The Unweaving

~ Chapter 9 of The Watchman Chronicles ~

The shop was quiet, but not peaceful. The kind of quiet that settles after something has gone terribly wrong and everyone’s pretending otherwise. A fine crust of frost still clung to the doorway; the hourglass shape had faded, but Ambrose suspected the countdown hadn't. Moss paced by the shattered threshold, nails tapping against warped floorboards, nose flicking side to side as if regret had a scent he couldn’t quite shake. On the topmost shelf, Tiberius observed the scene like a minor deity displeased with the offerings. Ambrose knelt stiffly to fasten the leather satchel at Moss’s side. “No herding while I’m gone. No chasing memories, and NO chewing the census inspector again, understood?”

Moss huffed, then leaned his head against Ambrose’s shoulder for the briefest moment. Ambrose didn’t acknowledge it. That would have been sentimental. A polite knock interrupted the farewell.

Father Quinn stepped in without waiting for a reply — his robes dusted with early frost, and his collar slightly askew, as always. He surveyed the scene: the cracked mirror, the sealed regret vials, the lingering scent of scorched lavender.

“I see you’ve been tidying,” he said dryly.

Ambrose raised an eyebrow. “Thought you were due another sabbatical.”

“I was. Then a crow turned up with your name stitched into its wing. Figured it was your version of a formal invitation.”

Behind him, Miles and Tobias exchanged a glance. They hadn’t summoned Quinn — and yet, here he was. Father Quinn gave Moss a scratch behind the ear, then nodded to Tiberius, who stared back without blinking.

“I’ll watch them,” he said. “And the shop. Though between the dog’s paranoia and the cat’s ego, I expect they’ll be the ones watching me.”

Ambrose dusted his coat sleeves with exaggerated care. “Feed them both. Twice a day. Tiberius won’t ask; he’ll simply knock something over. And Moss doesn’t like sermons before breakfast.”

Quinn gave a small nod. “Noted. I’ll try to keep the theology down to a murmur.” Ambrose hesitated, then added, more softly, “And the regrets?”

“I won’t touch them,” Quinn said. “Not unless one touches me first.”

Satisfied — or as close to it as he’d get — Ambrose turned to the waiting wardens: “Well then,” he said, voice light but shoulders tight, “lead on. I do so love a leisurely stroll towards an uncertain and probably irreversible reckoning.”

Tobias gave him a look. “We’re walking because your broom still refuses to open a portal.”

“It’s temperamental that one,” Ambrose replied. “Much like its owner.”

As they stepped out into the frostbitten morning, the bell above the door didn’t chime. It simply creaked, as if even it knew something was coming to an end.

The road out of Latchmoor was the sort that had no business being used. Cobbled in uneven haste during some forgotten age, it wound through frostbitten thickets and past trees that seemed to lean in just a little too far. The mist hadn’t lifted since dawn — it never did, this close to the Boundary.

Ambrose walked with his hands in his pockets and his coat collar turned up against the cold. Miles kept a deliberate pace beside him, while Tobias occasionally consulted a glittering thread-map that adjusted itself irritably with each twist in the path.

“Still no broom, then?” Miles muttered.

“I refuse to let it sulk its way into being a plot device,” Ambrose replied. “Besides, I rather enjoy the melodrama of a doomed march.”

The frost deepened with every step. Trees wore it like lace, and the very air began to hum — not with life, but with memory. This was Oracle ground now, and the world knew better than to misbehave under her gaze. Ambrose had met her once before. Not officially. Not under Guild sanction. It was decades ago, during the Warden Schism, when entire villages vanished and no one could decide whether to classify it as sabotage or an atmospheric phenomenon. He’d found his way into the Oracle’s threshold by accident — or perhaps by invitation poorly disguised as coincidence. They'd argued, naturally. Not with shouting, but with precision. She questioned a choice he had made involving a tethered soul and a corrupted clocktower. He, in turn, accused her of confusing detachment with wisdom.

She hadn’t raised her voice. She hadn’t needed to. Every word she spoke seemed to arrive already proven. Ambrose had walked out of that meeting with a headache, an unsettled ego, and the distinct impression that she hadn’t disliked him — merely catalogued him. Like a particularly verbose contradiction in a dusty footnote. He hadn’t planned on ever seeing her again. But somewhere, in a quiet and professionally inconvenient corner of his mind, he’d always wondered how the next conversation might go. Whether he’d get the better of her this time. Whether he’d finally say something she didn’t already know. He doubted today would be that day — but the curiosity remained, flickering stubbornly alongside the fear. He took a breath, steadied his thoughts, and followed the two wardens into the deepening frost.

After an hour’s walk, the path stopped pretending to be part of the world at all. The trees gave up. The frost turned crystalline, arching into impossible shapes above their heads. Words — faint and ancient — glimmered in the ice like forgotten conversations. One phrase repeated in dozens of tongues: “She remembers.” Tobias stopped beside a frozen standing stone, fingers hovering just shy of its surface. “Last chance,” he said without looking back. “You could still claim magical exhaustion and a debilitating sense of irony. Might earn you a week’s delay.”

Ambrose smiled faintly. “I’ve already packed the dramatic resignation and the long sigh. Would be a shame to waste them.”

They reached a set of carved steps descending into a cavern of lightless stone. No guards. No gate. Just a threshold with one inscription burned into the lintel: “We do not forget.” Miles took a step forward, but the doorway pushed back — not physically, but with something that tasted like embarrassment and old secrets. He turned to Ambrose. “I think she’s expecting you.” Ambrose drew a slow breath, rolled his shoulders once, and stepped into the dark.

The stone tunnel swallowed sound as thoroughly as it did light. No echoes, no footsteps — just the hollow sensation of moving forward while everything behind you quietly vanished. The path sloped gently downward, the walls lined with symbols too old for translation and too recent to ignore. At one point, Ambrose reached out to trace a familiar rune, only to find it shifted beneath his fingers — a name, he realised, once his own, then someone else's, now forgotten. Then, the space opened. The chamber was vast, but felt neither grand nor cold. Its size was not meant to impress. It was meant to observe. Pale light filtered through a ceiling that had no visible source, settling across the smooth stone floor like mist. There were no torches, no guards, no throne. Just a simple, slightly raised platform at the far end — and a figure standing atop it. She was tall, but not imposing. Clad in muted layers of white, her form was indistinct around the edges, as though reality hadn’t yet agreed where she ended and air began. Her hair was silver without age; her gaze the colour of still water under moonlight. When she looked at Ambrose, it felt less like a glance and more like a cross-examination conducted in silence. He stopped ten paces away. The wardens stepped back without needing to be asked. And then she spoke:

“You arrive with forty-six broken threads behind you, two patched breaches, and a dog that refuses to obey containment protocols.”

Ambrose tilted his head. “I’m pleased you’re keeping up. And for the record, that dog wasn’t-”

“I never stopped,” she replied, unblinking. “You were the one who wandered.”

A pause.

“Ambrose - if that is still the name you wear - do you understand why you’ve been brought here?”

“I assume it’s not for commendation.” He gave a faint smile. “Though I did single-handedly avert a breach.”, he continued.

“You single-handedly caused one!” she corrected. “The Guild merely cleaned up after you. As they always do.”

Ambrose’s shoulders stiffened. “I was careful.”

“No,” she said. “You were clever. And you have mistaken the two for long enough.”

Ambrose didn’t flinch, but his reply came slower this time. “If cleverness were a crime, half the Guild would be ash by now.”

The Oracle stepped down from the platform — not descending so much as arriving nearer. “The Guild measures cleverness by outcome. I measure it by cost.”

She circled once, never quite touching the ground. “Your trades altered memory paths across six boroughs. A seam‑quake followed in three. You bartered regrets you didn’t understand with clients who didn’t remember consenting. And you did so without once asking who had placed those regrets in your care.”

Ambrose straightened. “I didn't steal them.”

“No,” she said, “but you forgot where they came from. Which is worse. Theft suggests intent. You worked in convenience.”

“I worked to keep memory alive!” he snapped.

“You worked to keep your memory intact,” the Oracle countered, her voice still calm. “Tell me, what was the name you gave up to become Ambrose?”

Ambrose opened his mouth - and stopped.

The Oracle tilted her head slightly. “There it is.” A silence settled like dust. Then Ambrose said, quietly, “You remember it, don’t you?”

“I remember everything,” she said. “That is both my task and my punishment.”

He looked away, jaw tight. “So that’s the game? You humiliate me until I beg for forgiveness?”

“No. You were not brought here to beg.” She stepped closer, her voice gentler now, but no less certain. “You were brought here to be unmade.”

Ambrose gave a short laugh — the sort used to fill space when silence feels too dangerous.

“Unmade? A bit theatrical, don’t you think?” He spread his hands. “What am I, a tapestry?”

The Oracle regarded him. “In your case? A rather frayed one. Beautiful in places. But pulling at the wrong edge.”

He took a step back. “You can’t just erase me.”

“I won’t,” she said. “You will.” The air between them shifted. Cold without wind. Time bent subtly, the chamber breathing around them.

“What you’ve hoarded,” she continued, “what you’ve buried beneath sarcasm and trade and careful forgetfulness — it must be returned. Piece by piece. Thread by thread. Not destroyed. Rewoven.”

Ambrose looked at her, and for once, said nothing.

“Do you think you became the Watchman by chance?” she asked softly. His eyes widened. That word — that name — it echoed through something deep in his bones. Something old.

“You’ve already begun to forget,” the Oracle said. “Not everything. Not yet. But the edges are softening.”

He staggered slightly. “This isn’t justice.”

“No,” she agreed. “This is mercy.”

Ambrose’s jaw clenched. “What mercy?”

The Oracle didn’t blink. “You mistake mercy for softness. Mercy is not sparing pain. It is choosing a pain that leads to purpose.”

He laughed, bitter now. “You’re turning me into a metaphor.”

“No,” she said. “You turned yourself into one. I am only returning you to your shape.”

Ambrose stepped back, voice rising. “You speak of unmaking like it’s cleansing, some noble act. But what you’re proposing is erasure. A memory scrub disguised as mercy.”

The Oracle’s gaze didn’t falter. “Not erasure. Return.”

“Return to what?!” His voice cracked on the last word. “You want me to forget everything I’ve built — the shop, the trades, the names of those I helped, those I—” He stopped. The Oracle stepped closer, her tone almost kind.

“You’ve built it all before, Ambrose.” The silence pressed down like snowfall. “You’ve stood in this chamber before,” she continued. “Not once. Not twice. More times than I care to admit. And each time, you bargained. Not to save yourself — but to forget yourself. Because remembering what you once were… is worse.”

His voice was barely a whisper. “What was I?” She raised a hand. And in the air between them, threads began to stir — luminous, trembling, resonant. A tapestry half-woven and half-unravelled.

“You were the Watchman,” she said. “Before the name was yours. Before the post existed. You yourself forged it out of guilt.”

Ambrose stared. “Then why do it again? Why bring me back?”

“Because,” the Oracle replied, “the world still forgets. And someone must remember what happens when regret is sold too cheaply.”

Ambrose’s hands curled into fists, though he didn’t raise them. “So I’m a cautionary tale with a lantern?”

“No,” she said. “You’re the reckoning that walks quietly. You’re what’s left when memory is stripped of vanity.”

He looked down at the cold stone beneath his feet. “And if I refuse?”

“You won’t,” she said. “You never do.”

Ambrose opened his mouth - perhaps to protest, perhaps to bargain - but the air in the chamber shifted before he could speak. Threads emerged, glowing softly, surrounding him like a constellation seen from within. Each strand pulsed with a memory — laughter, loss, a contract signed in haste, a name whispered in the dark.

The Oracle raised her hand. “We begin.” Ambrose took a step back. “Wait—” But one of the threads had already connected — just above his chest, near the hollow where memory lives.

A thread drew taut — and Ambrose staggered as the memory unspooled.

A boy in a thunderstorm. Barefoot, breathless, chasing after a book that had slipped from his satchel. The pages fluttered into the river. He’d dived in after them, not to save the book, but the margin notes written by a girl whose name he never dared say aloud.

That thread dissolved.

Another one rose. A rooftop in Olven’s Reach, moonlight sharp on tile. Ambrose — younger, thinner, crueler — arguing with a man whose name he no longer remembered. The man’s regret had been turned into a charm. Ambrose had taken it as payment. The man never woke again.

A flicker. Gone. Dozens followed.

A market square. A whispered spell in a dying language. The smell of oranges.

The moment he forgot the name he was born with.

The exact phrasing of the vow he swore to the Oracle, the first time.

Each thread, a sliver. Each one, a subtraction. His spine curled slightly under the weight of letting go.

His voice cracked. “Will there be anything left?”

The Oracle’s expression didn’t shift, but her tone softened — almost imperceptibly. “Only what must remain.”

The final thread hovered. It was thin, barely visible, and yet it pulsed more brightly than the rest.

Ambrose touched it.

A border collie bounding through autumn leaves. A lazy cat sprawled across an open book. A cluttered shop full of half-remembered things — and the sound of the front door chime.

He closed his eyes.

“I’d like to keep that one,” he whispered - the words catching somewhere deeper than his throat

The Oracle paused.

Then nodded.

The thread dimmed — but did not dissolve.

The light dimmed, though no source faded.

The threads had vanished, woven back into whatever vast loom the Oracle served. Ambrose stood — or what was left of him did — shoulders slack, breath even. Not empty. Not broken. Just… untethered. His coat no longer bore his name. The satchel at his side had vanished. Even the weight behind his eyes — the tangle of grief and cleverness and unspoken guilt — had lifted.

He blinked once. “Why am I here?,” he said, more to himself than to her.

The Oracle stepped back onto the raised platform. “You came because something was forgotten. And something must remember.”

He looked up. “What am I?”

The Oracle did not answer. She simply raised her hand — and with the gentlest motion, the chamber itself began to dissolve. Stone gave way to fog. Symbols unraveled. Time fell silent.

As the light receded, a lantern appeared in his hand. It glowed softly. Not with fire — but with memory.

And somewhere, faint but familiar, came the sound of a dog’s bark, and the slow, steady toll of a midnight bell.