The train lurched once, then hissed as it came to a halt, exhaling a cloud of steam that thickened the already icy January air. When the doors slid open, Sophia stepped down onto the platform and felt the cold strike her like a sharpened blade. It cut straight through her coat, through the several layers beneath, and down to bone. For a moment, she stood completely still, breath fogging in front of her, wondering—not for the first time—why she had ever agreed to come here.
The station in Muntenia looked like something left behind while the rest of the world rushed ahead. Its walls had once been painted white, but time and weather had turned them into a patchy, weary grey. Cracks ran like veins along the plaster. A single overhead lamp flickered with an electrical buzz, throwing weak halos of light onto the frozen ground. The old station clock, perched above the entrance like a watchful, tired guardian, ticked in a rhythm that didn't quite match reality—slower, almost reluctant, as if the mechanism inside it also wished to hibernate through winter.
Sophia read the time with a frown. She wasn't sure if the clock was five minutes slow or if she simply felt out of sync with the world around her. Everything here seemed slightly off.
She adjusted her grip on the worn leather suitcase she carried. It had belonged to her father—one of the few objects of his she had kept after everything changed. In her other arm, a folder stuffed with sketches and loose papers pressed against her ribs. A bit of charcoal dust smudged the sleeve of her coat. These were the last remnants of who she had been before this trip: a life that felt like it belonged to someone else now.
The wind picked up, dragging her hair across her face. She tucked it behind her ear and drew in a slow, bracing breath. "Well," she whispered to herself, "too late to turn back."
With that, she stepped forward.
The Quiet Town
The station opened into a small square paved with stones that glistened with frost. A few houses sat clustered around it, their red roofs coated with a thin layer of snow like powdered sugar. The streets were empty, eerily so. Even in winter, even in small towns, she had expected… someone. A passerby. A barking dog. A curtain twitching.
But Muntenia lay still, like it was sleeping with one eye open.
Sophia tightened her scarf and made her way down the narrow street. Her boots slipped slightly on the icy patches, and each breath she took felt sharp. But beneath the cold, beneath the quiet, she sensed something else—something strange she could not name. It wasn't exactly danger, nor was it fear. It was more like the atmosphere held its breath around her.
The town was picturesque in a worn-down, neglected sort of way. Old lamp posts bent at odd angles, some flickering, some dead. Wooden fences surrounded little yards, some with dried vines clinging stubbornly to them. Chimneys released thin trails of smoke into the early evening sky.
A place frozen in time, yet somehow restless.
She pulled out the piece of paper with the address of the house she had rented—handwritten in careful, looping calligraphy by the owner who had responded to her ad with surprising enthusiasm. A quiet place, perfect for an artist, he had promised. Close to nature. Peaceful.
Peaceful wasn't the first word she would've used.
But she kept walking, and eventually the houses thinned out until the road curved toward the outskirts of town. There, near a stand of towering, dark pine trees, she found it: a small, quaint cottage with a slanted roof and pale yellow walls. Its shutters were painted green, the colour peeling in places, and the porch creaked under her weight as she stepped up to the door.
When she unlocked it and pushed it open, warm air greeted her, along with the faint smell of old books and dried lavender. The place was exactly as the owner had described—small but charming, with tall windows that let in soft, fading light. The wallpaper, though old, had a floral pattern that made the room feel lived-in rather than abandoned. A small fireplace crackled in the corner, already lit for her.
Someone had prepared the house before her arrival. That should have made her feel welcome. Instead, it left her wondering how long ago they'd been here, and why she felt like the house had been waiting.
She set her suitcase down and walked slowly through the space. The bedroom was simple: a wooden bed frame, a thick wool blanket, a dresser that looked like it had survived several generations. The kitchen held mismatched dishes stacked neatly in open shelves, a kettle resting beside a gas stove. Everything was functional, but nothing felt personal.
No photographs. No decorations. No hints.
Just a blank space waiting to be filled.
She sat on the edge of the bed, running her fingers along the rough wood. The silence pressed in around her, thick and full. In the city, silence was never truly silent—there were always people, cars, voices drifting through walls. But here, the quiet felt absolute, as though the world outside the cottage dissolved into nothing the moment she closed the door.
It wasn't entirely unpleasant. Just unsettling.
A Long Night
Sophia tried to settle in. She hung her coat, unpacked her sketchbook, and warmed her hands by the fire. She made tea, though the water tasted slightly metallic no matter how long she let it boil. She paced from room to room, trying to familiarize herself with the space, but the more she walked, the more she felt an inexplicable sense of being observed—not by a person, but by the house itself.
By the time she climbed into bed, exhaustion should have taken over. She had spent hours on the train, jostled between strangers, then walked through freezing air to reach a place she knew nothing about. But sleep refused to come.
She lay on her back, staring at the ceiling. The faint crackle of the dying fire was the only sound in the cottage. Shadows crawled across the walls as the flames dimmed. She wasn't scared, exactly, but she felt… alert. Her mind raced with questions, half-formed sketches of ideas, flickers of memories she had hoped this trip would quiet.
She rolled onto her side and stared out the window. The glass had frosted over earlier, leaving the outside world blurred and ghostly. She could make out faint shapes of the pine trees towering in the distance. Their branches shifted slightly when wind swept through them.
Then, just as she began to drift toward something resembling rest, a sound cut through the night.
A sharp, distant cry.
Sophia sat bolt upright.
It came from the direction of the forest—far enough away to be ambiguous, but close enough to make her skin prickle. She listened, breath caught in her throat, waiting for it to come again.
At first, there was only silence.
Then another cry, this one longer, strange, almost metallic in its intensity. It wasn't an animal sound she recognized, not wolf, not owl, not fox. There was something human in it. Or something trying to sound human.
A chill crawled slowly up her spine.
"What on earth…?"
She slipped out of bed and wrapped the blanket around herself, moving toward the window in small, cautious steps. Her fingers brushed the cold glass as she peered out, searching the tree line for any sign of movement.
Nothing.
But the feeling—the tension, the instinctive tightening in her chest—lingered.
Something was out there. Something that did not belong in a peaceful, quiet town buried in winter.
She stayed by the window far longer than she meant to. Eventually, the sound did not return, and she began to doubt herself. Maybe she was overtired. Maybe the wind had twisted its way through the trees just right to create a phantom noise. Towns like this had all sorts of unsettling night sounds, especially near forests.
Yes. That was probably it.
Probably.
But when she finally forced herself to lie back down, she did so without taking her eyes off the window. She kept the blanket pulled tightly around her, fingers gripping its edges. Sleep, when it finally came, was thin and uneasy.
And far in the woods, where the pines swallowed the moonlight and the snow lay undisturbed, something moved.
Something that had watched her arrive.
Something that was waiting.