The first thing Elara felt was the damp earth beneath her palms. Cold. Heavy. Alive.
Her breath came in shallow bursts, visible in the morning air. For a long moment she couldn't move, couldn't remember where she was or how she had fallen. Only the sound of water dripping from the leaves above reminded her the world hadn't stopped.
When she finally lifted her head, the gravestone loomed inches away. Moss crept over its cracked face, the carving nearly gone. But she didn't need to read it again to know what it said.
C. Veyne.
She drew a trembling breath, pushing herself upright. Her lantern was gone. Her coat clung to her shoulders, soaked through. The storm had passed, leaving behind a pale fog that swallowed everything beyond a few feet. The forest was silent too silent. No wind. No birds. Only her heartbeat, loud and unsteady in her ears.
She brushed her hand across the gravestone. The stone was slick, but the ground beneath it was warm unnaturally so, as if a fire smoldered deep below the soil. The warmth pulsed once, faint but rhythmic, and she snatched her hand back.
Something moved in the fog behind her. A rustle. A footstep. She spun around.
"Who's there?"
No answer.
The forest stretched in every direction, the trees ancient and gnarled, their branches reaching like twisted hands. She thought she recognized a path a faint line where the grass broke but the fog shifted again, erasing it.
"Elara…"
The whisper was soft, almost gentle, and it came from nowhere and everywhere at once. Her name floated on the air like breath. She froze. It wasn't Agnes's voice, nor her mother's. It sounded… younger.
"Who's there?" she called again, louder this time.
The answer came as laughter. A child's. Brief, echoing. Then silence.
Elara's pulse quickened. She turned back toward the grave and stopped.
Small footprints marred the damp soil near the headstone. Bare feet. Leading away into the mist.
Her chest tightened. She knew she should go back to the manor, that nothing good waited down that path. But she also knew who those prints must belong to. The blood kin. The girl.
Elara tightened her grip on her coat and began to follow.
The forest deepened with each step. The air felt thicker, colder, as though she were walking through breath instead of fog. The prints continued ahead, weaving between the trees. Once, she thought she saw movement to her right a shadow flickering just beyond sight but when she turned, the trees were still.
After what felt like an hour, she reached a clearing. An old stone well stood at its center, choked with ivy and age. Ravens perched along its rim, silent and watchful. The prints ended there.
Elara approached slowly, her boots squelching in the mud. "Hello?"
A soft humming rose from inside the well. It was the same tune she'd heard as a child a lullaby her mother used to sing. The melody carried upward, thin and haunting.
She leaned closer. "Is someone there?"
The humming stopped. Then a voice, soft and young: "You came."
Elara staggered back. A girl was standing behind the well.
She couldn't have been more than ten or eleven. Her skin was pale, her dress tattered and old-fashioned, the color of ash. Her hair was long and black, her eyes wide and bright and wrong. Too dark, as if they swallowed the light around them.
Elara's throat closed. "Who are you?"
The girl tilted her head. "You know."
Elara hesitated. "You're Clara's daughter."
The girl nodded once. "You were supposed to stay away."
The words made Elara's skin crawl. "I came to help you. You're in danger."
The girl's lips curved into a faint, sad smile. "You can't help me. It's already here."
Something moved above them. The ravens on the well took flight all at once, a storm of wings and cries. The girl didn't flinch. Elara ducked instinctively, covering her head as feathers rained down.
When the sound faded, the girl was gone.
Panic rose sharp and fast. Elara turned in circles, searching the clearing. "Where are you?!"
The forest answered with silence. Then footsteps. Slow, deliberate, behind her.
She turned.
The man stood at the edge of the clearing, half-shrouded in fog. His coat dripped with rain; his face was still hidden beneath the shadow of his hat.
"You found her," he said softly.
Elara's pulse spiked. "Where is she?"
He stepped closer, his boots sinking into the mud. "You shouldn't have followed the footprints."
"I'm not leaving her here."
"She doesn't belong to you anymore."
Elara's breath quickened. "What are you?"
He smiled faintly. "A reminder."
Before she could move, the ground trembled. A deep, resonant sound rolled through the clearing like a heartbeat beneath the earth. The well began to shake. Stones shifted, crumbling inward. A rush of wind burst upward, scattering dirt and leaves.
Elara stumbled back, covering her face as the fog thickened, swirling around her in a spiral. The sound grew louder, faster. It wasn't the earth's pulse it was hers. The same rhythm she'd felt beneath the grave.
When the fog cleared, the man was gone.
In his place, the girl stood again, only now her eyes glowed faintly, reflecting the lantern light that no longer existed.
"Elara," she whispered. "You can't break what you are."
The forest darkened. Every raven in the trees began to scream. The ground split, the well collapsing inward into a pit of blackness that breathed.
Elara ran.
Branches whipped against her face. She didn't know where she was going only away from that voice, that whisper, that truth. The forest seemed endless, each tree identical to the last. The fog thinned for a moment, revealing a faint glimmer ahead a clearing, light breaking through the canopy. She stumbled toward it, gasping.
And stopped.
The gravestone stood before her again.
C. Veyne.
Her knees gave out. The air around her pulsed once, deep and steady, like the slow beat of a buried heart.
She pressed her hands into the earth, whispering, "No. No, no, no."
A raven landed on the stone. It tilted its head, black eyes reflecting her face. When it spoke, its voice was soft and unmistakable.
Agnes's.
"You've woken the roots, Elara. And now it will find you both."
The bird spread its wings, and as it lifted into the air, the fog swallowed her again leaving only the sound of feathers and the echo of a child's laugh fading into the trees.