Run: 2026-02-17-01KHMQGJFNMNTTY4DX95ZFTTSZ

The air inside the boundary tasted different, thick with the scent of loam and something sweetly rotting, like lilies left too long in a vase. Aurora Carter stepped over the threshold of the ancient oak standing stones and the noise of Richmond Park vanished. No distant hum of the A307, no rustle of late-night joggers. Just silence, heavy and pressing against her eardrums. She checked her watch. The second hand was frozen. Again. Rory tucked her chin into the collar of her jacket and moved deeper into the clearing. The Fae Grove was supposed to be a pocket, a breath held between Earth and somewhere else. Tonight, it felt like a lung filling with water. Wildflowers bloomed in the darkness, petals unfurled wide despite the lack of sun. They were too vibrant, their colors screaming in the monochrome night. Bluebells glowed with a bioluminescent hum, and patches of white clover seemed to shift when she wasn't looking directly at them. Her hand went to her chest, fingers closing around the Heartstone pendant beneath her shirt. The silver chain was cold, but the gemstone itself pulsed with a faint, rhythmic warmth. It was supposed to glow near a Hel portal. She hadn't found a portal. She had found this silence. You are being stupid, she told herself. It is just a park. Just a weird patch of London. But the hair on her arms stood up, prickling against the fabric of her sleeves. She rubbed her left wrist with her thumb, tracing the small crescent-shaped scar there. A childhood accident, her mother had said. Falling off a bike. Sometimes, in places like this, the scar throbbed in time with the pendant. Tonight, it itched. She stopped in the center of the clearing. The standing stones encircled her, their bark rough and dark, resembling twisted muscle more than wood. She had come here because the pendant had led her, pulling her compass off true north until she was walking blindly through the trees. Now that she was here, the warmth in the stone had spiked, then died to a dull heat. A twig snapped. Rory froze. She didn't turn immediately. She listened, cataloging the sound. It hadn't come from the brush. It had come from above. She tilted her head back. The canopy was dense, blocking out the moon, but the flowers below provided enough unnatural light to cast long, wavering shadows. Nothing moved in the branches. No birds. No squirrels. The ecosystem of the Grove was exclusive. Probably just the wood settling, she thought. Trees expand and contract with temperature. She took a step toward the northern stone. The grass beneath her boots felt spongy, wet despite the dry forecast. As she moved, the shadows lengthened. She stopped. The shadows snapped back to their original positions. Rory exhaled slowly, her breath pluming in the air though it wasn't cold enough for frost. Her mind raced, cool-headed analysis kicking in to suppress the primal spike of adrenaline. Time moves differently here. An hour inside can be minutes outside. Or days. If she stayed too long, she might walk out into a London that had moved on without her. She needed to leave. The data was insufficient. The risk outweighed the reward. She turned to go back the way she came. The path between the flowers seemed narrower than before. The gaps between the blooms had closed, the stems weaving together like fingers locking. She stepped forward, pushing a cluster of crimson poppies aside. They felt warm to the touch, like skin. Behind her, something whispered. It wasn't a voice. It was the sound of air rushing through a hollow tube, dry and rasping. Rory spun around, her hand dropping to the pocket where she kept her keys, fingers wrapping around the jagged edge of her house key. The clearing was empty. The stones stood silent sentinel. The flowers swayed, though there was no wind. Show yourself, she said. Her voice sounded flat, absorbed instantly by the mossy ground. No answer. But the feeling of being watched intensified. It was a physical weight between her shoulder blades. She knew that feeling. She had felt it in the hallway of her old flat in Cardiff. She had felt it through the door when Evan was on the other side, breathing too hard, too fast. That certainty that someone knew exactly where you were and exactly how to hurt you. She forced her feet to move. Walk, don't run. Running triggers the chase instinct. She walked toward the gap in the stones that marked the exit. The distance seemed to stretch. She walked for thirty seconds, but the stones didn't get closer. The crimson glow of the pendant against her sternum grew hotter, burning now. It wasn't signaling a portal. It was signaling danger. She looked down at the stone. The deep crimson gem was pulsing faster, erratic like a heart in fibrillation. The whisper came again, closer this time. Right by her ear. Rory swung her hand out, key ready, but she hit nothing. The air rippled where her hand passed, like water disturbed by a stone. She broke into a run. The ground seemed to grab at her boots. The wildflowers tangled around her ankles, stems strong as wire. She stumbled, catching herself on a low-hanging branch. The bark was soft, yielding under her palm. She pulled her hand back and saw sap on her skin. It was dark red. Don't look at it. Don't acknowledge it. She scrambled up, sprinting toward the line of oaks. The exit was there. She could see the normal darkness of Richmond Park beyond the boundary. The streetlights of Richmond glowed faintly in the distance. Safety. Civilization. Something stepped out from behind the southern stone. It didn't have a shape. It was a collection of shadows that refused to align with the light source. It stood tall, taller than the stones, and it faced her. It had no face, but she felt its attention lock onto her throat. Rory didn't stop. She didn't scream. Screaming wasted oxygen. She drove her shoulder forward and crashed through the line of oak trees. The transition was violent. The air pressure dropped instantly, popping her ears. The scent of rotting lilies vanished, replaced by the smell of exhaust and damp pavement. She stumbled onto the grass of the normal park, her knees hitting the earth hard. She lay there for a moment, gasping, waiting for the cold bite of London night to settle into her lungs. She pushed herself up on trembling arms. Her hands were clean. No red sap. No wire-thin stems. She looked back at the Grove. The standing stones were just trees now. Old oaks, gnarled and silent. The wildflowers were gone, replaced by dead winter grass. The boundary was closed. Rory stood up, brushing dirt from her jeans. Her heart hammered against her ribs, a frantic bird in a cage. She reached for the pendant, needing to confirm it was dormant. The Heartstone was cold. Dead stone on a silver chain. But as she turned to walk toward the main path, toward the safety of the bus stop and the ride back to Silas' bar, she heard it. A sound that didn't belong in the open park. A dry, rasping whisper, carried on the wind from behind her. It sounded like her name. She didn't turn around. She walked faster, her hand gripping the pendant tight, keeping it warm with her own heat, pretending she couldn't feel the eyes still fixed on her back, watching from the space between the trees.