Chapter 11: The Geometry Beneath the Thornwood

The Thornwood announced itself the morning of the second day with a change in the light.

Not darkness — the canopy was not yet close enough for that — but a quality of the illumination itself, as though the photons arriving from the east had passed through some filtering medium before reaching the road and had emerged slightly more considered. Thordun, who had been walking with his head down in the particular posture of a man whose thoughts were moving faster than his feet, noticed it first, or noticed it first in a way that entered his notes. His notation for the morning reads: *light quality changed at approx. 0730, origin uncertain, cloud cover insufficient to account for the degree of change. Air temperature consistent with forecast. Sound: reduced.* And then, as though the observation embarrassed him: *no likely cause identified. Noted for completeness.*

The road bent southeast and the first trees appeared.