Chapter 34

The morning after the fourth thread broke, Black Thickett woke as if nothing was, or had been, out of the ordinary.

It was the first thing Edmund noticed as he stepped out of Agnes’ cottage. The village looked entirely mundane. Smoke lifted from chimneys in thin, untroubled spirals. A milk crate sat on a door step, bottles slick with dew. Somewhere, a radio allowed soft music to linger on the air through an open window. Even the birds seemed louder than they had been for days, hopping along rooftops as if reclaiming ground.

Normal.

Disconcertingly so.

Malcolm walked beside him, his hands deep in his pockets, his shoulders loose in a way Edmund had not seen before. Will trailed behind, smoking despite Agnes’s pointed warning about lungs and lingering curses.

“You’ll feel strange for a while,” Malcolm said. “Empty. Or heavy. Or both. Folks who survive a Binding need time to settle.”

Edmund nodded. His chest still ached where the forest had lived. It wasn’t a pain, exactly. It was more like the memory of a faded bruise, with the cause forgotten and no business hurting anymore.

The Black Swann stood ahead, unchanged. The same warped windows. The same strange, weathered sign creaking gently on its chains. The roof might never have collapsed. Roots might never have torn through it. Repairs had been made quickly, quietly, and without conversation.

The village had endured worse.

Inside, the pub was warm. A simple warmth that evoked cosiness and welcoming. Edmund felt the difference at once. The air did not hush at his presence or curl around him. It simply existed, there to be breathed.

Malcolm guided him to a table near the hearth and Will sat beside him.

“Sit. I’ll fetch coffee.”

Edmund didn’t argue. He and neither the strength nor inclination. His legs still felt unreliable. He watched the fire dance around the logs, seeing the colour and shadow shifts in his peripheral vision, without turning to view them directly. It was, simply, the fire. Nothing more sinister. No sounds carried from the walls to interrupt or steal the crackling of logs.

When Malcolm returned with the mug, Edmund wrapped both hands around it, bracing himself for the familiar tremor.

It didn’t come.

He held the mug steady. Lifted it. Drank. The heat spread through him slowly, natural and earned.

Malcolm smiled faintly.

“Better?”

“Yeah,” Edmund said, surprised to find it true.

For a moment, the world simplified itself. Coffee. Fire. The low murmur of villagers exchanging greetings. A morning like countless others. A couple of men playing dominoes, but with mugs beside them rather than pint glasses.

Then the door opened.

It was only a fraction, long enough for cold air to slip across the floorboards. No one stood entered. Malcolm frowned and crossed to check the latch, muttering about draughts. Will watched from his seat, his eyes narrowed, saying nothing.

Edmund turned back toward the hearth.

From beyond the pub garden came a faint rustle. A shifting of branches. Something settling. The sort of sound most would dismiss without thought.

He did not.

There was no pull or whisper. There was only attention, old and eternally patient. It was a reminder that the forest did not forget those who’d slipped its hold.

Malcolm returned, shutting the door firmly.

“Nothing out there,” he said, though the uncertainty lingered in his voice.

Edmund nodded and took another sip of coffee. He was still steady. It was still warm.

Life in Black Thickett, it seemed, had returned to its familiar rhythms.

Yet as the morning light filled the pub, Edmund could not shake the sense that the forest had not retreated. It had only stepped back. It was still watching. Still waiting.

And, somewhere among the trees, something moved, as subtle as a root turning in newly disturbed soil.

It was not finished. Not yet.

Edmund lowered the mug. Perhaps it was only the wind.

Perhaps.

Still,he kept his eyes on the treeline long after the fire had settled and his mugwas emptied, just in case.

Here’s the second Epilogue I wrote for Black Thickett. I was torn between the two, but went with the other. I hope you agree!