The air thrummed with a nervous energy as we neared the Gate of Trees. The path, usually clear, was choked in a fog too thick, too cold. Not the usual mist that clung like perfume to the Perennial Forest. This was something else. Heavier. Hungrier.
The trees down that way looked... wrong. Hunched and rotted, like gossiping corpses. The bark flaked like dried blood. Even the air felt violated, like it had been breathed one too many times.
The fog was different here.
Not the light, floating kind that liked to kiss your ankles. This fog clung. Thick, gray, hungry. Like it didn't just want to be touched—it wanted to remember you.
We were looking for the quickest path to The Gate of Trees to find more ltTheost Breaths.
At least, that's what we told ourselves. That if we just found a few more—scattered, tucked in forgotten corners—we could somehow stitch the world back into something that made sense. That if I kept moving forward, I wouldn't hear my own name echoing wrong inside me.
My feet ached. My ribs still buzzed from the last realm's magic. But I didn't say anything. I just followed Antic's back, the damp hem of his overalls swaying as he talked nonsense to himself and occasionally to us.
"Alright, map says north-ish," he said, holding out a soggy, half-burnt paper like it meant anything. "North is the direction where the moss don't grow on the trees. Or is it do grow? Either way, I'm pickin' vibes, not science. Feels northy."
"Northy," Dolly repeated, adjusting a velvet ribbon in her curls. "Darling, the only thing you're navigating is a midlife crisis with no expiration date."
Antic smirked. "You wound me, Porcelain. My instincts are legendary. Ask anyone who's lived."
"Exactly," she said, sidestepping a root with the grace of a ballerina at a funeral. "None of them do."
I didn't laugh, but I wanted to.
It was easier, sometimes, to let their rhythm carry me.
Grin followed behind, silent as fog. Every few steps, he'd pause, look up at a tree, like it might recognize him.
I nudged Antic. "You sure this is the right way?"
He looked at me over his shoulder, grin half-loaded. "Nah. But y'know, that's half the fun. Could be we find more Breaths. Could be we find a death carnival run by talking worms. Who's to say?"
"Please let it be the worms," Dolly sighed. "They have impeccable manners."
Antic squinted up ahead, then stopped. "Huh."
I nearly ran into him. "What?"
He pointed.
Between two trees, barely noticeable unless you squinted hard enough and tilted your head like a confused fox, was a thin split in the forest—a trail, but not a trail. A line in the trees that looked more like a scar.
Dolly gasped like she'd just spotted a sale on knives. "Shortcut."
That one word made the wind go still.
Grin made a sound behind us. A low, gravel-dragging groan. "No."
We all turned.
Grin flinched. His face—normally unreadable—twitched like a haunted painting. "Absolutely.... not..," he muttered. "That's… the Gravestone Realm."
I turned toward him, something aching in my chest. I reached out and brushed his arm, gently. "What is it?"
He didn't look at me. "It's... where ...I was ...banished. A... place where guilt doesn't.....fade."
Antic scoffed so hard his whole body tilted. "Seriously? We've been hunted, half-eaten, spat out, and you're worried about vibes? Come on, Grin. Live a little. Die a little. It's the brand."
Dolly cackled and twirled a strand of her black hair. "I say yes to grumpy ghosts. Maybe they'll fancy a taste of doll joints. I haven't been chased in heels in weeks."
I hesitated. The shortcut wasn't calling to me—it was daring me. A whisper not of temptation, but inevitability.
My hand found Antic's. His thumb brushed my palm. Warm. Human. Nervous.
"Come on, slowpokes," Antic grinned, stepping into the gloom like it owed him money. The forest breeze licked the bare patches of his legs, mist tracing his collarbones. "Adventure awaits. And I'm not letting some haunted twigs ruin my vibe."
He tugged me forward. I stumbled a little, made a noise I didn't mean to make. He didn't look at me, but the tips of his ears flushed.
Dolly pranced ahead like she was about to accept an award for Best Dressed in a Cursed Dimension.
Grin didn't follow.
He just… stood there.
His fingers clenched around the scythe until it whined. I could feel it—whatever weight he carried, it went deeper than just fear. Something buried. Something awful.
And then we left him behind.
The Gravestone Realm opened like the mouth of something starving.
Trees like skeletons clawed at the sky. Fog curled around our legs like cold fingers looking for seams in our resolve. Antic's cocky stride slowed. He didn't say anything, but I could hear his breath catching. The mist kissed his chest, freckled skin blinking through like shy stars.
Dolly was thriving.
She pirouetted over skull-shaped stones like it was a runway show for the recently cursed. "This place smells like a tragic love letter. I'm into it."
Me? I felt it all. The air was heavy with silence that wasn't empty—it was waiting.
"Something's watching," I whispered.
Beneath our feet, a low hum started. Not mechanical. Not magical. Older than both. We stepped over stones inscribed with a language that didn't want to be remembered. The wind whispered back now.
Not metaphorically.
Real whispers. Names. Pleas. Accusations.
Antic inched closer to me, his hand brushing the small of my back before realizing it. "Sorry," he whispered.
He didn't move it.
I didn't tell him to.
His heartbeat was louder than the wind.
I reached for his hand. He gave it.
We pushed forward, breath by breath.
Somewhere behind us, Grin stayed frozen in the trees, the weight of his scythe nothing compared to what haunted him.
The Gravestone Realm didn't scream.
It waited.
And with every step we took, the fog welcomed us in
I hesitated.
For a moment, just one, my hand lingered behind me, fingers twitching for something that wasn't there anymore.
Antic noticed.
He looped his arm through mine like it was no big deal—like we were just out for a stroll and not headed straight into something with teeth. "C'mon," he muttered. "He'll follow."
I didn't move.
Antic tugged, light but firm. "He likes us too much to let us go. Especially me," he added, smirking. "I grow on people like mold on a sandwich."
"I'm not hungry," I said.
"Didn't ask."
He started dragging me gently down the path.
In front of us, Dolly gave one last flutter of her lace sleeve toward Grin. "Oh, let him stew. No one stays mad forever—not when I'm in the group photo. Who'd want to run away from these piercing blue eyes?"
She batted her lashes at absolutely no one and sauntered after us.
the fog closed on us...
We shouldn't've come here.
Not because it's dangerous—everything is dangerous now. But because this place doesn't want to be walked on. The dirt flinches beneath our steps, like it remembers pain.
I don't need eyes to know how wrong it is.
The air stinks like crushed violets and hot iron. The silence is thick. Alive. Like it's listening.
Antic walks beside me, but slower than usual. His boots scuff instead of strut. I can hear the wet of his breath where it catches in his throat.
"You good?" I ask.
He doesn't answer right away. Then, softer than I expect: "Yeah. Just… hate grave air. Smells like old secrets."
Dolly twirls ahead of us like a horror ballerina. Her skirts don't rustle—they hiss.
"This place," she declares, "smells like a love letter written in blood and mailed to your childhood bully. Absolutely divine."
She kicks a skull-shaped pebble like it's a dance partner. It winks at her. She winks back.
Antic takes my hand.
Not like before. Not teasing. Not flirty.
This is the kind of grip you use when you're scared of disappearing.
His palm's too warm. His fingers twitch.
I hold on.
I don't know why.
The trees don't rustle. They don't move at all. The leaves hang limp, like dead tongues.
The path curls like a spine, all bone-colored stones and dried roots. Something crunches beneath my foot. I don't ask what.
"Don't like it," Antic mutters.
"What?"
"Place is too quiet. Even the air's got manners. I like my haunted woods with a bit more... chaos."
Dolly turns, walking backward now. Her eyes flash with amusement.
"I find it charming," she purrs. "Like the inside of an abandoned chapel—full of ghosts and just enough regret to make it spicy."
A shiver crawls up my spine. Not cold.
Recognition.
There's a sound—too low to name. Like someone saying my name from under the soil.
"No Eyes…" it hums.
I stop.
Antic's grip tightens.
"You hear that?" I whisper.
He doesn't speak. But I feel the yes in his knuckles.
Dolly stops, too. Her head tilts slowly, like she's listening to music only she can hear.
"Voices," she says. "Such flattery. I do love an appreciative audience."
The fog thickens, curling around our legs like curious fingers.
I don't move.
The dirt breathes.
Not metaphor.
It moves.
Slow. In and out. Like we're standing on something sleeping. Or something pretending.
Antic leans close, his voice barely a rasp.
"Stick close, No Eyes. Grave realms got a bad habit of tryin' to swallow soft things."
My name—if it is my name—echoes again.
Not loud.
But deep.
Like teeth sinking into memory.
The path opened without warning.
One moment, we were weaving through ribs of stone and sighing fog.
The next—
A field.
A perfect circle of stillness, too quiet to be natural.
And in its center: trees.
But not trees.
Bones.
Hundreds of them, maybe thousands—spines that curled upward like birch trunks, ribcages blooming like parasitic flowers, fingers that reached for sky but never quite touched it.
The orchard.
Each "tree" hummed. A low, pained sound. Like a choir stuck on one long, aching note.
Antic stopped short beside me.
"Okay," he said flatly, "gonna go ahead and file this under absolutely not."
He laughed.
It wasn't funny.
Dolly, of course, clapped her hands.
"Oh, it's delightful," she said. "A little macabre landscaping! Maybe I'll install a jawbone swing when I redecorate the parlor."
She flounced toward the nearest bony "sapling"—a delicate cluster of ivory femurs braided together like a woven chandelier.
It bent toward her.
She touched its cheekbone lightly, like a lover. "Well aren't you a tall drink of calcium."
The bone creaked.
It smiled.
Antic gagged.
I stepped forward slowly. The air here was denser. Almost… reverent. Like a place that wasn't meant for feet, only for remembering.
Each bone shimmered faintly with names.
Some were familiar.
Too familiar.
Elara.
My hand moved on its own. I brushed a curled spine shaped like a weeping willow.
The moment I touched it—
Flash.
I gasped. Not out loud—my breath was too busy being hijacked.
I saw—
A hand in mine.
A voice whispering prayers.
A stone marked forgiveness under a blood moon.
Someone weeping. Not for me. For her.
For Elara.
The name bled through my skin.
I stumbled.
Antic caught me before I hit the ground.
His arms wrapped tight around me, like the orchard might bite.
"You okay?" he whispered, too close. Too warm. His breath hit my cheek and stuck.
I nodded, not trusting my voice.
He didn't let go right away.
Behind us, Dolly twirled with a femur bouquet, humming the tune of someone else's funeral.
The orchard watched.
The orchard waited
The path twisted downward, the ground sloping beneath our feet like a spine. We didn't talk much. Even Dolly's usual flair dimmed, her heels clicking softer than usual, as if she respected the hush that crawled here.
The deeper we went, the quieter the world became.
No birds.
No wind.
Just the brittle sound of things not meant to move… moving.
The Bone Orchard didn't announce itself. One moment, we walked among moss and dead trees—and then the trees were bone. Ribcages arched over us like dying cathedrals. Femurs jutted from the soil like grave markers. Skulls bloomed like flowers, too many to count, too perfect to be random.
They weren't arranged in rows.
They were posed.
Whole scenes: a feast of jawless skulls leaning toward invisible meals, skeletal lovers frozen in an eternal kiss, children's bones knelt before a throne made of teeth.
I slowed.
Not because I was scared. I was… noticing.
The way the bones pulsed slightly.
The way they watched.
Dolly broke the silence. "This place is an art gallery for the deranged. I'm in love."
Antic didn't answer. He walked just behind me, unnaturally quiet.
His breath hitched once—then steadied.
He hated it here. I could feel it. His warmth was too still, his bravado buried under something that felt like guilt.
I turned. "You okay?"
He met my gaze like he forgot I could sense him. "Me? Pfft. I'm great. Nothing like being surrounded by dead decorations to remind a guy of his unresolved issues."
I waited.
He cracked first.
"This place... it's not just bones. It's memory." His voice dropped, thick with old anger. "My parents—they were slaughtered during the War of the Willow Spires. No bodies. No burial. Just… gone. And I always wondered if their pieces got used here. If some of this art is them."
I stepped closer. "You never told me."
He shrugged, rough. "Tried not to tell myself. But this realm's good at forcing you to look at things you buried so deep, even the dirt forgot."
Dolly moved ahead, her lace sleeves fluttering, a rare stillness in her steps. "This place feeds on those who forget. That's why it looks like this. That's why it hums."
The hum. I could hear it now.
Low. Faint. Like singing teeth.
And then it stopped.
Not faded.
Stopped.
The silence was a wound.
We turned as one—Antic, Dolly, and me.
Behind us, the bones moved.
Not all. Just a few.
One skull—small, delicate—lifted slightly from the pile.
Its mouth opened.
And sighed.
Antic grabbed my arm. "We need to go."
"I heard it say—" I whispered.
He shook his head. "Nope. No hearing. No interpreting. This is the part in the ghost story where the idiot listens harder and ends up possessed by a bone-witch named Carol."
Dolly raised an eyebrow. "Carol?"
He shrugged. "Scariest name I could think of under pressure."
Another sigh. Then another. A chorus of breathless voices, filling the orchard with memories we hadn't asked for.
"I think they remember us," I said quietly. "Not just Grin. Me. You. All of us."
Dolly's face sharpened. "Then we remember louder. Come on."
We ran.
Not away from danger—toward it.
Because this wasn't a realm to tiptoe through.
This was a place that wanted to know if you'd scream.
And we weren't going to give it the satisfaction.
We didn't slow until the bone orchard thinned behind us—until the teeth stopped singing and the ground stopped twitching.
The new path curved through a canyon of jagged stone, each slab taller than a house, leaning in like gossiping old women. The wind changed here, brushing against my skin like it had fingers. It felt like it wanted to touch more than just the surface.
Dolly was the first to speak, eyeing the stones with narrowed, glitter-laced suspicion.
"Do not hum, anyone. Or sing. Or even breathe rhythmically. I've read about this."
Antic raised an eyebrow, hands on his hips. "Oh good. A Dolly monologue. Everyone take cover."
"I'm serious," she said, waving one gloved finger. "These are Singing Stones. They're cursed. Enchanted. They record voices. If they like yours? They trap it. If they really like it?" She leaned in, whispering dramatically. "They sing back—in your voice. Only twisted. Inverted. Like a mockery of your soul."
Antic squinted. "That sounds… kinda hot."
I gave him a light nudge.
The moment I did, a whisper bloomed along the rocks. Not wind. Not an echo.
My voice.
"I didn't faint."
The sentence cracked through the air like ice breaking.
Antic's head snapped toward the nearest stone. "Was that…?"
Then another voice joined.
Dolly's.
"Trickery… Forest-born illusions…"
It came from the stone on our left, etched with strange spirals. The voice didn't sound quite like her. It was her pitch, her cadence—but too cold. Too calm.
Antic swallowed. "Okay. Nope. Don't like that."
Then—his own voice, from somewhere behind.
"She's not a receipt. She's a person."
He turned, eyes wide. "Did I sound that heroic when I said it? That was actually kinda—"
The stones laughed.
Mocking. Multilayered. Like children repeating back grown-ups' words to make fun of them.
Pecola. Pecola. Pecola.
The name fluttered from a dozen angles—sometimes whispered, sometimes shouted, once sung like a lullaby in a voice that might've been mine at age six.
I froze.
My fingers curled. Not in fear. In anger.
These rocks didn't know me. They remembered versions of me—scraps, echoes. And they used them like puppets.
I stepped forward.
Antic caught my arm. "Whoa, hey. What're you doing?"
"They think I'm scared."
"Yeah, and you're planning to prove them wrong by…?"
I took a deep breath.
And sang.
Not a melody. Not a lyric.
Just a tone.
A note, deep in my chest, hummed into the stone's face.
The stones stilled.
They listened.
My breath slowed. The hum vibrated my ribs. And for a moment, I felt them hum back—not in mimicry.
In… understanding.
Then I stopped.
And said, "We're not echoes."
The stones went silent.
Dolly blinked. "Well, damn. I feel like you just bitch-slapped a symphony."
Antic grinned. "No Eyes strikes again."
The stones didn't laugh anymore.
They parted.
Not literally. But the path ahead glowed faintly, the air less tense, like we'd passed some invisible test.
Antic whispered low beside me, voice half-melted in awe.
"…What are you?"
I didn't answer.
Not because I didn't want to.
Because I still didn't know.