AI The air in Richmond Park was thick with the promise of rain, and the scent of damp earth and crushed grass clung to Rory’s boots. Ahead, between two gnarled oaks that seemed to lean toward each other in conspiracy, stood the circle of standing stones . They weren’t stone at all, she realized as she drew closer, but ancient, petrified wood, their surfaces whorled with patterns that looked less like bark and more like frozen, silent music.
“This is the place,” Isolde said, her voice a soft chime. The Half-Fae seer moved ahead of them, her silver hair a beacon in the grey afternoon. She left no imprint in the soft ground, a detail that made the back of Rory’s neck prickle.
Nyx flowed beside her, their form a concentrated patch of evening in the daylight, edges shimmering like heat haze. “The boundary is… pliable here,” they whispered, the sound seeming to come from just behind Rory’s left ear. “It tastes of old magic and regret.”
Rory’s fingers found the Heartstone pendant beneath her jacket. It was cool, inert. This wasn’t a Hel gate. This was something else. The Fae-Forged Blade, a weight at her hip in a borrowed sheath, felt no different either, just its perpetual, soothing cold. She took a steadying breath, the one she used before stepping into a crowded courtroom or a silent, hostile flat. Cool-headed. Think.
“What do we do? Just walk through?” she asked.
Isolde turned, her lavender eyes holding a light that didn’t come from the clouded sky. “You must want to see. Truly. The grove does not welcome the indifferent.” She stepped between two of the oak-stones and simply faded, as if the shadows there had drunk her in.
Nyx glanced at Rory, their violet gaze unreadable . “After you, mortal.”
Right. Rory squared her shoulders and walked toward the gap. For a moment, there was only the pressure of a strong wind against her face, the smell of ozone, and a dizzying sense of vertigo, as if she’d missed a step in the dark. Then she was through.
The sound changed first. The distant hum of London traffic, the chatter of birds in the park—it all vanished, replaced by a profound , living silence . Not an absence of sound, but a blanket of it: the gentle sigh of moving air, the soft, liquid drip of moisture, a faint, melodic humming that seemed to come from the earth itself .
Then the light. It was the golden, honeyed light of a perpetual late afternoon, but source-less. No sun, no sky as she knew it. Above was a canopy of impossible leaves in shades of copper, amethyst, and deep, heartwood green, filtering the glow. The air was warm and carried a fragrance that made her head spin—jasmine, ripe peach, damp moss, and something spicy, like cinnamon and starlight.
“Oh,” Rory breathed, the word swallowed by the grove .
They stood in a clearing carpeted with moss so vibrant and green it looked soft as velvet . Wildflowers bloomed in reckless, perfect profusion: bell-shaped blossoms of indigo, star-shaped flowers that glittered with dewdrops, and curling vines heavy with fat, golden berries. The standing stones formed a perfect circle behind them, but looking back, the park was gone . Through the arches, she saw only more of the grove, stretching away in confusing, beautiful perspectives.
Nyx solidified fully beside her, their shadow-form gaining strange definition in the magical light. They held up a hand, examining it. “The shadows here are not shadows,” they murmured. “They are… memories of light. It is disconcerting.”
Isolde was waiting a few paces away, standing by a pool of water so clear it seemed not to be there at all, just a hole in the world filled with the reflection of the glowing canopy. “Time rests lightly here,” she said. “An hour may be a minute in your London. Or a day. The grove decides what you need.”
Rory moved forward, her boots sinking silently into the moss. She reached out and touched the petal of a nearby flower. It was cool and faintly resilient, like polished silk . “It’s real.”
“More real than the world you left, in some ways,” Isolde said. “This is a place of essence. Of truth. That is why liars and hollow men wither if they stay too long.”
A shiver that had nothing to do with temperature traced Rory’s spine. She thought of Evan, his charming smiles that never reached his eyes. He would have hated it here.
Curiosity, her old, relentless companion, pushed the unease aside. She walked toward the pool. Kneeling at its edge, she saw her own reflection—her straight black hair, her bright blue eyes wide with wonder. Then the image rippled and changed. For a heartbeat, she saw herself older, wearier, a scar on her cheek that wasn’t there, holding the Fae blade aloft against a sky the colour of burnt amber. She jerked back, falling onto the moss.
“The waters show not what is, but what may be,” Isolde said, not unkindly . “Fragments. Possibilities. Do not be anchored by them.”
Nyx had drifted to the edge of the clearing, where the trees grew denser. “There are paths,” they observed. “They shift when I look at them.”
Rory stood, brushing off her jeans. She approached Nyx, and together they peered into the woodland. Indeed, what looked like a clear path between two silver-barked trees seemed to curve away the moment she tried to focus on its destination. Another, overhung with weeping vines of sapphire flowers, appeared to her left.
“The grove leads you where it wills,” Isolde said, joining them. “You sought knowledge. Understanding of the Veil that you have brushed against. So look.”
Rory forced herself to be still, to stop trying to *solve * the grove like a puzzle. She just listened. She felt the cool weight of the blade, saw the way the unnatural light played over Nyx’s form, making the shadows they were made of seem deeper and more profound . She thought of the Heartstone’s warm pulse in the presence of Hel’s energy, a sensation absent here. This was a different kind of magic. Older. Less about consumption, like Dymas, and more about… being.
“This is a tear,” she said slowly, working it out. “But not a torn one. A… woven one. A place where the Veil was made to be thin on purpose.”
Isolde’s lips curved in the faintest smile. “The mortal sees. The Veil is not a wall. It is a tapestry . In some places, the weave is tight and strong. In others, worn. In others still, threads from different realms were deliberately knotted together. This grove is such a knot.”
As she spoke, a soft light began to emanate from the Fae-Forged Blade at Rory’s hip. She drew it, and the slender moonsilver dagger glowed with a gentle, moonlike radiance. The vines near her trembled , and the sapphire flowers turned their faces toward the light.
“It remembers its home,” Nyx whispered, a note of longing in their wind-voice .
A new path suddenly clarified before them, not shifting away. It led to a small, natural archway formed from the intertwined branches of two trees. Through it, Rory could see a smaller clearing where a single, colossal flower grew, its petals closed tight like a fist of opal and pearl.
“The grove offers a gift,” Isolde said. “Or a test. They are often the same.”
Rory sheathed the blade, its glow fading. She looked at Nyx, who gave a slight, shadowy nod. Together, with Isolde gliding behind, they walked the offered path. The air grew sweeter, heavier. The melodic humming grew louder, resolving into something almost like a wordless song.
The opal flower was the size of a armchair, rooted in a patch of pure white crystal . As they approached, it began to unfurl, each petal moving with a soft, crystalline sound. In its centre, on a cushion of shimmering pollen, rested a single, perfect acorn, carved from what looked like solid moonlight .
“A seed of a World Tree,” Isolde breathed, true awe in her voice for the first time. “A memory of a time before the Veil was fully woven.”
Rory felt no desire to take it. It felt too vast, too sacred. This wasn’t a trinket or a tool. It was a piece of a world.
“Why show us this?” she asked.
“Because you carry a blade that can cut wards, and walk with a spirit born of a torn Veil,” Isolde said. “The grove shows you what was lost, so you may understand the fragility of what remains. The Veil weakens where it is not remembered. It fails where it is not respected.”
The opal flower slowly began to close again, hiding the luminous acorn from sight. The path behind them was still there, leading back to the standing stones. The audience, it seemed, was over.
The wonder of the place was now underpinned by a deep, resonant unease. The beauty was not for them. It was a reminder . A lesson etched in living light and shadow. As they walked back through the arch of trees, Rory felt the grove’s attention lift from her, like the sun moving behind a cloud. The silence felt less like peace and more like a held breath.
They passed the vision-pool, now showing only the reflection of the leaves. They reached the circle of petrified oaks.
“Time,” Nyx said suddenly , their voice taut. “How long?”
Isolde stepped through the boundary first. “Come and see.”
Rory followed, the transition less dizzying this time, a slipping from a dream back into a familiar , if greyer, reality. The cold, damp air of the park hit her like a slap. The sky was still overcast, the light the same flat grey as when they’d entered.
Nyx coalesced beside her, a tense column of darkness. Rory fumbled for her phone. The lock screen showed the time. Only twenty minutes had passed. She let out a long, shaky breath that misted in the chill air.
But when she looked down, she saw it. Clutched in her left hand, pressed so hard the impression was etched into her skin, was not the luminous acorn. It was a single, perfect petal from the opal flower, now the colour of dull pearl, its edges faintly glowing. She had no memory of picking it up.
The grove had given its gift after all. Or its marker. She tucked the petal into her inner pocket, next to the cool, silent Heartstone. The wonder and the unease were now hers to carry, out here where time moved in only one direction, and the Veil was just a faint, forgotten shimmer in the air.