Wren turns. This is, she privately admits, probably a bad idea — but so was taking a dead man's armour and quest-parchment and calling it a plan, so at least she's consistent. The white-barked corridor is there, pale and still, and The Watcher is still in it. It does not retreat. She walks toward it. Three steps. Four. It stays. She stops close enough to see what there is to see: a long charcoal coat, hands loose at its sides, and where a face should be — nothing. A pale, smooth oval. No eyes, no mouth. Just surface. It is watching her regardless. She doesn't know how she knows this, but she does. It has not reached for her. It has not blocked her path. It is simply present the way a question is present — patient, requiring an answer. Behind her, ten steps back in the clearing she has just left, the amber thread still breathes through the grate.