Caelun Thorne (The Griefroot Child)

Echo-Bound Child #2: The Forest That Weeps Through

Name:

Caelun Thorne (The Griefroot Child)

Age:

15

Region:

Echowilds

Linked Cryptid:

The Whispershed

“His voice was buried. But the trees still heard.”

Appearance & Essence:

• Deep brown skin with faint glyph-like scar patterns that appear and disappear across his shoulders

• Eyes like storm-glassed pools, shimmering blue-gray when emotions rise

• Wears a tattered woven bark shawl, gifted to him by his grandmother’s mourning circle

• When he walks barefoot, wildflowers grow behind him, but only in silence

Personality & Traits:

• Speaks rarely, but when he does, the wind listens

• Carries a satchel of carved woodmouths—fallen bark with silent screams etched in them

• Often found sitting beneath weeping trees, eyes closed, humming wordless melodies

• Grief-sensitive: he can feel when others are mourning even if they don’t realize it

Spiritual Bond with the Whispershed:

• The cryptid found him during his first silence rite after his twin died

• Their connection is root-deep—he can feel where the Whispershed is buried beneath the forest floor

• When he cries into the soil, the Whispershed's antlers rise like trees nearby

Glitch Threat:

• The Nullwoven seek to use his unprocessed grief to infect ancestral groves with echo-null sigils

• If his bond is severed, the Whispershed will become the Hollowbark Chorister, a mimic forest that traps Seeker names in wooden screams

Seeker Role:

• Caelun is a guide for grief rites, but does not lead—he sits with you until you are ready

• Seekers must protect him during the Cycle of Sorrow, when ancestral groves become unstable

• His emotional attunement is key to sensing ritual imbalance across the Echowilds

Sacred Quote:

“Sometimes the forest doesn’t want your prayers. It just wants to cry with you.”— Caelun Thorne