The Rotcrown Stag

The dying lord-stag of the eastern wood, its antlers crowned with a crystalline corruption — too strong to die, too wrong to live, dragging the wild into its slow ruin.

Once the lord stag of the eastern wood, its antlers have crowned over with a hard, glassy growth — a crystalline corruption rooted in living bone. It cannot heal and it will not die; it drags the wood's lesser beasts into its slow circling ruin, and where it beds down the grass comes up grey and wrong. The Cullers want it ended with one clean arrow before the corruption spreads. The Rootbound want it knelt where it falls, so life returns to the place and a whole glade grows from the cost. Warden Esk has, for once, refused to decide — which is why the matter waits on a stranger's hand.