The Anchors’ Guild is not a guild in the traditional sense.
It has no charter, no oaths, no ranks, and no formal process of membership. There are no initiations, no dues, and no authority that can grant or revoke belonging.
If you are an Anchor, you are already part of it.
The Anchors’ Guild is a coalition by condition, not by consent.
It exists as the informal alignment of all beings capable of affecting narrative across Story Realms—those whose choices persist beyond a single story and whose actions can alter outcomes without replacing them.
The Guild is not founded on ideology.
It is founded on shared capability.
Anchors may disagree violently. They may oppose one another. They may never meet. They are still part of the same coalition, because they operate under the same rules of existence.
The Anchors’ Guild is not:
An arm of Homeward
An enemy of the Unwritten
A governing body
A heroic order
A force for “good”
It does not issue mandates.
It does not assign responsibility.
It does not guarantee moral alignment.
The Guild exists whether anyone wants it to or not.
The Guild’s only true function is coordination without control.
Through shared spaces—most notably the Hearth of Many Roads—Anchors exchange:
Information about unstable realms
Warnings about Unwritten collapse
Knowledge of gates, routes, and Wake conditions
Requests for aid, offered without obligation
The Guild facilitates awareness, not action.
No Anchor is required to intervene.
No Anchor is punished for refusal.
What binds the Guild together is not duty—but consequence.
Homeward tolerates and accommodates the Anchors’ Guild, but does not govern it.
From Homeward’s perspective, Anchors are travelers who return—but who may leave again. The Guild represents motion that Homeward itself does not demand.
Some in Homeward quietly believe the Guild is necessary.
Others believe it delays rest.
Homeward does not interfere either way.
The Anchors’ Guild is the only faction that can meaningfully interact with the Unwritten without becoming part of it.
This does not make the Guild an enemy of Darkness.
Many Anchors allow stories to fall Unwritten. Some believe intervention is arrogance. Others see denial as cruelty.
The Guild does not resolve this disagreement.
It merely ensures that those who can act are aware that a choice exists.
There is, at times, a single figure associated with the Anchors’ Guild.
They are not a guildmaster.
They do not command.
They do not recruit.
They are simply someone who has:
Been an Anchor longer than most
Seen more stories end than continue
Chosen to remain present rather than rest
This figure offers guidance when asked, perspective when needed, and silence when neither would help. They are not always the same individual across eras—but the role persists.
Those who know of them compare them to a teacher, or a witness, or a keeper of difficult truths.
They never decide for anyone.
The Anchors’ Guild is not harmonious.
Common points of fracture include:
Whether intervention is ever justified
Whether some stories should be saved
Whether Anchors cause more harm than good
Whether refusal to act is itself a choice
These disagreements are not settled.
They are lived.
In the structure of Tales Unending, the Anchors’ Guild represents Agency.
Homeward is where stories rest
The Unwritten is where stories refuse to end
The Anchors’ Guild is where stories are still being decided
The Guild is the only faction that exists entirely in the present.
You do not join the Anchors’ Guild.
You become an Anchor—and the Guild exists around you.
It will not tell you what to do.
It will not absolve you of choice.
It will not condemn you for inaction.
It exists to remind you of one thing only:
A story can still change
as long as someone is willing to decide.