Run: 2026-02-17-01KHMMC98EJJP4VRCATR8ZWXSZ

The autumn wind whispered through Richmond Park, rustling dead leaves across the path as Rory made her way deeper into the darkness. Her phone's flashlight beam caught fragments of the ancient oak standing stones, their weathered surfaces gleaming like wet bone. The Heartstone pendant beneath her jacket pulsed with unnatural warmth against her chest, matching the quickening of her heart. She hadn't wanted to come here after sunset, but the message had been clear — meet at the Grove at midnight, alone, if she wanted answers about the pendant's origin. The rational part of her mind screamed that this was exactly the sort of situation her father had warned her about during his countless safety lectures. But after three weeks of increasingly strange events, she needed to know. The standing stones loomed closer, marking the boundary where the ordinary world began to blur. Rory's flashlight beam seemed to bend oddly here, the light fracturing and refracting as though passing through crystal. The wildflowers that perpetually bloomed in the Grove caught the distorted light, their petals taking on an otherworldly iridescence. Something rustled in the undergrowth behind her. Rory spun, the beam of light slicing through darkness, but revealed nothing but swaying branches. The wind, she told herself. Just the wind. But the air felt thick and still now, like the moments before a storm. She checked her phone — 11:57 PM. The screen flickered, numbers distorting briefly before settling. As she watched, the battery percentage dropped from 82% to 47% in seconds. Rory swallowed hard, her throat suddenly dry. The pendant's warmth had intensified to an almost uncomfortable level. The Grove itself lay just ahead, a perfect circle of ancient trees with a small clearing at its heart. During the day, it was beautiful — ethereal even. But now, in the grip of night, the trees seemed to lean inward like hungry spectators at a gladiatorial arena. Their branches reached for each other across the gap above, weaving a canopy that blocked out what little moonlight managed to pierce the clouds. As she stepped into the clearing, her flashlight beam caught something that made her freeze. The wildflowers, which should have been swaying in the nonexistent wind, were perfectly still. Not just still — they appeared to be moving in slow motion, as though underwater. She watched, transfixed, as a single petal drifted downward, taking several seconds to fall what should have been a quick descent. The crack of a twig snapping jerked her attention away from the flowers. Rory whirled, light darting from shadow to shadow. Nothing. But when she turned back, the clearing had changed. The flowers that had been moving in slow motion now seemed to be growing before her eyes, stems elongating like time-lapse photography, blooms opening and closing in rhythmic pulses. "Hello?" Her voice sounded wrong — muffled and distant, as though she were speaking through cotton wool. "I got your message. I'm here." Something shifted at the edge of her vision. When she turned to look directly at it, there was nothing there. But in her peripheral vision, she could see movement. Shapes that might have been human, might have been something else entirely, circling the clearing just beyond the reach of her light. The pendant burned against her skin now. Rory wrapped her fingers around it through her jacket, feeling it throb like a second heartbeat. Her own pulse hammered in her ears, too fast, too loud in the unnatural silence that had descended. She glanced at her phone again. 11:57 PM. The same time as before. She blinked hard, checked again. Still 11:57 PM. The battery was at 12% now. A whisper carried on air that wasn't moving. Her name, maybe, or something that sounded like it. The sound seemed to come from everywhere and nowhere at once. The shadows between the trees deepened, became almost liquid in their darkness. Something brushed against her hand — soft, like silk or hair. Rory jerked away, stumbling backward. Her flashlight beam caught nothing but empty air, but she could still feel the phantom touch against her skin. The crescent scar on her left wrist tingled, a sensation she hadn't felt since the day she'd received it. The shapes in her peripheral vision were closer now, more distinct. Still maddeningly just out of sight, but she could make out suggestions of form — too tall, too fluid to be human. They moved with a grace that made her stomach turn, like watching insects skitter across a floor. Her phone died with a sudden finality, plunging her into darkness broken only by the faint glow of the Heartstone pendant. In that dim crimson light, she saw the wildflowers had changed. Their petals were black now, edges sharp as razor wire. They swayed toward her like hungry things, despite the continued absence of wind. Rory backed away, her heel catching on an exposed root. She stumbled, caught herself against one of the standing stones. The stone was warm to the touch and seemed to vibrate beneath her palm. When she pulled her hand away, it came back sticky with something dark that glistened in the pendant's light. The whispers grew louder, became almost words. Almost her name. Almost answers to questions she was no longer sure she wanted to ask. The shadows between the trees had become doorways into deeper darkness, and something was emerging from them, something that made the pendant pulse like a frightened heart against her chest. She ran. Behind her, time resumed its normal flow in the Grove. The wildflowers returned to their natural colors, though anyone looking closely might notice their petals were now edged with teeth. The standing stones continued their ancient vigil, wet with something that wasn't dew, wasn't blood, wasn't anything that had a name in any human tongue. And in the shadows, things that had almost been seen slipped back into spaces that had never known light, patient in their hunger. They could wait. After all, she would return. They had seen it in her eyes, in the way the pendant had chosen her. She would return, and next time, she wouldn't leave so easily.