Wren makes herself hold still — a harder trick in borrowed armor than it sounds, since the pauldrons want to shift and the sword hilt wants to be drawn, and everything about the Thornwood wants her to run. "What is it?" she asks, low, eyes on the tree-line. "The shape in the trees." The brook woman is quiet in the way of someone who knows the answer and is deciding how much of it to give away. "Old," she says. "It has walked the edges of this wood longer than the road. It watches travelers." A small pause. "Mostly it just watches." The word *mostly* lands in the mist between them like a dropped stone. "And when it doesn't just watch?" Wren says. The brook woman looks at her — really looks, at the faded sigil on the breastplate, at Wren's hand on the hilt. "When someone carries *that* mark into the Thornwood," she says carefully, "it tends to follow."