's why I need you here. Someone has to keep me honest.” Silas felt the shadow entity's influence weakening as truth cut through its lies. “You're not just my friend, Kai. You're my brother. The only person besides my grandmother who's always seen me, not my title.”

Tears slid down Kai's face as the corruption's hold broke completely. “Fuck. I hate magic that makes me feel things.”

“I know.” Silas pulled him into a rough hug. “But that's how we beat it.”

“Still an idiot noble,” Kai muttered against his shoulder, but his voice held familiar warmth. “Getting us both killed chasing after your terrifying forest spirit boyfriend.”

“Yeah.” Silas grinned as they broke apart. “But you wouldn't have it any other way.”

“True.” Kai wiped his eyes, straightening with renewed purpose. “Someone has to tell this story later. 'The day my best friend fell in love with living shadow and we all nearly died.' It'll be great at parties.”

The shadow entity shifted tactics, abandoning subtlety for raw psychological assault. It pulled images directly from Thorne's memories now. But each scene twisted halfway through, showing how that trust could corrupt, how that love might poison everything.

“Stay focused,” Silas told Kai, who kept flinching at shadows that wore familiar faces. “It's learning our weaknesses. Testing what hurts most.”

“Easy for you to say.” Kai's attempt at humor sounded brittle. “Your true love's noble sacrifice protects you. Some of us just have regular old friendship to work with.”

But even as he spoke, Agnes's protection charm flared around his neck, pushing back a particularly vicious illusion.

A sound like Thorne's laugh echoed through twisted trees, carrying traces of genuine warmth that made Silas's heart ache.

“It's getting stronger,” Silas realized, watching corruption spread in their wake.

“Then maybe we should-” Kai's suggestion cut off as darkness coalesced into Thorne's form ahead of them.

The apparition looked perfect. But its eyes held wrong shadows, and its smile curved with cruel purpose.

“Everything changes. Everything corrupts. That's the natural order of things.” It said in Thorne’s voice.

But the bracelet pulsed once, weakly.

“Nice try,” Silas said, stepping forward. “But you still don't understand. Real connection isn't about staying pure or perfect. It's about choosing each other even through darkness.”

Time was running out. But somewhere in this twisted nightmare, Thorne waited - changed but not destroyed, corrupted but not lost

The change hit without warning. One moment they were navigating twisted shadows, the next they stood in perfect sunlight. Silas's breath caught as he recognized where they'd emerged - their sacred grove, untouched by corruption, exactly as it had been the first time Thorne showed it to him.

“Silas.”

The voice struck him. He turned and saw Thorne stood in the grove's heart, crown of branches catching sunlight exactly as it should, luminous patterns flowing across his skin in their original silver beauty. No trace of corruption marked his ethereal form as he moved forward with familiar grace.

“This isn't...” Kai's warning faded as protective magic flared around him, pushing him back toward the grove's edge. “Shit. Silas, don't-”

But Silas barely heard him. Everything he'd been fighting toward, everything his heart ached to reclaim, stood before him whole and perfect. Thorne's hand reached for him with such achingly familiar gentleness.

“It's alright now,” Thorne said softly, his voice carrying all the warmth and wisdom Silas remembered. “I found a way to contain the corruption. We can stay here, safe in our sacred space. Just take my hand.”

“I've missed you,” Thorne murmured. “Missed teaching you, watching you work with forest magic. We can have that again. Just accept what I'm offering.”

Silas's hand lifted unconsciously, drawn toward that promised comfort. But as their fingers nearly touched, something caught his attention. A detail so small it almost slipped past.

The key remained cold.

In every true interaction between them, the key had responded to Thorne's presence with instant warmth. Even corrupted, their connection had generated some reaction. But now it hung lifeless against Silas's chest.

This wasn't restoration. The shadow entity had pulled their combined memories to craft a perfect illusion, weaponizing their deepest wish for things to simply be fixed.

“No,” Silas said quietly, letting his hand fall. “This isn't real.”

The false Thorne's expression shifted subtly, something hungry bleeding through his gentle smile. “It could be. Accept this gift and-”

“And what? Live in a beautiful lie while corruption spreads?” Silas squared his shoulders, feeling the key's dead weight like armor. “The real Thorne would never offer that. He'd rather face darkness honestly than hide in false light.”

The sacred grove shattered like broken glass. Sunlight turned to shadow as the shadow entity's rage manifested, twisting their precious space into nightmare. The false Thorne's form corrupted in fast-forward, crown of branches blackening as his skin turned dark as starless night.

“You could have had perfection,” it snarled, still using Thorne's voice. “Could have kept him exactly as you remembered, unmarred by pain or change.”

“I don't want perfection.” Silas stood his ground as corruption raced toward him. “I want him - exactly as he is, shadow and light both. You don't understand anything at all if you think we need to be flawless to be worth choosing.”

The entity's scream of rage echoed through twisted trees, but something else threaded through it. Through their damaged bond came a pulse of Thorne's true essence, fiercer than before, responding to this simple truth.

“You're learning,” Kai said, rejoining him as the illusion fully collapsed. “How did you know?”

“The key.” Silas touched the cold metal. “Real connection leaves traces that can't be faked. The shadow entity can only twist what already exists.”

The corruption fought this understanding, throwing fresh horrors at them as they pressed deeper into its heart. But each attack revealed more about its fundamental nature. It could only corrupt existing bonds, could only poison connections that already held meaning.

When another phantom of Thorne appeared, this one wearing his face from centuries ago, Silas recognized the entity's strategy. The scene played out Marcus's betrayal from the guardian's perspective, every moment of trust turning to poison, every shared joy becoming weapon.

“See how it always ends?” The shadow wearing young Thorne's form gestured at the unfolding tragedy. “Love corrupts. Connection breaks. Why fight the natural order?”

But Silas saw past the surface manipulation to what this reveal actually meant. “You're afraid,” he realized, watching the entity flinch.

The phantom's borrowed features twisted with rage, but beneath that expression lay something that felt like validation.

“We're close,” Silas told Kai, feeling the bracelet pulse stronger despite corruption's screaming presence. “His real essence responds every time we understand something about what we're fighting.”

“Great.” Kai managed a shaky grin as he readied another protective charm. “Just figure out the psychological nature of darkness itself while we walk through literal nightmare.”

The shadow entity's attacks grew more desperate as they pushed forward, but each one revealed more of its limitations. It could only work with existing emotions, could only corrupt genuine feelings.

Eventually, they reached what had once been the forest's heart. The corruption here felt different. Silas's protective charms vibrated with constant warning while the bracelet burned ice-cold against his wrist.

“Is that...” Kai breathed, stumbling to a halt beside him.

The words died in his throat as they took in the scene before them. A vast vortex of corrupted magic swirled in the grove's center, darkness moving with terrible purpose. But it was what floated at its core that made Silas's heart stop.

Thorne.

The forest guardian hung suspended in shadow's embrace, transformed into something that hurt to witness. His crown of branches dripped darkness like liquid night, while corrupted patterns pulsed across his skin in sickly phosphorescence. Where luminous beauty had once made him ethereal, twisted magic now turned his form into living nightmare.

“No,” Silas whispered, the key growing impossibly cold against his chest.

Corrupted magic filled the air like poison gas, making every breath burn. But Silas couldn't look away from Thorne's transformed face. Those eyes that had once held forests now swirled with unnatural darkness. Yet when their gazes met across the corrupted space, something sparked through their weakened connection.

Recognition. Warning. Love.

“Silas, don't!” Thorne's voice emerged twisted but unmistakably his own. The effort of fighting the entity's control made dark veins stand out across his corrupted skin. “Get out - it's using me to-”

Shadow slammed through him, cutting off the warning. The entity seized control of Thorne's form, making him arch in agony as fresh waves of corruption poured into his essence. But that brief moment of connection had changed something fundamental.

“He's still in there,” Silas said, feeling hope flare dangerous and bright in his chest.

The shadow entity struck again, this wave of darkness hitting harder than before. Dead flowers bloomed in its wake, beautiful and wrong.

“We can't keep defending,” Kai shouted, throwing his last protective charm that shattered on impact. “We need something more!”

Silas staggered back from another assault, the key burning against his chest. Something felt different this time - not just the usual warmth, but a building resonance that made his bones hum.

It's time , the Elder Willow's voice echoed in his mind, ancient and certain. The Sword of Balance chooses its bearer.

“The what?—”

The key erupted in blinding silver light, tearing itself from its chain. Power surged through Silas like lightning as the metal stretched and transformed, coalescing into a blade that sang with impossible harmonies. Ancient symbols traced its edge - the same marks he'd seen on Thorne's crown of branches, now blazing with combined human and fey magic.

“Holy shit,” Kai breathed, backing away as silver light rippled off the weapon. “Is that?—”

“The First Blade,” the Elder Willow materialized beside them, her bark-skin glowing faintly. “Forged when realms were one, meant to protect the balance between all powers. It hasn't appeared since the original sundering.”

“You might have mentioned this was possible,” Silas said, adjusting his grip on the sword's hilt. It felt perfectly weighted, as if made for his hand.

“Some things must be discovered, not told.” The Elder Willow's ancient eyes tracked the blade's light. “The sword appears only for those who understand true harmony – who can accept both shadow and light.”

The shadow entity's rage manifested as physical assault, darkness lashing out with stolen power. But this time, Silas met it with the sword raised. Where the blade cut through corruption, silver fire burned in its wake.

“If you have a plan,” Kai shouted over the magical maelstrom, throwing protective herbs that burst into blue flame mid-air, “now would be an excellent time!”

But Silas was already moving, the sword an extension of his will as he carved paths through writhing darkness. Each swing carried traces of their combined magic. Shadow constructs recoiled from the blade's light, hissing where it cut through their corrupted forms.

Everything in the grove had gone strange - sound muffled like being underwater, time moving thick and slow. Through this warped perception, he watched darkness pour into Thorne's transformed body in endless waves. The sword pulsed in his grip, resonating with each surge of corruption.

Yet something wasn't right about how the darkness flowed. The shadow entity's attacks felt desperate rather than triumphant, its hold on Thorne's essence more tenuous than it wanted them to see. Each time Silas's blade cut through its manifestations, he felt the connection between them strengthen rather than break.

Each wave of corruption that tried to break him instead created another point of connection, another way to fight back from within. The sword's light grew brighter with every strike, drawing power from their strengthening bond.

Their damaged connection suddenly blazed with impossible warmth. Silas felt Thorne reaching for him through the very power meant to corrupt them both, turning the entity's connection into bridge instead of weapon. The sword in his hands sang with recognition, its light matching the patterns that still glowed beneath Thorne's corrupted skin.

Come on, that touch seemed to say. See what I'm doing. Understand how to end this.

The sword hummed in Silas's grip as understanding hit like lightning. “The vortex,” he breathed. “It's not just corrupting him - it's using him as conduit. Every connection between us gives it more power, but also-”

“Also what?” Kai ducked beneath a shadow construct, his protective charms shattering one after another. “Because from here it looks like your boyfriend is being turned into a shadow battery!”

“Also gives him a way to fight back.” Silas swung the blade in a wide arc, its silver light carving through waves of darkness. Where the sword cut, corruption couldn't immediately reform. “The entity can only corrupt existing connections. But real love, chosen despite knowing its cost...”

The blade's light pulsed, each beat matching their shared heartbeat. Shadow constructs lunged for him, wearing faces from his memories. But the sword cut through illusions as easily as corruption, leaving trails of burning silver in its wake.

Corruption poured into Thorne with renewed violence, trying to break him before Silas could act on this insight. The forest guardian's form twisted further, crown of branches melting like tar while sickly light pulsed through blackened veins.

Silas charged forward, the sword blazing brighter with each step. Shadow constructs fell before his blade like leaves in autumn, their darkness burning away where silver light touched them. Through their damaged bond came something stronger than pain - fierce triumph tangled with desperate urging. Yes, Thorne's essence sang. Finally, you understand.

“Silas!” Kai's warning came too late.

The shadow entity's final assault hit like physical force, corrupted magic filling every molecule of air. Darkness reached for them with horrible familiarity, wearing Thorne's stolen knowledge of exactly how to hurt them most.

The sword exploded with light as Silas met the attack head-on. Silver fire spiraled up the blade, matching the patterns that still glowed beneath Thorne's corrupted skin. Each strike burned away more darkness, not just cutting but purifying what it touched.

In this moment of extremis, with corruption trying to tear reality apart, Silas felt something impossible through their nearly-broken bond: Thorne wasn't just fighting anymore.

He was winning.

Every wave of shadow that crashed through him became another point of light, another chance to reach back through darkness. The entity's desperate attempts to break their connection only made it stronger, purer, more impossible to corrupt. The sword sang with each blow, its light growing brighter as their bond strengthened.

Their eyes met across the maelstrom - storm gray finding forest green beneath layers of shadow. In that shared gaze lay perfect understanding: some bonds couldn't be broken because they chose each other knowing darkness might come.