thethorneverse

[thethorneverse]

Dawn Blueday:

The One Who Tends to Concrete Cracks

She crouches where the wild things refuse to die—between city blocks, beneath forgotten benches, and along the edges of parking lots where moss dares to rise.

A First Lighter, she’s here for the truth growing through fracture.

She is a guardian of overlooked resilience, a midwife to the small defiant miracles that bloom from concrete scars. Her presence is felt in any place cracked by pressure but not destroyed—where something green still finds a way. She tends to those sprouts. She nourishes them wherever a sidewalk cracks and something finds a way.

What Does She Do?

Nurtures Growth in the Broken. She blesses the stubborn flora that take root in impossible places. Vines through fences. Ferns in stairwells. Daisies in sidewalks.

Hears the Hurt:

She listens to the emotional echoes soaked into cement. She's drawn to the weight of old steps and the ache of those who feel forgotten. If your life has ever felt like it was cracking underfoot, you might have felt her watching.

Plants Dreams:

Her touch seeds silent hope. A dream might come to you after standing barefoot on a broken curb, and you'll never know she passed by.

Appearance

Her look is earthy urban:

Wings like bruised monarchs and late-summer skies.

Hair like the edge of a stormcloud split by light.

Clothes for movement, not beauty—yet she is still breathtaking in her authenticity.

Always crouched, one hand to the ground, like she’s listening.

Because she is.

Show her respect.

Draw in chalk. Even crude lines.

Water the weeds. Whisper a thanks when you see something refuse to die in the cracks. That's enough.

[thethorneverse]

Bloomsprung

These are urban fae but they love the romance of public Rose gardens and botanicals in human cities and they prefer those with romantic ambience like Paris, anything in Italy, parts of NYC and any well populated places with ornate architecture and some fragrant sprawling parks loaded with floral attractions.

These fae were the ones to inspire artists and writers who inadvertently gave humankind the mistaken impression that fae are tiny and cute and maybe slightly spunky (but sweet overall!) in general personality.

Not even the bloomsprung are all those things but they fake it pretty well ….for a while.

Physical: they are usually blonde or redheaded and prefer to wear their luxurious tresses long (longer than their hips and sometimes much longer still) with eyes that put off the faint but clear light of obsessive love. Add a sprinkle of freckles across the nose and cheeks that match the fired color of the monarch butterfly wings they have grown from their back (and which serve transportation purposes for them being fully functional wings)– and you have what seems like a classic fairy Mr Disney would've approved of. 

They are always under 18 inches in height, more often they're about 9.5 inches tall, each with voluptuous female figures as they all appear to be female and most would identify themselves as female individually. But in actuality they have no true gender as they are egg layers who are also self fertilizing. They have zero use for breeding. Gender is something they choose or not. It is a fashion statement for these tiny fae. 

–Which some think might have led to their preoccupation with love and romantic notions of all sorts.

Essence: obsessive love isn't love at all and it's remarkably dangerous. That is the madness of the Bloomsprung.

Perhaps one day in some public place you will lean down to smell the roses and discover a beautiful little woman is there napping or just reveling in the day's beauty. She will put you at ease about the absurdity of the situation and do some minor lash batting. She'll give you a tiny but dazzling smile and you'll part ways bemused but almost intoxicated with ease and a calm certainty that it's not all as strange as it would sound if you tried to tell it.

But by morning she will be at your window weeping with her anguished little heart and it's unrequited love. She will be you to let her inside and to match her love for you with love of your own.

If you let her inside or not doesn't matter ultimately because it will only go downhill from there whatever way.

The obsession the Bloomsprung springs will not be a feeling anyone could match fae or human. It's not love as the fairy will insist. It's lust, obsession, mania and a possessive madness at best but that combo is very deadly and when the Bloomsprung it is likely to increase in intensity until the Bloomsprung has destroyed your worldly possessions and driven you to sincere breakdown.

It is also believed to be mostly insincere affection and when you've cracked the tiny thing will recover instantly. She's off to the public gardens to do it all again with another true love.

Talisman uses:

This fae has 2 types of talisman. The fist is to ward against their obsession. You can wear it to make yourself unappealing to this fae ir to repel when they're already crying and breaking things.  They *usually*work both ways. 

The 2nd talisman is made by the Bloomsprung to summon them.

Why would you?

Well.

This fae is renowned for a love potion that is said never to fail. It doesn't manufacture genuine love but obsession is often more enduring anyway.

If summoned the Bloomsprung will expect you to be requesting the potion and they'll want to barter. Their prices are usually paid in chocolate or flower petals but a vial of Spring dew is another favorite. 

Warning:They will not return to help you when you're realize how dangerous obsession is and want to reverse the potion.

[thethorneverse]

The Sagittarii

They of Loaded Fates

Type: High Fae, forged in pact with Time and Vow itself

Nature:

The Sagittarii don't believe they're born Sagittarii although many are born to Sagittarii parents. They believe they are chosen— by the Arrowmaker's Flame and the Bow of Oaths.

And so with that in mind Sagittarii must take vows when they come of age in order to continue their education. The Sagittarii education is beyond rigorous. It's a life-long devotion and it penetrates the deepest theories of barely understood magic.

Not every born Sagittarii becomes a true Sagittarii. The Sagittarii as an institution also recruit and then educate other fae who exhibit certain characteristics and qualities early in their lives. They will eventually take vows of service from these outsiders when they deem them talented and wise enough to make the vow.

They claim that if a human presented the same qualities they would extend themselves to the human but as of yet, according to the elder Sagittarii, this has never happened.

To join the Sagittarii is to give up one's birth story, in any case, and to devote all the days of one's life to the Sagittarii cause and to mastering The Craft. It's a pledge to one day become the weapon you committed yourself to when your use as a craftsman has ended.

They give incoming pledges new names and those Sagittarii are never directly in contact with family or friends from their earlier life. Who a Sagittarii was before they were recruited is left behind entirely when they become someone new.

A Sagittarii.

Appearance:

Sagittarii all wear monk-like robes of a light shimmering material that seems to rearrange itself as they move. They are all also heavily armed and tend to wear a partial mask that conceal roughly 60% of the face. The eyes they leave uncovered are gold or a dark green or the combination of those colors.

They're approximately human sized. Slightly taller than humans on average as natural Sagittarii (born to Sagittarii parents) will mostly stand around six and a half feet and as tall as seven feet but only rarely.

They have a muscular build, lean but cut sharp like ballet dancers or yoga fanatics.

Natural Sagittarii are all built like this regardless of gender and because they live such secular and disciplined lives they often exhibit no obvious character traits that might indicate gender in people or other fae. This trait also resembles some type of religious order.

Within their culture gender is unacknowledged as are most other traits of individuality. All traits but one: the craft. The spellwork that goes into their arrows is nothing but individuality. It's deep, intimate magic.

The Sagittarii Arrow

The Sagittarii make arrows that are oftentimes single-use realities.

Each arrow they craft is a stunningly powerful spell, a mindful prophecy, and a resolved demand. Flesh and bone are inferior targets for the weaponry of the Sagittarii. Any metalsmith could undo a body with their craft.

The Sagittarii arrow aims instead for threads. Fate lines. Bloodlines. Destiny, reliant on the past to secure certain versions of the future. Possibility. Probability.

"Our arrows do not miss but you won't comprehend the target when we take aim."

Crafting Lore:

Every Sagittarii crafts only one bow in their lifetime. That bow becomes part of them. If it breaks, they do too.

They inscribe arrows in the bone language, using marrow ink, silence, and cosmic intent. Each arrow is one-of-a-kind. Some can only be fired once the target has spoken a specific word. Some only fire at the moment a promise is broken or a version of the self is shed.

They don’t mass-produce. Their trade is slow, sacred, and painfully expensive— measured in years, emotions, or something worse.

Caste Structure:

1. The Drawn – apprentices, youthful Sagittarii, their bodies half-etched in vow runes.

2. The Notched – full arrowcrafters; all their memories are committed to their fletching archives.

3. The Let-Go – veterans who no longer make arrows become arrows themselves. They are bound in enchanted stasis until their spirit is called upon to be fired as a potent living missile into time-critical moments. Once they willingly answer that soul call and are loaded into an arrow their soul will be fired as part of that deep magic. Their bodies vanish of their own accord. No avowed Sagittarii has died by nature, happenstance or violence for over seven hundred years .

The Sagittarii do not believe The Let-Go will ever die. They become bound by spirit, on levels deeper and broader than any magic alone could be, to the very threads of time and fate itself.

4. The Quivermind – a rare Sagittarii who can hold multiple arrow-fates in their spirit at once without unraveling. These are the true leaders. And they’re insane.

Rules of the Sagittarii Craft:

A Sagittarii may not fire their own arrow. While they are excellent archers it is considered a conflict of interests.

-A Sagittarii must never retrieve an arrow once given no matter who has exchanged for it or what they intend to use the arrow for.

-If an arrow is left unfired too long, however, they MUST retrieve it. Or suffer unraveling themself.

-Only the maker of a Sagittarii bow may use it.

-the Sagittarii Craft in terms of specific technique, study, magical theory or any other description is not to be shared with outsiders. Ever.

-High skill is equal to high prices and the Sagittarii live by this shrewd business minded philosophy as much as they do to their code of ethics or the secrecy of their kind.

[thethorneverse]

Shardsharp Black

The Widow of the Shard. Mourner of Eternity & breaker of Mirrors

"Revenge is only petty if you lack imagination and have no ambition!"

Shardsharp was once a humble Potter, a fae who spun life’s joys into magical concentrates held in the delicate vessels of her people’s magic. (Pots, hence the name potters )

Grief is alchemy though and when Shardsharp's Lifelove abandoned eternity for a Luna's false light and the perils of following that light? He left her with a shattered vow, and the echoes of his betrayal burned into her heart, turning a talented Potter into something unrecognizable.

Now even her name has become unstable, magically explosive.

Tainted Magic

The rage that swirls within her seeps into her craft. The once-perfect sealed pots she was so well loved for making perfectly now crack beneath her touch. The life-magic trapped within leaks like blood or like tears you fight but eventually they spill. Her grief surges outward in waves of shattering power — mirrors, windows, even polished steel or stone sometimes if it's too reflective -- all fracture at her approach. The sight of her reflection, of her changed expression and her agony visible in the eyes, ruptures her soul all over again every time as though it were the first. Everything nearby pays the penalty.

Summoning

You do not summon Shardsharp Black lightly.

1st you must procure her middle name.

2nd Do not say the name until every reflective surface is veiled in heavy black mourning cloth.

BE WARNED⚠️

Shardsharp Black cannot abide the sight of her own singular condition reflected in a mirror. The grief in her own eyes is enough to shatter every reflective glass or mirror for miles around and when she discovers that you've been the fool to rip the scabs off her wounds?

Expect:

Shattering would be a relief for you compared to what Shardsharp will put you through. She will exact a very steep price and you'll have no choice but to agree. You may thereafter find you're a halflife slave to the widow. More substantial than a ghost but a long way from the living.

Never meet her eye because the eye she looks into may reflect her image as well .

Tread carefully.

Shardsharp Black is often accompanied by a warbling shadow that may be the reflective nature of one such soul who failed to observe her customs or it may be the widow's own reflection bobbing behind where she won't see it. Nobody knows for sure. Better to be safe though and veil with care, either way. Especially if you seek her assistance.

Cover every reflective surface completely and thoroughly before attempting to summon the widow.

FIRST STEPS

Shardsharp is dangerous and her name will only be had through a black market of sorts- another dangerous undertaking- unless the name is inherited by a blood relative (your step parent or cousin twice removed will not be able to utter the name should they know it. Magically sealed!) Or if it's given by the widow herself. ( Not a chance!)

Her full name must be spoken — including her carefully guarded middle name, known only to those who’ve bartered with the worst kind of desperation.

If you're preparing to summon her you'll likely need to summon someone or some thing even less pleasant first. Someone who specifically deals in possession of and trade in Names. We will not advise on that here as it is your own responsibility to manage the Name and its procurement. The mission may become quite dangerous though and we don't advise newbies to Thorne to attempt this alone. Names tradesmen are very much a low criminal element.

The Trade Off

The price she will ask of you will be one memory of one time when you kept a promise at a steep personal sacrifice. She'll keep the memory and it'll be no longer a part of you. It's lessons will no longer help to shape your character.

Shardsharp appears for negotiation where broken promises, betrayed oaths and defiled vows demand a price be paid. This fae will become the debt collector if she wants to and if you offer her something near and dear in exchange for her help.

In exchange for your one valuable memory?

She will act with savage righteousness against those who've betrayed sacred trust they entered into with you.

It's personal for the widow but everything is business ...even when it's personal. Because everything is personal too for the widow.

The Spellwork

Shardsharp Black specializes in cutting the not-so-fine line between truth and lies. The one who betrayed your trust or broke their vow to you will find that they can hear the truth all around them even when those around them lie outloud.

They will find that everyone's truth is now a second voice heard only by them.

Mirrors will also ice over in their presence and if they attempt to clear away the cold fog the glass will shatter and begin a domino effect of breaking glass in every room they enter.

They will soon be driven mad by honesty as it becomes a cocophany and if they think they'll seek solitude to escape the tide of contradiction coming from everywhere they'll be disappointed. When they find a little quiet time, Shardsharp's curse will really heat up. That's when the whispers become their own voice and they are assaulted by all the lies they've told and the betrayals they are guilty of.

Every word they've ever uttered that was false will come for them in the silent spaces they call sanctuary. It'll be their own plasticity that drives them raving most likely - some even try to escape their own mind the hard way.

There is no time limit to how long the torment continues. A contract being what it is to the fae-- your ex will die and at that point the spell will finally expire. Never before.

They don't usually die of a natural old age though, the subjects of Shardsharp's vengeance.

[thethorneverse]

The Emberkin

These are A childlike fae born in the embers of nearly burnt-out fires and nursed on hope-laced regrets. Old flames and nostalgic romance are weaknesses of this fae and romantic love is its specialty.

The emberkin can't resist answering a call from human or fae. The desire to hear your love story overrides all else for them and inevitably they'll agree to help you rekindle that old flame or put a fired match to one that's unrequited.

The exchange:

Love at what cost?

All you have to do is tell your story of love and tell it well (it doesn't take any embellishment because the emberkin are easily pleased by love, in general). You'll also have to promise the tiny spark of a fairy an invite to the wedding in exchange for the Emberkin's help to make your romantic ambitions become a reality. . .Not to worry though -your guests will think the Emberkin gathered at your wedding are fireflies if you plan for a dusk ceremony outdoors. In fact it'll heighten the romantic ambiance and poeple will speak of it for years to come as the only wedding they've attended where they felt like the entire assemblage were falling in love with love as they observed the ceremony.

Emberkin never come alone. They travel in swarms of tiny (but bright ) flickering lights.

Advice for smooth transaction:

Emberkin are easily sidetracked even as a colony and are likelier to get the job done in a timely fashion if you offer them an incentive when the work is completed.

A particularly good incentive is to promise them some driftwood for the fire when they return to you with good results. They absolutely go flickering mad for that gem bright firelight burning green and they manage to keep it in mind when they sey out, halving the wait time for their spells to do their work. S'mores make a great backup plan if you can't pay in driftwood.

Just make certain you can deliver because a swarm of angry Emberkin, even small as they may be, can leave scars deeper than your skin. After all, love hurts like hell sometimes.

A note on Love Magic:

No fae, godling, spirit, goblin or troll can manufacture genuine love. It's considered by those of and in thorne to be the only divinity that's universal across all fae, human and spiritual life forms.

We all love and do so in a way that's unpredictable, unique and embedded with our essence. That cannot be replicated by any known magic.

Emberkin are pure with very little malicious intent and have never been known to tinker with the mind or its deepest darkest chambers. They wouldn't imagine making such waste of effort.

Obsession can be manufactured. Obsession is purely about thought and ego and those are easily exploited by fae magic by a number of types of Fae.

This is not how the emberkin operate though.

The Emberkin magic merely draws the attention of the one you have been burning for back on to you. It reminds them, by seeming happenstance, of things they like about you or small memories you share.

The Emberkin are skilled at reminders, serendipity, "coincidences". Maybe you'll be having your lunch in a diner and in the old flame will walk, having been through a series of lunch mishaps that took them across town to some little place they've never been, wouldn't have normally have ever seen ...

If your old flame is from schooldays for instance? He or she may wake to see an old yearbook somehow fallen from the bookshelf and lay open to the page where your picture was printed. As they pick the book up an old love note might fall from between two pages and it's your sentiment and your signature front and center.

The Emberkin.

They don't create love out of nothing. They tweak the circumstances in your favor though and they make room for you to roll the dice. Be ready to do your part though because the driftwood isn't contingent on you saying "I do".

"All you need is a little firelight to flatter your memory!"

[thethorneverse]

Mensir & Fugaria The Twins of Tetherment

Once high courtiers in the Court of Whim, these fae were split by the constant mortal push and pull. To keep safe or to live free? To seek your bliss or to be responsible? Practical or wild?

Cursed to embody prudence and recklessness respectively, the twins drift through the urban landscape, invisible to most, choosing humans like puppeteers picking dolls.

When they pick you, your life becomes a game — you never know if you're following wisdom or unraveling and you don't realize you're being influenced most of the time.

If you've ever seen the imagery of an angel on one shoulder and a devil on the other? You are at least passingly familiar with these twins and the way their images have been branded into humanity over centuries of what is- to the twins - pleasure sport.

They are impossible to summon on purpose… unless you know the Rhyme of Reversal and stitch it into a piece of clothing.

Then, the game begins and with proper use of this charm, you'll find yourself in the rare position of becoming a conspirator with these wicked fae.

Betrayed? heartbroken? Mad as hell? Point them at your enemy and watch even the coolest and calmest of them make their way to the asylum within weeks –or maybe within months if they're strong and/or if the enjoyment the twins are getting out of the interaction makes them want to stretch it out. They like to play with their food.

Be Warned: you'll need to be certain the person you're sending the twins for truly deserves it because they cannot be called back if you change your mind.

And another warning: do not botch the reversal magic or the only one visiting the psych wing will be you. The twins don't discriminate and if you've called them to yourself, drawn their eyes toward yourself without proper protection …you'll be fair game

[thethorneverse]

The Potters of Thorne

The Potters are not called such because they make earthenware. What they make is magic (which they have sometimes stored in little jars or “pots") and they are known to barter the little pots of magic in exchange for various interests. Each has his/her own exchange rate.

These are fae who by nature first and then reinforced by runes and magical bindings, have always been bound for life to one another when partnered. This and tightly cast spell work is what they are widely known for.

Birth and Lifespan: Potters are especially long lived even among the fae. They easily live eons before growing tired and finally planning their own return to the cocoon from which they do not usually return. There is folklore among various fae about this and it's generally agreed that in a high up, frozen, lonely place there are thousands of the Potter’s large cocoons in the treetops of the most ancient and powerful trees on earth. It's not agreed upon where this might happen but all seem sure that there are cocoons and in each of these there is a fairy who's gone into a willful stasis.

They also use the cocoon their parents wove for them (from raw innocent magic and the promise of love) all their long lives at various times. It's a haven to retreat to when they need to sleep deeply- this involves decades sometimes. In such long lives they encounter periods like this, exhausted and suffering blocks in their spell work. They take refuge always in the same cocoon.

That's a “natural death“ for a Potter which isn't death at all. Theoretically that which enters stasis may begin to develop again and will reawaken.

The Potters have, on occasion, died by violence and/or been rendered magically irretrievable but this is a very rare occurrence.

Appearance: The Potters have a slight build and are airy in their paleness with white or palest blue/violet hair and porcelain skin covered in almost transparent runes that glimmer silver when the light touches them just right. The older the potter the more heavily runed as the first is applied at their emergence from the 4ft tall chrysalis. They are not quite human height with the tallest around 4 ½ ft tall but all Potters are very thin and possess a pair of bird type wings, similar to a cardinal or crow.

General Environment: They live typically in icy climates like the Andes or Siberia but they can live anywhere.

Nature:

Nocturnal as well but they have no allergy to the daylight.

The Potters suffer grief in extremes if they lose their partner especially but also in all matters of the heart- family and friendship, in business dealings (barters), community commitments etc.--they're fierce.

These fae cannot lie but some of their kind are devious enough to take pleasure in learning the art of dishonest truth telling, speaking in riddle sometimes or leaving out critical detail. For a potter it is agony beyond agony for both parties if promises are broken, vows are set aside or if a lie were somehoe told explicitly (--that last part is pure theory because no potter has ever told a direct lie).

Truth telling :

This relates to another human awareness- the myth that all fae are bound and cannot tell a lie. This is untrue of most fae types but all The Potter's promises are magically sealed, every word they speak is magically enhanced upon it's enunciation and so is guaranteed to be the truth.

You cannot confuse honesty with integrity in the case of some Potters. Some have a great deal of character but others.... not so much. The potters are like humans in their broad variety .

And sometimes, at great personal expense, they do find workarounds on the truth telling.

Warnings: use your best judgements when interacting with potters. They can be very virtuous or very devious and it can be tricky determining which is which with them.

They may withhold important information or tell you half truths in your barter contract and you may not know until you pry the top off your little jar of magic only to find the magic within it is very dark indeed.

[thethorneverse]

Hollowheart the Rootless: guardian of the lost forest

(Once called Corrick)

The story the fae know and tell says (with no doubt at all) that before the time of men and women and humans in general, when even the ancient branches of the fae family trees were childlike still, there was another type of being.

They were unpredictable in form and character even to the wild fae. These were partly magical like the fae of Thorne but they were also earthen. They weren't immortal but some of them were close to it. These beings attached their spirit to the earth and if they attached it well to nearly immortal things, their own lifespan was bound to eons as well.

Among these was a boy called Corrick, newly minted by the Elder Souls. Corricks' favorite slice of his new life was when he was given leave to just sit and listen to the Elder Souls tell histories and tall tales.Grandfather's stories were the very best of them all. Corricks' grandfather was bound to an ancient gnarled tree with roots a mile deep if you believed the common talk. Grandfather's Soul Tree sustained for thousands of years and was still rooted deep, very strong when Corrick came into existence. Or so Corrick and everyone else believed.

They all thought almost casually that Grandfather would live for always. But the tree seemed to grow sick overnight and so did Grandfather.

The wise women convened to pool their communal knowing of trees and healing magic. By that night the Soul Tree's massive trunk was etched with the runes of Corricks' poeple. The runes hummed and their silvery color became a light that fluctuated constantly.

And still there was no improvement in the tree nor was there healing in Grandfather. Finally, Time came to collect them as both the tree and Corricks' beloved grandfather had expired. Their span elapsed.

But Corrick could not and wouldn't accept Time’s decree. He was horrified by his kinsmen who accepted Time as the ultimate accountant and who saw Time as a force not to be contradicted – who saw Time as law. Corrick decided then he would never bow down to Time or break bread with those who would.

So he ran away from his kinsmen and sought to outrun Time itself.

He found a mystical little patch of forest far from his people and from the fae too and it was with this forest that he made his spirit bond– not to a single tree but to the whole lot of them and every living thing on, in or beneath the trees.

Corrick used the magic of the forest -which was now also his own- to make them invisible. The forest and he himself were so well concealed that they could never be plotted on any map or discovered by magical means. The trees of his forest all emitted the faint glow of the runes Corrick had learned before he ran away. They were all there to protect and hide Corrick.

But Time hates to be made a fool of and takes insult very seriously.

Time was beyond offended that a mere boy thought that he could escape what everyone else was beholden to. And so, with no effort whatsoever, Time appeared in Corricks' forest. Time announced to Corrick and the listening trees that the intent was to collect Corrick ahead of schedule.

“Because Time is Time's prerogative, idiot boy!” Was the reply when young Corrick dared to ask why his allotted time had expired so soon.

But Corrick was a rebel all the way through and he stood his ground with idealism and pomp only the very young can manage. "I'll never bow to you!" He declared even as Time closed the distance between them with menace and a swirling of blackness lighter than air but worn like a cloak by a divine spirit who had no face. The darkness fell as though there were a body there wearing it and and it swept up dry leaves as time moved in toward the arrogant child.

“Do you imagine that I require your consent to collect your debt?!"

Corrick was pinned to a nearby tree in a flash so bright and fast that lightning would envy it. He was looking into the folds of darkness cloaking the area that should have been a face just a few inches from his own. No breath came to his skin from the mouth of Time. There was nothing within the black folds but more black folds and seeing that made Corricks' pulse jackhammer and he couldn't help struggling. He flailed his feet and legs uselessly for a few moments before realizing the futility.

He resolving to be silent. He would not have Time making a fool of him if he could stop it.

He told his heart to slow down it's galloping and reached onto the depths of himself for the magic stored there. It soothed him instantly, created peace where none should be, but it didn't shake off the grip Time held him with. That could be accomplished by no magic he possessed.

Time gave him a shake and laughed a booming sound that blew back Corrick’s hair but carried no promise of high spirits.

“I've changed my mind," Time declared and there was a joke in its invisibly coiling voice as the words wrapped Corrick tight and began to slowly squeeze.

“Corrick the Young!" Time decreed. "You'll be known from this moment forward by a new name: Hollowheart the Rootless! You will live without time and you will answer to nothing! But you'll have no one as the world turns and spans elapse for everything and everyone else!"

Time gave Corrick another shake as he struggled to understand what this statement could mean. But Time explained.

"You'll outlive your poeple and every being you make contact with from this day foward! You will know no Time. You'll know nothing but grief without context! The only voices you'll ever hear will be the lost and the damned calling out but even they won't choose to stay in your little rootless forest outside of time! Even runaways don't want what you're going to offer!”

And at that one invisible claw etched deep grooves into the place where Corrick's heart lived in his chest. “This," said Time, tucking Corrick's freshly plucked heart onto the folds of dark, as tho there were a pocket there. "This I'll keep. As a reminder."

The empty place was on fire as Time sealed it with an invisible finger and with that Corrick was cast out along with his powerful little forest. The light in the Lost Forest has been betweenlight ever since. The sun does not rise to nourish the wooded land or the river running through it. In fact the river is frozen as if the pause button were depressed and it was stopped even as the gentle rapids danced.

Corrick will not age there. He becomes more like the trees tho and when he wearies he sleeps. When he awakens from sweet dreams spun for him by the trees and from the lullaby of their kind, he finds vines thick as he is have overgrown him, wrapped him up. If there were time in Corricks' world he was sure a lot of it would have disappeared during his naps.

He doesn't sleep from exhaustion tho. He never tried . He just needed the comfort.

Sometimes Hollowheart hears the calls of the lost or those who are like him– runaways who want not to be found. These are the only souls he is able to connect to or communicate with in any way.

He offers them sure passage when they come near. He draws a map for the lost wanderer to get them home safe. In the case of runaways he makes an offer of hospitality.

Should he ever find you lost on purpose, he will be kind and offer that same sanctuary but beware. Hollowheart is twisted by a singular infinity and most of all by isolation. He may offer his help but with vague conditions.

He may privately hope you won't make it home if you choose not to stay with him in the Lost Forest - and nobody ever has accepted his invitation.

But The Rootless means no harm so it is advised that you be gentle with him. Do not assume that you can't break the heart of Hollowheart. His heart still shatters at every rejection and each shattering is one that Time gets a chuckle from, knowing that his punishment is still effective as the heart in his cloak radiates pain again and again.

Be compassionate if you happen to meat Hollowheart. Always give your kindest manner to those who live without time.

[thethorneverse]

The Dreamweaver

The Dreamweaver might haunt your sleep— but it does a lot more than that. It negotiates, trades, and manipulates destiny from within your dreams.

The Weaver may hear whispers of the future but it's likely to twist prophecies by weaving them prematurely into someone's tapestry, causing obsession, madness, or night terrors that lead inevitably to obsession and madness.

Dreamweaver plants illusion. The illusion is so deeply planted that it becomes reality.... Or perhaps you'll only believe it's reality.

Abilities: It can thread into a dreamer's mind and pull raw creative substance into patterns, using a mental loom. Dreams, memories, art, and emotion are its materials.

Nature: The Dreamweaver is not a fae in the traditional sense but Thorne is full of fae that will surprise you by their very nature.

The Dreamweaver exists in the deep unconscious, where symbols are currency and emotional gravity is law. It is part archivist, part predator and partly a child who just wants to know what happens when you do this thing or that one.

Weaknesses: Cannot process raw, chaotic emotion (especially grief or rage) without personal consequence.

Also bound by traditional gift-exchange laws: freely given items come with karmic baggage if not reciprocated properly.

Mortal Talisman Carriers: The talisman hums when near sleeping minds.Carries psychic residue—memories not your own, symbols that aren’t quite yours but feel familiar. Holding it too long may blur the dreamline—make a mortal susceptible to illusions, revelations, or even astral travels. Not always a great vacay.

Artists, Poets, Insomniacs: The Dreamweaver loves these. Feeds them images, muse whispers, unfinished riddles. May “sponsor” one for a time, like a fae patron—until they stop dreaming for themselves and become just another spool on the loom.

Children & Sleepwalkers: Can be kind, even nurturing. Dreams of stars, warm oceans, hidden worlds and epic adventure. But if the child is neglected or abused, the Weaver may twist their dreams into warnings for the adults. Nightmares with teeth.

What It Wants:

Not power. Not chaos. It wants complexity. Every soul is a narrative knot—this fae just wants to see what happens when you tug a single thread. It's a voyeur of fate, a crafter of what-if, a living surrealist painting.

[thethorneverse]

Integra TruthKeeper :

Records guardian for the River Of Knowledge (aka the Akashic Records)

Integra TruthKeeper is bookish with a major fae slant. Her passions are blade or arrow she's created herself, crafted from broken shards of truths she's bartered for.

Integra offers a guided dip into the wisdom of the Akashic Records. This fae allows those who seek answers (but to one question only) into the river of knowledge, a great flow of ideas and thoughts.

The river may also present itself as an eternal library or a cathedral-like filing room.

Take your crucial advice from the universe itself, the collective mind- if Integra opens the library doors to you. The wisdom you seek may be given in a rush of information as the record includes every thought or idea ever had by any intelligence anywhere. But you'll not gain entry unless you barter for it and the knowledge you seek will be gained only in exchange for your best kept secrets.

Beware: Not every thought In the history of thinking beings has been good advice and this fae will give you the worst if you try to hold out on her in the exchange. Offer only your deepest and most guarded untold truth. Try to get one over though and every instinct you have in every decision you will ever face will be tainted to your doom.

You will have a reverse Midas touch for the rest of your days and you'll be likely to see much more of Integra than you ever wanted to.

Note: As the Record Keeper Integra is not looking to catalogue your secrets. The record already includes every thought you've ever had, those you're having at this exact moment and those you'll have decades from today. Integra wants to own those truths - meaning they no longer belong to you at all.

She'd bind your secrets by magic, sharpened to lethal edges, your hidden truths will carry the power of your silence into the hearts of Integra's choosing.

She's fond of making an example of prolific liars but tread carefully; it might end up being you who feels the blade no matter who wields it or whom it cuts. You may feel it's every battle for all of eternity.

Or worse.

You may find yourself drowning in the river of knowledge over and over again.

Truths are powerful weapons. And attempting to lie to this fae carries infinite penalty.

Realm: A sprawling archive carved into the inside of a dead god’s skull, shelves made of calcified light, and a river of liquid memory running through its core.

Integra and the Records may appear anywhere at any time.

Form: Appears humanoid, graceful, with ink colored skin etched with faint golden script. Her eyes are like library lamps—softly glowing unless angered, when they flare white-hot. Her voice sounds like pages turning in a storm. Encounters have been reported with Integra going back centuries and they are inconsistent on aspects of appearance. In a few accounts she reportedly possesses a pair of wings like a dragonfly while others describe her having antlers or antenna. It is believed her unprecedented access to The River had made her knowledge of magic unparalleled and undoubtedly she can wield that magic in ways we haven't imagined - certainly changing her appearance at will would be child's play for her.

Habits: She speaks in absolute terms—no metaphors. She finds poetic language offensively imprecise. Her hands are stained with the ink of ancient truths.

She has a familiar: a blind bird made of parchment, called Vellum, who whispers forgotten names.

Philosophy & Motivation: Integra doesn’t hoard knowledge—she enforces accountability. You may seek her guidance, but you’ll pay in your most tightly wound truth, sealed into a blade. That blade will be used somewhere in the cosmos. You may never see it again… or you might be stabbed by it a thousand years later when you least expect it.

She believes:

Secrets are liabilities.

Ignorance is indulgence.

Truth is sacred, but not necessarily safe

[thethorneverse]

The StarBlown

The StarBlown is a title, not a name. Each individual has a real name but it’s a name assigned by the cosmos in the language of the unknowable heavenly intelligence that was around to rule before The Big Bang. Unpronounceable to most beings in the universe– including humans- their individual names are lost to supernova winds and spacedust.

The StarBlown are a branch of fae who drifted too close to the edge of the universe before time was time and these came back uniquely suited for nonsense creations and little else.

Essence: Touched by entropy, soaked in space-wind.

They speak in rhyme and in riddles, trailing meteor dust and seeds that sprout dreams and harvest fruits of inspiration– or not.

Power: StarBlown create nonsense that becomes real if its believed.

Dangerous to be around during a psychotic break.

Appearance:

Glittering dark eyes, constellation scars, and a cloak of leftover night. Their wings are comet tails. They may also speak in static, rhyme, riddle or coded language only other StarBlown (or the universe itself maybe) can translate.

[thethorneverse]

Get to know the Fae of Thorne

Hidden in the cracks of our world like a sliver of glass embedded in flesh, exists Thorne. In it's ancient, fractured ways it's fiercely alive as it was long before the times of Men and Women. It is not a place either of danger or of safety. It is a place coexisting in the places where you are. It's a place of meaning and where translation is perilous.

For those of and in Thorne, shadows blossom and light tells you lies. It's where any whispered pact or disgarded trinket can carry the balance of your fate- even of Fate in general- in passing.

Poeple wander into Thorne by accident, insanity or sometimes even by explicit invitation—but they never return unchanged. Time chews you up slowly in Thorne but it's teeth are sharper too.

The fae of Thorne don't resemble your storybook pixies very often. These fairies don’t sparkle. They watch. The amuse themselves - maybe at your expense if they are having that kind of day. They barter but only with those who know the ways of the fae and ask for their favors correctly. But then if you really know the ways of Thorne? You probably would be wise enough not to try to barter with the fae at all.

A little knowledge- incomplete knowledge especially- is a dangerous thing in Thorne. Everyone knows that. If your world is roses remember what waits beneath every bloom. A Thorne.

A LETTER FROM THE SCRIBE

Dear Thorne Newbs,

Welcome! I will be posting an index of those fae of Thorne as I am able and as they become known to me.

I'll give you the survival guide to interacting with Thorne and will soon post talismans and other throne artifacts as they are available. These are objects charmed or cursed to call to or ward off specific residents of thorne. Sometimes they are charmed objects imbued with a small taste of fae magic-- just enough to repell brain funk, attract the right kind of attention of to help you remember the things you value most.

I have been nominated for the task of making introductions between the Thorneverse and the human world and I take it aeriously.

So we'll be in touch I'm sure.

Isla Cross

The archivist and scribe of thorne's human/Thorne relations dept.