From "The Grandmother's Tale"

Long ago when the world was almost new, when the forests were young and somewhat untraversed, when animal trails were fresh, and new brush hadn’t yet made way for ageless paths. Before the instincts of animals took them down the same paths year after year, a garden shut and its perimeter was hidden and guarded.

Telaranthion sighed as she stared at the trees around her. When she began her post a few years ago, she’d been so excited to see Erea. The new world. The physical world. She’d only seen the reflections of his glory. Now here, she stood in the forest, looking out, keeping them out. But they never tried to get in. They never wandered close, but stayed in their fields day in and day out. Oh how she’d wandered in her early days here. She took in every speck, every fibre. She saw the colors change around her, felt the light of the sun glow around her, the moonlight phase through her, the wind tousle her feathers. She’d guarded fiercely, building up the thorns outside of the forest she looked out of, focusing her powers out at the tiny lights she saw in the evenings, where the men built up their fires at night after days in the fields.

She could feel their souls from afar, the spirit part of them calling out of the darkness. She used this method to hone in their location in case they got too close. She could feel their emotions, their love and rage and jealousy. These creatures, these men, were so fickle, changing their feelings so often.

Still, she felt for them and their fickleness. She longed to show them constancy, discipline, order. She heard their celebrations in the nights, their singing throughout the day, and heard the cries of their despair. She felt the new ones burst into the world. She felt them fade away into the Erea and leave it. She felt the cloud of darkness in their hearts and the saw the fireworks of joy from across the fields, inside the briar barrier of the forest she guarded.

Though she guarded her forest unfailingly, she had trouble tending to it properly. Fascinated with every plant, every insect, every animal, she watched as they played their games with life and death. The predators hunted and let the numbers of prey bob up and down. She saw the animals learn to hide, learn to build lairs and shelters. She watched insects change form and flutter away. She watched critters nuzzle the ground seeking food beneath the surface. She saw the rain ravage the canopy and drip down into rivulets which formed and flooded the trails, forging ahead undisturbed, unguided by her hands or otherwise.