Finn Pinefall Writing

After they finished lunch, Brandon decided they could stop by Sherwood park. After taking in the view for a while they sat down on a bench.

“This is where it happened.” Rich said

“It?”

“Where I encountered the… thing that’s blackmailing me. They’re calling themself Wren now.”

“Like Wren as in Wrenfield?”

“I don’t know. That’s just how they signed the letter they slipped under my door last night.”

“Well, if that’s how they meant it— actually first, tell me what happened here.”

“Well one of my notes from this thing was burned into the bottom of a wooden bench, and that note said that the next orders would be burned under the bark of a tree here. Since I know how much you like burning things with magic…” Rich trailed off. He didn’t like bringing things up which he had already apologized for.

“Yeah you told me about this already. So what I was saying, if they named themself after the city, we may have something entirely unique on our hands.”

“I’m sure it’ll be an extremely exciting discovery once I’m dead.”

“So there’s a theory of shape changers that says that they’re like a disease, not of a person but of a city. They reproduce with the population of a city, and if a woman carrying a shape changer moves to another city, that city will inevitably become infected with shape changers. If this entity is calling themself Wren, they may be some… advancement of a shape changer. A sort of next step in their evolution, a sapient shape changer. They may be naming themself after the city because they see themself as a product of it. Like a parasite naming itself after its host.”

“Since when are you an expert in shape changers? That’s a pretty far out thing to assume just from the fact that they’re naming themself Wren.”

Brandon shrugged “Maybe so. I did read up a lot on shape changers when we were doing research a couple days ago, but nothing covered anything close to this. We should probably get going back to the library. They’re probably missing their archivist.”

Brandon stood up and Rich wordlessly followed suit. As they were leaving the park, Rich saw Wren, in the same form they’d had in the bar, and as they left their last encounter. Shit. They’ve got their hand on the grip. All they’d have to do is think and they’d be gone before I even took a step towards them. No point in trying anything.

Wren silently mouthed some words. If Rich had been able to read lips, he would have known that they’d said “I’m still watching”. But even though he couldn’t, he still got the message.